- Jun 11, 2023
- 136
- 43
- 28
❀‿ The forest darkens and the moon makes her creeping ascent through the sky, and Lupinesong enters her first night as a Skyclan warrior. The silence is amicable between the three of them, Lupinepa- Lupinesong thinks, and really, it should have been a delight to share this newfound embedded ritual with the cat she called her best friend and perhaps her closest family member. But, the silence they oathed to uphold stretched out across the night ahead of them, and it left too much space for contemplation.
Today's ceremony was not met with as much dread and trepidation as her first—she'd matured quite a bit since then. She was quite happy with the way everything turned out, actually. She stepped into her name with a feeling of pride, and she almost felt guilty for fretting that Orangestar would bestow her a name that she wouldn't be able to fill. To receive it in such good company, too, the day would remain in a special part of her memory, she was sure of it. Now, though, felt something like the aftermath of a party, as everyone else headed to their dens and she, Drowsynose, and Cherryblossom were left to sit at the entrance of camp alongside the ghosts of the celebration.
The calico she-cat sits only a few fox-lengths away from her, and she doesn't mean to let her eyes linger, but something keeps her there for a long moment. It's as if something held her very blood in place, and for a second all Lupinesong can do is stare. It's almost as if she's seeing her for the first time, even though she knows she's looked at her at least a thousand times before. The stark white is illuminated in the fragile moonlight, the cascade of flame and soot billowing down her frame, and she is transfixed. To say that Cherryblossom was a beautiful girl was a mere statement of fact, but Lupinesong felt something like grief at the realization that she had taken this for granted.
Congratulating her after the ceremony had been the first time in a while she'd been close enough to touch her, and though it had been hours since then, Lupinesong's paw still hummed with the memory of silky fur beneath it. Some feeling overwhelms her, and she is reminded of the moment that she saw Cherryblossom together with Edenberry for the first time, and then of the same feeling that flashed as Drowsynose confessed a secret to her. Now is the same, or different, but those moments are what burns in her body regardless. It's something she can only describe as crushing her from the inside out, and she's nearly brought to tears like she was a child once more. She feels, and she wants, and there is a whole host of thoughts that start racing around her head but everything is tainted with an acid-rain of guilt, and the sense that she was completely helpless to whatever feeling it was she was facing.
It's perhaps a few moments too late when she realizes moonlit amber eyes are staring back at her, and she's too overwhelmed to recognize anything hovering beneath them. Her eyes are tugged away with a swiftness, and suddenly she becomes very aware of her reality, not just now, not just their uneventful night sitting by the bramble wall. Guilt prickles at every inch of her pelt, and it is either a sixth sense or paranoia that has her twitch her ear backward where her brother sits. She doesn't turn her head to see if he's looking at her and brushes off everything with a quick lap of her tongue to her chest, smoothing down some nonexistent fly-away. Instead, she takes a deep, careful breath and tries to find something to look at in the darkened pine around them, the crushing feeling in her chest still gnawing at her ribs and ventricles.
She breathes, in and out, and then in again, and watches the forest. Lupinesong looked out into the now-memorized maze of pines stretched before her, and it was no longer just the next eight moons of her life she looked toward, but something more akin to the rest of her life.
What was she to do with it? That wasn't something she would find the answer to tonight.
Today's ceremony was not met with as much dread and trepidation as her first—she'd matured quite a bit since then. She was quite happy with the way everything turned out, actually. She stepped into her name with a feeling of pride, and she almost felt guilty for fretting that Orangestar would bestow her a name that she wouldn't be able to fill. To receive it in such good company, too, the day would remain in a special part of her memory, she was sure of it. Now, though, felt something like the aftermath of a party, as everyone else headed to their dens and she, Drowsynose, and Cherryblossom were left to sit at the entrance of camp alongside the ghosts of the celebration.
The calico she-cat sits only a few fox-lengths away from her, and she doesn't mean to let her eyes linger, but something keeps her there for a long moment. It's as if something held her very blood in place, and for a second all Lupinesong can do is stare. It's almost as if she's seeing her for the first time, even though she knows she's looked at her at least a thousand times before. The stark white is illuminated in the fragile moonlight, the cascade of flame and soot billowing down her frame, and she is transfixed. To say that Cherryblossom was a beautiful girl was a mere statement of fact, but Lupinesong felt something like grief at the realization that she had taken this for granted.
Congratulating her after the ceremony had been the first time in a while she'd been close enough to touch her, and though it had been hours since then, Lupinesong's paw still hummed with the memory of silky fur beneath it. Some feeling overwhelms her, and she is reminded of the moment that she saw Cherryblossom together with Edenberry for the first time, and then of the same feeling that flashed as Drowsynose confessed a secret to her. Now is the same, or different, but those moments are what burns in her body regardless. It's something she can only describe as crushing her from the inside out, and she's nearly brought to tears like she was a child once more. She feels, and she wants, and there is a whole host of thoughts that start racing around her head but everything is tainted with an acid-rain of guilt, and the sense that she was completely helpless to whatever feeling it was she was facing.
It's perhaps a few moments too late when she realizes moonlit amber eyes are staring back at her, and she's too overwhelmed to recognize anything hovering beneath them. Her eyes are tugged away with a swiftness, and suddenly she becomes very aware of her reality, not just now, not just their uneventful night sitting by the bramble wall. Guilt prickles at every inch of her pelt, and it is either a sixth sense or paranoia that has her twitch her ear backward where her brother sits. She doesn't turn her head to see if he's looking at her and brushes off everything with a quick lap of her tongue to her chest, smoothing down some nonexistent fly-away. Instead, she takes a deep, careful breath and tries to find something to look at in the darkened pine around them, the crushing feeling in her chest still gnawing at her ribs and ventricles.
She breathes, in and out, and then in again, and watches the forest. Lupinesong looked out into the now-memorized maze of pines stretched before her, and it was no longer just the next eight moons of her life she looked toward, but something more akin to the rest of her life.
What was she to do with it? That wasn't something she would find the answer to tonight.
- OOC: @DROWSYNOSE @Cherryblossom
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lupinekit.lupinepaw. lupinesong
— trans she/her. 12mo warrior of skyclan. formerlu mentored by dandelionwish, padding after falcongaze
— bobbie x duke. littermate to crowsight & drowsynose. older half-sister of hollykit, lionkit, and candorkit
— a tall, pretty, long-haired black smoke with low white and green eyes
— smells like sweet lupine flowers and young pine needles
— "speech", thoughts, attack
— fullbody by pikaihao and funnyguy by pin
— penned by eezy
