twolegplace EPIPHETS — skyclan encounters

[FANG]

Maneuvering the thin line between the neighborhood and claimed territory is tricky, Fang has found. There's not much room in this liminal space, and prey creatures care little for things like borders or busy roads. Snow-drenched and freezing—anywhere in this forest, the pickings are slim. Fang does what he can. But sometimes that means straying closer to the places he would rather avoid.

Hunting the prior day proved fruitless, so he's rose at dawn from his makeshift den to go searching for any early birds flitting around the brambles. The snow that filters down through the knitted tree canopy feels frozen to the touch. The unyielding ground crunches underfoot. He slips through the murky gray which smooths through the underbrush in misty, gossamer droves and conceals himself within a tangled bush. Though the nearby rustling that he'd spotted just prior reveals no little songbird—rather, a troupe of wild cats stalk into sight.

He's yet to cross their border, nor has he made any plans to do so, but Fang is near enough that he can see the leaf-litter sticking to their pelts and catch the conversations shared between them. And though his hiding spot may have fooled an unaware mouse or squirrel, one member of the patrol is quick to clock him.

Before they can demand compliance, Fang has already emerged from his spot. A few burrs snag into his fur from the brambles. Some sort of greeting sits unspoken, stilted, on the back of his tongue—he wonders, perhaps, if they will leave him alone.​

 

[Cherryblossom]

Cherrypaw isn't particularly observant with matters unrelated to her own pelt, but by fortune or skill she spots the silver flash of a whisker flicking some fox-lengths away. She halts unceremoniously and quietly, ears flicking forwards; she makes no attempt to hide the notice in sunlit eyes. "Something's—" Her call is cut off with the thing's reveal, which turns out not to be a thing at all but another cat, as untamed and rough-hewn as the peeling pine bark of their territory.

Immediately, her hackles rise. "Guys!" More urgent than before, her tone is one peal of a warning bell. "There's a rogue." The tom, at first glance, isn't very rogue-like, but the broken bodies of their apprentices are fresh in her mind. Cherrypaw has never been personally fond of Howlfire's brood, but their wounds had been as gruesome at Little Wolf's, and they had not shouldered them out of their own will.

Her glare is as unyielding as she can make it. He is only one cat, and she is with @SLATE and a patrol of warriors. Still, he, as much as any stranger, could've been one of those responsible for the savagery. Claws flex in their pristine sheaths. She has never really fought another cat before, for all of Slate's insistence on preparing her for it, and—now that she's really staring at him—the stranger doesn't look too willing to spring for her throat either. He is outnumbered, and, at any rate, continues to stay a reasonable distance away from the scent markers. Hesitation doesn't lower her bristles, but it does coax her into a more civil word. "...are you a rogue?"​

 

[TATTEREDLIGHT]

just because i carry it so well doesn't mean it's not heavy .
︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

He prided himself on his keen eyesight, albeit, maybe it wasn’t something to take pride in, seeing the stranger step out from the brambles, brows drawn together. That can’t be comfortable. He thought wearily, staring at the burr-ridden feline, Cherrypaw’s voice bringing him to the past, of broken bodies and fearful cries.

He winced, nibbling at the supple flesh of his lower lip, drawing beads of blood to the surface, lapped up by a nervous tongue before it pooled greater. “He’s not crossing the border.” If he was a rogue, he would have attacked, not make himself known. He supplied, bringing himself out of his half-dazed state, willing the fur along his spine to flatten with a quiet rumble, shifting awkwardly on three limbs, staring at the stranger. “Hello.” He offered a greeting, plumed tail swishing, kicking up miscellaneous things like pine needles and twigs in its wake. “I’m Tatteredlight.” He introduced himself, tone uplifting despite the maelstrom of thoughts, and emotions threatening to tug him under.

“You might want to steer away from the border—for a while.” He added, blinking languidly, thoughts drifting to bloodied bodies and the strong stench of rogue. His muscles tensed, licking the inside of his mouth out of habit, calming the rising fear nestled beneath his heart. ​

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thought speech​

 

[FANG]

A molly's voice breaks through the morning quiet, head whipping back to her group mates as he's trying to subtly finagle the last thread of his fur from the brambles. They all have a wild look about them, though their forward figure is girlish and oddly pristine compared to the rough, scarred company she keeps. "Rogue...," he repeats numbly. The word is familiar, just perhaps not in the way that they mean it. Fang looks over his shoulder to catch whatever vagrant Cherrypaw's tittering about. Turning back, he sees her daisy-yellow attention focused squarely on him.

Are you a rogue? "...No," Fang answers. He truly has no way to determine whether or not he is a rogue, but he's not going to take his chances with the wrong answer. The cats poised opposite him all stand with varying levels of tenseness; like there's a tripwire just underfoot and none of them are quite sure where it is. He anticipates that any mistake may cause an explosion. He tries to tread lightly.

"You're clan cats," he states. Pinning a title to faces. To him, the first of their kind. Initially they seem just like any other band of misfits, but the cohesive scent of forest-pine concealing them and their border is hard not to notice, and the unfamiliar accent with which they speak becomes more apparent the longer he sticks around. From within this stark group comes another voice: Tatteredlight. He's got a friendly malaise about him, with eyes that glance this way and that in nervous, fleeting jolts.

Tatteredlight suggests that he avoid the border, though it is of a reasonable distance to him now. This strikes a nervous chord within him. Aside from the border, there aren't many places for someone like him to go. "I meant no offense," Fang offers at length, frowning lightly as he glances through the patrol. Is it too much to be even spotted from their territory? How far does the authority of a border truly go?​

 

[Cherryblossom]

Cherrypaw's tail tip twitches, not quite in the throes of lashing yet. The burr-stricken creature makes no other moves towards them other than a halting few words. She cocks her head. An ear twists backwards to catch Tatteredlight's objection, but her gaze gleams steadily upon the stranger. He could cross the border if he wanted to, a step, skip, and a hop into SkyClan land. Why Tatteredlight bothered to introduce himself is beyond her guess. Announcing her name to him was like announcing herself to the trees, or to the river, or the sun. Rogues and loners were a part of nature she'd never bother with, so long as they never bothered her. If he wasn't a clan cat, then he didn't matter.

The tom seems to realize this too, or at least the caste the clowder before him belongs to. His observation distantly reminds her of Mallowlark, and how he spoke of his kin who knew of the clans but strayed away from joining. "Yeah," she responds, making it clear he should've realized sooner. Loners—for this one has proven himself not to be a rogue, at least not now—would forever be an odd bunch to Cherrypaw. Look at Slate, Dogbite, Tatteredlight, Silversmoke: they'd all grown stronger for their acceptance of clan life.

The stranger indicates no will to be another joiner though. Tatteredlight suggests he keep his current distance, and the tom responds with bland placation. "Well, you haven't really done anything wrong," the apprentice admits, rolling her shoulders. "Who are you?" she adds after a moment. A name for a name seemed fair enough, and Tatteredlight had already given his.​

 

[FANG]

The girl responds. She is sharp and expressive, peering at him as she would a speck of dirt on her fluffy white paw. It's a strength that he can't claim to have had in his younger days—Fang was scolded for his soft-spoken-ness more often than not, and that lingering quiet vice has him chewing on his words even now. He was never particularly good at doing as he was told.

Cherrypaw only slightly reassures him. He gets the sense that she's the child of someone important, and perhaps that instills a sense of authority within her; she knows her clan and is familiar with its seats of power, dispassionately sharing its will. But that's not the same as having authority.

He would avoid the border if only there were the space—and prey—to do so.

A long moment passes. "Fang," he answers finally. The confession is more than he would've liked to give. Anonymity is a worn and familiar defense, concealing him like a frayed but sturdy cloak—to shed it is to pluck at its threads, score through the fabric, and risk exposure to the elements. Nonetheless, he relents. It'll do him no good to make enemies of these neighboring cats. He can spare this much, especially for cats that he intends to avoid for the rest of the season.

He feels this encounter has run its course, but Fang will not turn his back to retreat across the tree line. Perhaps to soothe the jagged-toothed anxieties which these clan cats share, he settles his wandering gaze upon them and offers: "I intend only to stay until the thaw." He casts a paw to the frozen sheets of icy snow on the ground. "Then I'll leave this place. Until then, I'll try not to be spotted from your border." He can't promise to avoid it, so he hopes this will be enough.​

 

[SLATE]

A cat hiding amongst a nearby bush only to be discovered by the keen eye of his apprentice was a cause for alarm, to say the least. The massive Maine Coon's hackles had stuck up like the quills of a porcupine, his hefty paws advancing forward as the patrol moved to confront the stranger. As he was about to growl out some sort of threat, Cherrypaw had taken the reigns instead, never seeming to know when to leave the talking to someone else. "Cherrypaw." Slate grunts toward his apprentice, as if verbally cuffing the tortoiseshell over the ear. Questioning strangers wasn't inherently wrong, but her nosiness was unnecessary. Never mind who he was, and even if he was a rogue, it was not as if he would tell her right then and there. Tatteredlight had the right idea, warning the dark feline to stay away.

His hackles slightly lower as the other answers Cherrypaw's inquiries ( albeit with little words ). Either this guy was lying through his teeth, playing the part of an innocent passerby while he secretly plotted to gain intel on SkyClan for the rest of the rogues, or he truly was just some scruffy-looking loner straying too close for comfort. There was no way to know the truth, and as Tatteredlight said, he had not crossed the border. Slate nearly had the nerve to threaten the tom here and now, despite having not actually done anything wrong; this could very well be one of those damned rogues! "Just watch your step. So much as a hair over the scent line and I'll flay your pelt." Slate conveys an icy warning, amber stare boring toward the yellowy hues of the supposed loner.

Urgh, he'd better not be making a mistake by letting them go. Slate made a mental note to circle around here later to make sure this "Fang" had sworn by his promise to keep his distance. The Maine Coon glanced to his other patrol members now, gesturing with his blocky noggin toward the rest of the borderlands. "Come on. We gotta get movin'." Maybe there were more "loners" wandering nearby. Keeping their territory defended was crucial, especially now, so there was no time to waste.

₊ ⋆ * ⊹ ₊ ☾ —— 𝙟𝙪𝙨𝙩 𝙨𝙩𝙪𝙘𝙠, 𝙝𝙤𝙡𝙡𝙤𝙬 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙖𝙡𝙤𝙣𝙚

• late but wanted to get this in rq!

• 

• 

  ✰ SLATE
  —— he/him; lead warrior of skyclan; former rogue
  —— bisexual; single; not looking
  —— hulking, scarred charcoal-black colored maine coon with amber eyes
  —— "speech", thoughts, attack
  —— link to full tags; @ on discord for plots.
  —— penned by beatles

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