Эрин Хантер - The Apprentice's Quest

Alderpaw wasn’t surprised. Since the Gathering he had been too busy to think much about the prophecy, but the rest of his Clanmates seemed to talk of nothing else.

Jayfeather let out a snort. “That was a mouse-brained idea! Kittypets have nothing to do with StarClan. They are no use to Clan cats.”

“Cherryfall thought it was worth a try,” Sparkpaw mewed defensively.

“Besides, you would have to cross

ShadowClan to get to the Twolegplace,” Jayfeather growled, letting out a hiss of annoyance as he stumbled over a fallen branch.

“You should have asked permission before just wandering out of ThunderClan territory. Stupid furballs!”

“It was only an idea.” Sparkpaw’s neck fur bristled at Jayfeather’s dismissive tone.

“Anyway, we didn’t get near ShadowClan territory. Cherryfall slipped and cut herself on some Twoleg rubbish before we came in sight of the border.”

Jayfeather made no response, though he still looked angry.

“We just thought if we made it to the Twolegplace, maybe we’d find some kittypets who knew the cats we wanted to talk to,” Sparkpaw added.

Jayfeather rolled his eyes. “StarClan help us! Mouse-brains!”

Sparkpaw clamped her jaws together as if she was biting back a furious retort. Alderpaw felt sorry for her, though he couldn’t help thinking that Jayfeather was right. Surely kittypets couldn’t be part of a prophecy from StarClan.

“It’s this way,” Sparkpaw meowed after a moment. She veered away from the shore, through a stand of hazel saplings, and into a grassy hollow shaded by a spreading beech tree.

Cherryfall was lying at the foot of the tree with one leg stretched out, while Sorrelstripe paced up and down anxiously beside her.

“Thank StarClan you’re here!” Sorrelstripe exclaimed as Sparkpaw led the way down into the hollow.

Alderpaw followed and stood beside

Jayfeather as the medicine cat examined Cherryfall’s paw. There was a deep cut across her pads, and blood was oozing out of it. Clots of blood had soaked the grass beside her, and Alderpaw spotted some scraps of hard, clear Twoleg stuff close beside her. He dabbed at it experimentally and felt the sharp edge.

“Careful!” Sorrelstripe warned him. “That’s what hurt Cherryfall.”

“Why can’t the Twolegs take their stuff back to their own dens instead of leaving it here to injure cats?” Sparkpaw asked angrily.

“Alderpaw!” Jayfeather beckoned with his tail. “We need some cobweb to stop the bleeding. Go and find some.”

Alderpaw froze, glancing around wildly.

Cobweb? Where? The sight and reek of the blood, and Cherryfall’s face screwed up with pain, worried him so much that his paws felt stuck to the ground.

“Over there!” Sparkpaw pointed to an oak tree at the far side of the hollow. “There’s a cleft in that tree—there should be cobwebs inside it.”

Before Alderpaw could move, his littermate darted off, closely followed by Sorrelstripe.

Now Sparkpaw is better than me at being a medicine cat! Alderpaw thought, furious with himself. He was even angrier when she turned out to be right, and she and Sorrelstripe returned across the hollow with pawfuls of cobweb.

“Oh, for StarClan’s sake, Alderpaw!”

Jayfeather hissed in exasperation. “Come here.

Put your paw there.” He pointed with his tail to a spot on Cherryfall’s leg. “Press down hard—no, harder than that. Don’t worry about hurting her. We’ve got to stop this bleeding.”

“It’s okay, Alderpaw,” Cherryfall gasped.

Alderpaw put all his strength into pressing down where Jayfeather had shown him, and to his relief the flow of blood from Cherryfall’s paw slowed and then dwindled away completely.

“Good,” Jayfeather grunted. “Now the cobweb.”

Alderpaw couldn’t believe how deft Jayfeather’s paws were in wrapping Cherryfall’s wound, especially considering he was blind.

“Now release the pressure,” Jayfeather instructed Alderpaw when all the cobweb was wound around the injured paw. “And—please, StarClan—let’s hope the bleeding doesn’t start again.”

Alderpaw lifted his paw and stared at the cobweb covering, afraid that he would see a red blotch spreading on the gray webs. “There’s no more blood,” he mewed after a few heartbeats.

“Right.” Jayfeather sounded satisfied.

“Cherryfall, let’s get you back to camp. And don’t even think about putting that paw to the ground. Sparkpaw and Sorrelstripe, support her.”

Back in the camp, Jayfeather had the other cats take Cherryfall to the medicine cats’ den.

Alderpaw arranged a nest for her beside

Briarlight, and she sank into it with a sigh of relief.

“Thanks, Jayfeather,” she mewed. “And you, Alderpaw. I’m sorry to be such a nuisance.”

“Just remember that the next time you want to do something mouse-brained,” Jayfeather muttered.

“Now, Alderpaw, unwrap the cobwebs. I want to get a better idea of the wound.”

“What if the bleeding starts again?”

Alderpaw asked nervously.

“Then we put more cobweb on, bee-brain!”

As carefully as he could, snagging his claws delicately into the cobweb wrapping, Alderpaw laid the wound bare. He hardly dared to breathe as he tore away the last of the cobwebs, but to his relief there was no more bleeding.

Meanwhile Jayfeather had gone to the herb store, and he came back carrying a piece of comfrey root. “We’ll put a poultice of this on the wound,” he meowed, dropping it at Alderpaw’s paws. “You can chew it up, and Cherryfall, give that wound a good lick.”

Alderpaw began chewing the root, blinking at its tangy taste. When he thought it was fine enough, he spat it out again. Jayfeather bent his head to sniff at it.

“It’ll do,” he commented. “Now spread it on Cherryfall’s paw.”

Alderpaw noticed how Cherryfall began to relax as he patted the poultice into place and the comfrey juices sank into her wound. “That feels so good… ,” she murmured.

“You should get some sleep,” Jayfeather told her when the poultice was in place. Turning to Alderpaw, he added, “And you’re done for the day. Go and get something to eat.”

“Thanks, Jayfeather.”

Alderpaw slipped out of the den, his legs shaky with exhaustion. Spotting his sister over by the fresh-kill pile, he padded across to join her.

“Come and share this vole,” Sparkpaw invited him as he drew near. “I caught it when I went hunting with Cherryfall earlier today.

Doesn’t it look good?”

Alderpaw felt his jaws watering as he looked at the plump piece of prey, and he realized that his belly was bawling with hunger.

At the same time a hot wave of embarrassment flooded through his pelt.

“I really freaked out when I saw Cherryfall’s wound,” he confessed. “I couldn’t do a simple thing like finding cobwebs.” He let out a long sigh. “How am I going to be a good medicine cat if I freeze up at the sight of blood?”

“Oh, mouse dung!” Sparkpaw mewed cheerfully. “I don’t know why any cat would want to be a medicine cat, but I was really impressed with the way you stopped Cherryfall’s wound bleeding. You just need to trust yourself,” she went on, brushing her tail against Alderpaw’s side. “The way I do when I’m hunting. It’s when you stop to worry that you miss your prey, and it was the same thing with the cobweb. But then you did the right thing. So

I think in the end you’ll be a pretty good medicine cat.”

“Do you really believe that?” Alderpaw asked.

Sparkpaw gave him a nudge. “Of course I do, you daft furball!”

Taking a bite of the succulent vole, Alderpaw realized that he was beginning to feel better.