Rabbitpaw was in a clearing that seemed to be surrounded by thick, ancient oak trees. He felt rather uncomfortable with the trees blocking out the starry sky, closing in on him. Wearily, he sniffed the air around him. He could quickly scent a mouse nearby. Moments later, he saw the creature nibbling on a root, oblivious to his presence.

     Rabbitpaw licked his lips hungrily and instinctively dropped down to a crouch. He looked at the ground, and saw all of the debris all rotted and withered as time wore down on it all. He imagined hunting in clear land was much easier. Before he could make a move however, a eerie voice called out from the depths of the shady treetops.

"Rabbitpaw.....Rabbitpaw...."

    By now the mouse was long gone, startled by the noise. He heard as the voice got closer.... And closer.....

    "Rabbitpaw! Wake up!" His mentor almost shouted into his ear.

   Rabbitpaw stirred. "Hmm? Wha?" He meowed sleepily.

     "Finally! You were sleeping like an adder in leafbare!" Duskpelt meowed. "Remember today? Going to go around WindClan?"

     At that Rabbitpaw groggily rose to his paws and tried shaking the tiredness out of him. "Are we going now?" He asked, a bit dazed from the awakening.

     Duskpelt turned his head to two cats padding towards us. "Not yet. Petalpaw and her mentor Quickstorm are going to join us." He watched Quickstorm, a huge, sleek, silvery tom cat padded with his apprentice, Petalpaw, a pretty tortoiseshell patterned she-cat who was a few moons older than Rabbitpaw and towered over him in comparison.

      "Petalpaw, today we will join Duskpelt and Rabbitpaw who are going around the territory. So, I want to take this chance to mark our borders," Quickstorm meowed in a deep voice, "As we want to keep straying RiverClan and ThunderClan cats out of our borders."

      "Not to mention kittypets and loners, right?" Petalpaw inquired.

      Quickstorm nodded. "Yes. We must keep an eye for them also."

     "Don't forget about the fresh badger scents around the territory," Duskpelt added. He then looked at both Petalpaw and Rabbitpaw. "Alright, are you two ready to go?"

Rabbitpaw nodded eagerly, shuffling his paws anxiously to finally go out of camp for the first time. Petalpaw simply nodded.

     "Just try to keep up, Rabbitpaw!" Duskpelt said. Passing a few sleeping cats, we quietly headed towards the edge of the camp. This was it.

      As soon a he left the camp, Rabbitpaw was stunned by the sheer expanse he viewed. There was vast rolling plains with the sun rising above as far as the eye could see. He let out a mrrow of impress.

     "Ha! You haven't seen anything yet!" Petalpaw smirked.

     "Come on you two," Quickstorm meowed, "I want to be back in camp by sunset."

     "Where we go first?" Rabbitpaw asked, anxious to go explore the territory.

     Duskpelt pondered for a moment. "Let's go to the gorge first," he decided.

     The four cats traveled across the seemingly endless grasslands until they finally reached the raging river. It was much bigger than Rabbitpaw expected. The foaming waters hurled itself over the edge of the cliff into the clear blue river below that seemed to travel on forever.

     "This is our border with RiverClan. You can tell by tasting the air here," Duskpelt explained. Rabbitpaw tried for himself and instantly crinkled his nose.

     "Yuck! It smells terrible!" He hissed.

      "So now you know what they smell like," Duskpelt said. "It's because they eat fish in their diet."

     "Why would any cat want to eat stinking fish? Rabbit tastes way better!" Rabbitpaw complained.

    "StarClan knows," Petalpaw huffed.

     After a moment, he refocused his attention on the gorge, the cliff dropping off tail lengths away. He was about to take a step closer when his mentor's tail swished in front of him.

     "Apprentice's aren't allowed to go near the gorge," Duskpelt meowed. "You certainly wouldn't come back alive if you fell in."

Rabbitpaw gulped and remembered what Moorpaw once told him about the gorge.

    "Where to next, Quickstorm?" Meowed Petalpaw, bringing Rabbitpaw's attention back to the other cats.

     "We will patrol around the borders and head to lookout rock and the Thunderpath," he answered.

     Duskpelt looked up at the sky. "Let's hurry up then and mark the border. We're wasting daylight."

     After the border with RiverClan was set, the small group of cats set off for outlook rock, keeping a close eye on the border for movement. Rabbitpaw looked at the trees on the other side of the border. How can a cat live without being able to see the sky?

      "Rabbitpaw," Duskpelt meowed after walking a bit, "Do you know why we have borders?"

     "To make sure other cats don't steal our prey, right?" He tried.

     "Correct. The warrior code states that the lines we create must not be crossed. Stonestar helped create the second code, as the elders may have told you."

      Rabbitpaw remembered that story. One of the branches snapped and fell down from one of the four trees many seasons ago, putting a distinct line in between ThunderClan and ShadowClan. Since then, the leaders of each of the clans have decided to have two warrior codes.

Up ahead, a huge tannish rock jutted out of the ground, and it looked climbable for a cat.

"This is lookout rock," Duskpelt explained. "You will be tested out here to see how well you can spot things."

      Rabbitpaw cocked his head. "Why would we need to be able to do that?"

Duskpelt casually shrugged and turned to face the young white furred cat. "Well, if a hoard of ShadowClan cats was spotted heading towards the camp, I think you'd be thankful to be able to see them coming."

Rabbitpaw nodded. In the corner if his eye he saw Petalpaw begin to climb the great rock while her mentor Quickstorm watched the apprentice. She scrambled up to the top and scanned the area.
"Now would be a good time to assess your alertness, Petalpaw," the silvery tom meowed. "Now, what do you see?"

"Pay close attention, Rabbitpaw," Duskpelt whispered into his ear. "You will do this soon."

He watched as a moment passed, Petalpaw nearly motionless as she assessed every last bit of the grasslands. The only thing keeping her from being soild stone was her chest faintly rising up and down.

     She suddenly came back to life and meowed, "There's three- no, four birds flying over the moor.... and group of rabbits to the left... oh! I can see the hunting patrol from here!"

Rabbitpaw suddenly remembered how hungry he was once the word "rabbit" was mentioned. His stomach growled loudly, and he shuffled his paws in embarrassment. Quickstorm looked up at the sky and meowed, "Duskpelt, it's sunhigh. We'd best get something to eat then quickly go to the thunderpath so we can make it back by sundown."

Duskpelt nodded and let out a long stretch. "Let us not waste time and go then," he meowed.

      "You did great, Petalpaw," Quickstorm added as the apprentice descended the rock. She purred at the complement.

      "Rabbitpaw, let's go. We can rest when we settle down to eat." Duskpelt started to pad away while Rabbitpaw followed.

     I have to watch very carefully when they hunt, Rabbitpaw thought, so I can be the best hunter WindClan has ever seen!