look alive .. morning frost

[hollowcreek]

( ✧ ) The air was starting to grow chilly enough that Hollowcreek struggled to rise the moment the sun arched over the horizon. His body protested whenever his moved a leg to adjust, the warmth from his fur disturbed and sending a shiver under his skin. Signs of leafbares approached danced closer in a haunting manner with every dawn. It wouldn't be much longer before his Clanmates find badger setts and fox burrows to huddle in together.

After much deliberation he decided it wasn't worth the struggle to try and stay asleep. The cold had disturbed him beyond remaining restful and so he rose from his barren nest to get ahead of some of the Clan. He parted from the gorse and heather to feel to moorlands under his paws but froze, pulling his paw back sharply when the grasses had felt frozen. His eyes pulled down from the skies and to the ground below to see an even, thin layer of frost covering the ground. Lush green blades crystalized until crushed underpaw.

"Oh, it's only just begun." Hollowcreek mused to himself, taking a few steps forward to see how far the frost reached. Most importantly if he could find any tracks within the layer of ice.
​

( I SEE YOUR COLLARBONE ; AND WANNA LOSE CONTROL )

 

[downyfur]

Downypaw feels like they struggle to get up in the morning as much as the rest of the apprentices, if not a little easier with the unyielding aid of their mentor. They barely feel the cold, dying grass beneath their flanks when they sleep, as if they're truly the cloud they seem to be, slumber unmarred by the ragged, crusted fingers of the earth.

Consciousness comes to them amid a heap of drowsing apprentices, mostly their siblings, all curled into neat little bundles and rolled into a corner of camp. They take care when stepping past them. The crunch of vegetation is a whip-crack to ears becoming accustomed to the tunnels, where the soil stayed silent and forgiving beneath pawsteps, and their ears strained to catch any whisper of movement rather than filtering it out.

They've got a patrol to catch, or just paws to busy; regardless, the air nipping at their nose makes sure they're not staying down once they're awake. Their soot-stained form creeps past a beast of a moor-runner on their way to find the day's purpose, only halted in their unispired mission by his voice. He didn't seem to be talking to anyone. Sapphire eyes reflect upon him and his pondering for a moment, and they grasp the trailing threads of meaning as easily as swatting a grasshopper out of the air.

"Leaf-bare?" they echo. The kitten has heard enough stories about it to know it, and fear it. They tap the grass underfoot a few times, feeling the crackle of ice splintering into a thousand tiny slivers beneath their toes. "Is it going to snow soon?"​

 

[RATTLEHEART]

The moors grew more and more chilled with each day that passed, and Rattleheart - like most of the rest of the clan - found himself reluctant to let go of any scrap of warmth he could get his claws on. It was often a fight to get to sleep with how wide open Windclan's camp was, and once he was blissfully far away without the cold worming its way under his pelt, he was resistant towards finally fighting his way back awake. Unfortunately he knew that staying asleep forever would do him no good, considering hunger was starting to gnaw freely at the edges of his belly. It seemed that some hunting was in order, and the tunnels would at least offer him some welcome protection against any stray cold gusts that tried to come his way.

There was a certain sluggishness to his every movement as he headed for the entrance of camp, figuring he'd pop his head out and see if there was any unlucky obvious prey before he chose to venture down into the tunnels. The nearby chatter from Hollowcreek and Downypaw caught his attention though, the tunneler glancing between the pair and the vaguely cloudy sky above. "The frost has decided to grace us with its presence these days, but I'm not sure about snow just yet. There don't seem to be many storm clouds around - the sky would be looking a bit like your pelt, Downypaw." Though things could easily change at the drop of a hat, especially if Starclan willed it so. Rattleheart wasn't even sure he'd be able to blame them, considering they'd done more than enough lately to earn their ire, and a crushing storm.
​

[ PENNED BY EO ]​

 

[FEATHERSPINE]

Silver coated the yellow-green grass- it wore a dewy sheen, a coat of armour. The warning signs of Leafbare were written upon the earth itself. Deadness, suffering- it loomed, and Featherpaw lay awake in the elderly hours of the night, glancing over the sleeping bodies of the apprentices her age and older. They were not prepared. None of them... none of them. All he could do was watch as they were thrust into this new hardship, unprepared...

Featherpaw had not been asleep. What rest he'd gotten had been faded and backdropped, interrupted by cold and worry. The conversation buzzing nearby, however low, was enough to doom his fantastical restfulness to Hell.

"The puh... p-prey will start g-getting scarce, soon." He echoed the words of someone much older than himself, wearing the hardy coat of someone wiser, someone stern and armoured. Featherpaw was prepared- at least, he told himself so. He knew what was coming would not be good, knew it approached in a dark, algid coat of creeping frost and growling stomachs. ​

✦ penned by pin​

 

[SCORCHSTORM]

Scorchpaw had survived the frozen teeth the mountains sank into her, but when she wakes to frost nipping her nose, she cannot help but feel transported back to those stony peaks. Dual-toned eyes flutter open and the girl immediately tries to feel a presence at her side. She'd only survived the mountains thanks to pressing against @LUCKYPAW 's flank through the bone-chilled nights, and since their return to WindClan the siblings have been nigh inseparable — and when she feels her brother's warmth at her side relief floods her. Aside from his apprentice duties, there is really nothing that should be separating them, and she shouldn't worry about whether or not he's in sight. There's no falling rocks to partition them, no dogs to rip her away from him. But she feels relief all the same. Before she leaves him to catch her patrol, she touches her nose to his ear in goodbye.

Then she's out, pelting over frost-hardened grasses to catch up to the rest of the cats she ought to be hunting with. Hollowcreek, Downypaw, Rattleheart, Featherpaw; it's impossible to know which of them she can truly trust, though she recalls Hollowcreek's pride at having 'felled' Smokestar and feels her guard go up wearily. Rattleheart, at least, she hopes to truly confide in. But Scorchstreak's words echo in her ears, and she wonders how much she can trust her uncle after all. At least they're feeling better.

Downypaw asks about snow. Featherpaw mumbles about prey. She chooses to entertain the fluffier, paler kit's musings: "In the mountains, the snow was so deep it could swallow a cat," she supplies, perhaps unhelpfully. She's not sure how much snowfall the moors themselves will see — she has yet to live through a real leafbare of her own. But her tail flicks in beat with her imagination. "You would blend right into it, too."

𝐀𝐏𝐑𝐄𝐒 𝐌𝐎𝐈 𝐋𝐄 𝐃𝐄𝐋𝐔𝐆𝐄 ✧ 𝘼𝙁𝙏𝙀𝙍 𝙈𝙀 𝘾𝙊𝙈𝙀𝙎 𝙏𝙃𝙀 𝙁𝙇𝙊𝙊𝘿

• 

• 
  
  — scorchkit . scorchpaw
  — she/they ; apprentice of windclan
  — short-haired tortoiseshell she-cat with low white and orange/yellow eyes
  — "speech" ; thoughts
  — signature by giinya, template art by ska-i
  — penned by meghan

​

 

[LUCKYPAW]

┌────────────────────☽【❖】☾────────────────────┐​

The first night they'd been back, Luckypaw's pretty sure he could have slept on for an eternity if left undisturbed, the exhaustion and relief and fear finally catching up with him, though from there'd slipped into something less blissful. Without any great fatigue to weight him down, his sleep had grown into something more fitful - at least, something more fitful than it had been before leaving. Whether it was some sort of hold-over from nights spent on alert, surrounded by those had only grown to trust in time and spent in such unfamiliar environments or the memories that bogged down his dreams, he can't say for certain, but neither of those feelings are pleasant, especially not when tasked with early mornings once again. This time, though, it's not Cygnetstare's prompting that drags him from his half-slumber, but a gentle nudge, a loss of a warm presence.

Even in his bleary state, he forces himself up all at once, as though Scorchpaw's disappearance from his side might be something more important than some early morning patrol. The chill in the air is familiar enough, even if doesn't find his pelt dusted over with snow, and he can't help the panic that seizes through his chest before he recognizes the nest beneath him, recognizes the gorse wall shielding them all in. They're back at home, and there's nothing to worry over, logically - he knows this, and Luckypaw lets out a soft, breathy exhale as his cold-stiff limbs slide back down for a moment. It's...still an adjustment, remembering that there's no reason to get so worked up at something so small. Even if they were both tunnelers, or both moor runners, there's no reason he and Scorchpaw would spend every waking moment together, no matter how his heart flutters at the thought. Nothing's going to happen to her, or to him, for that matter - nothing so devastating had happened before the journey (save for the badger encounter), and it's hardly like they'll encounter any of the journey obstacles at home. But, still, he pulls himself up, slower this time, and makes for the gorse tunnel.

Might as well get warmed up before Cygnetstare seeks him out for today's training, right? Besides, there's already a forming cluster just outside the bounds enclosing camp; it's not like he'll be out of place for a few minutes. Quietly, he takes a place next to Scorchpaw, brushing against her flank even as he nods a greeting to the others, taking in the moors more than anything else. The frost crunching beneath his paws is strange, but only in that he doesn't remember it from before the journey; frost and snow are no strangers, anymore, though it's still startling to see an appearance outside of the mountains. He knows it won't be nearly as harsh as those icy peaks had been, but it's not exactly a comforting thought nonetheless. Clearly, he's not the only one concerned with the shifting weather, and Luckypaw's attention drifts over to Featherpaw's direction. The thought of just how scarce prey had been on the journey, whether from the cold temperatures or thick vegetation on the way back only the ThunderClanners had been able to navigate, pulls a grimace onto his expression. "We'll just have to work extra hard, then. Nobody likes all that snow, not even the rabbits." He'd have to work on his ability to hunt in the tunnels, especially; that's where all the rabbits will be hiding, or so he's been told, and it's not like he's had many chances for successful hunts underground these past couple moons.​

i'm falling into place, but still the timing's not right (☘) yeah that's a fire i just can't seem to light

• OOC: --​
• 
• 
  - Luckykit Luckypaw
  - He/him (AFAB)
  - 7 moons (Ages on the 1st)
  - Kit Apprentice of WindClan
  - Small blue tortoiseshell with white spotting & green eyes
  - Art by myself & meghan respectively! <33
  - Minor powerplay allowed!
  - Penned by Hijinks​

 

[Azaleafrost]

Everyone has their worries about leafbare, and she understands them. She was born in leafbare, if she remembers. Her earliest memories are cold and uncomfortable, she remembers warmth as she is put next to a queen after being rescued from the thunderpath. When she opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was snow and ice. She remembers wanting no part of it, choosing to stay in the nursery where it was warm, even if the queens didn't want to be touched by kittypet filth such as she.

Now, fully grown, she lays clear eyes on the frost that covers the grass. This cold, brittle substance is what she was named after. It crunches under her paws and chills them, but she pays no mind. Frost is like... A herald of things to come. Of the trials and struggles of leafbare. A harbinger of demise.

Much like she is, she thinks. Being caught under her claws is almost certainly a death sentence.

"The tunnelers are going to have their paws full." She says. "All the prey will start to go into their burrows...."

A shame, since hunting was one of her favorite things to do. She can snap a rabbit's neck without repercussion. A clanmate that gets under her skin? Not so much. Her thoughts are always so....Violent, she realizes. Is that really a problem though?

"And....Hopefully we don't get snow big enough to consume a cat." She adds, thinking of what Scorchpaw just said. That sounds terrible. Cold and terrible and dangerous.​

 

[PEONYBREEZE]

❀༉˖°Leafbare sucked, Peonypaw knew, and the season hadn't even fully turned to it yet.

The snowy blanket that would soon cover the Clans' homes could be perceived as beautiful; the sky would be almost purple, especially in the morning, and everything would feel quiet and slow and muted. That same blanket would bring with it frost though, driving prey further away into hiding, and the empty bellies would only feel worse with a bone-chilling cold.

Peonypaw hated it more for the memory it carried. Those kithood moons were not too long ago in retrospect - especially when one considered the more senior members of the Clan -, and still he found it bittersweet. He could barely recall the faces of his parents, but the knowledge that the cold and sickness took them away from him was one he couldn't push away with such a stark reminder.

He listened to his Clanmates conversing about it, and let out an amused snort at Azaleafrost's comment. "I should try and gain a few inches then, yeah? I'm way too short for heavy snowfall."

°
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[hollowcreek]

( ✧ ) One by one his Clanmates rose like dotted poppies over the fields. The first to appear would be an apprentice, one of Brightshine's kits. He glanced down at fluffy pointed fur with a subtle smile, kind and lacking any of his usual mischief. "It's a warning to leaf-bares arrival." He answered patiently before looking over the others that followed after them.

Scorchpaw shared what she had lived through in the mountains and he can feel the fur along his spine raise in an imaginative chill. Snow that could swallow an entire cat sounded like nothing he wanted to be around. It was troublesome enough dealing with the icy ground and ankle-deep snow.

"Sounds near impossible to hunt in. How, what, could any of you eat?" He recalled their arrival and couldn't detec they had endured the same sort of starvation they had. Obviously some returned more battered than they had left, changed by the tides of the journey, but he wondered now how what sort of prey they encountered.
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( I SEE YOUR COLLARBONE ; AND WANNA LOSE CONTROL )