lavenderpaw
blessing in spring
She can still feel her heart thrumming beneath her skin, the blood rushing in her ears. It all happened... so quickly. She had slipped away from Frostmoth and met up with a few like aged cats at the gathering. With the comfort of her sister, she laughed and teased, maybe even made new friends. And then the shouting happened. It blurs from there.
Lavenderpaw looks down at the water. She's half expecting it to start running red at any point, given how much blood was spilled in the woodlands. She knows she watched Pikestar die, yet the image hadn't burned into her mind's eye like she thought it would. She knows she heard her mentor exile Adderfang, yet she still expects to see him on the next patrol. She was there when Pikestar took his first breath again, but not a moment has lodged into her mind. The facts mean nothing, and if she were any more infantile, she may even believe that none of it had happened at all.
A line of scales flash in the water, and Lavenderpaw lets it go.
"I didn't like it," Frostmoth can't be too far from her, brooding in the way he does. The apprentice doesn't look to see if he's caught the fish she let swim pass, nor if he's caught anything at all. She keeps her eyes on the water; she waits for red. "Do we have to do that again, Frostmoth? What if... Hawkstar asks for your life next?" The shade of worry in her eyes does not fade so quickly, akin to a flash of scales beneath the water, eager to have fangs fastened into every etching. She doesn't let him see that her skin itches with worry, that her heart's beat is so tangible that it keeps distracting her.
"Or Hazecloud's, or Lichentuft's, or Smokewreath's - what's stopping her from asking for them all?" Lavenderpaw feels more anger in the moment, and then her tone drops, a morsel of fear entering next, "What's stopping Adderfang from coming back, and trying again?"