Ravenblaze's Determination [Warrior Cats Fanfiction]

Chapter 8

Ravenblaze awoke softly due to the shuffle of paws throughout the den. Blinking one eye open, the raven-pelted she-cat saw Poppytail stretch her forepaws out of her moss nest, her jaws wide open in a yawn as she tried to say, "Good morning, Ravenblaze," but it was muffled by her gaping yawn.

Ravenblaze rose to her white paws and stretched the same way Poppytail did, and padded out of the den beside her. Sunhigh had come and left the sky, and now the sun was on the way to setting.

In the middle of the camp clearing, a red-and-black apprentice was bouncing around eagerly in the clearing. It was Maplepaw, the medicine cat apprentice. His amber eyes surrounded by black fur were wide with wonder and excitement. As cats walked by him, he tried to grab the attention of every one of them. Only Clouddapple stopped to hear what he had to say, so Ravenblaze decided to check it out as well.

As she walked over, Dawnripple exited the medicine den tiredly, and went over to her apprentice. "Stop your yapping, Maplepaw. You'd already woken me up, so why don't you let our other medicine cat get a bit more rest?"

Maplepaw turned to his mentor excitedly, not a bit of guilt in his expression, as he told her, "I had a dream last night, Dawnripple! The Clan needs to know!"

"What was it, first, Maplepaw?" Dawnripple inquired, suddenly seeming slightly interested. Her blue eyes stared at him intensely.

"I saw a StarClan cat," Maplepaw began to his mentor, Ravenblaze, and Ravenblaze's mother, "He had SnowClan scent!"

"A former SnowClan cat... what color was his pelt?" Clouddapple asked quickly.

"He was completely gray, just like smoke! A-and he had brilliant green eyes! I can't describe them!" Maplepaw exclaimed.

Suddenly, Clouddapple's eyes widened worriedly and she murmured, "Smokewater... he's in StarClan?"

Maplepaw must've heard, because he asked the white she-cat, "Yeah, that's him! He told me that. Why wouldn't he be in StarClan?"

Clouddapple snapped her head over to glare at the medicine cat apprentice. "We do not speak of Smokewater. Your dream was foolish. It wasn't Smokewater, it couldn't have been! Not after how he almost got all of us killed..."

Maplepaw flinched and slowly nodded. "Sorry," he whispered.

Dawnripple stepped forward to confront Clouddapple. "Don't speak to my apprentice like that. He doesn't appreciate that, and besides, his dream might be important.

"And Smokewater is indeed in StarClan, Clouddapple. Maybe if you hadn't always been so rude to him when he was alive, he wouldn't have done what he had. I remember how much you hurt your own brother," Dawnripple scolded Clouddapple.

Ravenblaze caught a sorry look on her mother's face, and she backed away suddenly knowing she didn't want to be involved in this conflict. Ravenblaze went over near the Frostledge, and soon saw Clouddapple coming over to join her daughter.

"I should've told you about him a while ago," Clouddapple silently began, grief on both her face and in her voice, and Ravenblaze knew she meant Smokewater. "He was mine and Eelface's brother.

"Our mother—your grandmother—she wasn't a good mother. She gave us milk, of course, but no additional comfort or love. Once we were old enough to get by with fresh-kill, she left the nursery. We never even had a father figure to look up to, Muddypatch never told us who the father of her kits was.

"Smokewater—Smokekit back then—he tried to love us. But he was small and weak. Eelkit and I pushed him away and hurt him just as much as Muddypatch did. His only friend in SnowClan was Brokenflower, who was Briarkit in the nursery at the time.

"The only option for our brother seemed to be the life of a medicine cat. And he liked the idea. But then Briarkit's injury happened while playing by the Frostledge. That's why she could never become a warrior and instead had to be the medicine cat.

"So Smokekit—Smokepaw—trained hard to be the best warrior he could be. And he wasn't that bad. But StarClan visited his dreams as though he were the medicine cat. When he came to us blabbing about a prophecy, we all ignored him.

"It pushed him over the edge—literally—when we had to evacuate camp and blamed Smokewater for it. He was a young warrior then, but he still couldn't get over his beliefs that he wasn't good enough for the Clan. That and the fact that we all hated him after he led us to the cave where we'd be safe is what made him jump," Clouddapple finished with a heavy shudder.

Ravenblaze opened her jaws to speak once more, but her speech was interrupted by a loud yowl.

"Streamwater's kits! They're coming! Now!"