pafp AT LEAST THE WAR IS OVER ⛧ asking about sootstar

[Vulturepaw]

˖⁺‧₊ ☽◯☾ ₊‧⁺˖ 　Privetpaw is a strange cat. His words seem far too sophisticated for an apprentice, for a rogue. Rogues are supposed to be nightmarish - and he is, in a different way. His words worm their way into Vulturekit's mind, so confident and holier-than-thou in their utter wrongness. He spoke to them in a way that mocked everything the kit knows, as though he was simply too dim-witted to see the truth.

It would be easy, now that he's back in WindClan, to settle back into the familiarity of everything he knows is true. Vulturekit, unfortunately for his mental wellbeing, is not the type to do so.

The words nearly burst out of him, catching a warrior by the freshkill pile. "Featherspine." It sounds like the word was dragged from them. The warrior is intimidating, with her needle-sharp glare, and they avert their eyes quickly. "You - you were th-there, weren't you? When Sootstar was..." they trail off. When Sootstar still lived, when she still ruled, when she was overthrown. That time before Vulturekit came to WindClan - he remembers. "What was she... what was it like, back then?" His voice is halting. "Was it really as... b-b-buh-bad as everyone says?" He nearly cringes at his own question. Of course it was, but... He can't stop thinking about Privetpaw's praises, his condemnation of Sunstar's violence. Is it really better, now?

‎‎┌── FOR I HATE THE BUILDINGS ⛧ AND THE WAY THEY TOWER OVER ME ──┐‎

• @FEATHERSPINE
  

• 

  
  
  "SPEECH"
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• 
  VULTUREKIT ⛧ he / they, kit of windclan, five moons.
  ⭃ a spiky-furred dark tabby with amber eyes.
  ⭃ skittish and dour, with little time for typical kit games.
  ⭃ micheal x npc, adopted by periwinklebreeze. sibling to dustkit and bilberrykit.
  ⭃ peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / / underline and tag when attacking
  ⭃ penned by SATURNID ↛ saturnids on discord, feel free to dm for plots.
  

​

 

[FEATHERSPINE]

Featherspine was not the type to regularly interact with kittens. He didn't hate them, but there was a profound awkwardness about navigating any conversation with them. As a child she had shunned everything childish- and had never learned what kittens were supposed to be like, what they were supposed to enjoy, for every moment of her own youth she had put everything into learning what an adult was supposed to be.

And now she stood in the in-between, wearing a mask of pride. The facade of a warrior, whilst treading in pawsteps that felt too big to fill, and not belonging amongst any of the youth.

None of that internal war could be seen behind the steely glint in her glare, though- a leer that flicked down to Vulturekit upon his approach. Featherspine blinked, the thoughts in her brain whirring for some answer that would be appropriate to give. He wrinkled his nose, annoyance buzzing across her muzzle like bluebottle wingbeat. "Of course it was," she spat uncharitably, patience thinning and wavering. Was Periwinklebreeze so soft that he shielded these kits from the truth of everything? That he would have to tell Vulturekit how bad it truly was?

If it had to be done ... then she would, she supposed. Even if she gained glares from it, it would be for the greater good. "She stole k-k-kittens from ShadowClan. She ordered my father killed for giving them b-buh ... g-giving them b-back. She's the reason all the other Clans hate us." His tail lashed. "WindClan would have gotten itself destroyed. She thirsted for b-b-buh ... b-battle so much that eventually we would have been run out of the forest."​

✦ penned by pin​

 

[ROWANPAW]

〔✦〕Featherspine's callous snap had grabbed the attention of the chimera, as the warrior clearly was not attempting to hush his words. Rowanpaw had not overheard Vulturekit's inquiry, but from stopping in their tracks and peering forth at the unfurling conversation, they could quickly gather what the subject was. Their claws involuntarily peek from their sheaths, a strange tension gripping them and making the blood roar in their ears. Those mongrels had the nerve to steal one of WindClan's children — thankfully Bluefrost had rescued him from that hellish group. Unbeknownst to Rowanpaw, young Vulturekit had been told filthy lies about WindClan from the foxhearted cat who had dragged his claws down their eye. Also, unbeknownst to Rowanpaw, that very cat shared their blood ( a fact that they would become nauseated by if they knew ).

The stories of Sootstar were no stranger to Rowanpaw; murmurings about the tyrant had evolved into nursery tales, and then eventually common knowledge amongst the moor cats as they began to discuss her rule more openly. She also knew that Snakehiss had been her deputy; how could she not, when the other apprentices gossiped about it ( often right in front of her )? In the end, however, it was not an undying devotion to Sootstar that had gotten Snakehiss thrown out of WindClan like it had the other loyalists. StarClan, instead, was Snakehiss' reason for betraying his clan. Truthfully, they find the fact just as shameful ( and not to mention confusing ).

Rowanpaw had plenty of questions about Sootstar. Why had Sootstar been that way? Why had she chosen Snakehiss as her deputy as opposed to anybody else? If things were different, perhaps she would have had the courage to walk up to Featherspine and inquire, but for now she is stuck somewhere between dipping away and listening for more information about the late Moor Queen. Like her father before her, she is a keen listener.

let me walk to the top ( of the big night sky ) //

• ooc.
  
• ROWANPAW —— tunneler apprentice of windclan , mentored by webthorn ✦ penned by beatles
  ✦ afab demigirl / they/she pronouns / 7 moons & ages every 17th
  ✦ single / graysexual & monogamous
  ✦ peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / underline & tag account when attacking
  —— easy combat difficulty / may start fights, won't kill
  
  ✦ "speech", thoughts, all opinions are ic
  ✦ biography — msg on discord for plots — toyhouse
  
• 
  
  

  a shorthaired black/tortoiseshell chimera with heterochromia. a lithe, slightly muscular cat with a smaller-than-average build. a direct line splits their face, as if mirroring an inner battle of identity and belonging. a serious expression usually graces their face, and their amber and blue gaze is always sharpened.

​

 

[SUNNVAR]

It is strange to speak of her as if she is gone. She is. She had been for so many moons now — he had struck the final blow himself, and buried her in a place that no others could know and mourn. It would not become a landmark, not even to those that had loved her. In some strange, distant way, he knows that he had been one of them. For Sootstar had once been kinder. Perhaps that was not the right word; she had never been kind. But her ambition had been tempered. Her love for this clan and StarClan total, unyielding. When had this begun to change? Looking back, even now Sunstar cannot say. A slow descent to madness. What he would do, what he had done, what must have been done and what should have been denied. . . all of it, muddied to uselessness.

Memories stick out like thorns in his mind. Featherspine defends him, as she has always done, but what could he know of the whole? What could any of them know, but those that had lived and died amongst her council? In times such as this, he misses the company and simplicity of earlier times.

"She was not always this way," he says. His voice is not wholly soft. Sunstar peels apart the conversation with a scalpel so fine that it could not hurt, and goes directly for its heart. "Once, WindClan felt much as it did now." Without the burden of knowledge and the weight of StarClan's redemption. They had never yet earned the sheer, unending hatred of the other clans. "It is hard to say where it began. When I came to this clan, it was under the guidance of a warrior who was capable of something I had never before seen. She had died before me; she came back. Her vengeance, her — presence — you could not help but be drawn in." An exhale, long-held, quivers from the warrior's lungs. Would it not be kinder to let Featherspine's words ring true? To let the newest of generations think they were always good, and she was always bad?

"She sought to protect this clan. She ordered us to battle against SkyClan in a time of great sickness, risking much to care for those who were ill. But then it became a war for ego. For pride. Not to protect our clan, but to prove that we would not be threatened." He had never worded it so succinctly, even to himself. "It was not to survive, but to build this clan higher, then, so that we would not be equals but better. It became madness, Vulturekit. She sought to put herself above all else. Even StarClan. And at a point, she would no longer take WindClan with her. We faced the brunt of the other clans' hatred for her actions, and she did not care for us. In the end. . . all that mattered to her was pride."

He is glad, he thinks, that the kitten had not started with him. He is far enough away that he does not feel looming in this conversation. An uneven stone rolls beneath his paw, back and forth, and his eyes still do not touch the trio. He fears, as he always does, that they will see him in this story. And so he does not look to know if they do.

𝐈 𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐌𝐄𝐀𝐍 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐈𝐌 𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐎𝐔𝐒 ╱ ( 𝐋𝐈𝐊𝐄 𝐀 𝗕𝐀𝐃 𝐃𝐎𝐆 ) 〚 06.17 〛 🟒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"

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[slateheart]

Perhaps, when Slateheart arrived to WindClan as a young apprentice (by the standards of back then), he was already too late to see the cat that Sunstar describes. To him, Sootstar was always as she was when she died: greedy, malicious, an enabler. He can't say he agrees with the sentiment that Sunstar provides, that perhaps she had WindClan's survival in her heart and nothing of the glory that comes with wars; but he does not argue. To Slateheart.. things were often more black and white than not.

He remembers the raiding party sent to SkyClan. How angry he had been then, that his littermate had been sent, returned beaten and bloodied. They had lost a warrior that day.. but it was never enough. "She didn't know when to stop," Slateheart mutters, more bitter than wise. It was the end of her, eventually. He wonders if she ever stopped, even in the afterlife..
​

CHARACTER INFORMATION — ♡ ˗ˏˋ ꒰ ♡ ꒱ ˎˊ˗ ♡ — OUT OF CHARACTER

• 

  slate slatepaw slatetooth SLATEHEART
  ━━ MOOR-RUNNER WARRIOR of WINDCLAN
  ━━ 24 MOONS,, ages every 6th
  ━━ LYNXTOOTH xx ADELAIDE xx SILVERFOOT
  ━━ SIBLING to GRAVELSNAP and ASHPAW
  ━━ MATE to none | PARENT to none
  ━━ MENTOR to BEEPAW | MENTORED by LYNXTOOTH​
  ━━ HEALTH ♥︎♥︎♥︎♥︎♡ | generally healthy, but experiencing shortness of breath.
  
• 
  
  
• speech is #bbbb88​