pafp SWORD IN MOUTH [ ✿ ] FIRST WORDS

[LAMBKIT]

Slowly, Lambkit is begining to understand more and more of the world around him. There is this place where he lives with sister and their mother. Nursery. He is vaguely aware of the name for it, but when he tries to say it the word comes out funny, garbled like many other words do. "Rahbu! Ah-ah!" he babbles as he tries to coax his sister into continuing to play with him despite the fact that they had been playing nearly all morning. He reaches out and, despite the heaviness that drags at his feet as he does, he attempts to smack his littermate over the head with a sheathed paw, darting away as he does in a fit of giggles. "RAHBUUU!" he screams as he dances away from her. The intention is clear come and get me! His golden tail waves in the air as he flits about, stopping to bat at a mossball, grabbing it in his teeth and shaking it while sending bits of moss flying everywhere. He grabs it with his kitten sharp claws and flings it in the air, not caring where it went or who it hit before he starts to run around in circles, tail and body fluffed to twice its normal size but a wide grin worn on his round face.

All too soon though the fun is ending. He can see Butterflytuft in the corner of his eyes, the look on her face that she wears right before it's time to settle down to go to sleep. Sympathy and adoration. Today, he is having none of it. He's not ready for nap time yet! Besides, there's so much to do still! Like, for example, who was going to go shred the mossball if not him? It's not fair! She takes a step closer to him and he steps away, his eyes narrowing and a frown on his features. "Nuu" he whimpers. Can't he just have five more minutes? Can't he just play for a little longer? But no. His milk mother advances, more than likely with an admonishment that it's time to go to bed. Regardless of what she says his answer is clear. "No!!" he says, but even as he says it a surprised look overcomes his features. Surprise, because that time the word came out right. A smile replaces the anger on his face immediately as he says it again, trying it out "No! No no no no! NOOOOO!" No he will not take a nap! He'll never nap again! Never ever!!!

// @butterflytuft @RAMKIT
please wait for these two to post ^^

-ˋˏ ༻❁✿❀༺ ˎˊ- but I’d stand in the garden with you

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  LAMBKIT SKYCLAN KITTEN ; HE / HIM
  SLATE X ORANGESTAR LITTERMATE TO TBNKIT ; HALF BROTHER TO CHERRYBLOSSOM, OWLHEART, GLIMMERSUN, TAWNYCLAW & EGGBOUNCE
  

  A fluffy cream coated tom with mismatched white socked toes, a white marking blazing a trail down his face, and striking blue eyes.

  ✿ easy in battle + no formal training
  ✿ difficult to befriend
  ✿ Peaceful + healing power-play allowed, anything else with permission only
  

 

[butterflytuft]

Butterflytuft's whiskers twitch with amusement as she watches Lambkit's energetic antics, the golden kit's boundless spirit lighting up the nursery. The mossball flings through the air and scatters bits of green across the den, bringing a warm laugh to the queen's throat despite the mess. Yet, the sun's slanting light speaks of the hour, and she knows it's time for rest, no matter how much her foster son might protest.

Stepping closer, her eyes soften as they meet his defiant glare. She can see the fleeting frustration dancing in his gaze, the tiny lines of rebellion on his face. "Nap time," She instructs gently, a little firmer than she's used to. She expected the usual flurry of squeaks and playful dodges, but what she didn't expect was the sudden clarity that breaks through the babbled gibberish.

'No!' Lambkit's voice rings out, clear and decisive. The tortoiseshell's eyes widen, a spark of surprise and joy lighting them up. Lambkit's own astonished expression shifts quickly, his initial defiance replaced by an innocent, beaming smile. 'No!' He repeats, this time with sheer delight, as if the single, simple word was the most wondrous thing he'd ever discovered. Butterflytuft's heart swells with pride. This is a brilliant milestone!

"Your first word," She whispers, awe threading through her voice. "What a strong little one you are, Lambkit!" She dips her head to nuzzle his tiny forehead, her fur brushing against his as she les out a soft purr. For a heartbeat, nap time is forgotten. The queen settles next to him, watching as his joy bubbles over. But as glee lights up her own expression, there now grows a shadow of guilt. She was the one to see it, his first word. With a tiny frown, she glances towards the nursery entrance, as if expecting to see Orangestar and Slatesnarl there. A slow exhale leaves her. I'll be sure to tell them every detail later.
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[RAMKIT]

"-Amb-bam-bam-bam!"

She follows her brother strike for strike, even as fatigue drags on her tail. He babbles at her, and she chitters back with the same insistence and glee, following the cream colored blur through the darkness of the nursery. Her paws have grown sturdier as of late, her limbs more willing to obey her wants. It's just her eyes that haven't sharpened to the same clarity yet. Everything is muddled - brigher by day, but definition lays nose-far and not a single mouse-length after that.

She knows no different; she races after Lambkit with a fervor, nips at his tail and outstretched paw with the same eagerness he gives her. She doesn't notice Butterflytuft's lingering, not until her twin does. Foggy blues tilt up, up - lingering on the impending shape as it unfurls more and more features. She knows the molly well, knows the intent in her steps and understands the language she rumbles, but -

No! Lambkit expresses distaste first, and with his teeth clicking in all of the right places. Ramkit looks at him with alarm, and as he continues to prattle on with his newfound joy, she dances on her paws with the same delight. He's so smart!! Lambkit figured out how to get them out of naptime! The younger twin watches as the queen gathers him up in a warm embrace, murmuring her cheers and celebrations. Ramkit, in this thin veil of distraction, tilts towards the light of the exit. When Butterflytuft finally looks up again, peering in the same direction to find their true parents, Ramkit is already peaking out into the too-bright brightness.

She eeks out a babble, a chitter. She squeaks like birdsong before, somewhere clenched in the middle of her ramblings as she stubbornly tries to escape, spouting a very proud, "Da-Da." She searches for masses of black fur, stunned at the edge of the nursery as everything long before her is nothing but shapes and blurs.
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[Oleanderkit]

Amsuement and joy abound! Orangestar's kits have discovered the joys of speech! And yet Oleanderkit, among the oldest of the nursery's kittens, cannot find it in her heart to celebrate with them.

It is certainly apparent to cats with eyes to see her that the girl is still in mourning. She sulks like a professional; head penitently bowed, oppressively glum; as if her grief were a disease she was intent on spreading. It is not just the fact that Dawnglare has died, but that his promise has died with him — if he had never told her that he knew the path to star-blessings, that he could save her from certain death, she might be impartial about his passing now. But he, in all of his sharp-tongued, vast-minded glory, has passed beyond her reach. It makes her wonder if he ever really knew the way to immortality. Maybe it was all just a big lie told to kits that wanted more than they could ever have.

After he'd died kits had flooded the nursery in waves. Orangestar's kittens, Oddgleam's kittens, strangers' kittens, all shoved into her space, small bodies all pressed against one another in a bulging, silk-furred mass. It puts her in a bad mood. The nursery in her rogue colony had always been so quiet, just Mercury and Birch and her mother and herself, and it had been so... well, Oleander would not call that nursery nice, but it was at least less claustrophobic. She aches for the simple silence — for the time before younger kittens squatted about her, chittering and giggling and whapping her tail when they missed their siblings'; the time before she had to give up the attention of her beloved den-mother; the time before she was no longer the most special kit in the nursery.

She loathes to stay there anymore. But even though she has grown, willow-limbed and tall and thin, she loathes even more the idea of becoming an apprentice.

So she tries to retreat to kitten games. She'd been watching Lambkit and Ramkit play with a languor matched only by swamp humidity in the dead of summer. They bat and smack each other; they dart and babble; they are not even close to playing the sophisticated kit-games of Oleander's own half-youth. Their incompetence makes her smirk. They don't even have words to imagine with, she observes, smug in her superiority, which is certainly a normal feeling for a near-apprentice to have about literal infants. But it's not long before they prove her wrong. First Lambkit finds what is, probably, the easiest word in the world to say: no. But Ramkit decides that isn't enough achievement for one day. Dada, she gurgles, the syllables bubbling from pink lips almost accidentally. Butterflytuft's praise casts Oleander in jaded shadow.

"They talk now," she hums, materializing at Butterflytuft's side with an acidic shimmer. The mottled queen frowns at the nursery's entrance for reasons Oleander doesn't understand. Her own gaze rakes the nursery lazily for Budkit's chocolate points, but when she doesn't find her immediately, she gives up. "Great." It is the kind of praise that a caught mouse would give its predator hawk. A wriggling worm talking is such a meaningless achievement when a much better conversation partner already exists... right?

𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋, 𝐒𝐊𝐈𝐍, 𝐁𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐇, 𝐒𝐖𝐄𝐀𝐓 𓆱 . ݁˖ . ݁𓆸

• ooc.
• OLEANDERKIT —— kit of skyclan . lovage x laurel . littermate to birchkit and mercurykit ✦ penned by meghan
  
  ✦ a willowy silver blue ticked torbie with low white and seafoam eyes. lonerborn, oleander struggles to learn the ropes of clan life while coping with anxiety and past trauma. may seem strange, and has unconventional hobbies.
  ✦ girl / she her pronouns / undiscovered sexuality / 05 moons & ages every 20th
  ✦ peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / underline & tag account when attacking
  —— will not start fights / will flee / will show mercy. a mere kitten, she cannot defend herself in battle.
  
  ✦ "speech", thoughts, all opinions are in character
  ✦ full biography — msg on discord for plots — toyhouse
  

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[PALADIN]

She moves with a certainty about camp. Her second moon had arrived, and she was more confident, stronger- yet, she was restricted to the den more often. Biting cold found that as her only truth- warmth and cold, back and forth. She settles near Butterflytuft just before the queen gets up to nudge the kits towards naptime, her eyes half-lidded and placed upon them. There isn't much thought to her right now, beyond the sloppy game that they play.

Oleanderkit watches with different thoughts then her own, and Paladin exhales a breath as her nursemother pushes forward and tries to gather them up. Her ears perked, copper eyes pointed towards Lambkit. Loud, demanding no's are crowed, and a frown finds Paladin's face. Her vision shifts towards Ramkit, who demands their father. Despite the different in thought, Oleanderkit voices the obvious, if not for the sarcastic tone that paints her voice.

Her head tilts, and her tail twitches, and she repeats the phrase, uttering it to herself. Great. Great? Great. Each with different tone infliction. An ear turns, and she pushes to her paws, stretching her steadily growing body before shifting to find a warm nest.

‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎‎ ‎ ‎‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎ ┌── YOUVE BURNT ME ⋅❁⋅ NOW GUIDE ME ──┐‎

• "speech"

• 

• PALADIN she/her, kit of skyclan, two moons.
  ⭃ LH black tabby / silver tabby chimera with low white and strong copper eyes. white plumed hair sits center on her head down to the beginning of her mane. a 'sword' is outlined in white on her back. she's quiet but intent, serious but still kitten-soft.
  ⭃ mentored by no one / / mentoring no one
  ⭃ mated to no one / / sibling to unknown
  ⭃ peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / / underline and tag when attacking
  ⭃ penned by dallas ↛ dallasofnines on discord, feel free to dm for plots.

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[butterflytuft]

The celebration doesn't end there. Butterflytuft turns her attention just in time to catch Ramkit toddling toward the nursery entrance, her tiny face tilted up as if searching for something. "Ramkit," She calls softly, getting up and stepping toward her to stop her from going outside, but the little she-kit seems utterly fixated. She stops just at the edge of the den, peering into the brightness beyond. With a chittering babble, she lets out a proud, "Da-da!" The word hangs in the air, and the queen's breath catches. Yellow eyes soften with emotion as her foster daughter squints into the blurry sunlight, searching for the familiar shapes of her parents.

"Ramkit," Butterflytuft repeats, her voice filled to the brim with warmth now. She pads over and brushes her nose lightly against the kit's ear. "That's right. I'll tell them all about how clever you are." She smiles, pride glowing in her gaze as she gathers Ramkit close, just in time to glance back at Lambkit, who's still bouncing with glee. The queen can't help but feel a pang of guilt as she once more looks toward the nursery entrance. She hopes Orangestar and Slatesnarl won't be upset that she's witnessed such a precious milestone for each kitten as she herds the twins back into the nest. "Now, let's settle down. You've had a very exciting day, little ones."

Her words are punctuated by Oleanderkit's sudden arrival. The older kit's voice carries an edge of sarcasm as she observes, "They talk now. Great." Butterflytuft glances at her, her expression one of patience. "Yes," She replies evenly, trying to read the lines of discontent on her delicate features. The nursery has felt so much busier lately, and Oleanderkit - always so anxious and perceptive - hasn't seemed to settle into the change. The tortoiseshell shifts her paws, choosing her words with care. "It's a special moment, don't you think?" They're learning, and that's all any queen wants to see from the kits in their care. She wraps her tail neatly over her paws and softens her gaze as it flickers to Paladin beside her. She doesn't expect an agreement, and Oleanderkit's clipped comment makes her heart ache just a little. She knows grief when she sees it, even when cloaked behind a sharp tongue and feigned indifference.
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