Heart Of A Fighter (Book 4): Magic In The Valley

Chapter 11: Sneaking Around

"As soon as you finish your prey, I want you to go to the riverbank and collect a bunch of Whitepine before sun-peak. Do you understand?" Lagoon Snarl asked, kindly eyes gazing down at her.

With a respectful dip of her head, the cream and brown apprentice replied, "Yes, Lagoon Snarl." "And don't stray off too far from the territory again. I won't be able to come to your rescue like last time, got it?"

"Yes Lagoon Snarl." With a nod, the snowy tom flicked his bushy tail and dismissed her from his den. This was her latest assessment; a test of her time management.

Wren took off from there, flying across the camp to the prey caches by the largest trees in the camp. When she caught sight of Thunder, she smiled and landed by his side, startling him slightly.

"Wren! Hello," Thunder chuckled as she picked out a plump frog for the pile. She smiled and replied with a muffled greeting back as he pulled out a thrush.

It had been a good few days after the gathering; life had been going on pretty well for the young heiress and her friends, and she couldn't imagine it any other way.

The BlazeClan cats seemed to have finally gotten the hang of flying after a while, which was enough to make the Queen send them out for regular tribe duties to make them pull their weight around.

Wren also realised that she hadn't really seen Dovetail recently, which was really refreshing to know considering she didn't want to see her mother around, coddling her sister to high heaven.

"How's training with Rime Scratch?" The she-cat asked as she took a bite of the frog. "Eh. She's strict but pushes me to the limit on training; I don't really mind because I think I'm getting much better at tracking."

He tilted his head with a smile after he took a mouthful of thrush meat. "How about you and Lagoon Snarl?" Wren grinned. "Well, he's a good mentor, and we've gone on quite some assessments already-"

"IDIOTS!" A furious voice suddenly roared. At that, Wren and Thunder snapped their heads towards the direction of the commotion to see a massive tribal she-cat towering over all the ex-Starpaws.

All of them were trembling, but none of them seemed more terrified than Swanpaw herself. She was literally shaking so much that it seemed as though there was an earthquake.

"I KNEW all of you were useless sacks of fur and bones from the start!" Screeched Sand Wrath, a large sandy gray classic caliby cat with light green eyes. "You all don't try your best in training and you still expect to eat?!"

Wren noted that none of their mentors seemed particularly interested in stepping forth to help their apprentices no matter how desperately they glanced at them for help.

The former Titanpaws were also standing a huge distance away, clearly beyond scared of Sand Wrath and her terrifyingly volatile and aggressive nature.

After all, Sand Wrath was the general leader of one of the tribe's most powerful war platoons. She was not to be messed with.

"YOU in particular!" Sand Wrath roared, and suddenly slashed her massive black claws down on Swanpaw's face, earning a howl of true pain.

"You are selfish, stupid, arrogant and pathetic! You think that you deserve every Wardens-damned thing in the world because you're 'oh-so pretty' and popular?!"

She laughed cruelly and spat straight on the ground, earning yelps from Cinderpaw and Hazelpaw. "Why, you all are so useless I should flay all of you alive; at least your skins can be used as nests as a purpose!"