Warrior Eevees #1: The Storm of Fire

4- The Lake Tribe

Emmy's paws were beginning to ache, but she was determined not to show it. This was the furthest she had been away from the Great Oak in the Forest Tribe's territory before, and she wanted to do a good job on her first border patrol. Dogwood, a Leafeon with odd, bite-like notches in his leaves, led the way, followed closely by Frond, with Sycamore keeping up with Emmy at the rear.

He waited for her perched on the end of a fallen log while she scrambled up to cross a clear, fast-flowing stream. The ground was growing wetter and softer under paw, the undergrowth falling away in favor of long grasses and sleek moss. This moss grew thick on the fallen tree trunk, and Emmy felt her paws skid uncertainly beneath her when she hauled herself up beside Sycamore.

"Take your time," Sycamore whispered to her while she picked her way cautiously across the log.

Dogwood and Frond were waiting with twitching tails at the other side of the stream when Emmy sprang down. Neither of them looked happy, exactly, to be saddled with her, but neither of them seemed to resent her for it, either.

"What's the Lake Tribe like?" Emmy huffed to Sycamore as they fell in step behind Frond and Dogwood again.

It was the border with the Lake Tribe they had been sent to patrol, north of the Forest Tribe. Emmy had heard it mentioned before, but never with the same sense of nervousness that the Leafeon spoke with of the Plains or Sand Tribes.

"They're mostly Vaporeon, as you might expect," Sycamore said. "They never give us any trouble."

"That doesn't mean we should underestimate them," Dogwood broke in from the head of the patrol. "They occasionally can learn Ice-Type moves, and they'll fight to defend their territory, even against us."

"Plus, it's a big Tribe," Frond added.

Sycamore snored disbelievingly through his nose, his whiskers twitching.

"Well, anyway- You can smell them now, we're getting close to the border," he said to Emmy.

She lifted her nose to the wind and inhaled cautiously. The now-familiar leafy, mossy scent of the Forest Tribe was mingled with a strong smell of mud and lake water in the near distance, shot through with a strong tang of fish. It would be an easy scent to remember, she decided. Sycamore had joined her in scenting the air, and now his ears pricked forward excitedly.

"Pidove!" he exclaimed in a whisper. "They rarely come down this far from the mountains."

Emmy followed the angle of his ears toward the little grey bird, pecking its way among a clump of lush marsh grass. Sycamore flattened his body against the ground. Dogwood and Frond had walked on ahead, paying no attention to the younger Pokémon falling behind. Sycamore was as good at stalking as Emmy was poor at it, and she crouched in the grass, hoping to pick up tips. His shoulders stayed low to the ground, his leaves fanned out to blend in with the mossy ground, his claws carefully sheathed in his brown paws. The Pidove hopped forward twice, pecking at something on the ground, unaware of the hunter sliding ever closer to it on soft paws, until, suddenly...

An explosion of movement! The muscles in Sycamore's hind legs fired, throwing him forward and up, his hooked claws flashing in the sun, catching one black-and-white wing, the scent of blood thickening the air, and he landed triumphantly with his catch in his jaws.

"Sycamore, get back over the border!" Dogwood screeched.

Sycamore's triumph turned to nervousness that flickered in his odd eyes, and his ears flattened as Emmy saw his nose flare. Now that Dogwood had mentioned it, she could smell the border, thick and strong, across the last line of shrubs where the dry land fell away into mud and reeds that bordered a glimmering river, a river from which a blue face had appeared.