Scourge's Second Chance

Chapter 9 - Shattering Ice

Icepaw shifted in his nest, restless. He hadn't gotten a good night of sleep since joining ThunderClan. Perhaps it had something to do with how... at odds he was with this environment. He certainly was new to living with so many cats, and he was still fumbling with threads of their culture. 

Icepaw stretched, nudging Dustpaw.

"Ouch," the irate tom growled. "Why do you sleep with your claws unsheathed, you goon?"

I wasn't aware I did, Icepaw responded mentally. He looked down at his paws. True to Dustpaw's word, they were unsheathed, their pointy tips glinting the sunlight that poked through the brambles.

"He's a kittypet," Sandpaw prodded. "He doesn't know how to sleep like a civilized warrior."

"Warriors are the uncivilized ones!" Icepaw growled. Then he realized what he had said. "Oh- I didn't mean it like that, I-"

"Wait until Bluestar hears about this!" Sandpaw crowed. "I told her we shouldn't have let a pair of kittypets into the Clan. Firepaw is soft and daft and you're uncivilized and rude."

Icepaw waited anxiously as Bluestar stepped out of her den. "Icepaw and Firepaw have shown disrespect for the ways of the Clan cats. Perhaps I was not so wise to invite kittypets into the Clan. I was too eager to help ThunderClan that I failed to see that the solution could not come forced. ThunderClan will preserve on its own. I will have Lionheart bring Rusty and Tiny to the Clan border."

Stripped of his name and his chance to become a warrior, Tiny felt enraged. His unsheathed claws scraped against stone as he growled. Tiny leaped at Bluestar. His claws slashed her flank in one piercing blow as her blood tinted his claws light red. Spottedleaf rushed out of the medicine den. "What's happened to Bluestar?"

"Tiny attacked her!" Ravenpaw mewled, shaking fearfully.

"I'm not Tiny," Tiny growled. "I am Scourge, and one day it will be I who rules the forest!" Then he raced out of camp.