Dawning Snow: Book 1 by _Cloversplash_

Chapter 15

I spent the rest of the day training with a sad and distracted Mossleap.

"What's this herb?" I asked, pawing at a pile of green stems with fuzzy burrs at the ends. Mossleap barely glanced at the herb as she sorted leaves.

"Oh, that's catchweed."

I stared at her expectantly, then rolled my eyes irritably and added, "Well, what's it used for?" Go easy on her, Cloverpaw. She just lost her friend, I reminded myself, a pang of guilt hitting me as I thought of Honeyblossom.

"The burrs are stuck onto poultices so they don't fall off," my mentor explained, then, at last, looked up at me and nodded towards the catchweed. "Don't get it confused with regular burrs," she said pointedly, "no cat will be happy if you stick those in their pelt."

I nodded and leaned forward in fascination to scent the herbs.

"Cloverpaw," Mossleap said suddenly. I looked up at her in surprise.

"Yes?" I asked.

"In a quarter moon it is the half moon meeting. You began your training shortly after the last half moon, so you were unable to go, but you will become a true medicine cat soon." Mossleap paused, looking me up and down, before adding, "Cloverpaw, are you sure you would like to be a medicine cat?" she asked.

I froze.

"This is your chance! Say no! Become a warrior again!" Whitecloud urged. For a moment, the possibility of me being a warrior again seemed tempting. But as I met Mossleap's gaze, I realized: she doesn't want me to.

She just lost Honeyblossom, her former mentor and good friend. Who am I to take her own apprentice away from her? I asked myself. But I knew that was just an excuse.

In the quarter moon I've spent as a medicine cat, I'd grown to enjoy it. And, let's face it, I'm much better at healing than I am at hunting.

"You fool! If you turn back now, no one will question you! Mapletail doesn't want you, so you'll probably just become a warrior right away!" Whitecloud snarled.

But I ignored her and meowed to Mossleap, "Yes, I'm sure. I want to be a medicine cat and heal my Clanmates." I watched tentatively as Mossleap's eyes lit up. Then the tortoiseshell she-cat cleared her throat.

"Well, that's good," she responded, flicking her tail as if it were nothing. But the smile curling at the edge of her muzzle proved that it wasn't. "You can go get some fresh-kill now, too. You've worked hard today," Mossleap praised.

My pelt warmed like it had so many times recently. I'm getting so many compliments now that I'm a medicine cat! I thought, whiskers twitching in delight. In my entire four moons of apprenticeship, Mapletail hasn't praised me as much as Mossleap has in the past quarter of a moon.

I bounded out of the den and plucked a skinny water vole from the fresh kill pile, then sat down on my haunches and took a bite.

I spotted Creekfall sitting near Streampaw and the other apprentices and as I met his gaze, he meowed a few quick words to his sister before rising to his paws and bounding towards me.

"Want to share?" I offered, nodding to my vole. Creekfall shook his head.

"No thanks, I just had a squirrel with Leopardpaw." Creekfall threw a quick glance at the fully stocked fresh-kill pile. "The prey may be skinny, but there's so much of it! This is a strange leaf-bare," he meowed, eyes narrowing.

I knew he wasn't just talking about the prey pile.

"Maybe because we don't hunt in the forest much, so the offspring didn't die off and were able to grow older and have their own kits," I suggested. Creekfall nodded, opening his jaws to reply, but suddenly a shadow loomed over us and I turned to see Lightstep and Mirewind standing behind me.

"Hi!" I purred. "Want to help me finish off this vole? I'm not very hungry," I laughed.

But neither of them looked amused. I exchanged a confused glance with Creekfall.

"We heard you two were accusing Flowerheart of....some things," Lightstep growled, and Mirewind nodded knowingly.

The gray and white she-cat took a threatening pace forward, her unsheathed claws glinting. "You two better stay out of this, or you could be next," she warned. Then the two of them spun around and stalked away, settling down to share tongues like nothing had happened.

I lashed my tail in bewilderment. "What?" I asked. "Why would they not want us to find out who killed our Clanmate?" I wondered aloud.

Creekfall met my gaze, the shock in his blue eyes fading away to be replaced by dawning excitement. "Only the killers wouldn't want someone to look into a murder."