What happens when a Starclan prophecy turns out wrong?
The five Warrior Clans are going extinct. Gatherings and Moonpool visits are inacessable, with leaders falling left and right. The lake territories are being wiped out to the brink of extinctio...
Tinypaw was crouched on the ground behind them. She despairingly muttered "what's a pain relief?"
Surprisingly Caracal didn't sound impatient or bothered as she evenly answered, "what it sounds like. It's a relief to the pain, but it's in the form of the neck-jabs or these white pellets they make you swallow."
Crescentpaw could hazily remember having a twoleg forcing her to swallow two white tablets, but it had been in her period of extreme tiredness. She also recalled eating some rock-hard meaty pellets that split between her teeth when she bit down hard. The apprentices had eaten the dried food only when they'd felt their stomachs cramp with starvation.
So that's why they had the soft white leaf wrapped around our paws. Despite the claws being bloody and torn out, we couldn't feel it because of the Twoleg 'pain relief.'
She tried licking her paws to soothe them, but immediately yowled and bit her tongue in failure.
"How long is this going to last?" Crescentpaw felt her heart throbbing at the fear of this pain becoming long-lasting. She had never felt a blistering torment like this before. It reached all the way into her paw-bones, straining and yanking at them with horrifying energy. Her body began shaking and emitting fear-scent.
"I'm not sure, dears." Caracal once again surprised them by laying down next to Crescentpaw, pressing her flank against the apprentice's tabby haunch.
"But me and Cheetah will be right here with you. If you need anything, tell us. In a moment I'm going to see if I can get the twoleg to help you. She should have some more of those white pellets from the vet."
Comforted that someone knew what to do to help, the tabby-and-white she-cat lifted her head to look for her sister. Tinypaw was still just a few paces away, now settled next to Cheetah. Cheetah looked over with sympathy on her golden-spotted face.
"Don't worry, we will stay with you while you heal."
Crescentpaw frowned and looked down at her paws.
But I don't want to heal. I want to escape and get back to the clan. And... will Riverclan even want us if we don't have our claws anymore?
🐈⬛
It wasn't much longer than Crescentpaw and Tinypaw had to lie there in agony. Caracal eventually got the twoleg to come into the spare room, where she finally heard the meows of anguish and remembered the cat's pain medications.
It was a bit of trouble when the Riverclan cats wouldn't open their mouths to receive it. But the old woman found some slabs of deli meat in her fridge and ground them up to put with it. The apprentices begrudgingly accepted.
Crescentpaw only scarfed it down because Caracal and Cheetah encouraged her to, while Tinypaw seemed so pain-wrought that she ate it while choking. In Tinypaw's mind she would eat anything to stop the pain. Even revolting crow-food smelling rot like kittypet food.
After a fitful sleep through most of the remaining evening they woke early the next day. The woman had opened some dusty dark curtains hanging from the windows, finally revealing a shaft of natural light. Then she opened the front door and walked out, closing it shut with a creak behind her. Crescentpaw blinked blearily towards the window. She noticed Caracal sitting in a pool of sun beneath it.
The light cast on the floor illuminated her pelt to near-gold. Its bronze-and brown color was several shades darker than Cheetah's light-yellow sandy colored pelt. But it was still just as beautiful.
Crescentpaw watched as she felt the tingling in her paws, wanting so desperately to stand up and join the she-cat, but knowing it would just cause more pain.
"Could you try to remind the twoleg about the herbs when she gets back?" Crescentpaw croaked, her throat dry and parched. Caracal turned her head sharply as she heard her, bounding out of the sun she had been luxuriously soaking up.
"Yes dear. She should be back soon... But I hope you're feeling a little better?" The bronze-spotted she cat asked, leaning down to sniff the white fur patch on Crescentpaw's face.
"Not really. My paws are so sore I don't want to move them. I know they'll just hurt and throb," she admitted, letting herself be weak in front of the kittypets. "I'm sorry," she opened her jaws wretchedly to ask for water again. "Can I please have-"
Cheetah raced across the floor, her pawsteps pattering on the carpet with muffled slaps. "Yep! I'm getting it. I'll get the food, too!" She first sunk her teeth into the plastic water bowl, dragging it over to the apprentices with minimal spillage. Then Cheetah returned with the ceramic dried cat-food bowl.
"Thank you," Crescentpaw murmured after a few laps, but didn't feel hungry enough to eat the food. She winched as another wave of pain rolled over her injured paws, extending up into the forelegs and past her shoulders. The tabby-and-white apprentice had to clench her teeth to bite off a yowl.
Cheetah looked excited to have another conversation with them, but her back hunched with disappointment as she realized they were in too much pain to chat. Crescentpaw was now curled around herself. Her back seized against the agony. Tinypaw hissed with pain and thumped back against the soft ground behind her.
"It's alright, Cheetah. They'll be able to converse with us more after they're feeing better."
The younger spotted feline turned her fluffy head towards her grand-cat. "But they really, really want to get back to their River-clan grand-cat. I won't have long to talk to them." Her huge golden eyes shimmered with worry.
"I know. But why don't you tell me more about this Riverclan of theirs? You can talk to me for now. And let's go back to the sunlight patch. It won't be there for long," Caracal knew that the twoleg would probably close it off when she got back. And yet she felt it drawing her toward its piercing rays. There was an invisible chain between her and that ill-experienced sunlight.
How intriguing, this talk of an afterlife called Starclan... and living in the cattails and wild grasses beside a lake. So much different than the Colony cat's stories.
As the apprentices sipped water and nibbled at the food, and then fell into a painful silence, the grand cat listened to her daughter's daughter's wonders. Intruige and interest peaked in her voice. And as the old she-cat listened, she folded her paws in on themselves and sympathetically watched the suffering Clan cats.
I wonder if there's a way that we could help them get home.
________________________ Caracal
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
