Father — Jaguarghost — had disappeared one day, leaving his kits lost and alone, unwilling to rely or confide in each other because they had always been told not to. Technically, Canes, or Muttpaw, was in charge while he was away — until he came back, because Vela always reckoned he would, because he couldn't just leave forever. Since starting her apprenticeship, Vela had more time to herself, but it was a sense of freedom that made her uneasy, even though it followed a similar structure to what she did with Jaguarghost — listen, observe, do well and do it right. But in apprenticeship training, second chances were given, and she found it almost too easy compared to what she had been raised in. She excelled, but she never seemed to celebrate that fact, keeping her expression dull, neutral, almost absent.

Around these Winterclan cats, she used her clan name. Elmpaw. It almost, almost, felt like a betrayal to her father, to not use the name he gave her, but secretly she liked how it sounded, she liked it was connected to Aspenstar in the fact they were both named after trees, even if the thought of it was rather silly. Elmpaw had never met Aspenstar, only heard of her through the things, the dazzling, infatuated things Jaguarghost would tell his children — her children, too, he said — and she took shape as a mystical, all-powerful, perfect figure in her mind, someone akin to an all powerful goddess. Perhaps it was wishful thinking, to see her as so perfect when she's never met her, never seen her, never known her, and perhaps it was the type of thinking that was only present in daughters who had never met their mother but wanted to believe the absolute best about her. It was for the best, then, that Winterclan didn't speak of the real Aspenstar too much, for it would have toppled the so carefully crafted image of her that Elmpaw held in her mind.

The disappearance of Jaguarghost offered more freedom from his constricting nature, but Elmpaw refused to take advantage of it. It was new, it was not something she was used to, it was not anything she was taught and so, as good and obedient as she was, she would do the same thing she always did, and she would wait. So, when the dawn appeared, she did what she did every single day — got up, waited for instruction and, if there wasn't any, she went out on her own, spending as much time alone as possible while trying to hone her own skills in her off-time. There was not much to do today, so she tried to think of something to assign herself, instead, as she walked through the tunnel that led outside, into the soft, blanketed atmosphere of Winterclan territory.