Introducing: Mothwing

[mothwingofriverclan]

Mothwing leaves camp at sunrise, wanting to beat the greenleaf heat. Herbs are plentiful this time of year, and Mothwing wants to find a few to take back to camp to teach Frostpaw their scents. She’s glad that she’d found a new apprentice with a connection to StarClan so quickly after Willowshine’s death, if only so that her clanmates wouldn’t bug her. She still doubts that they really need StarClan; it had been Bristlefrost that saved them from the impostor and the Dark Forest, not a bunch of mouse-brained dead cats. Still, Frostpaw was learning her herbs well, which was what really mattered.

Heading for the lakeshore, Mothwing keeps an eye out for borage, and maybe some rosemary. Padding up to the edge, Mothwing takes a look at her reflection. She’s getting old. Her dappled golden fur isn’t as shiny as it once was, and her amber eyes are tired, but she notes with satisfaction that she’s still bigger and stronger than most of her clanmates.

There’s an odd flicker in the lake, and Mothwing instinctively swats at it with her paw--extra fish is always welcome, even in bountiful greenleaf--but it turns out to be a trick of the light. Disappointed, she looks up, and is startled to find herself at a completely different lake. It’s much smaller than her lake, and she can’t see the Gathering island anywhere. Besides, it smells completely different--is it leaf-fall suddenly? She backs up a few steps, the fur on her back raising defensively.

For a moment, she wants to laugh--is this her first ever vision from StarClan? They couldn’t have sent this to her seasons ago, when her position was in question? Then she notices the large twoleg dwelling looming over the lake, and she feels a stupid kind of relief. There are definitely no twoleg dens in StarClan’s hunting grounds, so this isn’t a vision. On the other paw... she has no idea where she is.

“Is any cat here?” she meows as loudly as she dares. Unbeknownst to her, anyone walking by would understand her words, whether they were a cat, a twoleg, or any other person.

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes. I didn't know cat medicine was the same."

[mothwingofriverclan]

"I see," Mothwing meows. "What's your role in your clan? Or whatever you call it? Are you a medicine twoleg?"

[onthewillowsthere]

He considers this in silence for a few minutes. "I'm not anything right now."

[mothwingofriverclan]

Mothwing blinks. "Oh. In RiverClan no one is nothing... if you retire, you just become an elder, which is an important job in itself."

[onthewillowsthere]

"What if you aren't retired, but you don't know what to be?"

[mothwingofriverclan]

Mothwing's tail whips around in annoyance. "In the Clans, you don't get much of a choice. You're a warrior or a medicine cat, and those are the two choices until you retire, or have kits, or become leader. If you ask me, we should be training more warriors in medicine, or training mediators like SkyClan has..." she trails off, embarrassed at having gotten so caught up when this twoleg has no idea what she means.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Why do you not have mediators?"

As he waits for her answer, he starts sketching her amongst the little pencil drawings of flowers already clustered on his page.

[mothwingofriverclan]

"The cat who invented mediating is kind of an oddball," Mothwing explains, settling back down. "No one really wants to be like him. Most cats feel as though they aren't contributing to the clan if they aren't catching their share of prey."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Why did he want to do it, then?"

[mothwingofriverclan]

"Partially, to avoid war," Mothwing tells him. "But also, he wasn't born in SkyClan, but he wanted to join to be with his mate, Violetshine. He wasn't good at being a warrior, so he made up his own position. Besides, SkyClan is a little more lax when it comes to the warrior code." Sometimes Mothwing wonders what it would have been like if her mother had brought her to SkyClan, and not RiverClan.

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad shades in her tail, curled around her paws, his expression blank with concentration. "I didn't know you could make up something to be. Why is SkyClan different?"

[mothwingofriverclan]

"It's a newer clan. Sort of. When the clans began, there were five of them, but twolegs destroyed most of what used to be SkyClan's territory. The former SkyClan cats were forced to flee, and eventually destroyed. This was long before I was born." Mothwing licks her paw and cleans one of her ears. "Then a ThunderClan cat went on a quest and revived SkyClan, and now they're back."

[onthewillowsthere]

"What is RiverClan like?"

[mothwingofriverclan]

"It's my home," Mothwing sighs. "But it's been through a lot. We like to swim, and we like to decorate our dens with shells... we're always the most well-fed clan, since we live by a river that feeds into a lake and no other clans like to fish, but even that doesn't stop us from getting into trouble." She thinks about the impostor, and how he'd convinced Mistystar to exile her. "We're definitely too proud."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Do you like to fish? Do you like water? What kind of trouble?" This is too many questions at once, he is well-aware, but everything about Mothwing is so interesting. Especially now that Magnus has given him the inner monologue of some of the Mansion animals, he's fascinated to know what they're all thinking, and Mothwing so far has been willing to let him ask.

[mothwingofriverclan]

"I do like fishing and water," Mothwing meows, a little amused by such a basic question. Of course, it's a worthwhile one. She's sure there's plenty of cats in other clans who might enjoy it, if given the chance, and probably a few RiverClan cats who secretly don't. "As for the trouble... let me put it this way. Do you have a code you follow? Laws that govern the behavior of your clan?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes."

[mothwingofriverclan]

"I thought so. We take our code, the warrior code, very seriously," Mothwing explains. "And sometimes, that's good. It's important not to kill prey if you don't plan on eating it, for example. But other times... well, the code is kind of stupid. Anyhow, most recently, we lost contact with StarClan, and an impostor ghost possessed one of our leaders and convinced the RiverClan leader to start enforcing the warrior code as harshly as possible, mostly for his own ends." Mothwing sighs. "I myself was exiled from RiverClan because romances with cats outside one's clan used to be forbidden, and I am the product of one of those relationships. We got rid of the impostor, but our clan is still recovering."

Mothwing's not sure she'll ever forgive Mistystar for giving in to the impostor's demands. It feels good to tell someone about this; she's not sure anyone besides Icewing and Harelight really understands what she went through. Besides, twolegs aren't really people, so she can open up to them and it won't matter.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Do you miss it?" softly. He can't help thinking of Camelot, and the trouble with being a child of two people who weren't meant to come together.

[mothwingofriverclan]

"Yes," Mothwing meows simply. "It's complicated, but it's home." She'd had plenty of opportunities to leave, or simply not come back after being exiled. "But I'm sure I can get back eventually. Do you miss your home?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"I miss my friend at home." He puts down the charcoal pencil and turns the sketchbook around so she can see the picture he drew of her. It's not bad -- he worked carefully to render the softness of the fur of her belly, slightly visible behind her front legs, the way her tail curls around her paws.

[mothwingofriverclan]

"What--that's me! How did you do this?" Mothwing asks, completely forgetting her line of questioning in amazement. She flicks her tail curiously as she sniffs the drawing. "This is amazing. It would be so useful to be able to show how herbs looked like this even if I didn't have any on nearby."

[onthewillowsthere]

"I'm learning to draw," he says, suddenly very shy at her approval. "If you find herbs here, I can draw them for you."

[mothwingofriverclan]

"I would love that," Mothwing meows. "Maybe I could take them back to RiverClan, if you don't mind. Though I wonder how to keep them from getting ruined in the water..."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes, they would be yours." He considers the issue of waterproofing and adds, seriously, "I'll find out. Maybe there's something."