Fawnleap's Heart [Warrior Cats]

Chapter 7

Fawnpaw slept restlessly throughout the whole night. Her thoughts consumed by Rainpelt's little grey kit. The sun was beginning to rise, and Fawnpaw knew that there was no point in pursuing sleep, as it wouldn't come to her.

She rose and stretched her legs, and shook out her pelt. The mornings had been getting a lot warmer lately, and she knew that it would soon be officially green-leaf, just as Foxnose told her about. She was excited for the warmer weather and the plentiful prey.

She cast a glance over her shoulder, and saw Fogpaw laying on his back, a look of contentment across his light grey face, a few spaces away was Mousepaw, curled neatly into her nest as usual. But Lionpaw's nest was empty, and she didn't remember him getting up earlier, unless she had actually slept through that. Did Lionpaw have a restless night too?

She shook Lionpaw from her head, which she found herself doing more often than not. It bothered her that the annoying orange scrap of fur was always on her mind, no matter how hard she tried to distract herself from him. He was just always there, even when he wasn't around to annoy her, he still annoyed her.

Fawnpaw padded into the clearing now, wanting to start off the day early, in hopes of being so tired that sleep would just grab her and take her away as soon as her paws hit her nest later that night. Lionpaw was in the clearing too, with Stoneleap, Breezeclaw, and Foxnose. Lionpaw must have sensed her gaze on them, because he turned and looked at her, his deep ivy green eyes seemed to stare right through her, although his expression was unreadable.

Foxnose looked to her and beckoned her over with his tail. Her gaze had thankfully switched from Lionpaw to Foxnose, but she could still feel his eyes burning through her pelt.

"We're going to go on patrol this morning, and then Breezeclaw wants us to do some hunting later, once we're back." Foxnose smiled, seemingly unaware of Lionpaw staring at Fawnpaw intently. Fawnpaw nodded in response and then whirled to face Lionpaw.

"Do you want something?" She asked irritably, she was sick of having to see him, it was bad enough that he rarely left her mind. But to see him everyday was much worse.

"From you? No." Lionpaw snorted as if the thought of him wanting something from Fawnpaw was hilarious.

"Then stop looking at me. I can feel your eyes burning holes in my pelt." She spat back, and then turned to leave the camp with the others. Ugh, he is the worst.

"Wait." Lionpaw said as he bounded to her side. "I'm sorry for yesterday, about what I said... I just meant that since I'm older that I would be the obvious choice."

"Mousepaw is the same age as you. Me and Fogpaw are only two moons younger than you. Not even a full two moons." Fawnpaw wasn't having it today.

"Okay okay I know. I'm sorry anyways. Soon there will be more kits for all of us to train anyways." Lionpaw stated.

"What? New kits?" Fawnpaw looked up at him in confusion, she had no idea where new kits would come from, since nobody in the clan was expecting.

Lionpaw shot her a look that said duh as if she was stupid for not realizing who the mystery queen was, he looked at her with his head tipped, as if asking her to guess.

"Who?" She asked louder, not wanting to play any guessing games.

"Really? Foxnose and Doveglade! I can't believe you hadn't noticed." Lionpaw looked amused.

"Uh..." Fawnpaw didn't know what to say, she really hadn't noticed any of it before, maybe she had been too busy training. Or maybe it wasn't as obvious as Lionpaw played it off to be.

"Why do you think I assumed I'd be getting one of Rainpelt's kits over Doveglade? Because she's clearly expecting. I figured you she-cats were always able to tell when another clan-mate was-"

Fawnpaw abruptly interrupted him. "Can we just get on with the patrol? I don't want to spend any more time talking to you than I have to." She turned and began to stalk away, but could hear his pawsteps close behind her.

A small sigh escaped Lionpaw's mouth, but he didn't try to talk to the tortoiseshell she-cat anymore.

Stoneleap and Foxnose were waiting by the border up ahead, a shallow nearly dry river flowed through their territory, and signified the start of the unclaimed land. Although it was uncommon, it wasn't exactly against the rules to converse with cats of other clans here.

"Did you tear another claw, Lionpaw? What took you two so long?" Stoneleap asked, flicking his ear.

"Well I-"

"It was nothing." Fawnpaw didn't want to reveal that they had been somewhat gossiping about Foxnose; her mentor. But she wondered if what Lionpaw said was really true. Would she mentor one of Foxnose's kits?

"Hello, MapleClan."

Fawnpaw's eyes darted to the edge of the territory, only to see three AshClan cats.

One was a dark brown tabby, the other was black with white toes, and the other was...

Rockpaw?

Fawnpaw let out a small surprised gasp upon seeing him. He met her gaze and a small smile crossed his face. He flicked his tail in greeting towards her, and she did the same.

"Hello Coalclaw, Brownnose." Stoneleap replied cooly. "Anything exciting happen so far on patrol?"

"No not much, anything with you?" Replied the black tom.

"Actually yes." Foxnose padded through the weak stream to join the AshClan patrol on the unclaimed territory. "We encountered a rogue recently on our territory, just to give you a heads up."

Fawnpaw flicked her ears at Foxnose's response. He didn't seem very aggressive. So why warn them? Up until this point Fawnpaw had been ignoring Lionpaw, and hadn't caught the confused glances he shot between Rockpaw and her.

The senior warriors exchanged light news and then said farewell to eachother before parting ways. Fawnpaw felt a burst of courage flow through her, as she tried to catch Rockpaw's gaze.

"Make up an excuse to stay back."

"What?"

"Just do it!"

Fawnpaw turned to follow her three clan members, and then let out a small meow of pain. She quickly lifted her paw and began to limp.

"Fawnpaw? What's wrong?" Foxnose had turned to see what was holding her up. She caught a strange look in Lionpaw's eye as he continued after Stoneleap. Weird.

"Oh nothing too big, I think I stepped on a thorn."

"Oh well let me-"

"It's okay!" She quickly replied. "I can take care of it."

"Well, okay. Check in with me when you get back." Foxnose smiled and turned to continue after the other two cats.

Fawnpaw waited until she could no longer hear him, and then retraced her steps back to where they'd encountered AshClan.

Rockpaw was nowhere to be found.

Fawnpaw couldn't help but slump her shoulders down, just as she was about to turn back, she heard a crack of a twig.

Rockpaw?

•••

Hiya! So this is my first authors note, I didn't really have much to comment on or ask up until now so, here are my questions.

-What do you think of Fawnpaw's and Lionpaw's weird relationship?
-What do you think Rainpelt's only kit will be named?
-How are you liking the story so far?

Thanks for reading! ❤️