- May 7, 2023
- 143
- 24
- 18
The night Sedgepaw visits the Moonstone, the sky is dark.
The moon is a flawed, lopsided thing; too full to be a crescent, too uneven to be full. It’s difficult to spot behind the wispy Greenleaf clouds, as thin and faint as they are, but Sedgepaw tries anyway. He used to spend a lot of time looking up at the sky, before he realized that the world around him was so much bigger and brighter and he forgot that he cared.
The smattering of stars across the Silverpelt are faint, but they are there. The air is cool and humid. Everything is softened beneath the gentle, gossamer light spreading from the sky—the harshness of the scalding daytime sun and bustling earth flaking away like rust in a watery bath. He isn’t sure that he’s ever seen a world so quiet. Though that is perhaps because this is the first time that he’s really paid attention.
It all seems so fresh.
The herbs that he ate earlier still sit bitter on his tongue, so he swipes at his teeth and grimaces. Wolfsong said they’d help his travels, stave off fatigue. Sedgepaw thinks it fruitless. His heart quivers within his chest, a flighty and unsteady creature caged within his ribs; his paws, too, shake. He doesn’t think he’d grow tired even if he ran ten laps around the moor, even before the traveling herbs hit his belly. Nerves, as he’s become so increasingly aware, will do that to you.
It’s a feeling he carries all the way from WindClan camp. Across the fields and through the pathways of Rabbit’s Run. Through the growing thickets of the lands beyond, where walls of trees grow denser than he has ever known, and grasses thin to make space for brambles and ferns. The smell is sharper here; unfamiliar. This is the furthest away from WindClan that Sedgepaw has ever been. And every footstep after, even farther still.
He’s a WindClan cat, born and raised, so he lifts his chin and tries not to look quite as nervous as he feels.
Granted, it’s an excited sort of nervousness. There’s a smile that flits across his face every now and again, uneven and uncertain, cresting over his maw in fluctuating intervals the same way that the ocean smooths over a beach’s sandy shore. It’s influenced by the sourceless thoughts that flow through his mind—things that he couldn’t really put words to if he tried.
But they all fade eventually, and when the rugged land smooths to a sharp, craggy incline and the Mothermouth is near enough to see, all that Sedgepaw feels is a quiet solemnity. Something…beyond his years.
Here we are, he thinks. The Mothermouth is nothing special—a dark opening into a long, shadowed corridor, blended into the earth so entirely that Sedgepaw might’ve missed it completely. He stares down into the dark and doesn’t really think that there ought to be more. He looms on a precipice, teetering the edge of his whole new life.
Perhaps sensing his reluctance, a voice chimes in from nearby: “Here it is, Sedge.”
Badgermoon is a smudge of silver in the overnight dark, the black splotches of his fur bleeding into the surrounding shadows; the bright twin pools of his eyes are crinkled at the corners, giving the impression of a smile. “The tunnel goes on for a while, but don’t stop until you reach the end.”
Sedgepaw nods, and then murmurs in agreement when he realizes that Badgermoon probably can’t see him nod. Insects buzz in the grasses and brambles jutting out from the rocks, creating a gentle hum over which a stark, tense silence looms. Sedge feels…something. A tightness in his chest, all twisted and solid and pressing on his lungs.
“See? Off you go. Not even a fox can keep you down, Sedge.”
That hushed thing within him untangles, at that. Sedgepaw dares one more sideways glance at Badgermoon and sees the warm outline of his face, perhaps more imagined than it is present, and echoes the smile there.
It doesn’t always dawn on him–and usually he doesn’t have to even realize—but the weight of loneliness had been pressing heavy on his shoulders until now. His parents, his mentor. Smears in the wild mosaic of his life. His siblings, too, a whole litter older and uninterested with the juvenile mundanity of apprentice life. Badgermoon probably didn’t have to be the one to take him all the way to the Moonstone, but he did; and as one of many in the menagerie of WindClan, almost a family in and of itself, Sedgepaw appreciates the effort.
Heart warmed, he looks upon the Mothermouth with a newly reignited courage, and begins to take the plunge.
The earthy maw of it provides a sort of barrier from the outside, and within the tunnel is a whole different world. Gone is the summertime humidity toiling through the air. The pathway within is cold and stagnant; everything smells of dirt and old, stale cavewater. The sounds of outside are funneled through the Mothermouth but are quickly nullified by the unnerving, overwhelming silence that permeates through the pitch. And it’s dark. Darker than the looming midnight, even with the hidden moon. It’s darker than anything.
Is this what the tunnels are like? Sedgepaw wonders, increasingly anxious. It doesn’t matter how much he blinks his eyes or squints or stares—nothing materializes in the stark black curtain over his face. He wants to turn around to see how far he’s walked from the entrance, but he’s realized that there’s not even enough room to turn his head. The walls have narrowed to a thin point and it’s too claustrophobic to do anything except tunnel straight ahead. His whiskers might’ve even dislodged a pebble or two in their nervous twitching.
He takes a breath. It feels gritty, stinks of soil. Badgermoon told him not to stop, so.
Sedgepaw inches forward for what feels like miles.
The nerves return. Dulled by the overwhelming presence of literally everything else, but there nonetheless. He’s been feeling it a lot lately. About life. About his warrior ceremony. About…
His fox exists more as a memory of teeth and claws and smell. A wild, roving beast which stalks the backdrop of his very life. It should make Sedgepaw feel unstoppable. He’s the one who tore that creature away from Snakepaw. He’s the one that survived.
But so did the fox, limping away from the moor while Sedgepaw bled over the grass. And that’s not really the problem. The problem is that he didn’t even want to kill the thing.
It’s a harrowing thought.
Sedgepaw has always been a prodigy. Hunting comes as easy as breathing; fighting as easy as thinking. He’s embraced his destiny to become a warrior with aplomb and a touch of youthful indifference, settling into the role without a second thought. It was only natural.
Sedgepaw is the cat who goes to training and slacks off on his chores. He sneaks out of camp at night and doesn’t care all that much about getting into trouble. He gets into competitions to see who can catch the biggest rabbit. He runs the moor and never leaves the territory and avoids the sites of skirmishes like the plague. He’s a good fighter, so he always pairs up with the younger apprentices in sparring matches and doesn’t use his claws so that he knows he won’t hurt them. Because he’s scared that maybe someone else will.
He’s realized now that he’s not actually all that excited to be a warrior. That he didn’t want to kill the fox.
He wanted to help Snakepaw. He wants to—
Something is glowing. The oppressive darkness—so complete that it’d become merely a backdrop to his roving thoughts—begins to dissolve in the presence of a dull, hazy blue sheen. Sedgepaw’s ears perk. The further he walks, the brighter the light gets; its cool and ethereal presence glows otherworldly, and it is with quickly baited breath that Sedgepaw finally reaches the end of the corridor.
The Moonstone is…incredible.
The cavern is huge compared to the corridor. Sedgepaw steps through the threshold and finally feels like he can breathe, though the air here lacks the same stagnant quality of the tunnel. It thrums, dull and quiet. Smelling of dew and of impending rain, bleeding in from the night sky canopy peeking through the hole struck through the cavetop.
Sedgepaw feels small here. Inconsequential. It takes effort to lift his paws and step closer to the Moonstone, but he does so as if possessed, all thoughtless and roving and wholly mesmerized. The Moonstone seems to glow from within. Its light is muted; not dull as much as is soft, as though all of StarClan is sleeping, and Sedgepaw is reluctant to wake them.
He understands why Sootstar requires that all apprentices visit this place. It’s magical.
He stands directly before the Moonstone now. It does not leap up upon his approach, and no booming voices fill his head, ancient dead called forth to bestow upon him wisdom or warnings. It lays dormant despite his presence, allowing his tumultuous heart just a moment to break free.
Sedgepaw is not the most studious of cats. He does not think of StarClan nearly as much as he probably should. He’s a bit crass and indifferent, but here he feels seen.
He’s not sure what surges through his soul, emotions called forth in this briefest chance of vulnerability. All of his longing, perhaps. His uncertainty and fear. All of the harsh and thorny things that conceal the piercing, glowing eyes of his fox, just waiting for the right moment to leap forward with its blood-stained teeth and finish what it started.
He’s not even sure if he wants to ask StarClan to cure him of these things.
He closes his eyes and leans forward to press his nose against the cool, smooth flank of the Moonstone.
The gesture lasts a second; two. Sedgepaw leans back, and nothing has changed.
He smiles, soft. For now, all of the things in his mind have quieted, and that’s enough.
But the journey back home will be long and difficult, and those herbs that Wolfsong provided are just about to wear off. He’ll probably complain to Badgermoon on the walk back, and might even get his ears cuffed for the trouble. Yet the night will be soft and quiet and moonless, and that will still be enough.
The moon is a flawed, lopsided thing; too full to be a crescent, too uneven to be full. It’s difficult to spot behind the wispy Greenleaf clouds, as thin and faint as they are, but Sedgepaw tries anyway. He used to spend a lot of time looking up at the sky, before he realized that the world around him was so much bigger and brighter and he forgot that he cared.
The smattering of stars across the Silverpelt are faint, but they are there. The air is cool and humid. Everything is softened beneath the gentle, gossamer light spreading from the sky—the harshness of the scalding daytime sun and bustling earth flaking away like rust in a watery bath. He isn’t sure that he’s ever seen a world so quiet. Though that is perhaps because this is the first time that he’s really paid attention.
It all seems so fresh.
The herbs that he ate earlier still sit bitter on his tongue, so he swipes at his teeth and grimaces. Wolfsong said they’d help his travels, stave off fatigue. Sedgepaw thinks it fruitless. His heart quivers within his chest, a flighty and unsteady creature caged within his ribs; his paws, too, shake. He doesn’t think he’d grow tired even if he ran ten laps around the moor, even before the traveling herbs hit his belly. Nerves, as he’s become so increasingly aware, will do that to you.
It’s a feeling he carries all the way from WindClan camp. Across the fields and through the pathways of Rabbit’s Run. Through the growing thickets of the lands beyond, where walls of trees grow denser than he has ever known, and grasses thin to make space for brambles and ferns. The smell is sharper here; unfamiliar. This is the furthest away from WindClan that Sedgepaw has ever been. And every footstep after, even farther still.
He’s a WindClan cat, born and raised, so he lifts his chin and tries not to look quite as nervous as he feels.
Granted, it’s an excited sort of nervousness. There’s a smile that flits across his face every now and again, uneven and uncertain, cresting over his maw in fluctuating intervals the same way that the ocean smooths over a beach’s sandy shore. It’s influenced by the sourceless thoughts that flow through his mind—things that he couldn’t really put words to if he tried.
But they all fade eventually, and when the rugged land smooths to a sharp, craggy incline and the Mothermouth is near enough to see, all that Sedgepaw feels is a quiet solemnity. Something…beyond his years.
Here we are, he thinks. The Mothermouth is nothing special—a dark opening into a long, shadowed corridor, blended into the earth so entirely that Sedgepaw might’ve missed it completely. He stares down into the dark and doesn’t really think that there ought to be more. He looms on a precipice, teetering the edge of his whole new life.
Perhaps sensing his reluctance, a voice chimes in from nearby: “Here it is, Sedge.”
Badgermoon is a smudge of silver in the overnight dark, the black splotches of his fur bleeding into the surrounding shadows; the bright twin pools of his eyes are crinkled at the corners, giving the impression of a smile. “The tunnel goes on for a while, but don’t stop until you reach the end.”
Sedgepaw nods, and then murmurs in agreement when he realizes that Badgermoon probably can’t see him nod. Insects buzz in the grasses and brambles jutting out from the rocks, creating a gentle hum over which a stark, tense silence looms. Sedge feels…something. A tightness in his chest, all twisted and solid and pressing on his lungs.
“See? Off you go. Not even a fox can keep you down, Sedge.”
That hushed thing within him untangles, at that. Sedgepaw dares one more sideways glance at Badgermoon and sees the warm outline of his face, perhaps more imagined than it is present, and echoes the smile there.
It doesn’t always dawn on him–and usually he doesn’t have to even realize—but the weight of loneliness had been pressing heavy on his shoulders until now. His parents, his mentor. Smears in the wild mosaic of his life. His siblings, too, a whole litter older and uninterested with the juvenile mundanity of apprentice life. Badgermoon probably didn’t have to be the one to take him all the way to the Moonstone, but he did; and as one of many in the menagerie of WindClan, almost a family in and of itself, Sedgepaw appreciates the effort.
Heart warmed, he looks upon the Mothermouth with a newly reignited courage, and begins to take the plunge.
The earthy maw of it provides a sort of barrier from the outside, and within the tunnel is a whole different world. Gone is the summertime humidity toiling through the air. The pathway within is cold and stagnant; everything smells of dirt and old, stale cavewater. The sounds of outside are funneled through the Mothermouth but are quickly nullified by the unnerving, overwhelming silence that permeates through the pitch. And it’s dark. Darker than the looming midnight, even with the hidden moon. It’s darker than anything.
Is this what the tunnels are like? Sedgepaw wonders, increasingly anxious. It doesn’t matter how much he blinks his eyes or squints or stares—nothing materializes in the stark black curtain over his face. He wants to turn around to see how far he’s walked from the entrance, but he’s realized that there’s not even enough room to turn his head. The walls have narrowed to a thin point and it’s too claustrophobic to do anything except tunnel straight ahead. His whiskers might’ve even dislodged a pebble or two in their nervous twitching.
He takes a breath. It feels gritty, stinks of soil. Badgermoon told him not to stop, so.
Sedgepaw inches forward for what feels like miles.
The nerves return. Dulled by the overwhelming presence of literally everything else, but there nonetheless. He’s been feeling it a lot lately. About life. About his warrior ceremony. About…
His fox exists more as a memory of teeth and claws and smell. A wild, roving beast which stalks the backdrop of his very life. It should make Sedgepaw feel unstoppable. He’s the one who tore that creature away from Snakepaw. He’s the one that survived.
But so did the fox, limping away from the moor while Sedgepaw bled over the grass. And that’s not really the problem. The problem is that he didn’t even want to kill the thing.
It’s a harrowing thought.
Sedgepaw has always been a prodigy. Hunting comes as easy as breathing; fighting as easy as thinking. He’s embraced his destiny to become a warrior with aplomb and a touch of youthful indifference, settling into the role without a second thought. It was only natural.
Sedgepaw is the cat who goes to training and slacks off on his chores. He sneaks out of camp at night and doesn’t care all that much about getting into trouble. He gets into competitions to see who can catch the biggest rabbit. He runs the moor and never leaves the territory and avoids the sites of skirmishes like the plague. He’s a good fighter, so he always pairs up with the younger apprentices in sparring matches and doesn’t use his claws so that he knows he won’t hurt them. Because he’s scared that maybe someone else will.
He’s realized now that he’s not actually all that excited to be a warrior. That he didn’t want to kill the fox.
He wanted to help Snakepaw. He wants to—
Something is glowing. The oppressive darkness—so complete that it’d become merely a backdrop to his roving thoughts—begins to dissolve in the presence of a dull, hazy blue sheen. Sedgepaw’s ears perk. The further he walks, the brighter the light gets; its cool and ethereal presence glows otherworldly, and it is with quickly baited breath that Sedgepaw finally reaches the end of the corridor.
The Moonstone is…incredible.
The cavern is huge compared to the corridor. Sedgepaw steps through the threshold and finally feels like he can breathe, though the air here lacks the same stagnant quality of the tunnel. It thrums, dull and quiet. Smelling of dew and of impending rain, bleeding in from the night sky canopy peeking through the hole struck through the cavetop.
Sedgepaw feels small here. Inconsequential. It takes effort to lift his paws and step closer to the Moonstone, but he does so as if possessed, all thoughtless and roving and wholly mesmerized. The Moonstone seems to glow from within. Its light is muted; not dull as much as is soft, as though all of StarClan is sleeping, and Sedgepaw is reluctant to wake them.
He understands why Sootstar requires that all apprentices visit this place. It’s magical.
He stands directly before the Moonstone now. It does not leap up upon his approach, and no booming voices fill his head, ancient dead called forth to bestow upon him wisdom or warnings. It lays dormant despite his presence, allowing his tumultuous heart just a moment to break free.
Sedgepaw is not the most studious of cats. He does not think of StarClan nearly as much as he probably should. He’s a bit crass and indifferent, but here he feels seen.
He’s not sure what surges through his soul, emotions called forth in this briefest chance of vulnerability. All of his longing, perhaps. His uncertainty and fear. All of the harsh and thorny things that conceal the piercing, glowing eyes of his fox, just waiting for the right moment to leap forward with its blood-stained teeth and finish what it started.
He’s not even sure if he wants to ask StarClan to cure him of these things.
He closes his eyes and leans forward to press his nose against the cool, smooth flank of the Moonstone.
The gesture lasts a second; two. Sedgepaw leans back, and nothing has changed.
He smiles, soft. For now, all of the things in his mind have quieted, and that’s enough.
But the journey back home will be long and difficult, and those herbs that Wolfsong provided are just about to wear off. He’ll probably complain to Badgermoon on the walk back, and might even get his ears cuffed for the trouble. Yet the night will be soft and quiet and moonless, and that will still be enough.
