“What’s this?” asks Lightpoppy, putting a bitter smelling herb under my nose.
I think for a moment, the smell’s familiar. “Burdock?” I ask.
“Good job, Rosepaw!”
Then my sister, Poppypaw rushes in, panicked.
“What’s wrong, Poppypaw?” asks Lightpoppy in her calm voice.
“Lionpaw fell from a tree and broke his leg!” she yells, breathless. Just great, my brother has managed to get into trouble again. He just had to break his leg! And when I was learning, too!
“Oh my!” exclaims Lightpoppy. She turns to me and says, “Rosepaw, please get me some cobwebs and burdock while I go get comfrey, rush, and poppy seeds.” Even though I feel like I shouldn’t help him, I wrap some cobwebs from the corner onto my tail and carefully put the burdock in my mouth, to avoid the bad taste. Quickly, Lightpoppy comes back with comfrey and rush in your mouth and poppy seeds under her tongue. We go outside and into the clearing. Lionpaw is in his bed in the apprentice den, surrounded by cats. We push through, careful not to drop anything.
Once we’re finally next to Lionpaw, Lightpoppy and I get to work. Lightpoppy holds the comfrey and rush in her paw and spits the poppy seeds into her other paw, ordering Lionpaw to swallow them, which he does. Almost immediately, he calms down and dozes off. Next, Lightpoppy chews the black comfrey roots into a pulp and lathers it over Lionpaw’s broken leg. It will help reduce pain and soothe any open cuts. I do the same with the burdock, which will have the same effect as the comfrey. His leg is bound first with the cobwebs, then with the long leaves of the rush. We make them stay with a little catchweed that is already in the den. There, we’re done. Everyone is ordered to leave and let Lionpaw rest, including extremely worried Poppypaw.
We’re back in the medicine cat den now, cleaning up. “That was a great job you did back there,” says Lightpoppy.
“It was what any medicine cat would do,” I reply.
“That’s right.” Then she adds, “Go get something to eat, Rosepaw, you’re probably famished after all the quizzing in the afternoon and Lionpaw’s accident.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” she says with a smile.
I walk outside the medicine cat den after quickly tidying up the water mint a little more. I look around the clearing to see what everybody’s doing. Since its evening a hunting patrol went out (Wetwing, Mosswhisker, Sharpfang, Berrywing, Shadowpaw, Rainpool, and Meadowpaw). I’m going to wait for fresh kill to get back before I eat.
Anyways, Poppypaw is sitting in front of the apprentice den with Sunpaw, Ivypaw, Eaglepaw, and Barkpaw, talking. Outside the queen den, Ashflower and Goldencloud are monitoring their kits, Stonekit, Skykit, Wolfkit, Mousekit, and Hawkkit, who were playing with balls of moss. Ashflower looks very scared, probably because her kits, Stonekit, Skykit, and Wolfkit are only 2 moons old and Goldencloud’s, 5 moons old.
Meanwhile, Whitefur, Frostheart, Littlekit, Crowfoot, Fernclaw, and Shrewnose are in front of the elder den, socializing. My mom—Petalfrost, Swallowfeather, and Silversplash are sharing tongues near the fresh-kill pile. Nettlestar is sharing tongues with her mate, Stormfall in front of the leader den. Finally, Sparrowtail, Reedheart, and Falconeye are joking around, like toms do, in the middle of the clearing. When it comes down to it, I have three places to go, over to my mom, to my sister and the other apprentices, or over to the kits because Skykit is like another sister to me. I choose to go over to the kits, first, to also to help the queens out, too.
The kittens start getting really excited once I’m next to them.
“Rosepaw! Rosepaw! Rosepaw!” squeak the younger kittens, Stonekit and Wolfkit, in unison. Mousekit and Hawkkit, being more mature, say simply, “Hi, Rosepaw”. However, Skykit doesn’t do any of these things. She, being the quiet yet lovable kitten she is, comes up to me and hugs me. I take her by the scruff and carefully place her on my back. Her tiny paws dig into the fur around my neck.
“I’ll be back with her in a few,” I tell Ashflower.
She smiles, relieved that at least one of her kits isn’t her responsibility for a while. “No need to hurry back. Have fun Skykit!”
Ashflower gives Skykit a quick licking then we’re off and out of the clearing.
“Where are we going?” squeaks Skykit in that cute sing-song voice of hers. She always waits to get away from her siblings and mother before she talks. I don’t know why.
“It’s a surprise,” I reply with a playful purr.