With the morning sun turning the lake water a shimmering yellow color, and sending streams of sunlight through the camp, Blazesong decided to take her apprentice out for the day. “Moonpelt!” she called to her medicine cat, who happily came trotting over, his mouth full of herbs. Ever since she’d made him medicine cat, he’d seemed a lot happier, and constantly did his best to help the tiny clan, and Blazesong was incredibly grateful for him. “I’m going to take Maplepaw training, but we won’t be far. If you need anything, come find us, okay?” The tabby tom nodded, and bounded away towards his den on the underside of the ridge. Her whiskers twitching, she walked off towards the tree trunk den to find Maplepaw. She was, predictably, still asleep, curled up against the back wall of the tree, snoring. Suppressing a laugh, Blazesong stepped forward, put her nose right in Maplepaw’s face, and said, “Boo.” Maplepaw leapt into the air, hissing and spitting, before she realized who it was. “Blazestar!” she snapped. “That isn’t funny.” “I mean, it was pretty funny to me.” Maplepaw swiped her paw over her leader’s ear in return. “Hey!” Blazesong chided, “that’s no way to treat your leader.” Straightening up now, she turned, beckoning her apprentice with her tail. “Come on, we’re going training.” All of Maplepaw’s irritation evaporated. “Training!” she exclaimed, bolting past Blazesong out into the clearing. She rocked impatiently in her paws. “Come on!” she yelled. “Let’s go!” Moonpelt, who was sitting on the beach sorting herbs, twitched his whiskers in amusement at the young she-cats yowls. Blazesong took her time, striding slowly towards her apprentice. “If you use all your energy now, you won’t have any energy to train.” Maplepaw seemed to take this advice straight to heart. She suddenly contained all her limbs together, stiff as a tree trunk, and spoke in a flat affect. “Can we go now?” Blazesong laughed, then nodded, giving her apprentice a small nudge. “Yes, we can, Maple-dork.”
***
Blazesong and Maplepaw didn’t travel far from the clearing before they found a small, flat hill near their camp with no shrubbery or trees. Blazesong purred with pleasure. “This is perfect,” she said, before turning to her apprentice. “Okay,” she stated simply. “Attack me.” Maplepaw looked confused. “What?” “Attack me. With your claws sheathed, but, attack me.” Maplepaw all of a sudden became bashful. “Blazestar,” she mumbled, shifting her weight, “I’m not sure if I—“ Tired of the her apprentice’s excused, Blazesong tackled her. “Hey!” Maplepaw cried out, before focusing her energy on kicking her mentor off. She built up power in her hind legs, and kicked out as hard as she could onto Blazesong’s stomach. She stumbled off Maplepaw, before she kicked a paw out and tripped her mentor as she stumbled. Then, she leapt across and pinned her down, teeth right at her throat. Maplepaw struggled to catch her breath. “Did I do it right?” she said, not removing her mouth from Blazesong’s throat. She nodded. “Yes, you did.” Then, Blazesong got a certain gleam in her eye, before kicking out her hind legs and flipping Maplepaw over. Looking her strong apprentice in the eye, she gave an order every apprentice knows well: “Good. Now try it again.”