Ptarmigankit Ptarmigankit
I'd find myself sitting on that distant shore...
I'd find myself sitting on that distant shore...
{$title} The night of the Gathering, while most of the clan has left to face their fellow clans, a stray kitten from a loner colony wanders into camp in desperate search for herbs to repay their debt. Though, something seems terribly wrong with the tiny thing.
———————————— You're not meant to sing along, it isn't that kind of song. ✦
TRIGGER WARNING
Descriptions of child mistreatment and medical neglect.
The last few days were a blur. Like a hazy nightmare of aching paws and heaving lungs. Sickness they couldn't shake, having gripped them for as long as they remembered.
There were days of lucidity in the past, maybe. Days they had been well enough to be pried from their nest and sent to replenish the stocks they had wasted. The herbalist had begun to grow infuriated with them, unable to shake the sickness that had clung to their very being. While the hot season was rich for herbs, they were reprimanded for wasting good plants they needed to save for the cold season.
They had wandered for days now, the herbalist demanding they not return home until they had an adequate collection of useful herbs to restock what they had wasted. But Ptarmigan wasn't well when they sent him out. No, no, he was still writhing in pain from a fever that made their legs weak and fur stick to them from the heat their tiny body radiated.
Even though they had just reached their 4th moon, they had made so little progress in their growth that their littermates towered over them. That was, whenever they decided to visit them. Too busy playing and learning to give them any company in their bouts of wakefulness.
But like a respite, an oasis in the blazing heat of the night, they found... Something. There was a strong scent of something new, but their mind were too fuzzy to register what it was. More importantly, they found what seemed to be an encampment, similar to their own home, but it seemed rather quiet. That scent was still powerful, so it seemed whoever lived here had vacated for now. The Herbalist told Ptarmigan that they didn't care how they retrieved the herbs, but they couldn't come back empty-pawed.
The kitten took a moment longer to register what else clung in the air, a strange mixture. Strange cats, faint herbs, blood... Blood. Their stomach turned, unsettled. If they had been able to hold down any food on their travels, they would have hurled it up at the smell. Death clung to this place, a scent they knew far too intimately. Their whole body quaked, and for a moment, they hesitated. Turn back. Turn back and find herbs elsewhere. This place reeks of danger.'
How weak they were. The heat that radiated from their shaking form. They wouldn't survive pushing any further for herbs; if they didn't find some now, they would perish on the trek back. So with a heaving gasp of air, they pressed ahead.
The kitten knew the scent of plants, clipped and tucked away. Even in the haze of illness and death scent, like a fog blanketing their mind, they knew they had found the storage location of this colony's plants. Though their paws could barely hold their own weight up, they managed to slip within and bask in the mottled scent of herbs.
Their bleary eyes were trying to focus on what they could. To their horror, there were shapes amongst the darkness. They blinked, hoping it was some vision from their fevered state. But it moved. From the corner of their eye lay another shape. The air grew still and heavy. The scent of herbs was strong, but the scent of cats was stronger.
A lump formed in their throat, like tears might threaten to roll down their cheeks. It was no use; they couldn't grab anything if cats were here. They tried to back away, slip out unnoticed. But their balance was poor, stumbling over their own paws like a newborn fawn, crying out in a whimper of pain that they tried desperately to stifile.
Their tiny body shaking as they tried in vain to clamber to a standing position. Wide, watery eyes staring up at the cat, praying that they had gone ignored, maybe these were like their colony, overlooked the kittens until they became of use.
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ooc - let @maxine / @SWALLOWBREEZE reply first please!
Note: Cause this takes place DURING the gathering, only those who haven't gone are invited to reply so you don't cause a rift in space-time /silly -
✦—Future Skyclan Kitten | 4 moons
✦—They/He/She
✦—"SPEECH", 'THOUGHTS', ATTACK
✦—A long-haired sealpoint kitten with tired amber eyes.
#94e4ae