The Precious Yesterday [Dove Fam]

Dovefrost sat off to the side of Skyclan camp, his eyes taking in the whole thing again for.. well he didn't know how many time he had looked over this camp. It was strange... It seemed like forever ago that he was last in Thunderclan.. He missed them sure.. He missed the cats he made connections with, Fawnshine, Starlingflare, Mottlerose... just to name a few, but at the same time he didn't think he would go back and change the choice he made. He loved Beechfang, he loved his kits.. It seemed like just yesterday he was looking at his newly birthed kits, getting to name them along side his mate, but now as he took in the camp again, they were growing up fast. Stars it was so fast... It was only a matter of time before they all became warriors..

With some training, Wolfpaw had become almost as comfortable in the trees as her mentor was. Cheerfully, she dropped the two birds she'd caught on the fresh-kill pile, glancing around camp. Her father's pale pelt stood out against the greenery, and snagging one of the birds she'd just dropped, the fluffy apprentice bounded over to him with a grin. "Dad!" she chirped cheerfully, "Look what I caught! And Ravenclaw's teaching me to fight, too!" Impossible not to, even in a world without the looming threat of whatever Riverclan would do in the back of everyone's mind. A thought she was very much trying to ignore, at the moment.

Lichenpaw had finally finished cleaning the elder's den, and Yewfrost didn't have any training for him, today; so the apprentice eagerly took the time to just relax in the cool shade. A flash of white fur within camp distracted him, however.. He beamed as he recognized them as Dovefrost and Wolfpaw. He flicked his tail in friendly greeting to his kin, approaching the duo with a bright "Hello!" His smile faded a bit as he came closer. It was hard to gauge his dad's expression.. But he almost looked.. sad? "..Nothing's wrong, right, dad?" Lichenpaw asked softly, concern growing on his face. Obviously things were wrong; all the events of the Gathering weren't forgotten by any SkyClan cat.. But it was still weird, seeing Dovefrost do nothing but gaze over camp.

A bright grin covered the tom's maw as soon as Wolfpaw approached with a bird, showing off what she had caught in a patrol. "That's wonderful Wolfpaw. I'm so glad you are growing into a wonderful warrior." He told his daughter before two of his other children approached, obviously catching on to his mood before Wolfpaw approached.

"Everything is okay Lichenpaw, and Plumpaw. Just thinking about how big of a change this was for me, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. Having all of you in my life is enough." He told them all with a fatherly look of love on his face. He was so glad he got to see them grow up, to see them become warriors. If he had stayed in Thunderclan he would have gotten none of this.

Trufflepaw strode up to her family, her flowing fur shifting slightly in the breeze. "Why would we be worried? Mother did nothing wrong, and RiverClan is nothing to fear anyway. I highly doubt Bloodstar will even do much. Old thing is about ready to keel over." The apprenticed huffed, only loud enough for her gathered family to hear. Bloodstar seemed like a hinderance to the clan, but Briarthorn seemed just as weak in her opinion. No, Beechfang should have been made deputy. Briarthron wasn't even a SkyClan cat, not that Trufflepaw really cared for clan allegiances, but it just simply did not make sense.

"Hey," Wolfpaw purred a greeting to Plumpaw and Lichenpaw. They'd zero'd in on Dovefrost's mood too, but rather than try and avoid it they'd chosen to ask about it instead. It seemed like everyone was in a mood recently, the tension in the air almost thick enough to cut through with her claws. Dovefrost's answer hadn't been what she'd expected, and she felt herself smile, however. "Is it really so different?" She was curious, she had to admit. Wolfpaw knew that Dovefrost had been a medicine cat of Thunderclan, but not much else. She couldn't imagine her life being any other way than it was now, with both parents and so many siblings.

Trufflepaw's words gave her pause, though. "She confessed to killing someone. I don't think that's 'nothing wrong,'" Wolfpaw mewed, eyeing Trufflepaw. How could she think mom had done nothing wrong? "She's still our mom, though. But Bloodstar has to do something, doesn't he?" What, that was the question. "Better him than Riverclan, I think." He'd seemed... Well, Wolfpaw didn't know her grandfather well at all. Trufflepaw was right that he was old.

"So? She didn't."

Birdpaw's appearance had seemed sudden, popping up at Trufflepaw's side unannounced. Her fur was slightly mussed, her eyes half-closed from weariness; she'd just returned from a routine sparring lesson that had left her ego with more bruises than her opponent, and she couldn't resist joining her family when she saw them flocking together. Though the conversation she walked in on was a tense one, she seemed unbothered by it. A soft smile warmed her features, and all her bunched muscles smoothed beneath her fur as she settled onto her haunches. "I think she was asking for it. If fish-breath wanted to stay alive so bad, she wouldn't have done anything to provoke. Mother was just helping, to see how well RiverClan could really swim." Birdpaw snickered, nose wrinkling at her own poor joke. "Not that she shouldn't be punished- she did break the code, I suppose -but she hardly did anything wrong."

Lichenpaw had almost forgotten his father hadn't always lived in SkyClan.. The thought felt weird; that Dovefrost was once a medicine cat of an entirely different clan, rather than a warrior and their father. Still, Lichenpaw's smile grew back to Dovefrost's kind expression. "Hey.. What was ThunderClan like?" he mewed, curiosity clear in his voice.

Lichenpaw turned, facing his newly-entered sister with a slightly furrowed brow. "But.. she was just a medicine cat, and all she did was cross the border! What if something like that happened to a SkyClan cat?" He shifted from paw-to-paw as his sister finished speaking, "Even if Cloverheart provoked her, what mom did was wrong, Birdpaw. No-one should do that to another cat on purpose."

Plumpaw shifted uncomfortably as her siblings argued over whether their mother had been wrong. Plumpaw wanted to believe that Beechfang's actions were justified, but some cats seemed so quick to condemn her. Murder is wrong, of course, but what drove Beechfang to that point in the first place? Surely a cat capable of cold-blooded murder can't be the same cat who helps their clanmates and raises kits?

Plumpaw kept her thoughts private, perfectly content to let her siblings do all the debating. Instead, she turned to Dovefrost in an attempt to change the subject.

"What were you like as an apprentice?" She asked, cocking her head curiously as she waited for an answer.

Dovefrost couldn't help but let out a deep breath as his kits began to debate what happened with Beechfang.. While he wasn't exactly happy with the fact that she would kill Cloverheart, he always knew there was something bad between the two of them. Though of course he didn't agree with what Riverclan wanted as punishment.. If what Beechfang had said was true, then Cloverheart did instigate the situation.. Stars.. he didn't want to think about it..

Thankfully Plumpaw had managed to distract him from his thoughts, having gotten lost in them due to the others words.

"As an apprentice? I was a little weird.. Actually that reminds me, I got into a fight with Shadowclan's Medicine Cat Apprentice cause she crossed the border trying to get Mossbloom to train her. Of course at the time I didn't know she was a Medicine Cat Apprentice." It was kind of ironic wasn't it? "After that.. well the Asylum, a nasty rogue group, showed up and kind of threw a loop in my warrior training. Luckily we managed to beat them back."