private BACK IN MY BONES — sunstride

[Thriftfeather]

Worry is a familiar snake on Thriftpaw's heels. It quickens his steps in time with his heart, too slow to be running but too fast to be relaxed. He'll always be like this: half-frantic, sitting on the edge of panic with just enough of a state of mind to swallow the fear and then swallow again when it doesn't budge from its place behind his teeth. He paces in an irregular pattern, his insistent paws telling him it simply isn't safe here and the reasonable part of his head trying to soothe those baseless instincts flat.

"Sunstride!" Thriftpaw calls as soon as he sees the older tom. He needs a distraction — if Thriftpaw is talented in any regard, its knowing when he needs a distraction.

"Sunstride," Thriftpaw says again, just as he's stopping at Sunstride's side. His paws, nervous as they are, continue working into the sand, even as his face brightens into something cheery, "You never did uh, you never did tell me how you ended up in WindClan. I know Sootspot was making fun of you before when — when I asked, but he isn't here right now." Thriftpaw finishes with the brightest smile he can manage.

@SUNSTRIDE​

WINDCLAN APPRENTICE ✦ GOLDEN TABBY TOM ✦ 7 MOONS​

 

[SUNSTAR]

✦　　. 　 ˚　.   He does not mean to startle as Thriftpaw approaches him. It's a jolt, the smallest of jumps that settles quickly as his mind catches up to him. He'd been lost in thought with the trouble of it all– with all that has become of WindClan in the last few sunrises, could he truly be blamed? His mind is far from the mountains he called home, and what his other clanmates had said. It is for the best that he puts it behind him. If he did not, the lack of trust his clanmates have in him might become more of a burden than he can carry. Thriftpaw, at least, is a reminder of the pleasant part of it all. He looks down upon the apprentice, who already nears the time he can no longer be referred to as such, and cannot help a brief laugh.

"Most of your clanmates are eager to see me put it all behind me," he explains. "Few would ask me to speak of it outside of stories." The truth is something different. He may speak of bears and snowcapped sky-teeth, of the long trek from there to here, but it is as much a warning as an inspiration. Do not go there. Stay here, and imagine with me. Sunstride cannot escape the fact that it wells up within him like a wound each time. A longing for his paws to journey onwards, even if this clan is and always shall be his home.

He settles down slowly, dipping his head in an invitation for Thriftpaw to do the same. "Many moons ago, Sootstar allowed a small band of cats to join this clan. We were outsiders– rogues, yet we stood witness to StarClan's strength as well as Sootstar's. But before even that, I came from a land far beyond these moors. It was a beautiful place, surrounded by great teeth that grazed the very clouds. Mountains, with snow so deep you could lose a kitten within it." He pauses, feeling the same tired homesickness begin to ache. It is not real; it is not homesickness, but a yearning for less convoluted times. For childhood. "Why do you ask me to tell you of it, Thriftpaw?"

𝘏𝘈𝘕𝘋𝘚𝘖𝘔𝘌 𝘈𝘚 𝘓𝘐𝘍𝘌 𝘈𝘕𝘋 𝘗𝘖𝘐𝘚𝘖𝘕; 𝘚𝘜𝘕-𝘉𝘓𝘖𝘖𝘋 𝘏𝘈𝘕𝘋𝘚𝘖𝘔𝘌  ╱╱ 9.16.2023 ˊˎ＜

• OOC. —
• ✦　　. 　 ˚　.  SUNSTRIDE. FORMERLY SUNNVAR. HE - HIM - HIS OR THEY - THEM. DEPUTY OF WINDCLAN. 4 YEARS OLD. PENNED BY REVELATIONS.  —————————
  
  
  ——  a tall auburn tabby with thick fur and bright glacial eyes. sunstride is broad and bold– a creature standing above most of windclan, though not a beast beyond it, with fur that flames red and deepens to a burnt amber with every stripe. his eyes, in comparison, are a pale summer's blue, still as bold as the rest of them. he radiates confidence and self-assured authority.
  
  

  ✦ NPC x NPC. DECEASED MOTHER, ESTRANGED FATHER. NO LITTERMATES. MATE TO WOLFSONG. FATHER TO BEARKIT, SINGEDKIT, RIVEKIT, SUNLITKIT, AND FEATHERKIT ——

• "speech"

​

 

[Thriftfeather]

Thriftpaw's smile eases into something more genuine as Sunstride speaks. He'd been half expecting a refusal — he's always half expecting a refusal — and the absence of such is a surprise to something that Thriftpaw hadn't known he had been guarding against. Thriftpaw sits as Sunstride does, his paws remaining ever-busy even as the rest of him relaxes, and his white-tipped ears perk as Sunstride explains. It doesn't lessen any of Thriftpaw's questions. Many more burst into his mind like mushrooms from wet ground.

But then Sunstride has a question of his own, and Thriftpaw doesn't recoil so much as he shifts his weight to his four heels, too sudden to be anything but dislike and too subtle to be mistaken for severe.

"I'm trying to...." Thriftpaw makes a vague gesture. Had it been larger, it would appear as if Thriftpaw was attempting to grasp the word he's searching for from the space directly in front of him, but in its smallness it is instead the minute flexing of his outheld paw, "Understand WindClan. I don't — I don't always get things. I wasn't weaned for more than half a moon when Ghostwail — when Ghostwail found — I was young when I got here, but that isn't enough."

It should be enough.

Thriftpaw frowns — it's a dangerous thought regardless, but he doesn't know what he means by it. His time here should be enough for him to understand WindClan the way a clanborn cat does, or his time here should prove him as enough? Should he be allowed to shed his former life as a loner just as easily as he sheds his pelt, until his history has always been WindClan? Sunstride was a rogue — is a rogue? (does it ever go away?) — as was Ghostwail, and many others in WindClan.

He quashes the thought before it can spiral into something ugly and rights his posture, once more correct. He shouldn't wonder why birthplace matters under the weight of the reality that it does, and he should be grateful that he is allowed to be in WindClan, despite the circumstances of his arrival.

"What did you see?" Thriftpaw asks. It feels like a fair trade: a question for a question, or an answer for an answer, "From StarClan? Or Sootstar?"​

WINDCLAN APPRENTICE ✦ GOLDEN TABBY TOM ✦ 7 MOONS​

 

[SUNSTAR]

✦　　. 　 ˚　.   Though the warrior laughs, it is not the most pleasant of sounds. The ghost of something far warmer, and all the sadder for its recollection of the past. His head tilts subtly. An examination, not unkind. He is not like Ghostwail or the other warriors who speak of their clan as if it was the foundation of the universe. It is blasphemous of him to even think it, he knows, yet Sunstride recalls a life far beyond these borders and sees it for what it had been: pleasant, vibrant, whole. Different, yes, and not truly better, but not made of the monsters some of his clanmates may see.

It does not go away. The burden of a rogue. Be it WindClan or these clans, he had sought a life worth living inside of WindClan and earned it with blood and claw. Still they had seemed...reluctant. Welcoming now, when all but few of his clanmates have allowed the past to fade and for him to begin anew. Sootspot is not among his admirers. That Sootstar can see beyond her children's concerns and trust his place upon her council is a point of pride within the warrior. (Is that good of him? Is it right to be so eager for her acceptance? Those worries bubbled up at times, yet are quickly popped. He will not linger on the place of treason that had befallen those who came before him.)

There is so much that he shares with Thriftpaw. He wishes he did not see that now.

"I do not know that I can help you understand. WindClan is not something that can be learned so much as....felt." The best he can offer, and it is not enough. He blinks his apology and well wishes at once, with a quiet reminder to, "Give yourself time. Once it does not seem so looming, your future here will make itself known to you." For all that they struggle against it, the future is as it always has been and always will be. Fate cannot be changed, even if they are desperate for it.

Yet StarClan– StarClan, distant saviors brought temporarily to the dirt each time that a leaders breath begins to fade from their lungs– it seems they can change anything as they please. "She died," he answers calmly. "Slaughtered before my eyes by the one who had led our group. Yet in the moments after...she returned. Her wounds knit before our eyes, and she ended the battle with both grace and ferocity. I could assume nothing but that she was blessed by something far greater than I had any true knowledge of. Where she led, I would follow." It had not been an oath of devotion at the time. He simply sought a place to begin anew. Devotion, he supposes, had come much later.

𝘏𝘈𝘕𝘋𝘚𝘖𝘔𝘌 𝘈𝘚 𝘓𝘐𝘍𝘌 𝘈𝘕𝘋 𝘗𝘖𝘐𝘚𝘖𝘕; 𝘚𝘜𝘕-𝘉𝘓𝘖𝘖𝘋 𝘏𝘈𝘕𝘋𝘚𝘖𝘔𝘌  ╱╱ 9.16.2023 ˊˎ＜

• OOC. —
• ✦　　. 　 ˚　.  SUNSTRIDE. FORMERLY SUNNVAR. HE - HIM - HIS OR THEY - THEM. DEPUTY OF WINDCLAN. 4 YEARS OLD. PENNED BY REVELATIONS.  —————————
  
  
  ——  a tall auburn tabby with thick fur and bright glacial eyes. sunstride is broad and bold– a creature standing above most of windclan, though not a beast beyond it, with fur that flames red and deepens to a burnt amber with every stripe. his eyes, in comparison, are a pale summer's blue, still as bold as the rest of them. he radiates confidence and self-assured authority.
  
  

  ✦ NPC x NPC. DECEASED MOTHER, ESTRANGED FATHER. NO LITTERMATES. MATE TO WOLFSONG. FATHER TO BEARKIT, SINGEDKIT, RIVEKIT, SUNLITKIT, AND FEATHERKIT ——

• "speech"

​

 

[Thriftfeather]

Sunstride's advice is taken with a small nod and a frown. His future in WindClan has always felt looming, a hawk's shadow over his back or the snake that can burst from the grass at any moment. The rest of his life will be nestled here, and the thought alone is enough to make Thriftpaw's pelt roil like the surface of a pond under rain. He wishes his future will make itself known to him soon, or he wishes it remains a distant someday, untouched and unthought of. He hopes that it is kind to him.

The information about StarClan isn't new to Thriftpaw, but it perks him regardless. He'd had it explained to him as a kit — and the information had been easily digestible then, but now that he is nearly grown Thriftpaw often finds that the whole of it sounds outlandish. The sort of story that older cats tell to the younger in order to laugh about later. But Sunstride speaks with such conviction that Thriftpaw leans closer without thought. It doesn't sound real, but Sunstride probably wouldn't lie about this.

"So she really came back?" Thriftpaw murmurs, fascinated, and then louder adds, "That's why you're — that must be why you're the deputy. Because you admire her so much." He says it as if he has just discovered something secret, and is feeling rather clever about figuring it out, "I think I need something like that, a battle, and then I could feel about, I could feel about WindClan the way everyone else does."​

WINDCLAN APPRENTICE ✦ GOLDEN TABBY TOM ✦ 7 MOONS​