Eclipse

They’ll be sore and itchy for a while.”

Thanks for the advice! Jaypaw bit back his reply. He was going to have to get used to listening to lessons he didn’t need; unlike Hollypaw and Lionpaw, he would be treated as an apprentice for many moons yet. As a medicine cat, he would still be expected to learn from his mentor and follow her orders even after he was given his Clan name. He might as well get used to it.

“Thanks, Jaypaw.” Toadkit’s grateful mew took him by surprise. “Sorry I was such a mouse-brain.”

Jaypaw felt a flood of sympathy for the young kit. “You were scared and hurt.”

“I’m fine now, thanks to you.” Toadkit began to head toward the entrance.

“Aren’t you going to wait for Daisy to fetch you?” Jaypaw called.

Toadkit paused. “I think I can find my way back to the nursery.”

Cheeky furball! Jaypaw felt a flicker of pride. Toadkit had been hard work, but Jaypaw had managed to earn his respect.

As the brambles swished shut behind the young kit, Jaypaw began clearing up the unused pulp. “I’ll take the poppy seed over to the nursery before bedtime,” he promised Leafpool before she could remind him.

But Leafpool seemed busy with her own thoughts. Jaypaw paused from his clearing up. She’s worried. Her mind, though closed to him, seemed to prickle with uneasy energy, like lightning on the horizon. As she padded to where Jaypaw had left the half-wrapped packet of honey, her steps were heavy, as though weariness weighted her paws. She must’ve worked twice as hard while I was away. He quickly scraped up the last of the pulp and, flicking it into the corner of the den, hurried to help his mentor.

“Sorry I didn’t have time to finish this.” He pressed his paws down on the honey parcel, now well bundled in rhubarb leaf, and held it fast while Leafpool wrapped the bark strips around it.

She tucked the last one in place. “You had to look after Toadkit.” Even her mew sounded tired. Why hadn’t he noticed before?

“I’ll check the stores,” he meowed, licking the last of the dock juice from his paws. “You were saying that we need to find out what we’ve got before leaf-fall arrives, in case we need to stock up.” He padded to the rock cleft and squeezed inside before Leafpool could offer to help.

They had only recently discovered this useful gap in the rock wall of the medicine cave. Leafpool had been clearing away the ivy that had gradually been creeping along the cave wall, threatening to dip its greedy roots into the precious supply of rainwater that pooled at the side of the den. The crack was narrow, wide enough for only a small cat to squeeze through, but inside it opened into a space large enough for a nest. Inside it now, Jaypaw had enough room to turn around, and he began sniffing the different piles of herbs, berries, and roots stacked along the wall.

“Pass them out,” Leafpool called. “We can see what we’ve got.”

One pile at a time, Jaypaw pushed them through the cleft.

By the time he emerged, Leafpool had them ordered into neat rows. His sensitive nose placed each scent until he had built a picture in his mind of one small heap piled beside the next: comfrey, mallow, thyme, catmint, poppy seeds gathered in an expertly folded bark shell, and countless more.

“Not much mallow,” Leafpool commented. “And I still want to get more catmint.” Leaves rustled beneath her paw. “I brought back as much as I could carry today, but there’s plenty more, and we should gather it while it’s still in full leaf and dry it to be ready for leaf-bare.”

Drying the leaves in the sun was the best way of making sure they didn’t rot away in storage.

Jaypaw felt a bundle of thyme, tickly beneath his paw. It smelled stale. “How old is this?”

Leafpool bent toward him to sniff it. “Must have been gathered last greenleaf,” she observed. “It’ll have lost a lot of strength. We should get fresh.”

“Do we have any deathberries?” Jaypaw had heard Littlecloud mention the fatal berry last time they were at the Moonpool. It was used only to save the sickest cats from a lingering death. A bushful of them grew on ShadowClan land, and Littlecloud had offered to share them. Leafpool had refused, and Jaypaw sensed a prickle of unease from her now.

“I don’t use deathberries,” she murmured. She began to pick through a pile of coltsfoot. “ShadowClan medicine cats keep them,” she added. “They teach their apprentices how to use them.” Her voice was thick, as though a dark memory filled her mind. “But I won’t teach you.”

Why not? Jaypaw was intrigued by the idea of having the power of life and death in his paws.

Leafpool clearly wanted nothing to do with it. “We must do all we can to help our Clanmates, but it’s up to StarClan to choose the moment of death.” She pushed a pile of leaves toward Jaypaw. Comfrey, by the smell of it. “Sort through these and throw out any that are musty or starting to lose their scent.”