Three moons later we were all called by Jaguar'star, "Let all cats old enough to catch prey gather beneath Tallrock for a Clan meeting."
All the cats, excluding those too old or too young, gathered around the rock.
"As you know," the clan leader mewed dramatically, flicking his tail towards the kit, "We have a kit ready to be an apprentice - Tornkit, from this day on Freckledwish will be your mentor and Tornpaw will be your name. May Freckledwish teach you diligently and may you learn all she teaches earnestly so all she knows will be passed onto you."
Freckledwish then moved forward and touched her nose to Tornpaws nose, their mentor apprentice bond sealed, proving my foreshadowing right.
It was harder to see Freckledwish now that TornPaw was her apprentice, but I still managed to with the excuse of bringing her herbs or injuries. If I was injured, Freckledwish attended to them mostly. It wasn’t until later she started using me as a guineapig to test out his skills, knowing that I knew some of the medical cat practices, she trusted me to speak up if he made an error.
Half a moon later Tornpaw, Freckledwish, headed to the mothermouth for the annual meeting of medicine cats. I followed only long enough to see them safely out of our clans land and then returned, somewhat disgruntled. I still had not got over my jealousy of the Paw. I could not understand myself.
Two moons later, I was out hunting and I was busy chasing a vole I had spotted. It was a tricky little begger and managed to out wit me by running into a thorn patch. As I was too focused on trying to catch and kill it, I missed the land marks which clearly indicated I was about to hit a thorn patch. So, this is how I ended up with a thorn in my paw. I did not pursue the vole, instead I headed home.
As I entered the medical den, I overheard part of Tornpaw’s lesson, "Because it's used to make people vomit because of the taste."
Upon seeing it was me, Frecklewish mewed,
"Okay, Tornpaw I'll let you deal with it."
I could not help the disappointment fill me as I was shuffled off to Tornpaws care once again. I sat down and Tornpaw came and mewed "lift your paw please."
I lifted my paw, as requested, and Tornpaw held my paw in place and carefully removed the thorn from my pad and grabbed some dock leaves and chewed it up and poured it in the thorn.
He then grabbed some cobwebs and placed it on my pad. "Make sure you keep off it for a while till it fully heals," Tornpaw mewed as I walked out, he had done a good job, and yet somehow, I could not be happy – I missed FreckledWish treating me. Her touch would seem to linger on unlike Tornpaws.
It was not long after this, however, that TornPaw was murdered by Cloudcream.
