OakClanDustkit felt as if her legs would crumble beneath her as she followed her brothers toward the center of camp, all too aware of each and every one of their clanmates' eyes on them. She was afraid, most of all, to meet her leader's gaze, sure that she would find only disapproval there when the authoritative she-cat saw the nervousness in her own--but when she looked up, she was surprised to find a warmth reflected in Beestar's eyes that reminded her of her own mother's. Relaxing a little, her tail tip that had been twitching just a moment ago now lay still, and while her stomach still turned nervously as her name was called, she didn't feel quite as anxious as before. She followed Beestar's gaze to Dappleleaf, and spotted the pretty calico she-cat striding towards her. Her gaze fell to her paws again, not wanting to stare at her new mentor, but she lifted it when Dappleleaf leaned down to whisper to her.
Dustpaw. It was hardly much different from the name she'd always gone by, and yet being called it for the first time, hearing it out loud...it made Dustpaw feel good. Swallowing and standing a little straighter, she nodded and touched noses ever so gently with her new mentor. "I'm glad to have you as my mentor, too," she mewed quietly, a tiny smile on her face.
"Oh, come on, don't say that," Splashfeather nudged Jackdawstrike, but she failed to suppress her own laughter. It was a secret to no one that Dappleleaf and Weaselstripe had become increasingly closer in the past couple of moons, and now most cats expected them to have kits any moon now. The thought made Splashfeather wonder about her own future. Would she ever have a mate or kits? Dappleleaf and Weaselstripe weren't much older than her; why, she had trained with Weaselstripe for a part of her apprenticeship. Almost subconsciously, her eyes darted from the ceremony before them to Jackdawstrike, but Raccoontuft's voice made her snap back to reality and turn to the she-cat. "Yeah, that's true," she agreed. Apart from Beestar a few moons ago, Creamflower was the only she-cat who kept the nursery from being empty, and Splashfeather always wondered if she ever got lonely in there. She'd never seemed to mind it before, but now that her kits were leaving the nursery, Splashfeather wasn't sure how she'd feel about being alone again.
Well, I guess she has Sunflare, she reminded herself. Ever since the two had gotten together, Sunflare had been spending most nights in the nursery with his mate. Still, Splashfeather was sure Creamflower wouldn't mind having another she-cat to share the den with, and new kits always brought joy to the clan. "What about you, Raccoontuft?" she asked her friend almost jokingly. "You thinking about having kits?"
Sunflare purred as Creamflower leaned into him, pride shining in his eyes as he watched his daughter touch noses with her new mentor. It was all he could do to hold back from cheering just yet. "Dappleleaf was a good choice for her," he murmured to his mate. "She's gentle and kind, but she's skilled for such a young warrior. Dustpaw needs someone like that." He noticed Fawnkit glance back at them nervously, and gave his adoptive son an encouraging nod, as if to say,
You'll be great. Dustpaw was the most nervous outwardly, but he knew Fawnkit wasn't always as confident as he put up and felt the need to prove himself more so than others due to his heritage. They both needed reassurance, just in different ways. And Poppykit...well, Poppykit didn't seem to need reassurance so much as he simply needed an outlet for his energy and someone to guide him. He loved all of their kits, and yet they were all so different with different needs. He had to hope Beestar would appoint an appropriate mentor for each.
Tigerblaze watched in silence as Dovespirit's warrior ceremony ended and the apprentice ceremonies began. Dustpaw was the first to receive her mentor--Dappleleaf, a skilled young warrior and Weaselstripe's mate. Tigerblaze had no qualms about her as a warrior, but like Jackdawstrike, he couldn't say he would have chosen her himself, simply for the fact that it was only a matter of time before she started expecting Weaselstripe's kits. He caught said tom glaring at Jackdawstrike, no doubt having heard the burly black tom's remark, and cleared his throat to get the deputy's son's attention. "Perhaps it would be good for you to receive an apprentice as well, Weaselstripe. If both you and your mate are mentors, that may help keep the two of you...focused." But if there was one cat who Tigerblaze thought deserved an apprentice, it was his own former apprentice, Jackdawstrike. The tom had trained hard to get where he was; if his physique didn't show that, his skills and strength in battle most definitely did. Beestar would have to be a fool to overlook the powerful tom, young as he was.
Riverstripe ducked his head sheepishly at Elmshade's teasing, but there was a smile on his face. He opened his mouth to respond, only to close it again as the ceremony had begun. Suspense filled the air as the clan awaited to hear what Artemis's new name would be--and when those last words fell from Beestar's mouth, the silence erupted into cheers of their newest warrior's name. "Dovespirit! Dovespirit! Riverstripe chanted. The clan had seen many moons' worth of warrior ceremonies, and yet while all were important, this one was different. This was the first time in a long time that OakClan had welcomed a cat among its ranks who wasn't born into them. As Dovespirit's warrior ceremony drew to a close, Riverstripe's gaze traveled to Sunflare and Creamflower's kits--hardly kits anymore, they were about to be the clan's newest apprentices. Even so, Riverstripe wondered if he would ever have kits of his own that he would be able to see grow up and become apprentices and then warriors. Training Beestar's son as his apprentice had only made him wonder that more, as he had grown fond of the young tom over the past couple of moons, and yet the knowledge that Beestar's kits' father was a tom that wasn't him often clawed at him, as much as he tried to ignore it. Shaking the thought away, he turned his attention back to the ceremony at paw. "Poppykit looks like he's going to burst from excitement," he observed with amusement.
EagleClanSouthstar nodded, a hint of sadness in his eyes. "I knew cats would question my decision--Deertail most of all. But I want him to realize that, whatever happened between him and Foxcloud, it isn't the kits' fault. They're good kits, and I know they'll make good warriors, like you said, if given the chance. I want Deertail to give Eveningpaw that chance--and for her to give him a chance to move past his bitterness. That reminds me..." He paused, his tail tip twitching hesitantly, before continuing. "Daydream, I know your intentions are good, but I don't think you should be as close to Foxcloud and her kits as you are. I understand you and her are good friends, and there's nothing wrong with that. But surely you understand how it looks, don't you? Especially considering everything that's happened in the last few moons, it's really easy to point claws. I don't want claws unfairly pointed at anyone in this clan--Messfur and Swiftbadger have already taken the brunt of that, thanks to their pelt colors." He added quickly, "I know you're not the father, Daydream, but I don't want anyone else to think you are...and I don't want you to become one. Those kits already think of you as their father, and if you let them continue to think and call you that, not only will it spread suspicion in our own clan, but outside of it. What do you think will happen if rumor spreads to OakClan that one of our queens cheated on her mate with our medicine cat, or that a medicine cat fathered a litter of kits at all? I want you to think of your own reputation, but also of the entire clan's." He paused once more, trying to think if there was anything else he should add. "And besides that, you need to think about the morality of it all. Whoever the kits' true father is, the fact of the matter is that Foxcloud was unfaithful to Deertail. She went behind his back to mate with another tom, covered it up, and lied about it to him; and not just to him, but to the entire clan, for moons, until she couldn't anymore. Do you really think, after all of that, that she still deserves to have a tom by her side, acting as a mate to her and a father to her kits? I feel bad for them too, but she made her decision, and she needs to live with the consequences of that decision. Think of Deertail, if nothing else. It isn't fair to him."
"Slow down there, tiger," Littleflower called to Wrenpaw with a slight purr of amusement. She could sympathize with the apprentices' excitement. Even now, as a warrior moons later, she still remembered how eager she'd been the day of her own apprentice ceremony. "Oh, you'll learn plenty," she assured Brightpaw, tapping her apprentice's ear with her tail. But just as they were about to leave camp, she couldn't help but cast one last glance behind her--and saw Swiftbadger looking her way, looking oddly...crestfallen. He quickly looked away though and his expression changed as he began talking to Redpaw. Littleflower, however, stood rooted to the spot for a moment. Had he wanted to join them? She figured he would have wanted his own space to train his new apprentice, but the look on his face told her otherwise. "You go ahead," she told Springheart. "I'll be right back." Without another word, she darted off in Swiftbadger's direction.
He probably just doesn't want to be left out, she decided, suddenly feeling bad. Deertail and Streamspot were going out with their apprentices, and she and Springheart were about to go out with theirs, and that left poor Swiftbadger and Redpaw all by themselves.
How could I be so mouse-brained? "Hey, Swiftbadger, Redpaw!" she called once she was close enough, skidding to a halt. "Do you two want to join me and Springheart with our apprentices?" She took a step back, shuffling her paws slightly. "I mean, only if you want to. If you don't, that's fine."
Darkclaw was surprised to see Quiverheart getting so worked up. He supposed if there was ever something she'd feel passionately about, it would be this, but still. It wasn't something he had ever seen before, and he didn't quite know how to respond. "Hey, cool down, it's fine," he told her, letting his tail brush against her slightly for only a heartbeat before pulling it away again. "I know what you mean. I wouldn't have assigned any of those kits to him, if I was leader..." Truth be told, the idea of Deertail with another apprentice at all rubbed Darkclaw the wrong way, but he wouldn't admit to it. "But hey, he's a grown tom. If he has that big of a problem with it, he can always just talk to Southstar." He remembered when he was still an apprentice and had wanted to rush to being a warrior, to break free of feeling like he needed anyone. His request hadn't been granted then...but he had just been an apprentice. Surely if Deertail insisted to Southstar that he didn't want to train Eveningpaw, Southstar wouldn't make him.
Eveningpaw froze mid-step when Deertail turned around to face them and resisted the urge to shrink back. She listened, wide-eyed, as her new mentor went on about the territory, nodding attentively to show she was listening and hardly daring to blink. She didn't want to accidentally anger the tom by seeming disinterested or like she wasn't paying attention. She held her tongue for a moment after, a bit overwhelmed by all the information and unsure how to respond. "Oh, um...The thunderpath sounds good to me. Unless you had something else in mind..." She was still caught off guard by the fact that the tom had spoken as much as he had to her, and even more so now that he was smiling at her--well, sort of. It didn't look like a very happy smile, more forced than genuine, but it was better than the scowl he'd had on before.
Nightwish responded with a shrug of her shoulders. "Not sure yet, but I'm sure we'll figure that out." She started to lead the way back to Messfur, but walked close enough to Blazefrost that she could still have a conversation with him on the way. She knew it was only natural for a cat to become hardened after so much loss; granted, all cats had loss at some point in their lives, but Blazefrost experienced much of it so young that it seemed to hit him harder than most. Yes, he and Deertail had definitely had it the roughest the past couple of moons, at least from Nightwish's perspective.
And Deertail doesn't know it, but Foxcloud has caused pain to more than just him, she thought bitterly as she was reminded of how close Daydream and Foxcloud had grown over the last few moons. Shoving the thought of her head, she turned back to Blazefrost. "Is there a specific spot you'd like to hunt?"
Throughout all of his littermates' shenanigans that morning, Emberkit had stuck to his mother's side, trying to catch a few more minutes of sleep despite the ruckus his siblings were making. He knew Acornspots liked to know where he was at all times anyway, and besides, he wasn't as rambunctious as Pinekit or Applekit. But when the warmth of his mother disappeared and Willowkit's urgent mew hit his ears, his eyes finally fluttered open and he scrambled to his paws. "It's okay," he attempted to comfort his sisters as he followed them out of the den with a yawn. "I'm sure everyone is close by..." But in what seemed the blink of an eye, it seemed that the ceremonies his siblings had been so eager to watch had ended before they'd even begun. He blinked the sleep from his eyes, still not entirely awake or caught up on what was going on. "Oh, well," he mewed nonchalantly, letting his tail brush against his sister Sorrelkit's. "There's always next time." He wasn't sure when "next time" would be, but he assumed there would be one.
