How Could You? [Smokepetal]

Beechfang stared at rocky overhang of the medicine den from across camp, tail swishing back and forth. The medicine den, the elder's den... So much blood had been shed, she wanted nothing more than to avoid both. Were it not for her kits and the life she so desperately tried to cling to, perhaps a part of her would want to avoid Skyclan camp altogether. She didn't, though, and she couldn't avoid the medicine den for much longer, either. There was a conversation that was needed, if only to bring her peace of mind. Bloodstrike was gone now, she'd buried him, but... Still. And Spottedfrog was injured, a cat she hadn't cared about but who, at the very least, had shared her love for their father. Smokepetal... Her voice had been quiet that day, but Beechfang had still heard her.

She wanted to believe that her father had not been given poppy seeds, given his history, but the scene played in her mind over and over. And over.

Silently, Beechfang forced her paws to move, heading directly for the den. Smokepetal was in there, she hoped. If not, then she could simply leave and put this off... But she didn't know how much longer she could do so with the scene of her father's last moments still so vivid in her memory.

"Smokepetal. We need to talk." Beechfang ducked her head into the den, fighting the urge to recoil from the place that had been stained with so much blood.

The aftermath of the incident had left the medicine den a mess, and having had to throw many a blood splattered herb away, Smokepetal knew that the current stock was pitifully low. Luckily, the supply of catmint had remained untainted, but as she sat amongst piles of herbs, counting and sorting and discarding more that she'd missed the first round, she couldn't help but feel even more like a failure. So many valuable resources, gone, and dwindling further with the amount of wounds she'd had to treat even since.

With a light sigh, she glanced over towards the corner of the den, where Spottedfrog lay, as curled as she could be with her injury. It had been days since the initial injury, and while the wounds themselves had begun to heal nicely, still the leg refused to hold weight, or respond at all to anything the older warrior asked it to do. It didn't look good. The medicine cat was no fool... and all the signs pointed to the elders' den being in Spottedfrog's near future... but she couldn't bring herself to tell that to the warrior herself, much less anyone else. Though rationally she knew what had happened wasn't her fault, Smokepetal was plagued with guilt every time she laid eyes on the black and white warrior. Another valuable member of SkyClan, injured on her watch and now destined to probably never be a warrior again.

Beechfang's voice preceded the large gray she-cat's entrance into the medicine den, and Smokepetal briefly closed her eyes, trying to swallow past the lump of fear and dread in her throat. The ex-medicine cat was the last person she wanted to talk to, but she managed to steel herself just in time to turn and catch Beechfang's gaze. "Oh - h-hello, Beechfang. Is there something I can..?" she trailed off, eyes quickly raking the other cat and seeing no apparent injury or illness. Her ears slicked back uncertainly.

Smokepetal turned to Beechfang after a moment of.. hesitation? Resignation? Eyes scanning the older she-cat doubtless for injuries. Given the situation that had led to Spottedfrog laying in a nest off to the side (and had led to the clearing out of several nests in the den), Beechfang expected she wasn't a cat Smokepetal was keen on seeing in her den. The feeling was mutual.

"I'm fine." Came the lie, terse as ever. Her gaze slid to the piles of herbs that were evidently being sorted through... Dwindling piles. A dangerous thing, but expected with how many injuries Skyclan had been dealing with recently. Beechfang frowned at the pile. She'd go and gather what she could, maybe return to twolegplace for some of the more useful things that would be needed as the seasons inevitably began to change. The sight of the poppy seeds made her stomach churn. Smokepetal's absent-minded mumble playing in her thoughts.

A quiet huff escaped the she-cat, forcing her gaze back to Smokepetal, and Spottedfrog awkwardly laying in her nest. "Any chance of that leg healing?" Beechfang wasn't hopeful. She knew the basics, but had avoided the den and her half sister. From where she stood the way in which Spottedfrog was laying... It reminded her of Smokefeather, though their injuries hadn't been quite the same. "Father would be rolling in his grave, if that fog he was in lifted in death." Beechfang's tail lashed once, bitter gaze settling on Smokepetal. A selfish part of her hoped that in the afterlife he didn't realize the harm he'd wrought on the way out. It would have been kinder... And wrong, she knew.

"Tell me you didn't give him poppy seeds. That this wasn't-" your fault, Beechfang stopped herself. I should've saw to his recovery myself.

The tension in the air was uncomfortable, something that extended not just between herself and Beechfang, but Spottedfrog as well, who up until now had been in a near catatonic depression. Smokepetal shifted between concern and uncertainty, glancing between the two she-cats warily, but despite the murderous glare fixated on the older she-cat, her patient made no move to rise and so Smokepetal forced her hackles to lie flat and turned back to their visitor as Beechfang began speaking.

"It's doing... as well as can be expected," she responded in a guarded tone. Briefly, she wondered if the concern was genuine, given everything that had happened. Beechfang continued, remarking on the she-cats' shared parent and the damage he had done before-

Smokepetal swallowed hard, the image of Beechfang's claws slicing through the air flashing before her mind's eye. She tried very hard not to tremble as the other she-cat continued, asking about poppy seeds in a tone that, to be quite honest, confused the heck out of her. "I- I don't understand the problem," she breathed. "He was- the injuries- he needed-" Unable to form even half a coherent sentence, Smokepetal took a step back, jaw quivering, and shook her head.

"Bloodstrike was very injured. He needed the rest, and the poppy seeds gave him that chance, I-" she lifted her gaze to meet Beechfang's, and despite her fear, Smokepetal's tone held a hint of indignance as she continued. "The treatment plan I used on him was the same as... as anyone else who would have come in with similar injuries, I- I didn't do anything-" She trailed off again. The suspicion and accusation was clear in Beechfang's voice, but Smokepetal simply didn't understand why.

Beechfang could feel her half-sister's glare searing her pelt. Spottedfrog could glare all she wanted, blame her all she wanted. In another time Beechfang would have returned her glares, her vitriol, tenfold. Now though, she was simply tired. Spottedfrog was too injured to do any harm, that glare was all she had.

Smokepetal's response... The scarred tabby let out a slow sigh and sat, what was left of her ears flat to her skull in dismay. "Poppy seeds were the last thing he needed. The very last. No matter how injured he was." Smokepetal continued, trying to justify their use. For any other warrior, that logic would have worked. Beechfang stayed silent for a moment, trying to muster the strength to speak. Smokepetal must not have known, and Spottedfrog... She wasn't actually sure how much her much younger half sister knew about what had happened before she was born.

"He... Never reacted well to them. Not after what the Asylum did to him. We got him back after an entire season, he'd lost his foxing mind because of them. The recovery was... Unpleasant." Understatement of the year. "There was a reason I never kept poppy seeds in the den while I was still medicine cat. I suppose that's changed." There was a sour note to her tone. Perhaps it had been unfair, but at the time she had done what she thought necessary.