Swiftpaw's Chance: Chapter 4
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Goldenflower doesn’t stop staring at him, the exact same unreadable expression on her face, the entire time Cinderpelt is putting cobwebs on her cheek. When the medicine cat gently nudges her from the den, along with a quiet reminder to keep the cut clean and come back right away if she thinks it’s infected, Goldenflower tears her eyes away like it physically pains her.
Dogscar looks down, and find himself meeting Cloudtail’s gaze. The warrior looks nothing short of disgusted with him. Dogscar wants to say he feels the same way.
“Cloudtail, Brightpaw,” Cinderpelt says quietly, “why don’t you two go out into the camp for a little bit.”
Cloudtail doesn’t even glance away from Dogscar when he protests, “But Brightpaw-“
“Most of Brightpaw’s injuries were to her face, and she’s been resting for several days now. If she takes it easy she should be okay. Go get some fresh-kill, talk to your Clanmates.”
Cloudtail’s eyes flick toward Brightpaw for one second before he goes back to glaring at Dogscar.
“ Cloudtail ,” Cinderpelt warns, and reluctantly, he goes.
Cinderpelt manages to make sitting look judgemental as the other two cats leave the den. Once they’re well out of earshot, she curls her tail around her paws and says, “Dogscar.”
He stares at the ground. Cinderpelt wants to give him a talk, fine. He has nothing to say for himself.
“You know that if you keep....doing things like this, there’s going to be consequences. You could be facing exile , Dogscar. I don’t have to tell you that no cat wants to live with a warrior that could attack them at any time.”
Dogscar looks at the places where he made furrows in the dirt with his claws. Past that, the place where three drops of Goldenflower’s blood are drying on the ground.
“Are you going to say anything, Dogscar? I’m trying to help you, but I can’t very well tell any cat you’re sorry if you aren’t. ”
“I am. Sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt her.”
“You didn’t mean to hurt Bluestar, either.”
Dogscar can’t say anything to that.
“She let you do it, if that changes anything,” Cinderpelt adds softly, and he looks up.
“What?”
“She may be a queen now, but Goldenflower has training, and any of us could see that blow coming from miles away. She didn’t even try to move away when you did it. Take from that what you will.”
Dogscar has to close his eyes, then. His mother, his sweet, gentle, loving mother, let him hurt her. He has absolutely no idea what to do with that information, just knows that it twists, sick and hot, inside of his chest.
After several long moments of silence, Cinderpelt stands and goes to her herb stores. Dogscar opens his eyes, watching her warily. “When I first got hurt, I spent all my time in my nest, feeling sorry for myself. I wanted to be a warrior so badly , and there I was, facing the possibility that I could never have that again. Yellowfang pulled me out of my funk with a mix of insults and love, and she taught me to be a medicine cat.”
Cinderpelt’s voice is thick with grief, and Dogscar remembers that it’s only been a little while—not even a half moon—since the fire and Yellowfang’s death. He flicks a tattered ear and shuffles his paws uncomfortably.
Cinderpelt takes a moment to sort through a pile of wilted leaves before she continues. “And I...I don’t know what I would have done without her there, you know? Probably just kept laying in my nest forever, maybe moved into the elder’s den. Yellowfang helped me. She saved me, when I thought my life was over.”
Dogscar is starting to get an idea of where this is going.
“And I know, right now...well, I don’t know what you’re thinking exactly, but I imagine the last thing you need is for every cat to abandon you. So I’m not going to leave you, no matter what you say to me, or what you do, because someday, when you get out of your head enough to move on eith your life, you’re going to be a good cat . And you deserve that.”
Dogscar doesn’t really know what to say after that little speech. So he just stares at the den wall, silent, until Cinderpelt finally sighs and leaves to tell Cloudtail and Brightpaw they can come back in.
-0-0-0-
Swiftpaw claws his way up a tree, one ear already ripped apart and dripping blood and scratches all over, with no thought in his mind except to escape. Something attaches itself to his back, at first more horrible, crushing pressure than anything, then two dozen points of needle-sharp pain. His claws gouge the bark of the tree as the dogs drag him down, and he screams at the little bit of sky he can see above him as his flesh tears away from his body.
Somewhere, Brightpaw is screaming his name. Swiftpaw hits the ground and turns to face the dogs. As one, they all speak, “ Pack, pack, kill, kill.”
“Not today,” Swiftpaw snarls, and for one instant his mouth splits in a wicked, bloody grin. Despite everything, he’s always loved a fight.
The dogs grow to the size of bears around him, and the drool dripping from their mouths turns into blood. Far above him, they speak again, and this time it’s his own voice.
“Pack, pack, kill, kill-”
“Dogscar! Dogscar, wake up!”
He jerks in his nest, legs scrabbling for purchase in the bracken before he recognizes his surroundings. Cloudtail is half leaning over him, but poised to jump away if need be. Dogscar takes another few seconds to get his breathing under control and slumps in his nest. He makes sure to glare at Cloudtail out of the corner of his eye, still.
“What do you want.”
Cloudtail reels. “You were having a nightmare? You do that a lot, actually, but this time you were, uh. Loud. And saying things. Like Brightpaw. And it seemed like you were maybe actually scared, so I woke you up.”
Dogscar keeps glaring at him, and Cloudtail’s gaze hardens. “Fine, then, next time I’ll leave you to suffer.”
“Fine,” Dogscar spits. Cloudtail stalks away, deliberately smacking him in the face with his tail as he does.
-0-0-0-
“Dogscar. I believe I said something yesterday about getting out of your nest? Walking around a bit? Any of that familiar?” Cinderpelt asks.
Dogscar turns over in his nest and refuses to look at her. He doesn’t want to walk around ThunderClan camp, he doesn’t want to see his family, he doesn’t want to do anything .
“The faster you get up and moving the faster you can start training,” Cinderpelt adds. Dogscar thinks that the apprentice he was would leap into action at a remark like that, but for the first time in his life he can’t summon the desire to train. To fight again.
He feels Cinderpelt come close to his turned back, watches her shadow fall across the dirt. “Dogscar, so help me, if you don’t get out of this nest I will drag your sorry tail out there myself.”
“Is that the insults part of you trying to be like Yellowfang?” Dogscar asks. Cinderpelt’s shadow flinches.
He gets up gingerly and walks out, making sure to knock his shoulder against Cinderpelt’s as he does. She doesn’t say anything, and Dogscar is left squinting a bit in the sun and itching a bit for a fight.
Cloudtail and Brightpaw are already talking to Fernpaw, Ashpaw, and Thornpaw. The rest of the camp looks normal—a few cats glance his way and linger there, and even though it feels like all eyes are on him, Dogscar is pretty sure they’re not. Longtail isn’t looking at him, but in a way that Dogscar can tell he’s doing it on purpose. Goldenflower is on her side, facing away from him, and as he watches Snowkit clambers over her body.
Dogscar remembers when he used to do that. He looks away.
There’s no one left for him to talk to, really. He was never close to many of the warriors, and aside from his siblings—who aren’t in the camp, thank StarClan, Dogscar doesn’t even want to think about seeing them yet—he never was close with any of the kits. And he’s not about to go talk to the other apprentices with Cloudtail and Brightpaw right there.
He pads to the fresh-kill pile, feeling oddly like a trespasser in his own Clan. To cover for it, he glares at a couple of the nearest cats and takes a mouse. Then he picks the farthest spot from any other cat that he can and sits down to eat it as viciously as possible.
“Dogscar?”
He jerks his head up at the world’s tiniest voice, looking over at the kit who’s apparently decided to join him. She’s small, but sturdy-looking, strong. Big enough to be almost Bramblepaw and Tawnypaw’s age, though Dogscar is pretty sure the oldest litter of kits is only around four moons old.
“What?”
“That’s your name, right?” she asks. “Bramblepaw and Tawnypaw said so. I’m Sorrelkit!”
Dogscar grunts. Maybe if he doesn’t respond she’ll leave him alone.
Undeterred, Sorrelkit presses on. “You fought dogs, didn’t you? That’s how you got your name? And why you have to stay in the medicine den?” She wrinkles her nose. “It smells weird in there.”
“Um. Yeah. I fought dogs. I lost, though,” Dogscar says, hoping that her interest will wane if he’s not some kind of heroic warrior.
“That’s okay!” Sorrelkit says brightly, bouncing on her tiny paws. Were his paws ever that small? “ Every cat can't win fights every time, because someone has to lose, right? That’s what my mama says when me and my brothers play.”
“But you’re supposed to want to win,” Dogscar tells her, even as he thinks that he should really not be engaging with this kit if he wants her to leave him alone. “To...to defend your Clan. To help your family. You can’t be a good warrior if you just let the other Clans win.”
Sorrelkit tips her head, considering this. “But if the other Clans lose all the time, what happens to the cats that live there? Won’t they be sad?” Her eyes get bigger. “What if they get hurt, like you?”
Dogscar shrugs a little uncomfortably, looking back towards the nursery. Willowpelt and Speckletail are sitting near Goldenflower, who’s still on the ground. Two other kits—Sorrelkit’s brothers?—have joined in climbing on her. Are none of them concerned about Sorrelkit being with him?
“Uh, well,” he starts, “the other Clans don’t matter so much as ThunderClan. I mean, um, your Clan is the most important thing. You have to take care of your Clan before you worry about the others.”
Sorrelkit nods seriously. “Okay. So if another Clan is in trouble, and ThunderClan isn’t, we can help them?”
“If helping them wouldn’t hurt ThunderClan,” Dogscar says. “Sure.”
Sorrelkit looks out at nothing for a moment, and Dogscar waits for her to absorb this and probably ask more questions. Instead, she just looks up at him.
“Hey, are you gonna finish your mouse?” she asks.
Dogscar almost laughs, despite himself, and pushes what’s left over to her. Hey, he’s not a complete monster yet. Sorrelkit takes a bite and purrs loudly. Across the camp, Willowpelt catches Dogscar’s eye. She doesn’t move to bring Sorrelkit back, but her expression says it’s a near thing.
“Hey, why don’t you head back over to your mama?” Dogscar tells the little she-kit. “What are you doing hanging out with me, anyway, when you could be using Goldenflower as a tree with the others?”
Sorrelkit licks at the bones of her mouse before the answers. “Well, you looked lonely over here by yourself. My brothers have each other, and Snowkit! And my mama always said that no cat should get left out of games, so here I am!”
“Your mama sounds like a very smart cat,” Dogscar says, looking straight at Willowpelt. Her wary gaze softens just a little, but she doesn’t take her eyes off him and her kit.
“She is !” Sorrelkit says, jumping to her feet. “I wanna be just like her when I grow up!”
“Smart like her, or a mama like her?” Dogscar winces as soon as the words are out. Probably shouldn’t be asking a kit whether she wants to have kits.
Sorrelkit doesn’t seem to notice, just taps her tail on the ground while she thinks. “Well, I wanna be smart like her. And I like kits a lot! I help Speckletail with Snowkit all the time! Even though he’s not good at games and he never talks.” She glances around, nervous, the leans up to Dogscar’s ear to loudly whisper, “I think there’s something wrong with him.”
“Huh.” Dogscar looks over at Snowkit, who’s still climbing over Goldenflower. If he never talks, he might be mute.
“ Don’t tell Speckletail I said that!” Sorrelkit hisses anxiously. “She got real upset when Rainkit asked what was wrong with Snowkit and Mama said we’re not allowed to say things like that.”
“It’s okay,” Dogscar reassures her. “Your secret’s safe with me. Now you go on back to your mama.”
“But you’ll be alone then!” Sorrelkit’s eyes go wide.
Dogscar glances around the camp quickly and says, “I’ll find another cat to talk to, don’t worry. Go on.”
With a last sad glance over her shoulder, Sorrelkit bounds away. She trips over her own paws just as she reaches the nursery, and Dogscar doesn’t stifle a laugh at that. He watches Willowpelt help her up and whisper something, her face contorted in the kind of worried anger only a mother gets. Sorrelkit looks up at her and protests, and then Willowpelt pushes her toward the other kits with a last warning look.
“You’re good with kits,” Cinderpelt says, and Dogscar jumps a little.
He shakes his head. “I’m not. Any cat would have done the same thing.”
“It was sweet. I don’t agree with what you said about the Clans, but Sorrelkit’s got plenty of time to figure that out on her own. And it was good for you, I think.”
“Good for me,” Dogscar scoffs. “Yeah, okay.”
“Maybe if you’re better by the time they’re ready to be apprenticed, Bluestar will let you mentor Sorrelkit.”
“Okay, now you’re really trying too hard. Like anyone would ever trust me with an apprentice in this lifetime.”
Dogscar stands up and stalks back into the medicine den. He hears Cinderpelt’s lopsided gait follow him in, and sighs, turning to face her. “What.”
Cinderpelt shrugs. “I saw you out there. That was....that was the first time I’ve seen you enjoy something since you came back from the fight. Maybe even before that.”
“Just because I didn’t claw the kit up doesn’t mean I enjoyed myself.”
“I think it helped you, having a cat to take care of,” Cinderpelt says, infinitely gentle. “Now that every cat is trying to take care of you .”
“I talked to her for a minute, that doesn’t mean I took care of her.” Dogscar retorts.
She levels him with a look. Yeah, sure. Like it’s obvious and he’s being ridiculous. “Still. You like taking care of cats. Being in the nursery every day for a little while might be good for you.”
Oh, no. Now Dogscar can see where she’s going with this. “Do you really think Willowpelt would let me anywhere near the nursery? Did you see her when I was with Sorrelkit? And what about Goldenflower, she’ll never let me in there, either.”
Cinderpelt waves her tail. “I’m the medicine cat. If I say it’s instrumental in your recovery, they’ll let you do it. I could also have a warrior supervise you, just to be safe.”
Dogscar shakes his head and goes back to his nest. “Sure. Whatever you want to do, Cinderpelt.”
She’s never going to actually go through with it. Or if she does, the queens would never accept it. So it’s not going to happen. He’ll just keep going outside enough to keep Cinderpelt off his back and making sure no one talks to him. The thought is definitely not making his chest do something funny about the fact that he probably won’t get to talk to little Sorrelkit anymore. Because he doesn’t care. Kits are annoying, and he has better things to do.