private 𝐂𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐔𝐍𝐀 ╱ 𝗕𝐋𝐔𝐄𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐒𝐓

[SUNSTAR]

The patrols have run their routes well into the end of their day. They come with reports of new growth– sprouts of grass poking through the char, rabbits hesitantly foraging further in from the unburnt edges of their territory. A few of them even caught sight of kits (rabbit kits, that is) freshly from their burrow to feed. Hungry as their clan is, most warriors know to leave them be until they have grown. A chance to bring offspring to this moor, and future prosperity. That is the way of things, is it not? Each of them would bring a future to this world. Be it through their litter, or the apprentices they train. He has known success in both. Those that had been named warriors are of great pride to him. Featherspine, Rivewhisper, Sunlitwing, all of them yes, but so too does he pride himself in Addervenom, Scorchstorm. Perhaps in distant moons, when he is long gone, his story will remain on the tongues of those he passed himself to.

Like the rabbits, who must speak of WindClan's prowess with fear and awe. Beware the moor-cats, the warriors made of gale-breath and heather. What a legacy this must be, to be feared. He cannot imagine the full of it. His expression slowly falters. Though unaware of it himself, a faint smile had grown across Sunstar's face in a mimicry of the storyteller he had once been. A grand vision playing before his eyes, of rabbits and WindClan and victory on such a scale. And then, inevitably, he thinks of Sootstar. His mind returns to her in cyclical passes. The moons he had spent as one of her most certain supporters to the rage he had felt at her descent, to how inevitable it now seemed.

Other clans had the benefit of distance. They were not buried in burning waters from the time they were comforting and cool. Another cat might have had a way out from beneath her. Sunstar was not among those lucky few. How much of her leadership did he carry within him still?

Graceless and without begging invitation, Sunstar sets a mouse down before Bluefrost's paws, and joins her where she rests. Her patrol could not have returned more than one hunt before, and Brackenpaw is not at her side. He does not know why he turns to her, of all cats. Addervenom would surely serve the same purpose just as well. A cat close to Sootstar, who might understand. Yet in truth, he knows there are none alive closer to Sootstar than the cat he now hovers nearby. Her lookalike and her apprentice, who followed in her steps until they became too grand, too steep. Pausing in her descent at the absolute last moment, Bluefrost had survived her. It reminds him terribly of himself. Must all things loop around to his father?

"Has your apprentice given you trouble?"

⋆ 𝐈𝐓'𝐒 𝐀 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘 𝐎𝐅 𝐒𝐀𝐂𝐑𝐈𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐄  ╱╱ 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝗕𝐄𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐘𝐀𝐋 〚 05.16.2024 〛 𖤓ᨒ

• OOC. —
• 

  SUNSTAR. WINDCLAN LEADER.  ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆
  ——– AMAB HE - HIM - HIS ╱╱ 4+ YEARS OLD.

  NPC x NPC,. MATE TO WOLFSONG; FATHER TO ONE LITTER WITH HIM. MENTORING NOBODY.
  
  TH ╱╱ A LARGE, SCARRED CHOCOLATE AND WHITE ROSETTE TABBY TOM WITH SEAGLASS EYES

• "speech"

​

 

[BLUEFROST]

She's paw-sore, bone-weary, and coated with a fine, velveteen layer of dust. She does not rush to share tongues with a Clanmate, does not meander towards her nest to solitarily clean the dirt from her pelt; she is too tired even for that. Bluefrost sinks to her belly in a secluded corner of camp, grateful for the solitude, even if it is momentary. A shadow looms over her, and a mouse is dropped between her paws. The warrior blinks, turning her face toward Sunstar's looming golden figure. She holds his searing turquoise gaze for a heartbeat before she bows her head. "Sunstar. Thank you for the mouse. It is much appreciated."

Warily, Bluefrost bends toward the bit of prey and takes a hesitant bite from its belly. It's warm, tender, and for the first time in what has felt like moons, it does not taste of fire. She swallows her mouthful and pushes it haphazardly, if not politely, toward her leader. "The taste of ash is finally gone," she murmurs, wondering if he, too, has dragged his tongue over his fur only to wince at the flames still sticking to every hair.

More than me, perhaps. He had rushed headlong into the flames. He had lost his limb to the beast, to the wildfire's singed, snapping jaws. She imagines he will taste the blaze upon his pelt for moons to come, just as the taste of dust haunts even her sleep.

He asks her about Brackenpaw. Bluefrost inclines her head, this time with less hesitance. "Brackenpaw is a pawful," she mews, the cottony fluff of her tail tip flicking. "But they're a quick learner, and sharp. Even if their tongue is just as sharp..." She frowns, turning her face away so that her profile is eclipsed. "Brackenpaw speaks to me in ways I never would have dared speak to Sootstar." She does not know if it's even safe to mention her mother's name around Sunstar—but she lets it slip before she can catch it between her teeth.

『 out of character. 』 ✧･ﾟ:* 『 about. 』

• ooc: —
• 
• Bluekit . Bluepaw . Bluefrost, she/her w/ feminine terms.
  — “speech”, thoughts, attack
  — 16 moons old, ages realistically on the 14th.
  — mentored by Sootstar ; mentoring Brackenpaw ; previously mentored n/a.
  — windclan warrior. sootstar x weaselclaw, gen 2.
  — penned by Marquette.
  
  
  lh blue and white she-cat with emerald eyes. aloof, dignified, poised, haughty, composed, distant.
  
  

​

 

[SUNSTAR]

"It is important for you to keep your strength," he affirms absently. He has been allowed time to recover and rest. The rest of his clan is not so lucky, and it shames him on some level not to have taken the opportunity set before him. Wallowing in his grief serves to purpose. Pushing himself past the limitations of his healing body would only delay how long it took him to get back out there the way that he must, and yet. . . it is a punishment of himself, he thinks. The only way that remains to deal with his grief, as most of his litter turns towards warriorhood and his mate settles distantly from him whenever they near each other. Grief is a cruel and terrible thing. Saying goodbye was not among his strengths. Whatever those were now.

On autopilot, he accepts the mouse. Its pelt tickles his tongue for a moment, then the realization Bluefrost shares echoes between his bones. He stares down at it in what must be surprise. The area around his eyes has softened, as does the slant of his ears. "I had worried we would taste it for the rest of our lives," Sunstar mutters, and bats it back. He had settled so that his scarred stump stood between them, but this only makes it more troublesome to reach the mouse. A rumble of desperate amusement huffs past his fangs. Of all the things that troubled him since his injury! The mundane bother him most of all. It was a loss he would never escape. Not even StarClan could return his paw to its place. They had given him back — it was not enough. It would never be enough.

He wonders, at times, what will happen to him upon his death. Will StarClan welcome him with the limb he had lost? Would he run their fields with all of his grace intact? Or would his soul return to the mountains in a long, limping journey, to face the hearts of those that had created him and celebrate in his war-wounds?

"It surprised me, when I first came to WindClan," Sunstar admits. "These. . . rules, that the clans follow. Mentorship had not been so ritual a thing in my home. I was traded amongst warriors in battle and hunters pulling fish from ice-crusted waters in equal measure; I sat behind my father as he spoke to his council, and climbed mountains alone, by my own choice." An exaggeration, perhaps, but a sign of a healing heart, too. That he could tell these stories with the twitch of a smile edging across his jaw. "It was a sign I had grown too large for his rule when I began to speak out against him. I had thought it would be much the same here." The smile fades. Serious eyes fix upon his clanmates as they speak and rest some distance away. The apprentices shout eager tales of all they had learned. The kits struggle against bedtime.

"What do you think she would have done? Had you dared to speak to her as Brackenpaw does to you?"

⋆ 𝐈𝐓'𝐒 𝐀 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘 𝐎𝐅 𝐒𝐀𝐂𝐑𝐈𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐄  ╱╱ 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝗕𝐄𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐘𝐀𝐋 〚 05.16.2024 〛 𖤓ᨒ

• OOC. —
• 

  SUNSTAR. WINDCLAN LEADER.  ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆
  ——– AMAB HE - HIM - HIS ╱╱ 4+ YEARS OLD.

  NPC x NPC,. MATE TO WOLFSONG; FATHER TO ONE LITTER WITH HIM. MENTORING NOBODY.
  
  TH ╱╱ A LARGE, SCARRED CHOCOLATE AND WHITE ROSETTE TABBY TOM WITH SEAGLASS EYES

• "speech"

​

 

[BLUEFROST]

Sunstar bends his head, nibbles at the flank of the mouse he'd brought Bluefrost. "I had worried we would taste it for the rest of our lives." She murmurs assent, slender green gaze hanging on the great leader's sunkissed pelt, the mane tufted around his throat. The sight of him, the scent of him, brings her back to kithood, to when she and her littermates tumbled aimlessly in the moorland dust, playing at pretending to be councilmembers. Her mother had trusted him then; his name had been warm on the tongue, gilded as his namesake. She shifts her paws, wondering at the space inside her that yearns to trust him again, to return to kithood dreams.

"What a strange world you and Wolfsong come from," she says, tucking her tail against her flank. Wintry winds, frigid waters, wolf's cry on the horizon. She can almost taste the leafbare cold as he speaks of his father's rule. "It was a sign I had grown too large for his rule when I began to speak out against him." She imagines it, following her mother into murky darkness, teeth bared in defiance instead of sheathed in acquiescence. "Your father was leader, then? Were you expected to..." Her jaw trembles briefly, then sets: "Lead after him?"

Imagine, such a world, she thinks to herself. Imagine a WindClan where the deputy did not fail Sootstar over and over again, who did not bare his teeth against her will in vitriol. Imagine Sootspot or Addervenom or herself sitting on the Tallrock, staring down at a sunlit kingdom.

"It is a great honor to be given an apprentice. I... had not expected it." A tattered ear twitches, uncomfortable. "And had I dared speak to Sootstar as Brackenpaw speaks to me..." She frowns. It is almost inconceivable. She had been molded from birth to be obedient. "I believe she would have harmed me. Made an example of me to the other kits and apprentices. I would not have gotten away with such a thing."

『 out of character. 』 ✧･ﾟ:* 『 about. 』

• ooc: —
• 
• Bluekit . Bluepaw . Bluefrost, she/her w/ feminine terms.
  — “speech”, thoughts, attack
  — 16 moons old, ages realistically on the 14th.
  — mentored by Sootstar ; mentoring Brackenpaw ; previously mentored n/a.
  — windclan warrior. sootstar x weaselclaw, gen 2.
  — penned by Marquette.
  
  
  lh blue and white she-cat with emerald eyes. aloof, dignified, poised, haughty, composed, distant.
  
  

​

 

[SUNSTAR]

Kithood dreams beset them both, it would seem. He misses the times that Adderkit had wrestled with his brother, the both of them playing with no concept of fairness. There had been eager violence in both of them, and yet he had always thought it worthy. A promise of honed claws and instinct both. He had not thought often of Bluekit and Cottonkit, he will admit. The tunnelers were not his reign; like their father, Sunstar belonged to the moorland above where those paws would take them. It amuses him then, that they are the two most prominent in his clan. Addervenom carries a streak of reluctance in him; it had taken a great effort to pull at the roots of his devotion. Bluefrost is harder to pin down than that. Where her brother was blunt with his heart, hers seemed carefully guarded.

He looks at her for a long moment, pulling back the layers of history as if he might peer to her very core. His eyes turn away, briefly, as he considers her question. Had he ever shared the truth of this? Not even his kits knew the full extent of their grandfather. Nor did they know the betrayal Sunstar ultimately inflicted upon him, or he upon his son. Breath huffs from the warrior's nose with conviction finally winning its war. "I was, yes." His brow knits. "It was the way of our clan, that the strongest of the leader's kits would follow in their stead. I was the only of my kin; his shadow, and his might. Yet he expected too much of me, and yanked what I had earned — what I thought that I had earned — from beneath my paws." Is this not the way that Sootstar's kids must think? A thought so bizarre as that is nearly enough to make him laugh.

"I did not want to lead the way he desired me to. And I did not want to stay within its confinement, however comfortable a life. I came here to begin anew." Here I am regardless. Blood and arrogance seem to follow him. The ghost he has for a paw must wander through it still, awaiting his heart's return to it. Every invisible step tracks sanguine behind him. Whatever he saw, he thought that he could improve upon it. He could prove himself to the moorland queen, become the greatest of her warriors. Each deed would seal his name as a cat to be remembered for all of time. Now, there seems little use in being remembered. How weakly old desires die.

A long pause lingers over their conversation. Awkward silence, wherein Sunstar seems to restart his sentence again and once more, until finally he huffs and holds both mind and tongue quite still. "I see nothing to be gained in learning through such means. Perhaps this too is something I carry from the mountains, yet even after so many moons among the moor cats. . . the only use of fear is not from a warrior to their leader, but an outsider to our whole." He sucks in a breath to wrangle in the other words that ache to escape, and even still loses more: "Then again, I had thought she would do the same to my own kits."

"I know that you are not your mother, Bluefrost. For all that she may have taught you, you do not inflict these wounds upon Brackenpaw. That is the trust I have placed in you."

𝐈 𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐌𝐄𝐀𝐍 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐈𝐌 𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐎𝐔𝐒 ╱ ( 𝐋𝐈𝐊𝐄 𝐀 𝗕𝐀𝐃 𝐃𝐎𝐆 ) 〚 06.03 〛 🟒ᨒ

• ooc: —
• ↟ 𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑.  ╱  AMAB  HE - HIM - HIS.  LEADER OF WINDCLAN.  ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ ⋆  ⋆̶̬́̀
  ————  a rogue brought to windclan in a search for greatness, one of sootstar's most loyal warriors turned into her downfall. with a mate and kits to worry about, and now nine lives from starclan with a missing limb, windclan's leader has a lot to prove.
  
  
  
  a large chocolate and white rosette tom with seaglass eyes. the first thing many see when looking at sunstar now is not his proud posture or un-windclan build, but the scarred stump that remains of his front left leg. a wound that would have killed most other cats took one of his lives; not even starclan could repair it.

• "speech"

​

 

[BLUEFROST]

Sunstar reveals himself, stripping petals from a yellowed core. Bluefrost listens with a careful expression, but her eyes give her away when the burnished moor runner speaks of betrayal. I would know something about that. Sunstar had betrayed his father, then, and then her mother, the queen of the windswept moors, but beneath the harshness of the word is something round and noble even still. Betrayal. She tastes it, sifts it around in her mouth, smooth as a marble, easy to swallow. Perhaps she has carried it for too long; perhaps it is time, finally, to spit it out and leave it on the ground where it belongs.

"You have had to escape your father, too." Her eyes narrow in thought. "Is it possible then, do you think? To... to escape." He tells her he knows she is not her mother, that he can see the way she handles Brackenpaw, and something cools inside of her, something wet and molten that had simmered for many moons.

I'm not my mother. It's a truth, barefaced, one she'd had difficulty grappling with, one she still struggles to look in its ugly face. Truth is not beautiful. It wears a thick charcoal pelt, a scent of rot, reddened, fiery eyes. It lurks in the tunnels... in the heart.

Bluefrost frowns, and she turns her face away from Sunstar so that only her profile is visible. "I am surprised to hear there is trust at all. I have done little to earn it. And I am... I am sorry for that. I am still..." She fights with her words, wrestles them and pins them under her paws. "I am learning about what is left of me without her."

『 out of character. 』 ✧･ﾟ:* 『 about. 』

• ooc: —
• 
• Bluekit . Bluepaw . Bluefrost, she/her w/ feminine terms.
  — “speech”, thoughts, attack
  — 16 moons old, ages realistically on the 14th.
  — mentored by Sootstar ; mentoring Brackenpaw ; previously mentored n/a.
  — windclan warrior. sootstar x weaselclaw, gen 2.
  — penned by Marquette.
  
  
  lh blue and white she-cat with emerald eyes. aloof, dignified, poised, haughty, composed, distant.
  
  

​