pafp DOWN IN THE DIRT WITH A LANDSLIDE APPROACHING — looking for herbs

[Starlingheart]

Burdock. Marigold. Horsetail. She recites the names of the herbs she is searching for in her head, draws up a mental image of them. She knows what little knowledge she possesses well and she clings to it desperately, especially during times like these. She should not be out here alone. The threat of the rogue that took the life of her brother still looms. Pitchstar’s killer is still out there. But she needs this distraction and she is quiet, agile. She knows she can slip through the shadows without being seen because it is something she has done her whole life. Besides, if she were to join her brother, her mother, her father in the stars would that truly be so bad? She is no longer certain.

It is the grief talking. She tells herself this as she paws through the swampy dirt, green eyes scanning for anything that could be of use. She does not want this trip to be for nothing, does not want to return to the camp with empty paws because she is afraid. Afraid of being seen like they had once seen Bonejaw. Useless. She wants to be needed by the clan, wants them to trust in her and she cannot do that if she cannot heal because right now, it is all she has.

New-leaf had been a promise spoken upon her clanmates lips. A time of healing and re-growth. So far it has only brought her more grief.

// please do not post in this thread until I give the okay! Thank you guys!
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[TWILIGHTFALL]

The marshgrass rustles, and a dappled black and white she-cat emerges. Her green eyes are pale and tender as the new growth budding from the earth, from the trees. She walks on silent paws. Starlingheart, lost in her thoughts as she is, would not hear her anyway.

The former ShadowClan queen catches up to Briarstar's daughter and brushes up against her flank. She feels solid, as real as any other cat who walks the mire. "Starlingheart?" The dark bridge of her nose crinkles with warmth. Twilightfall had been a queen after her only child's death. She'd been present for Briarstar's kitting, and for Sandra's, and had assisted with their care until they'd been apprenticed. Briarstar had been busy dealing with ShadowClan's affairs, and Sandra had lost herself to grief after Spark-kit's health had declined.

Twilightfall purrs softly, trilling like birdsong. "I remember when you were the tiniest creature," she says with genuine affection. "Your mother was always so proud of you, and all of StarClan is now. You've been so strong, Starlingheart, even when your Clan has been forced into weakness."

She pulls herself away from the medicine cat's flank, and gestures her to follow with the flick of a tail. Before long, she will pause, using the length of her spotted tail to halt Starlingheart behind her. "I know the marshes have always been harder to live in. But there is beauty and life here, too. ShadowClan is hardy because we must be. Until the end." She looks at Starlingheart and gestures towards the patch of strangely-spiked flowers that grow before them.

"StarClan has not forgotten ShadowClan," she promises, her voice soft. "ShadowClan may hunt more freely with wild garlic. It is not to be plucked, but to be rolled in." It's as specific as she can get, but it is close enough. Twilightfall nods for Starlingheart to get closer, to taste a frond, to capture it's scent in her nostrils.

When Starlingheart looks back or attempts to ask her further questions, Twilightfall will be gone.​

[ PENNED BY MARQUETTE ]​

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[Starlingheart]

She startles as she feels a pelt brush against her fur and her head swings around to affix round green eyes on whoever it was that had bumped into her. She pauses for a moment as she is faced by an unfamiliar face and she blinks hard before realizing that wait she does know how this is.

"T-Twilightfall?" she asks softly. She had not seen her since she was much younger. Since before she had taken up the mantle of medicine cat apprentice. Her heart flutters with grief when she remembers her aunt refusing to treat her. She had been so young then, without the knowledge she possesses now. She wishes she had been the medicine cat back then. Maybe she could’ve saved her.

She would get swept up in the what-ifs if she allowed herself but she needed to focus. Twilightfall was moving, gesturing for her to follow. On shaky white paws she does, listening as the starry she-cat speaks. She talks about the beauty and the life here. It’s hard to see it, sometimes. But she can see that she is right. She thinks of Magpiepaw, of the kits she had helped deliver that were living. All the cats she had helped that were living.

She looks at the plants that she gestures to and her breath catches in her throat. She is now saying something about how it is to be rolled in not plucked. How it will help Shadow Clan hunt more freely "I- what?" she asks, but when she turns to look for the StarClanner she is gone and Starlingheart is alone again.

// this is open now!!
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[smogstar]

Starlingheart looks as though she'd just been plunged into icy water. Emerald eyes train onto her surroundings in search of only StarClan knows what, with a haphazardness which registered as abnormal for the astute medicine cat. Of course, the pawprint left by her brother's demise went deeper than in most minds, and he can fathom the potential of it to increasingly distress her so. Yet, something's off. It appears that her provocation does not stem from the echoes of Pitchstar's death, but rather a more immediate, in-the-moment factor. A flick of a black-capped ear marks his intrigue, and Smogmaw elects to approach the young healer shortly thereafter.

Trudging through reeds and other bog flora, the deputy bears a heedful demeanour as he draws near. He does not pity, nor feel sympathy for Starlingheart, but granted that the clan's collective health lays in her paws, the inkspill she-cat is exempt from his indelicacy given towards others in her age range. "Everything all good, Starlingheart?" he probes, while dipping his noggin in a reserved greeting. "You look like you'd just seen a ghost. Something the matter?" An urge to remark on leader-killing rogues is narrowly smothered, now destined to never leave his throat and become put into speech. Some would call such a comment insensitive, though Smogmaw simply sees it as realistic. ​

 

[CHILLEDSTAR.]

DON'T YOU GIVE ME UP, PLEASE DON'T GIVE UP​

---

chilledstar had made it a point to look out for starlingheart. poor girl reminded them of their brother sometimes... minkpaw was just fortunate enough to still have them. starlingheart had lost many... it was a heavy weight to carry. so seeing her look so stunned, as if she'd saw something she'd have no real way of explaining made the leader twitch their ears forward, gently making their way over, glancing briefly as smogmaw before turning their full attention to the medicine cat. he was right about that. she certainly looked spooked.

"take a deep breath, kid. tell us what's up."
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[Magpiepaw]

"There are always ghosts if you have eyes." Cryptically mewed and tone light, the black and white apprentice appears in almost jarring silence next to Chilledstar, staring unblinking at Starlingheart directly curiously at her sudden wary expression. Had she heard something? Seen something? Maybe the birds were talking to her finally now too as they did him, it would make sense. They were born of feathers and named for wings not yet grown. He would be delighted to know this was the case but it was unlikely. Speaking to the birds was considered strange, a novelty, most cats stared at him strangely when he did it. Curiously he wanders forward past both deputy and leader to examine the strange fronds near Starlingheart's paws with a hesitant sniff before sneezing abruptly. Was this food or was this poison or perhaps something new? Like poisoned food. Magpiepaw's tail twitched as he leaned down again and noted the crisp clean leafy stems shooting upward and the odd white lump just settled beneath the earth below. "Were you talking to these?"
As if it were common for cats to converse with plants but given her knowledge he would not be surprised to find out this was the case. How else did you learn what they did if not amicable discussion.
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[Starlingheart]

She startles again at the sound of Smokemaw's voice, so focused on her thoughts about what she had just seen to hear anyone coming up behind her. She whirls around, green eyes wide and fully expecting to see another visitor from the stars. Hoping even, that it would be her brother this time. Her heart falters when she sees this cat is among the living. Relief and sadness in equal measures. He tells her she looks like she had seen a ghost. "I-I did" she says, her voice hushed, in awe. This was the first time StarClan had spoken to her directly like this. Before, it had been a sign but this time... "A st-starclanner came to me" she explains to the gray-furred deputy, her eyes flashing to the two cats who come after him. She is glad Chilledstar is among them, she wouldn't have to explain herself again later.

Now, it was just a matter on if they believed her or not. "Tw-Twilightf-f-fall" she pauses and takes a dee breath, trying to steady her shaking nerves "She was he-here. She told- She told me that St-StarClan havent- they haven't abandoned us" She feels tears sting her eyes as she talks. She had never thought they had abandoned them, but she knows some of her clanmates have and to hear that that fear is unfounded brings a rush of relief to her. "She also t-told me that uh that 'ShadowClan may hunt more freely with wild garlic. It is not to be plucked, but to be rolled in." she relays the words of the queen to her leader and deputy, though her green eyes focus on Magpiepaw's black and white pelt, drawing strength from him. He asks if she was talking to the garlic but hopefully now he knows that it was StarClan she had been conversing with, not the plants.

She then looks from Chilledstar to Smogmaw, studying their faces as she awaits their respective reactions.
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[smogstar]

A fleeting glance is given to Chilledstar, who encroaches on equally meddling paws. They put forth consolation more curt than his own, which elicits a brief snort from the silver tabby. He has embraced their straightforward manner of leadership considerably quicker than he had with Pitchstar's asinine quirks. Tell us what's up Starlingheart, indeed.

When the medicine cat validates his query, which had been rhetorical at best, Smogmaw's auburn gaze swiftly grips onto her own. An apparition, she alleges, relayed to her at the behest of StarClan. The notion of it rots in his brain for a moment. It is only now, after many moons of distress and anguish, that the starbound cats give ShadowClan their backing—moreover, it was a rather impractical backing at that. Rolling around in garlic? Are they implying their scent of crowfood and mud isn't foul enough?

Perhaps there is something wrong in the water here. The swamp pools are barely unfrozen, and with the return of frogs and whatnot to the clan's diet, Smogmaw can see it being the source of Starlingheart's hallucination.

"Hmmph, could've fooled me," he remarks in a tart tone, dwelling on this apparent denial of their abandonment. Vague prophecies could have been significantly more beneficial during their period of starvation. The deputy looks around, in search of a semblance of any lingering ghosts or this wild garlic they spoke of. "Fascinating," twits Smogmaw, "so what does this mean?" Not plucked, but to be rolled in; in other words, hunt for the stuff, slather yourself in it, yet do not harvest any of it. An idea, or rather the seeds of one, is then planted in his mind. "Do you use wild garlic for your healing, Starlingheart?" he asks. "And d'you know where we can find it?"​

 

[Starlingheart]

Starlingheart shakes her head at the deputies query, she had never used wild garlic before for anything but certainly it had a use other than making their pelts stink if the former ShadowClan queen was telling her they should roll in it? She wants to believe that her vision had been real, Twilightfall had seemed to be really there after all and then there was the fact that the wild garlic was here in front of her. There was no way she could’ve found it herself, she had never even really heard of the stuff, after all.

"it-it’s right here" she says, gesturing to the patch of flowers before them, small and white. They remind her of snow drops. She does not deign to answer his other questions though, she would not pretend that she knew what the stars really truly wanted them to do with this information. It was a mystery to her.
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[CHILLEDSTAR.]

DON'T YOU GIVE ME UP, PLEASE DON'T GIVE UP​

---

chilledstar's tail lashed behind them, nose scrunching up with a snort. starclan hadn't abandoned them, hm? then why had their lives been filled with nothing but hardship and heartache? why had they been struggling as badly as they were? starclan had a lot to prove if they wanted to say for one damned moment that they hadn't abandoned shadowclan. chilledstar would believe it when they saw it. with a twitch of their ears, they looked over towards where the medicine cat gestured, lids lowering. they had half of a mind to not say anything at all.

"guess it is up to us to decipher their cryptid ass messages. tch. very well then. we cab discuss this more... at a later time."

they needed time to think, themselves. away from everyone. they would be thinking for quite some time, too.
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