eternal: anemone || warrior cats

chapter 1

mintberry

~~~

MINTBERRY'S DREAMS WERE haunted by Snakestar's furious face.

It was odd. She'd never cared for her brother's opinions of her before, and even in her dreams - the two were always arguing - she'd been fueled by anger. But despite whatever fury she'd felt during her slumbers, she always woke up with guilt bubbling low in her stomach.

It always took a few moments after she gained consciousness to adjust, but once she did, the same words always replayed in her mind. There's nothing you can do for them, she told herself. There's nothing you can do.

She was now awake, somewhere in the sleepy, comfortable feeling that wanted nothing more to sink deeper into the soft moss and pass out again. She could hear the river flowing near the den, and the sound of the water running over the pebbles was deeply soothing to her, and the cool breeze that fluttered in every now and then was about to lull her back to sleep.

However, the gray tabby fought it, deciding that it was probably time for her to get up and do something with the day. After all, everyone else in camp was awake and moving.

She yawned, and as her jaws parted wide, the scent of fish and reeds flooded her tongue. Seasons of life had prepared her for the smell of sharp pine needles, and so when her sleep-muddied brain was greeted with this instead, she always clamped her mouth closed in shock.

It wasn't that the RiverClan scent was unpleasant. Mintberry had long ago become fond of it through her relationship with Dapplestar.

Speaking of which, Dapplestar's scent was overtaking the gray tabby's senses right now. After all, it was her nest Mintberry was sleeping in.

ShadowClan's former medicine cat yawned again, stretched, then padded out of the leaders den into RiverClan's camp. She'd been living her for the past moon now, and was surprised at how easily she'd gotten used to a different territory. Fish didn't taste any more unpleasant than frog, and ShadowClan's territory had wet, marshland areas that mimicked RiverClan's land.

Suddenly, the entrance of RiverClan's camp rustled, catching Mintberry's attention. Dapplestar burst in, two water voles dangling from her jaws; the rest of the patrol filed through shortly after, all carrying prey. The hunting patrol seemed to be successful, and the cats who'd been in camp quickly got to their paws and padded over to greet their friends, tail-tip twitching happily.

Mintberry followed that group, stopping only when she was right in front of Dapplestar. "Hey."

"Hey." Dapplestar grinned at her, dropping one of the water voles at the gray tabby's paws. "You're awake. Sleep well?"

"Mhm," Mintbrery hummed in reply. "Better than I have in moons."

Sadly, that part was true. It should've been odd that she felt more at ease in an unfamiliar camp rather than the one she'd grown up in, but Mintberry had a strange sense of safety in a territory under Dapplestar's rule.

The prophecy had been haunting her for as long as she'd known about it. When Ivorystar was leadering, she'd been fretting about the fate of her and her brothers under the victor of the war. When Snakestar became leader, she still wasn't assured; it sounded awful, but she didn't trust her brother not to try and seize the power for himself.

After all, the prophecy only required the death of one. In his eyes, surely her or Viperfoot were easily replaceable; he could've killed one of them, then gave himself a tiny cut to fulfill the rest of the prophecy.

Thankfully, though, he made no such move, and focused his energy instead on winning the war.

Which ended up not working out in his favor, but Mintberry didn't like thinking about that.