A New Form || A Warrior Cat Fanfiction Series \\

|+|Chapter 28|+|

                       "Hey, if you're down, just remember I'll always be here!" Whistlepaw grinned, nudging the she-cat again playfully, their Clanmates were all up and ready for the day. "I'll get back to you, Whistlepaw, I should get some sleep. You still have training with Lynxberry, right?" Whistlepaw pouted but then nodded his head in acknowledgement. "Alright, whatever you say." He licked her ear goodbye, before treading away. The large bicolor warrior had not needed to say words but a simple blink to get Whistlepaw to follow him.

"Northpaw, I am quite surprised you have gotten your pile stacked in one night." The apprentice flinched, looking towards her mentor, Kestrelpelt, who inspected Northpaw's amount of prey caught in her pile. Cautiously, she peeked at his expressions, the light-mottled tom's eyes sparkled briefly, and she already saw it.

Northpaw relaxed, thanking StarClan for their spiritual help. Her muscles ached for rest by the time being. She asked, "Kestrelpelt, could I sleep for a moment?-" Her words ceased, Kestrelpelt sighed audibly, then he nodded, looking at her. "You have done great, but I do say I'm sorry for being a bit too harsh on you yesterday. I greatly respected Creek and Cerulean, and I was stressed and worried to hear the news of that." She straightened her posture at the mention of the two Loners.

"But I did not mean to do that..." She reasoned, down-turning her gaze. "Yeah right, it would have been better if you had some self-restraint." Kestrelpelt snapped back quickly, taking Northpaw aback by his sudden tone increase.

She shifted her paws, and her mind raced with thoughts, overthinking the memory and Kestrelpelt's remark. Kestrelpelt huffed, his eyes reflected sudden disinterest, which was unusual for him from his usual understanding and lively attitude since.
                                  "Right..." Northpaw could only mumble the word.

High above the sky, the sun shined at the camp. The two lone elders, Ashthistle and Fallowtree stretched their limbs, walking around camp for the day. Dovelake had gone somewhere, along with Northpaw, not that most had minded much. Except for two of the apprentice's siblings, Echopaw and Oddpaw had noticed their disappearance. Along with Lightwhisper, their mother, she had just come back from a border patrol a while ago.
                                   "Has anyone seen Northpaw? I didn't see her around much in camp today." Lightwhisper questioned Echopaw and Oddpaw as they sat down near a shaded spot at the edge of the camp. "No, not really mother, but I do sympathize her situation as of now," Echopaw said as Oddpaw's ear flicked. "Dovelake is also missing," She pointed out, making a thinking face. 

The light-red warrior sighed solemnly, "I'm worried about the weight of the duties Kestrelpelt had assigned to her." She turned her head to her two children, "Can't forget how she tends to isolate herself from us, I've tried to approach her one day about it, but Northpaw just excused herself away from me." Echopaw admitted. 

"Wait, but she's rather close with Whistlepaw though." Oddpaw meowed, "I've seen them sharing tongues earlier this morning, before they parted ways and before Kestrelpelt began to-" She got cut off by her brother's tail smothered on her snout. "I don't think it's appropriate to talk about that last one, you saw how uncomfortable and stressed she was in Kestrelpelt's scolding." 

Oddpaw nodded silently, crouching low into a loaf.