private sometimes people leave you halfway through the woods | foxkit

[robinheart]

”Hello Foxkit.”

Robinheart limps heavily to the water’s edge where the tortoiseshell kitten sits, a bittersweet smile resting upon her face. She had asked how the abandoned kit was faring and another Riverclanner recounted the events of days prior - of Foxkit being told his mother was not returning for him.

In her heart of hearts she had known, but flushed in newborn emotion and duty she couldn’t take it upon herself to reveal the truth to him. It has been over a moon now, much too long to leave a child waiting for someone who will never return.

Robinheart feels the sting of guilt for playing a role in his heartache.

“I heard about what happened… with your mother,” she murmurs as she gently eases herself down beside him, careful of her still healing leg. It still sat at a slight angle, which troubled her, but there’s nothing to be done about it now. At least it would heal and she would be okay. She had Gentlestorm and Moonbeam to thank for that. Citrine eyes flick away from her hind leg and settle back upon the kit she has come to love as one of her own. “The others are correct in that you have all of Riverclan to look after you. But… if you’ll allow it… I would be honored to claim you as one of my own. A-As my son.”

@Foxkit ​

[ penned by kerms ]​

 

[Foxpaw!]

Foxkit had lingered near the camp's edge after the older cats had broken the news to him. For what, he didn't know. To hope that they had been wrong? He knew they were right, that she really had left him behind for being unable to keep up. Unable to live up to the vision she had had for him. He had let her down. He knew it was foolish to sit here, still waiting, and yet...

Robinheart broke the silence, padding up to sit beside him. She spoke to comfort him, offering to claim him in the way his own mother had been unable to. His ears swiveled back to listen, but he didn't turn to look at her, gaze stuck on his small forepaws. He had leit his mother down, and who was to say he wouldn't disappoint Robinheart as well? "I can't keep up," he told her quietly. "I fall down all the time and I walk funny."

 

[robinheart]

’I can’t keep up,’ Foxkit claims, his eyes fixated upon his paws. Robinheart’s gaze softens immeasurably and she aims to wrap her plush tail around him as he continues. He cites his falling down and the way he walks as further reason for the tortoiseshell queen to rethink her proposal.

It does not sway her decision in the slightest.

“Moonbeam told me that I would walk funny from now on because of my leg,” Robinheart hums softly, trying to relate to the wobbly kit as best she could. The dull ache makes her shift her weight ever so slightly to alleviate the strain on bones freshly knit back together. “Sometimes life slows you down in one way or another. But you don’t have to go through it on your own,” she adds, craning her neck and gingerly touching her nose to the top of his head, “I want to be by your side to help you when you fall down, to walk alongside you no matter the pace, and take any burdens you may have from your shoulders…” Should he happen to glance up he would see that Robinheart meant every word - that she was committing herself to raising him when his mother no longer desired to do so.

“Would that be okay, Foxkit?”​

[ penned by kerms ]​

 

[Foxpaw!]

Robinheart spoke gently to him, telling him that the medicine cats had told her that her injury would affect her gait. Foxkit's gaze travelled slowly to the queen's injured leg as she touched her muzzle to the top of his head. Did she really mean everything she said? He let out a small, nervous whimper. He supposed she had never disappointed him before...but up until now his mother had never disappointed him either. Never lied to him, never abandoned him. Or maybe she had lied to him. Had he really been so stupid that she had been peppering his short life with fib after fib and he hadn't realized?

He thought of all the times she had taken his siblings out without him, all the times she'd scolded him for slowing them down. He thought of Robinheart's younger kittens in the nursery. He hadn't known any of RiverClan long, but Robinheart had not lied to him. Not on purpose, at least. And that was more than he could say about his vanished mother. Robinheart would fill in the space better than his mother ever had.

Turning to look at her with round orange eyes, he gave a small, nervous nod, afraid she might snatch the offer back at the last moment. "Okay," he said in a small voice.