- Sep 7, 2022
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Focus on the future. Let go of the past. The advice that his grandmother had given him was invaluable, something that he reminded himself of every single time his paws drew close to the border that ThunderClan shared with SkyClan. It had been a whole turn of the seasons since Morningpaws death though and he finds himself standing on the very spot where he had watched as his sisters throat was torn open, where he had stood helpless as she lay dying, bleeding out in the snow. That was the day that had changed everything. From there, there would be no more visits with his mother to SkyClan. There would be no more father to press his nose to the top of his head and to say "Have you gotten bigger since the last time I saw you?" despite only having seen him a couple days prior. After that, he would be forced to choose. His mother or his father. He had chosen his mother. ThunderClan. He had been born on the border between the clans. His mother had told him that, once. She had not trusted the medicine cat at the time, for she was the same cat that had ripped one of Emberstar's nine lives from her almost immediately after she had received them. Honestly, he cannot say he blamed her for the decision she had made but it left him wondering. If he was born in two clans then who was he really? Whos blood running through his veins made him him. The answer does not elude him for long. He is a ThunderClanner, and he has been ever since he had made the choice to stay when Howlfire and Fireflypaw had chosen to go.
And he wonders about them, his siblings. As he is standing here, toes just touching the invisible line between the two clans, he thinks about the last time he actually talked to his siblings and is disappointed when he comes up empty. He cannot remember. He has no idea what their lives are like, who they loved, who their friends were. He knows his sister had kits, nieces and nephews he would never have the opportunity to have a relationship with. He did not even know who their father was.
If he was a liar he would say that he didn't care, that things were better this way. But it's just him now and he can speak the truth when in the company of his own mind. He misses them terribly and he mourns the fact that none of her three kits would ever get to have the realtionship with him that he had had with his own uncle. He had looked up to Graystorm when he was a kit. The tom was a hero to him. He would not be a hero to any of these kits. No, he was a stranger.
The thought is almost too much for him to bare so he turns away, and he lets out a long shaky breath. Everything was different than it was the last time leaf-bare had rolled around. He had other siblings, Skyclaw and Duskbird and he loves them terribly, but in this moment he mourns everything that his family had lost. His mother, his sister, his uncle. And then he thinks of the cats who were not in the stars but who were lost to him anyways. Lakemoon, his brother, his sister, his sisters kits.
Finally, when he can't stand thninking about it any longer, he turns away and heads back into the heart of the oak forest. The place where he belongs, though he knows a part of him will always remain on that border.