Post by ShinoDino first of her name! on Jul 26, 2019 16:24:40 GMT -6
You're the best friend
That I ever had
I've been with you such a long time
That I ever had
I've been with you such a long time
“You sure this is really worth it?”
The scruffy black tom thought his legs would surely fall off. He’d been climbing up and down the cliffs since sunrise. Not alone though.
The silver tabby rolled her eyes so hard her head followed.“No. I’ve just had you running up and down steep cliffs all day for my own amusement.”
Stonestar’s deadpan humor almost missed him. His ears twitched halfway flat before he processed the joke. Her dancing eyes should have given it away.
It really wasn’t so bad up on the cliffs. The breeze came stronger and more constant up here. Up here, he could forget his struggles for a minute.
Or less when Stonestar was counting.“Seriously Crowheart, you’ll gain a lot of strength very quickly if you do this a bit every day.”
Stonestar scaled the cliffs easily to stand next to him and Crowheart felt the hot sting of jealousy hit his stomach. Then he squelched it. She’d been born here. To her, these cliffs were as simple as WindClan’s flat moors.
He had not been born with the strength and fearlessness that all SkyClan warriors seemed to possess innately. But he’d chosen this life, and by StarClan, he’d work forever if he had to.
“How much strength do I have to gain in order to gain respect?”
he asked quietly.“I know you’re weary of the mutterings of others, but they grow less and less with each prey you bring back and with each order followed. Despite their prejudices, the Clan is seeing your value.”
“But will it ever be enough to see past the curse I bring with me?”
Stonestar snorted so hard dust flew up from the cliff in front of them.“The one that needs to see past any so-called curse is you. Attitude is a vast percentage of being a warrior and if you expect bad things to befall you, they will.”
Crowheart’s lips curled back in a snarl.
“You’re full of pretty advice, but you’ve never lived for moons never knowing which cats would protect you in a battle or leave you to die. Or come up behind a group of them whispering about you on patrol. Or-”“Quiet.”
The one word fell like a tree on his ears and Crowheart stopped mid-sentence. Stonestar’s gray-blue eyes burned into his own icy blue ones and her hiss carried through the wind that cut the tension between them.“Listen to me very carefully. You have only truly known me as the lauded leader of this Clan. That leadership was hard fought and even harder won. After I spent a season hopping around to every Clan in the forest, I had to earn back every morsel of trust and then some. Even once Sagestar named me deputy I faced dissenters.”
She paused and Crowheart had to force himself to stay standing tall when he wanted to cower like a chastised kit.“I’ve made my fair share of wrongs, but I think I’ve made a good path. I trust you. The Clan will come to do the same. Unless you don’t trust me? Or my gift of letting you in? I didn’t have to do that.”
Her eyes flickered with her last words and, wracked with shame and guilt, Crowheart pounced.
“Oh yeah? Then why did you and Ravenghost beg me to join? Why have you spent every day since then making me into the perfect little SkyClan warrior? Oh,”
he sneered,
“But you still don’t totally trust me, do you? Your daughters are apprentices now, but you don’t see me out training them now, do you? Or is it yourself you don’t trust?”
The eyes rolled again, head and body following. Her groan echoed.“Oh for StarClan’s sake, Crowheart, please use your head for more than a place for your ears to rest! You’re not ready to mentor an apprentice. Mentally or physically. Not to mention emotionally. I invited you into the Clan because you needed a home. A family. You’re as good as my brother, and I daresay I’m closer to you than I am my own littermates.”
She paused and the silence leaned heavy on his eardrums.“I have all the faith in the world in you. I trust my instincts. I trust you. And I trust two certain she-cats.”
Crowheart shook his head, backing away from her until his hind paws scraped empty air. He didn’t want to hear those names. Not now. Not ever again.
But especially not after the great betrayal of his heart the previous night.
“Don’t. Don’t.”“You need to acknowledge them, Crowheart. They shaped you.Without their love for you I would have no reason to see you as anything more than the scrap I pounded on the border seasons ago.”
“Just let them stay buried. I can’t take the pain. Not from you.”The dream would haunt him until his dying day.He’d been running through the territory, every blade of grass alight with sun, every leaf ablaze with beauty. He’d been so content - yet so empty.He’d gotten to the spot on the border where he’d first met Tempestpaw, and where he’d met Cloversplash, and stopped to look for them. But they were not there. They never were.
He visited the spot often, in darker dreams.
But this dream had been brighter. Happier.
Hopeful.
Then he’d heard her voice.“Come on silly! The prey won’t wait all day.”
But the look in her eyes spoke of things far more precious than prey. Those bright blue orbs that danced without the ferocity that Stonestar’s did. At least, they danced for him.
He’d been Tempestpaw’s mate in every sense of the word.
His last day with Cloversplash, he’d promised her the same.
He’d somehow befriended Stonestar.
And the she-cat in his dream . . . had been Ashsong.“Crowheart?”Stonestar’s voice broke him out of his daydreaming and brought the ceaseless wind back into his ears. He shook out his pelt and let it lay flat again. She understood him better than any other cat in the world, but even she couldn’t possibly understand this.
Could she?“Crowheart, any cat that blames you for Tempestpaw and Cloversplash’s deaths-”He flinched but Stonestar plowed on,“is a complete pigeon-brain. Especially after all this time.”But if they knew . . . if you knew . . . would it all come back again?“Look around you at the next mealtime. I bet you’ll find many more cats than me that support and like you. Like my girls. Like Breezesoul and Featherwing.”He couldn’t totally deny that having the support of Stonestar’s elder brothers did indeed help. The sneers and taunts seemed to be coming from a core group of cats now - mostly Sootyfoot and Echovalor. Though Frecklewhisker didn’t much trust or like him either . . .
“Your daughters think everything you do is perfect. Of course they like me. And your brothers would never say a word against y-”“Oh!”Stonestar interjected. Her eyes twinkled merrily and Crowheart wrinkled his forehead in confusion.“I know one other cat that supports you.”She reached over and prodded his shoulder with her forepaw.“Ashsong.”His blood froze. So he hadn’t been imagining the gentle femme’s sharp retorts to his detractors? He hadn’t imagined, then, her choices to sit near him during Clan meetings or to include him in her dinnertime chats.
“Oh. Huh.”
The words croaked out of his tight throat, betraying all attempts to act nonchalant.“Oh come on, Crowheart. I’m not an idiot.”Oh no.“I’ve seen how you look at her.”He dropped to his knees, ready for the leader to strike him where he lay. But then, a purr and:“Oh come on. I’m not blind. Get up, will you?”He climbed slowly to trembling paws, trying to read the look in her eyes. After so many moons spent in her nearly-constant company, he knew almost all of Stonestar’s moods and expressions. But this one was harder - grief, amusement, joy, and annoyance all rolled together.
“Stonestar, I never meant to-”“Fall in love?”Stonestar finished quietly.“Oh come off it.No one walks up to a cat and decides to fall for them.It doesn’t work like that.”“Aren’t you scared?”“No. Of what?”“Of me cursing your family again?”
She didn’t answer right away. Crowheart watched her eyes, her face, go through every stage, every thought, and every emotion. Then she stepped forward, turned, and stood beside him. Her head turned to him and the blazing look in her eyes struck him speechless again.“I trust my family. My sisters did not make a mistake in choosing you as their mate, and you would not make a mistake in pursuing Ashsong. And she would not make a mistake if she returns your feelings.”The relief that flooded his body warred with the questions that still remained in his mind. He started back down the cliff face again, hearing Stonestar follow. He went all the way down and back up, Stonestar beside him, before he spoke again.
“I’m glad to hear that, Stonestar, but I still don’t understand something. Why do you trust me? It can’t be just because your sisters like me. Your mother doesn’t. Sootyfoot certainly doesn’t. You’ve trusted me with things . . . things that are absolutely incredible. And dangerous. And fragile.”
Her gaze dared him, so he kept going.
“I’m the only cat in the Clan that knows exactly how many lives you’ve lost. You lost one the day we met those rogues. And you lost two lives, not one, while you were ill. I know everything about how hard you work to please your family. And I know, even though you haven’t told me, that you’re worried sick about Ravenghost. You don’t know where he is or if he’s coming back.”“Silence! I don’t have to know! He wouldn’t leave without a reason and he’ll return as soon as he’s able. Oh, and as for mother and Sootyfoot, it matters very little. Mother has gone cynical since Dad passed, and unless you plan to date Sootyfoot too, he doesn’t matter either. And let me say, he doesn’t seem like your type.”There she went, hiding her truth behind humor and command.
“Stop it, Stonestar. You’re just as scared as I am that, one day, everything will come unraveled and you’ll have to pick up the pieces of this life that you’ve so carefully constructed. You’re terrified that you might face the rest of it alone.”“Fear is something you feel. Not something I have to act on.”But he heard the tremble in her voice. Only with him would she be even this vulnerable.
“But it’s there. Every day. It’s why you won’t send more patrols to look for Ravenghost. It’s why I’ll probably never be able to tell Ashsong how I feel about her. Fear of a definite answer . . . and that answer being the worst one.”
Her words came in a whisper:“I missed so much time. When I fell ill, I lost so much. And then he just vanished. How do I tell my girls that their father is gone? How do I even tell myself?”Her shoulders had now sunk lower than his own, no small feat thanks to her height advantage. He pressed his dark pelt into her striped one, feeling the tremors quaking deep inside, where no cat could see unless they shared such a bond with her.
“Start with me. Tell me the things you fear. I’ll always be here. I’ll always be a friend you can trust.”
She deserved that. Oh, she deserved that and so much more from her Clan! From her family. From every cat in the forest and beyond. There could never be a leader greater. No greater friend.
No greater cat, period.“Crowheart . . . you’re the best friend a cat could have.”His heart swelled with warmth. He loved Stonestar. But not at all in the way he’d cared for her sisters. Their bond ran deep and strong. Deeper than any he’d ever had. Deeper than anything he’d had with Marcus. Much deeper than the flimsy bonds he’d never been able to develop with his parents.
“Stonestar - I couldn’t ask for a better friend. Thank you, for everything.”
You've stood by me girl
I'm happy at home
You're my best friend
I'm happy at home
You're my best friend