Rising Wild

CHAPTER 5

LAKEPAW FOUND HERSELF in a forest. It wasn't leaf-fall anymore. The green leaves and flowers in the trees, the ferns, and the stream flowing next to her carried the scent of newleaf. She could hear the birds chirping, and mice and squirrels crawling under leaves. She fought the impulse to leap and catch one, which wasn't neither StreamClan-tish nor medicine-catish, and focused on the sound that puzzled her the most: mewling far away, behind a juniper bush. She stalked towards it and peered in its branches to watch, cautious to be downwind so that the cats didn't scent her.

"Greetings, Chestnutwhisker." A sleek black tom was padding towards a small and brown she-cat laying on the grassy floor, showing her belly.

"Greetings, Crowseed." Chestnutwhisker answered, flicking her tail.

So Crowseed! Lakepaw thought. Wasn't that Fernwish's mentor?

"Where is Gravelnose?" Crowseed asked, gazing around the clearing.

"I'm here!" A big broad-shouldered grey tom appeared from behind a bush, from where he had been eating berries.

"And Sage-eye?" the sleek black tom demanded.

"I don't know." Chestnutwhisker glanced around her. "He said he would come soon."

"He should." Gravelnose growled, accommodating himself beside the brown she-cat. "The medicine cat apprentice should already be about."

"Yes, she should." Lakepaw heard a new voice coming from behind a tree. Another tom, this one a black-and-yellow tortoiseshell with sage-green eyes, came to sit beside Chestnutwhisker. "I can feel she is near us."

"You can feel everything." Gravelnose sniffed, lashing his tail.

"I can't." the tortoiseshell tom countered calmly. "I just know this time."

"Well, do you know exactly where she is, Sage-eye?" Chestnutwhisker asked the tom.

"She is..." Sage-eye opened his mouth to taste scents. "There." he finished, pointing with his muzzle at the juniper bush where Lakepaw was spying. All the cats turned to look at her. How did he know? Lakepaw marvelled. She shifted her paws uncomfortably, making a crackling noise. It didn't make sense to hide anymore, so Lakepaw got up and left the concealing branches of the bush to show herself to the four cats in the clearing.

"Greetings, Lakepaw." Crowseed meowed.

Lakepaw dipped her head.

"Greetings, Crowseed." she retorted, trying to sound the most respectful possible.

"I believe you know who I am." the tom mewed, twitching his ears.

"I do." Lakepaw answered. "You're Fernwish's mentor."

Crowseed nodded. "A perfect apprentice." he muttered. "I hope she's doing well."

"She is." Lakepaw assured. "Why do you want to speak to me?" she asked politely after some moments of silence.

Sage-eye looked at her.

"You must not follow the path of a medicine cat." he declared.

Lakepaw felt hollowness dwell up inside her. Why not? She didn't think she was perfect at it, but she could improve.

"ShineClan foresees it is not the proper path for your life. You must be a warrior." Sage-eye continued.

"But... but..." Lakepaw couldn't bring herself to talk. She had wished all her life to be a medicine cat, and now a bunch of dead cats told her she couldn't? But she immediately realised they weren't "a bunch of dead cats". They were wise, they had lived a life that living cats hadn't completed, and they should be respected. ShineClan cats didn't hunt prey; they hunted wisdom, which would always be inside them.