The Heatherpaw Vignettes/Helping a Clanmate and Letting Go a Little
From Children of StarClan
< History:The Heatherpaw Vignettes
This is the fourth vignette in The Heatherpaw Vignettes series of short stories. It was written on the 12th of March, 2008. This features Heatherpaw and Elmcloud. It takes place on the 5th day of the Moon of Tiger's Wrath (2006)
Featuring
Notes
- Written March 12th, 2008
Helping a Clanmate and Letting Go a Little
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts - Winston Churchill
Heatherpaw wandered over to the fresh kill pile, still lethargic from her sleep. The day before there had been a small fighting assessment, and she was still worn out. She hoped Gingerfur didn’t have big plans. He wasn’t up and ready for her, so the silver she-cat took it as a good sign.
Grabbing a skinny mouse, she sat down near a young black and white warrior. He was very quiet, but so was Heatherpaw. Her mind was racing furiously to remember his name… Cloud something. Cloudtree? Cloudbark? Cloudleaf? No, did it end in cloud? Maplecloud, Oakcloud, Treecloud? No, that made no sense. Elmcloud… yes, that was it. He always seemed nervous.
Heatherpaw took a bite of her mouse, watching the tom as she chewed.
He swallowed hard and looked back at her. He opened and closed his mouth and tried to make small talk. “So… your mentor is Gingerfur, right?”
She nodded. Awkward.
“He’s, erm, nice..." He paused. "How’s your training?”
“Good, I guess. Fun. Sometimes.”
He nodded. “That’s good, great…” Again, he paused, thinking of new topics. “Have you seen the new kits?”
“Umberkit and Morningkit?”
“Yes, ah, those two.”
Heatherpaw nodded. “They seem healthy, though Morningkit is small…”
“She’ll be okay," he mewed shortly. "This leaf-bare doesn’t seem too harsh, and hopefully the war will end soon…”
Heatherpaw couldn’t tell if he was sure or just reassuring himself.
He stood up, pushing the bones of his scrawny mouse aside. “Well, have a good day –” He cut off and gave a sudden and sharp exhale, looking at something over Heatherpaw's right shoulder.
“What?” Heatherpaw looked around and spotted a large spider on a web between two branches of a bush. “Oh, spiders are awful. Hey, are you okay?” She touched his shoulder with her tail.
But Elmcloud seemed to be as frozen as the ground, tense as he took a step away from her. He stared intensely at where the spider was, as some amount of disgust and wariness lit up in his eyes. "Oh, kill it!" he whispered quickly.
"Um, come on, let’s get away from the spider...” she meowed, realizing his fear. “You should go hunting. Sounds like a plan, right?” she offered quietly. Heatherpaw tried to get him to move, pushing him slightly, but upon trying and failing to move Elmcloud, who insisted that the spider must be killed, but not by him, Heatherpaw gave up her feeble attempts with a sigh. She turned back around at the spider and tried not to shudder – it was so big! – and aimed some snow at it, flicking it at the web. After two flicks, the spider fell to the ground, and she quickly buried it with snow.
When she turned back around, Elmcloud had visibly relaxed, and he sighed, "Thank you." With a tiny smile, Heatherpaw touched his flank with her tail tip.
“Ah, so... How would you like to gather another apprentice and go hunting?” Elmcloud offered.
Heatherpaw’s small smile widened slightly as she tried to contain her excitement as she rushed to get Sparkpaw. She was reserved, but she was still a young cat.