Post by --SWIFT☁. on Sept 26, 2013 19:42:58 GMT -5
RAINBIRD ◊ FEMALE ◊ TWENTY-NINE MOONS ◊ THUNDERCLAN DEPUTY gorgeous cream and grey she-cat with striking blue eyes.
rather small in size, rainbird isn't big and muscular like the typical thunderclan warrior. slender like a willow, she's a magnificent specimen of both beauty and flaw entertwined. named for her blue eyes, the color of rain as it plummets to the ground from rolling grey storm clouds, she is quite like the weather itself. swift to come, but not always quick to leave and with a personality to match any kind of twist in the weather. with a pelt as soft as featherdown and the color of buttermilk, she's really a sight to behold. easy on the eyes, one might say. and the prominent dark grey markings on her face, oddly enough two under her eyes the shape of wings if your imagination allows, legs and tail only make her stand out even more against the traditional dark colors of the forest dwelling clan. with such a slim build, her specialty isn't the art of war, but rather the live-giving form of the hunter, being more suited to sneaking rather than charging. eyes the color of the sky, the rain, the sea, she has a piercing gaze that rarely reveals her state of emotion. closed and locked tight like a secret treasure chest rather than open like a book for all to see. oddly enough, rainbird was born without a tail. while it is not common to see a cat with no tail, by birth, it's not that uncommon either. sometimes things just turn out that way. but as it happens, her mother had no tail, as the same with her mothers father, and probably way back some more. however, out of the litter of four only she recieved this odd trait. being a well seasoned warrior, it's out of the question that she would escape life without some scars to show for it. but the marks that mar her fine pelt are ones she takes great pride in. two ragged scars part the fur along her side, and around one hind leg is a ring where teeth have torn a wound. thankfully she has managed to keep from being marked much more, however it is doubtful that will last long.
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one might see rainbird and think, oh what a sweet little girl. but would they sure be wrong. though she is not far from sweet, it's never the first thing noticed about her demeanor. while kindness and compassion do reside in her being, she's mostly made up of strong, unbendable steel. kind of like she was born with a rod of pure titanium for a spine. though she's not too stiff and uptight, she's a very bossy female. but one must be when they are smaller than most of their clanmates or they are walked all over in the assumption that it is okay to do so. she tends to order others around, regardless if she's a warrior or not, and she expects those orders to be followed anyways. kind of controlling might be the best way to explain this. rainbird has a personality that is about as diverse as the weather is. she can be as sweet as an early spring day, full of flowers and good smells and just overall happy and agreeable, only to fly into a rage at the drop of a leaf, much like a tornado would rip through the land at a moments notice, and everything in between. calm is another trait of hers. rarely does she get herself worked up physically over anything. while anger isn't a foreign emotion to her, rather than letting it rule her being, she prefers to let it all steam up and out, a remaining a calm, cool, even, outward disposition as she disapates all that pent up emotion. similarly she is also very stubborn, and usually about things she doesn't need to be stubborn about. she likes things to be done her way, and there is no highway. she refuses to budge if it is not to her liking. the den is a mess? clean it or no one gets to sleep until it's fixed. but everyone is tired? too bad. no sleeping until it gets done. but while she is stubborn, calm, temperamental and bossy, she is actually very helpful. her mind is nothing but rules and regulations, while her heart is ruled by compassion. this often creates turmoil inside herself that she usually has a hard time coming to terms with, thus making her stubbornly irritating ways all the stronger in her agitation. the urge to be kind to all and help all the time often wars with her sense of judgement. while helping would be right, if doesn't fall in with her strict guidelines, she can often be led into quite a mess. rainbird is also quite the sassy female. though she is capable of being cold and calculating, it does nothing to dull her razor sharp wit, which she can easily lash out as quick as a whip, and rarely does she restrain her tongue when she is in the mood to cut someone with it. it is her preferred weapon choice, because while she is quick and agile, her grace is somewhat lacking and this makes her slightly more clumsy, and to her, a quick insult can be just as deadly, if only because it can enrage a target into blundering and making an oafish mistake. but in general, rainbird is quite the charismatic female.
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3-1+1-2.
leaves fell and the snow came early, leafbare came knocking at the door, impatient to give the world a rest and freeze the earth. inside a clearing, under a covering of tightly woven plants, sheltered from the storm, the miracle of life was being preformed. the struggle of a new mother bringing two little lives into the cold world of snow and ice, despite the shattering pains of labor. a gust of chilling wind announced the new arrivals with it's eerie howling as it passed through the leafless branches of the surrounding wood like a ghost flitting over the world, wailing its sorrows. two voices rose over the ominous song, calling out their distress as an exhausted mother comforted her new charges with soothing licks and nuzzles.
3
it doesn't take too many moons before a pair of lively siblings are blundering about with all the grace of a twoleg. before the snow had even melted from the ground, the streams still covered with an icy crust, rainbird and her younger brother managed to cause mischief wherever their paws hit the forest floor. mussed bedding in the warriors den, berries scattered in the medicine cats den or freshkill strewn across the clearing. if they could mess it up, it got messed with. it's the simple nature of kits, the urge to explore and destroy everything with their curiosity. literally. rainbird had always had quite a close relationship with her brother. but then, what youngsters aren't fond of their siblings? at least at the age where their only friend was the only being around there age that they knew.
-1
but while winter can be a beautiful, the scenery breath taking and the snow a joy to kick up into clouds and just a pleasure to witness, lurking under the peaceful facade, is the deadly chill that can take even the strongest of warriors by surprise. unfortunately, it tends to target those too young or too old to combat the icy fingers that take hold of one and squeeze all the life from the body. and it started early one morning. rainbird was a little less than fine. her small body make it difficult to find comfort in the cold air, but she was trooping along. her brother, bigger and stronger than she, was even worse off. some say it should have been her to fall as deathly ill as he did. that, realistically speaking, it should have been the smaller and weaker one who was sent to starclan to hunt among the ancestors. but life works in funny ways sometimes. this winter had been particularly harsh. kittens and their mothers who were always fed first, and generally kept plump year round, were scrawny with bones visible under the thick winter coat. it would be remembered for many years to come as a dark time in history.
she could tell something was wrong the morning it all went down hill. his breathing was off. it was wet and heavy, like he was having trouble drawing the air into his lungs. his usually energy wasn't there, and he was lethargic. it worried their mother and the medicine cat took him away, took him to the den secluded from the rest of the camp, shielded by brittle vines that draped across the entrance. she wasn't allow to visit him, not allowed to poke her nose in or call out to him from the clearing. disturbing his rest wasn't good. but it would all be in vain. when the coughing started to wrack his lungs, shaking the body that had quickly withered away under the heat of fever, the medicine cat knew it was hopeless. it was heartbreaking, watching the kitten she had been so close to, her very own brother, withering away like a flower on a hot summers day. not that she would know what that was like. she hadn't even made it to spring yet. however the older cats could make the connection. they had seen how plants wilt under the intense sun. and they could feel the same pain as well. it wasn't just the kitten who had been stricken with white cough. normally this chest cold wasn't fatal. easily treated with catmint, few felines died now when the herb was available. but the precious plant was scarce. the bushels where it was usually abundant were scorched with frost, unusable and a tragedy to the clan as elders and warriors fell ill. though the sickness infected many, it took few to the stars. just a few elders who had one paw in the silverpelt, the other on the ground and the kitten.
+1
it was well into her apprenticeship before she ever fully got over the damaging effects the death of her only brother had on her. a full five moons before the sharp, explosive pain had dulled to a persistent throbbed. not easily ignored, but possible. for her, anything was possible. her apprenticeship was hard on her emotionally a lot of the time, though there are no lasting effects to date. but it was all for the best. or maybe the worst. she had yet to come to complete terms with everything in her life. however, it was difficult. coming into her training, she wasn't given the most experienced of mentors. rather, he was fresh out of the apprentices den, as some warriors might say. he was a newbie still in their eyes. the new kid on the block, and she was his first guinea pig of an apprentice for him to experiment with. while his experience with training another felines was little to none, he didn't do too bad a job. but he was insensitive a good portion of the time. but it was good for her. he wouldn't let her sit around and mope while he continued to impress the ways of a warrior on her. he would ignore her depressing attitude and uncaring mindset. if she had problems, she had to lay them out and study them for herself. he didn't have time for that. ain't no body got time for that. not when there is work to be done. physically, the training wasn't demanding. when she decided to put her effort into it, everything was rather quite easy.
as most teams do, the two bonded. at first she looked up to him as a big brother. but later, feelings began to develop. soon he was more than just a mentor and a big brother. but that was only in her eyes. in all reality, the relationship was of siblings. he thought nothing more of her than a good friend and a younger sister. romantic feelings weren't in the pages for them. but she was stubborn and refused to acknowledge this clear as day fact. while the age difference between them wouldn't have been much a problem, maybe frowned upon by the elders, but barely even blinked at by others, it just wasn't in her stars. it was in her mothers however.
just like the age difference wouldn't have matter between mentor and apprentice, it didn't matter for her mother either. it turns out the real romance was to be found there. seeing the love that developed between the two, rainbird was eventually forced to give up her fantasies about the older tom as he went from being big brother and potential mate, to father.
-2
As with all good things, it always has to end at some point. luckily for her, it was many many moon in her future that the rest of her family would be taken from her. so far into her future, that she was already an experienced warrior, and her parents had been in the elders den for a few moons. once again winter came, and it would prove to be another deadly winter once more, though no where near as horrible as the one that took her brother, though still tragic. the two older felines were stricken with a strange sickness. it was unlike one ever seen in thunderclan. it resembled white cough in the way that the elders sickened at first, but as it progressed, it became much worse. when the coughing would rattle their bodies like leaves on the trees, blood would often be expelled through the mouth and if it was bad enough, through the nose, and a dangerously high fever. once, long ago, it had been called black-cough. it was an advanced form of white-cough and green-cough. because it was so rarely seen, the herbs or herb combinations to treat it were unknown to the medicine cats. needless to say, cats died. but the luck of starclan was with them during that season. no kittens were taken, and no warriors fell dangerously ill, though some did contract white-cough, like usual in the cold season. only a few elders fell with the sickness, and it has yet to make a reappearance. no one really knows why it came, or where it even came from. it can just be hoped that it will never return.
the passing of her parents wasn't such a hard blow as one might think. if she had lost them at a younger age, as an apprentice or a kitten, it might have scarred her for life. but at this point in her life, while she had maintained a close bond with the two aging cats, she had grown distant. she still loved them, as they loved her. but no longer were they her whole world. she had discovered that if she broadened her horizons, then there was so much for the world to offer her. and while it hurt her to watch her parents die, it didn't nearly incapacitate her as the death of her sibling had done. sure, she mourned, but the hard taught lessons that her mentor and father had drilled into her left her unable to completely break down and shatter into a billion irreparable pieces.