[Fawn]

♠BLACKWOLF♠ _{of NightClan}

I am the Sin Called Wrath.

Featuring [smear:9ee6ba]Frogsplash[/smear:FFFFFF]

"So you're Applepaw, huh? What's it been like training with snake-eyes over there?"

Jet black ears swiveled with minimal interest to the pair of voices just behind him, silent, wolf-like movements neither slowing nor faltering despite being the subject of their conversation. Blackwolf wasn't necessarily in a bad mood, but nor was he in an overwhelmingly good one either. The last few sunrises had left him a little... Not necessarily out of sorts, but more pensive than usual, more introspective, as if he had found a mark on a previously spotless surface, and couldn't, for the life of him, figure out how it had gotten there.

For the NightClan tom with a temper and a habit of never apologizing, his 'daring rescue' of Ghostlight had some kind of unforeseen long term effect on the otherwise normal creature. Confused over the fact that he didn't outright hate Ghostlight as much as she probably deserved, and even more flummoxing is the idea that he wasn't even that completely agitated with her. Probably because she's not right in front of me waving her tail and smirking like she's StarClan's gift to the forest. He noted with a mixture of bitterness and derision.

Blackwolf wasn't alone, clearly by the fluffy young tom who followed in his wake alongside a she-cat with a beautiful marbled coat, one of NightClan's newest warrior by the name of Frogsplash. Once upon a time, a young, awkward she-cat had been following after him claiming to want to learn how to catch an owl, but with the arrival of maturity was the departure of her childish crush on him - which was all for the better, as he had never viewed her as anything more than a kid-sister type of nuisance. She was utterly over him now, judging by the characteristic gleam of devilry and the confidence of her stride, having fully bounced back from the death of her uncle-slash-mentor.

~*~

While Blackwolf took the hunting patrol closer towards the muddy pools, Frogsplash kept up her amicable conversation with the somewhat unusual, fluffy tom-kit that had the misfortune of being assigned to Blackwolf of all cats. Steps easy going though the casual left-to-right sway of a honey-based, black-ringed tail conveyed the underlying energy and vigor of the NightClan youth. Thoughts drifting back to her best friends, Grimjaw and Darkice, now, it felt like it had literally been yesterday that they had all slept next to one another, dreaming of the days when their life as apprentices would soon be over.
Glancing over to Applepaw, Frogsplash was able to note with a mixture of pride and satisfaction that even as three new warriors had joined their comrades in the warriors' den, the nursery had produced another batch of would-be future NightClan warriors, and just as Boneshadow had helped shape her into the warrioress she was today, Frogsplash had agreed to aid Blackwolf and Applepaw in their training in any way that she could.

Even if it meant just a little friendly conversation and competition with the two toms who were so vastly different from one another.

[Deleted]

Applepaw tagged along behind his mentor with a cat he had never really been around before, he found that happening quite a bit as he had never been allowed out of the nursery for very long without his sister. Often he would get dragged back and sent to his nest for a nap before he ever had a chance to even talk to the cats the occupied the camp outside of his little nursery home. So as he was questioned by Frogsplash, after he had to be reminding of her name, he followed her and his tall dark and scary mentor out of camp getting ready for some sort of training session. He was probably told by Blackwolf but it wouldn’t matter what he said, most of the time he was in any sort of proximity to his mentor he was just super upset and touchy. He twitched an ear as he listened to the she-cat questioning him about training and couldn’t help but let out a girly giggle as she called him snake-eyes. “There hasn’t been much training.” He confessed as he recounted their first adventure out of camp together. “He did stick me in a tree against my will however, so I learned how to climb really fast. If I hadn’t I’d probably still be up there.”

[Fawn]

♠BLACKWOLF♠ _{of NightClan}

I am the Sin Called Wrath.

Featuring Frogsplash

Frogsplash's ears pricked forward in surprise at the apprentice's retelling of his most recent 'training session'. She should've been more surprised by her own reaction - of course Blackwolf would put an apprentice in a tree. He was a bully if ever there was one, and the apprentices in general were usually prime targets; it was unusual for him to go after his own though, Frogsplash had noted. He'd trained Grimjaw and Clawstorm, and neither one had ever complained to her about any sort of mistreatment. Though Grimjaw would never complain of anything, not even if he were bleeding from both ears and close to collapse. Frogsplash liked to think that the suffix part of his name was more or less a tribute to just how easily Grimjaw could keep his mouth shut, refusing to speak up about things that my be bothering him.

Pulling her thoughts away from her two best friends, Grimjaw and Darkice, Frogsplash swiped her tail over Applepaw's ears in a playful gesture, amber-yellow eyes sparkling with a roguish sort of glee, as if she would delight in teaching Applepaw how to best his grouchy, bigoted mentor if only for the sake of seeing Blackwolf so annoyed. "Well at least you learned a valuable lesson about climbing - that'll come in handy if you ever have to fight a TreeClan cat." Frogsplash almost hesitated just then, not quite sure why 'fight' and 'Applepaw' did not really belong in the same sentence. It was true that the littermate to the much more aggressive, if not tom-ish Strawberrypaw was more of the sister in their relationship then his own sister was, but that didn't mean he wouldn't have his fair share of fights. Whatever career path he wanted, being able to protect and defend himself, his Clan and the cats he loved was a valuable skill to have.

~*~

The jet black tom finally came to a standstill once they were in a decently dry area of NightClan territory, Blackwolf pivoting on tar-dark paws to face the pair of them, at first eying Frogsplash as though he could not decide if he wanted her to stay or go. She lifted her chin at him, eyes glittering like crystallized tree sap in the light that came filtering in through the gaps in the branches overhead. Blackwolf rolled his shoulders, neck, stretched out his front limbs, back limbs, and then arched his spine. "You too, Applepaw. If you stretch now you won't injure yourself later." While Blackwolf mewing instructions to his apprentice, Frogsplash set about stretching too, though with a slight roll of the eyes that Blackwolf's mismatched orbs completely missed, her ringed tail held semi-high in the air to convey her good mood. Stretching was important, yes, but for a new warrior who had been hunting for at least 6 moons, she was already limbered up and would not cramp if she held a crouched or stalking position too long.

The same might not be the case for Applepaw, however, as he had not gotten much exercise while in the nursery, had he?

"We're going to learn how to stalk birds, and how best to catch them based on what kind of bird they are. Applepaw," Blackwolf's words were barked, but they were with a note of indifference, as if he had made his peace with the apprentice he'd been given but would make no serious effort to make this a 'fun' experience. It was work, and that's all it was going to be. "Name three birds you're most likely to find in NightClan territory."

Frogsplash: 2cd46d
Blackwolf: 000000.