Sparkpaw

Kit Name: Sparkfire

Apprentice Name: Sparkpaw

Warrior Name: Sparkfire

Gender: Female 

Rank: Apprentice 

Mentor: Sootpelt (formerly), Shadestar

Status: Alive 

Father: Flameheart

Mother: tbd

Sibling: Pinepaw

Sparkpaw is a rambunctious and energetic she-cat who always seems to be rushing into things. She has a bit of a temper and has started her fair share of fights with the other apprentices and sometimes even the younger warriors. She often speaks without thinking, a habit that has gotten her in trouble many times in the past. While she often holds grudges Sparkpaw is also very loyal and fiercely protective of her friends and family. 

Shortly after becoming an apprentice Sparkpaw's impulsiveness got her and her mentor into a fight with a group of loners after Sparkpaw attacked them for "invading" Forestclan's territory. Her mentor Sootpelt was forced to join the fight in order to break it up and suffered a fairly serious injury before being able to stop the fighting. Luckily for Sootpelt a border patrol had been nearby and was able to help him and Sparkpaw back to camp. 

Due to the severity of his injury Sootpelt was given strict orders to rest while his injury healed. Once it became clear that he wouldn't be able to teach Sparkpaw much of anything until his injury healed Sootpelt went to Shadestar and asked that Sparkpaw be given a new mentor so she could still continue her apprenticeship even if he couldn't continue being her mentor. 

Shadestar ended up taking on the job of being Sparkpaw's mentor herself, a choice Sparkpaw wasn't exactly thrilled about. Shadestar had Sparkpaw collecting and changing bedding along with accompanying Minnowleap and Flintpaw to gather herbs instead of letting her join border patrols or doing battle training with her. Shadestar claimed it was because she needed to get an idea for Sparkpaw’s abilities before they started really getting into battle training but Sparkpaw claimed that Shadestar really just hated her. Generally her complaints were just seen as dramatic and she was often told as much by some of the other apprentices. 

A few weeks after becoming Shadestar's apprentice and the night Sparkpaw hadn't been allowed to attend a gathering alongside Pinepaw she met a cat she had never seen before in her dreams. The cat seemed to have stars in his fur and  introduced himself as Grayclaw, a former Forestclan warrior. Sparkpaw was fascinated by this strange cat, a cat that she was sure had to be from Starclan, and then Grayclaw offered to help train Sparkpaw, to help her learn how to fight since Shadestar would not. Sparkpaw jumped at the chance to continue her battle training and the next night when she fell asleep she found herself inside a shadowed forest with Grayclaw already waiting for her.

It was strange, training in her dreams. It felt real, Sparkpaw would wake up with sore muscles and even the same injuries she’d gotten the night before in her dreams. She once had to lie and say a thorn had gotten into her best and scratched her in her sleep when she woke up to Pinepaw worrying over a still bleeding scratch on Sparkpaw's leg. Grayclaw has never forbidden her from talking about their nightly training sessions but something in Sparkpaw told her to keep quiet so she did. 

About a moon after she first started training with Grayclaw Sparkpaw got to meet other cats. There were more cats like Grayclaw with stars in their fur like Cloudfang, Silverfur, and Thunderclaw. And there were also cats like Sparkpaw, cats that were still living, like Blossompelt and Honeystipe. Blossompelt was nice but very fidgety and Honeystipe didn't say much but he seemed ok. There were other cats too but that first night Sparkpaw only got a small amount of time to try and talk to the others before Grayclaw was whisking her away. 

A few nights later Grayclaw told Sparkpaw that she was finally ready to start her training for real. Sparkpaw was excited, wondering what kind of training it could be. Up until that point she and Grayclaw had only ever trained one on one. It was hard, Grayclaw was bigger and faster and fought with claws unsheathed but Sparkpaw was getting better, even Shadestar had noticed it, even though she was still taking things way too slow with Sparkpaw’s battle training way too slow in the waking world. Sparkpaw was eager to show off what she had learned, to prove that she had what it took to become a great warrior. 

Then, Sparkpaw watched a cat tear their opponent’s throat out and heard the group surrounding them cheer. Sparkpaw felt her heart stop in that moment, desperately hoping that she had suddenly fallen into a nightmare but she hadn't. She was in the same forest she had been training in for weeks, surrounded by cats with stars in their fur, except now she could see that those stars were red. Sparkpaw was surrounded by cats with blood forever dripping from fatal injuries, forced to watch as cats like her tore each other apart to the cheers of the cats she had thought were from Starclan.

Sparkpaw was horrified and she was trapped. It wasn't long before Sparkpaw was shoved into the middle of the circle, a cat even smaller than her shoved in behind her. Sparkpaw could see the fear in her opponent's eyes as they began circling each other, neither wanting to make the first move but both knowing they had to fight. 

It was a one sided fight, Sparkpaw had her opponent pinned in a matter of minutes. As she stood there with her paw on the younger cat’s chest she could hear the sounds of cheers surrounding her. When she looked up she locked gazes with Grayclaw, his eyes locked onto her. Grayclaw told her to finish it, to strike the final blow but Sparkpaw couldn't. She backed away from her opponent, trembling as the cheers turned to shouts of anger. Her opponent tried to get away, rolling to his feet and attempting to flee but Grayclaw stopped him.

In one fluid motion Grayclaw slashed through the young apprentice’s throat. The cat was dead before he even hit the ground. Sparkpaw stood frozen as the apprentice’s blood began to trickle towards her, she had to wake up, she had to wake up, she had to wake up.

Sparkpaw woke up with tears in her eyes and a knot in her stomach. She didn't talk much that day, and when night came she didn't go to the apprentice den, instead she snuck out of camp. She wandered the forest until the sun slowly began to peek through the trees. She narrowly missed the dawn patrol on her way back into camp and managed to sneak into her nest with waking any of her denmates. Moments later her denmates’ mentors began coming to fetch them and Sparkpaw once again left the den. She was exhausted but she couldn't bring herself to sleep, terrified of ending back in that blood soaked forest. 

Despite her best efforts Sparkpaw couldn't keep herself awake the following night. She found her eyes falling shut and when she opened them she was back in that terrifying forest. She didn't even bother looking around, she just bolted. She ran desperately through the blackened trees, searching for any amount of light on the sea of shadows. Sometimes Sparkpaw caught a glance of a cat and she could faintly hear the sound of pawsteps trailing her but she didn't stop, not until she found herself hurtling out of the forest and into a flowering meadow. 

In the meadow Sparkpaw finally collapsed, her chest heaving as she struggled to catch her breath. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Grayclaw creep out of the dense trees but he stopped before crossing into the meadow, a dark look on his face. Behind her, Sparkpaw suddenly heard the rustling of footsteps and when she turned she was met with the sight on two cats, one large and scarred and one small. They were both white but the smaller one also had a scattering of gray spots alongside flower petals tangled in her fur. They both had stars in their fur too, but this time the stars were actually white. 

Grayclaw tried to step forward but the larger white cat quickly put himself between Sparkpaw and the Grayclaw. The smaller cat padded over to stand beside where Sparkpaw was still sprawled out on the ground, whispering reassurances as she helped Sparkpaw to her feet. 

“She’s ours!” Grayclaw snarled but the big white cat shook his head. 

“No, she’s not. Go back to your forest, this one is Starclan's.” 

Sparkpaw had been sure Grayclaw would bound across the divide and throw himself at the white cat but he didn't. He kept his gaze on the white cat for several moments before briefly looking to Sparkpaw, his eyes hard and cold, before turning and disappearing with a hiss. 

When even the sound of Grayclaw’s pawsteps had faded from view the larger white cat turned to face Sparkpaw and his companion and Sparkpaw finally recognized him. This was Cloudstar, the former leader of Forestclan before Shadestar. Sparkpaw found out that the smaller cat was Blossomkit, Cloudstar’s sister, and that Grayclaw was actually their brother. Cloudstar and Blossomkit told Sparkpaw the truth about the forest she had found herself trapped in, about how it was where those who were rejected by Starclan were sent to. 

For a moment Sparkpaw worried she had doomed herself to the forest forever but Blossomkit assured her that that was not the case. Living cats were sometimes lured into the forest but they could leave if they were brave enough to try. The meadow Sparkpaw had fled to acted as a border between Starclan’s hunting grounds and the forest. It was technically ruled by neither side but cat’s of the forest never dared cross the border. 

For cats like Sparkpaw the meadow was their salvation. It meant that they had escaped and that they could be free from the forest. Blossomkit warned Sparkpaw that sometimes even cats like her found themselves unable to cross the forest’s border into the meadow, those whose paws were too stained with blood and whose hearts had turned too black. She called Sparkpaw lucky and told her if she ever choose to return to the forest she may not be able to make it back out again. 

Sparkpaw awoke to Pinepaw shaking her awake with worry in his eyes. He said that she had been crying out in her sleep but Sparkpaw refused to tell him what she had been dreaming about. She never found herself in the forest again, though there were a few times she found herself in the meadow, peering into the forest with an invisible force tugging at her paws. On those nights Sparkpaw usually woke up with her claws dug into the earth, frantically holding on to whatever they could grasp.

Sparkpaw eventually learned how to get along with Shadestar and the two of them even ended developing a solid relationship by the time Sparkpaw earned her warrior name. By the time Sparkpaw had earned her warrior name she had developed a great deal more patience and had improved her battling skills even without secret night lessons.

Extra Info

- She has excellent hearing