Top of Our School [C]

Subconsciously, she had learned to keep an eye on her family. It was for a myriad of reasons. As the first to earn her warrior name, she cared deeply about all of her siblings. Tinyshadow had joined her in the warriors den, so she often looked for her brother to see how he was faring. If she could join him on a patrol or not. Wrenpaw had transitioned from being on the path of a warrior to now training as a medicine cat, and so the carbon-copy of their mother found herself searching for her sister to see if she was adjusting well enough. Perchstar was an easy enough answer-it was her mother. One who was due respect and she would hate to be the one to slip up.

Then there was Willowpaw.

Willow, her sister, who should have been the first one to earn her name. In every right and reason, it felt as if she would have been the one to have deserved it most. Not the sickly apprentice who had somehow pulled out from that illness, only to charge ahead, and now was tasked with training two of her clanmates in turn.

It just didn't feel right.

That had given her a subconscious avoidance, and a nagging feeling in her belly that never wanted to go away. Guilt was truly what it was. Guilt that she had taken a prestigious title from her sister, when it wasn't hers to have taken. So as she saw the slightest glimpse of that pale silver fur, Mistwalker had began eating her meal just a bit faster. Looked around for her own apprentices as some sort of excuse to get moving early. It felt awful to consistently brush her sister off, but... they were busy. Clan life meant they both had their responsibilities to take care of, which made it easy enough for the warrior to simply tell herself it was a conversation best served for another time.

Until she couldn't wait any longer.

There was no lie as she greeted her sister with a dip of her head, a kin-bonded warmth that flickered for just a moment in her shared blue gaze. "Willow," She greeted. "Busy. Two apprentices takes up much time." She didn't like answering questions on how she was, it was much easier to speak in fact rather than emotion. Mistwalker found herself emulating their mother as she prompted her next question, stiffening just slightly at the discomfort that came from being so... caring. Not that it bothered her to care about her sister, not in the slightest. It was just not in her typical daily vocabulary to engage in such a conversation. "How have your duties with Stormdance been?"

Unsurprisingly, she was training well beneath her mentor's tutelage. That was simply how her sister always was. Nigh-on the perfect apprentice, always working to hone her talents, unable to accept anything less than perfection. Had there been a set of their mother's litter to be named a worthy successor, Willowpaw worked tirelessly to achieve that worth. A nod towards her paler-furred sibling was her signal of satisfaction of the news, allowing at least some modicum of manners as she chewed at her prey.

Her jaw tensed, however, as her sister asked that question. Mistwalker's face hardened into that mask that they both would know instantly: it was the look of their mother when processing an emotion that felt like it was too strong. Or, to the warrior herself, unfamiliar. Just exactly what ugly feeling it was that crawled beneath her pelt, she couldn't quite name. Guilt, perhaps, was the closest approximation to it. But she had already felt that for this entire encounter... this was something different. Worse. Was it some feeling of wrong-doing, for giving her sister the impression that it was she who had done something wrong? Was she even brave enough to finally reveal how she felt?

Of course she was. She was the daughter of Perchstar, the first in their family to earn her warrior name. Swallowing the rest of her bite, Mistwalker's gaze failed to meet that of her sister. "You have done nothing wrong, sister." Carefully, the two-toned molly answered. Wrenpaw always had such an easier time in drawing the answers out of her, of allowing that thick mist of her mind and emotions to part to really showcase how she felt. She simply didn't have that bond with Willowpaw, and that was truthfully more of her own fault than that of her sibling. Even Tinyshadow she had an easier time being vocal with.

It would be now or never. There was no dancing around the subject, because in the skill of an expert hunter, Willowpaw had her pinned. She couldn't escape, because even just that simple tell that there was something, especially given the way she avoided her sister's gaze? She would know. Closing her eyes to release a sigh of tension, her teeth clenched for once more moment before she forced herself to look at her sister's face. "...I am afraid, Willowpaw, that I have hurt you." That was the core truth of the matter. However, that simply answered the what, not the why that had been asked of her. "I feel it was wrong for me to earn my name before you. ... That... you dislike me because I have." She braced for the reaction. Her ears tilted themselves back just slightly, waiting for the brutal honesty that would meet her. In a way, Mistwalker was thankful for it. There would be no confusion on just where Willowpaw's opinions stood. If she was frustrated about it? She would know. If she thought her sister to be an absolute idiot for thinking that would change her judgement of her sibling? Well.. she was about to find out.