Closed you are the light, i've been searching for forever ; juniperstar

serpentberry serpentberry

i imagine you're still out there
ThunderClan
Medicine Cat
132
14
Freshkill
45
Pronouns
she/her
Played by
Nya
The familiarity of it doesn't fade. Moons ago, Serpentberry had done this very thing - she sequestered herself away from the Clan at night, stolen to a nest that belonged to another. Then it had been beneath the guise of, "I'll help you." She was freshly, too, a mother without a second to help raise the kits. The early mornings and late nights were the hardest, she knew first hand, and perhaps either with her rare selflessness or a sense of self importance, offered the help that she had. They clustered their kittens, six total, into the same nest for a moon or so before Serpentberry moved back to her own cavern once more. She supposes, thinking back, that the longing never left.

Today marks the umpteenth morning she finds herself tucked into chocolate fur, eyes half lidded with the streaming sunlight, simply watching the other's chest rise and fall. It's too easy, in a way that makes her feel pathetic. She should've seen this attachment from miles away, should've predicted that the molly most alike her deceased lover would be next to capture her heart. It hurts, something dull, something slow and aching, to have anyone secure in her heart at all. Perhaps it's a saving grace that thus far her affections are unspoken and lack a fathomable return. Sure, Juniperstar smiles at her at night - they tuck their paws in close and dare the quiet tangle of their tails... but it can't be just that. Comfort where they both need it; love shrouded in the depths of the evening.

Many phases of the moon later, and only now has the tiptoeing has bothered her some. The rumors that flutter about are often spoken by cats who do not care if Serpentberry hears them or not. She half wonders if they speak them boldly, simply waiting for a reaction at all from the medicine cat. If she were any more sour, any more terse, they'd have earned a tongue lashing. But it is not only her business, but Juniperstar's. The honor and humility that Serpentberry harbors for her friend (?) leash her to a post and keeps her standing, a torture befit of a convict, not a molly drowning in unspoken affections.

She leaves. Without a word to Juniperstar, without rousing the other with a rasp of her tongue or a tight hug, she leaves. It is as if she is angry or disappointed, crossing the gorge towards her medicine den to continue discussing new parameters with her daughter. The day goes on and Serpentberry says nothing to her leader, no matter how many times the tabby attempts to address her. It continues to hurt but only in ways that spur her paws on and glue her lips shut. The sun sets and before long, the medicine cat is standing in the dimly lit entrance of her friend's den once more.

Only when the other sees her, acknowledges her, does she speak: "I didn't like doing that." It is simply spoken, factual and clipped. Venom eyes do not dim with the lack of light, as if StarClan's life imbues them to glow even in the darkest recesses. "Not speaking to you... all day. It made me feel childish, you know." She sits before the other, curling her tail atop her forepaws and allowing the tip to rattle like her namesake. "But that... is what this feels like, Juniper. It feels like you're... hiding me away. What - what are we doing?" Serpentberry laughs then, incredulously barks sharply into the air. Her hurt rings in the syllables. "We're full grown mollies with children, Juni. Not useless, dumb adolescents who need to hide from their overbearing mothers...!"

She finds that the emotion in her tone is too full-bodied. It scares her, more and more, as she treads ever closer to what she wants of the molly. Serpentberry bites her tongue, "I'd like to continue this, but I don't know what this is. And if this -" she gestures to the inset cavern, to the nest made slightly bigger to accommodate to bodies, somehow even to the scent that wreathes around the den, herbal and spice, nearly identical to the medicine den, "- is nothing, then I need to know. I can watch my leader throw away her lives with reckless abandon, but I can't watch my Haw-" a cough. Her paw finds her throat and the panic in her eyes is all but a morsel, drowning thereafter in the depths of her grief, "I can't watch someone I care about do the same. Not without the time in between being well spent."
 
juniper

it's a comfort wrapped in barbed nostalgia... the press of flesh against flesh, the rhythmic hum of twin breaths being taken, the effortless warmth and ease of sleep. it had once been that way with litter-mates... too small to really notice their big sister's presence and her elation to know them. then between friends, curled up together after a long night stayed up until near the sun's rise, chattering away about their hopes, sharing jokes. once more between the twined tails of lovers, fantasizing about family and future.

it had been a long time without that luxury... now stained in a path laden with blood where separate sets of paws had diverged. family uprooted, friends sent heavensward and love shattered into irreparable pieces on the ground. fragments had been welded together with painstaking efforts, leaving the stained glass approximation of what their hearts might've once looked like.

she leaves her that morning, silent. the other half of her nest is left stale with the memory of her sleeping figure and even the ruffs of fur along her tail tell a tale of what once had been carefully held affections, hidden in the entanglement of limbs. the spotted tabby draws her tongue over the ghost of her touch, trying not to let anxiousness stir too eagerly in her chest. the tortoiseshell had better things to do than laze the entire sunrise away with her... right?

but any attempt to share space with her had been stubbornly ignored. each rejection less subtle than the last- she'd caught the hint quickly enough to spare herself the pain of padding over the bed of thorns all day but still, confusion wore itself in the creases of a furrowed brow, in the insistent need to find something to do to fill her time instead. hunting only did so much to entertain her focus, dogged as her thoughts were with the sharpness of a glare that had so willfully overlooked her every interjection, the way two-toned cheeks had turned so coldly from any greeting.

by the time the sun sets, the prickling of uncertainty has grown difficult to ignore, resting in a half-hollow nest while turquoise eyes trace the cracks in the stone floor like it might hold some sort of wisdom for her. a long shadow drags across the ground and with too much eagerness, Juniperstar lifts her head to face her. there is still a strongly held distance... a rigidness to the way she stands even as she opens her mouth to say her name-- but there's no need to, cut off surgically with a clinical sharpness. was she not even allowed to say her name now? a privilege revoked in the heat of her ire?

her jaw slowly clamps shut, tufted ears folding back as the medicine cat announces her distaste for the day. how their every interaction had been intentionally withheld to prove a point; to teach her something. Juniperstar swallows past the tightness in her throat, listening and not daring to interrupt, lest it be the final straw to see the molly chased away. a willful silence... just like the well-maintained curtain placed in front of Serpent that she'd been holding there. burying it behind duty, erasing its intimacy and depth under the rug of shared experience; they couldn't be more than what they'd always been-

she declares that this is already more than that though. carefully skirted around in an oblivious haze, obfuscated behind an unwillingness to acknowledge it sincerely. openly... vulnerably.

her gaze trails towards the empty space at her side, an accommodation made without thinking and one she hadn't ever considered might be temporary. when had that part changed...? the idea of permanence, the need for her presence? it is cold, even in the middle of the summer, without her closeness. the half-bitten mention of another shared loss makes her chest ache, clicking the pieces into place only as Serpentberry guides her paws to where they're meant to rest. her words are gentler for her now than they would be for anyone else, maybe... reserved tenderness that she has so little room to hold onto.

she finds Serpentberry's face again, "You feel like I've been hiding you...?" the earthy patterns of her figure unravel themselves to stand, taking a cautious step closer before hesitating. would she run...? would the torture simply resume? "I'm sorry I've made you feel this way... I.... Today was.. uncomfortable, to say the least." to expound upon that tenfold, for as many weeks as the other molly had felt shrouded, locked away... it isn't a suffering she is keen to mull over for long. the urge to try to prove that her care is genuine makes her paws itch to draw closer, hinted by the nervous whisking of her tail behind her ankles. "I don't want you to leave again."

her frustration sits at the back of her throat threatening a whine- then she'd really be as childish as Serpentberry felt. crying for something she wants just to see it returned to her grasp? wasn't that just the way she was... the soft one? the keening one? always asking and never taking. maybe that was what she needed... proof that Juniper could do more than just beg. "We are more than just a shared nest... I want every moment I can have with you. If I have to leave you someday, let every single painful breath be made easier seeing your face.... Please."

she cannot help the gentleness, even in her half-demanded proclamation. "I'll stay as long as you'll let me... as long as you'll fight to keep me here too." with every swab of cobwebs pressed into the tender flesh of an exposed throat, every foul-tasting herb to combat whatever sickness may threaten her. every life-preserving measure for every unavoidable death... at least once more. at least until there are no more lives to spare.

  • juniperstar
    leader of thunderclan
    seven lives remain
    ignore me
 
What is left unspoken somehow speaks louder than the words said - in Serpentberry's demands for a title, a description of what they are or what they're going to be is near begging all the same. Her voice cracks, the morsels of her pitiful wants and needs showing, the glimpses of vulnerability quickly hidden by a well ruffled coat. It had been too easy with Hawthorne; love at first sight was a beast they were not well acquainted with, but a monster they were eager to accept. Her and Juniperstar? It grows to be love of convenience, of necessity. The affability of affinity blooming into something more due to the harrowing circumstances around them.

The other gives her time and space. Serpentberry feels the thrum of her heart in an uncomfortable way, her lips pulling tight against her sharpened fangs. Even now, she cannot smile. In the momentary silence, she anticipates that Juniperstar will rebuff her in some way. When the other speaks - "You feel like I've been hiding you...?" - and lopes a single, lonely step closer, the tortoiseshell tilts her head, near mockingly, "Don't be a tease, now." The rattle of her tail keeps her centered, but still. She ruffles her fur much like a bird on display, half lidded eyes crinkling with silent delight as the chocolate tabby describes her discomfort with the day, not to mention an apology. It takes everything in Serpentberry's body to retain the purr that wishes to rumble. Truth be told, as petulant and painful it was to bear through the day without a single word nor look towards Juniperstar - it was just as exciting to experience. Glimpses of the other's surprise and disappointment, watching as her leader slowly deteriorated and gave up. The subtle perk of her ears when Serpentberry arrived here tonight, too. It's the slightest sense of control that she always craves.

"I don't want you to leave again."

That could've been enough. Her eyes widen ever so slightly, observing Juniperstar in her entirety. The molly, a walking contradiction with several stars vesseled within her; flighty yet assured, sturdy yet flexible, engaged with matters across the border yet... here. With her. Juniperstar doesn't edge another paw closer, her formerly injured wrist still pressed forth in the dirt. Her tail twitches about her ankles, that very sense of anxious assuredness keeping her rooted. Her heart must be pounding like a hummingbird's now. Strangely enough, even if this is an outcome Serpentberry wanted, she finds that her own chest thrums to the same quickened beat.

Her lips part, prepared to tut a quiet, "Well, that is that, then." But more - more - tumbles from Juniperstar's tongue. A surprise. An impassioned (for lack of a better word) speech, as if the other had grounds to cover before they could rest again in the lone nest. Serpentberry feels her ears and cheeks genuinely burn, for all the peacocking and preparing she had done, most of her expectation ended with the other feeling defeated. But this... this declaration of intention, of infatuation... The sorrowful acceptance that they must experience time after horrible time, but that they are willing to do it together. "Please," almost breaks her. The façade of a coyly sharp-tongued woman, almost entirely undone by her closest friend's attempt at a union. Success of a union.

"I'll do anything for you, Juni," she murmurs, quietly, nearly surprised by the softness of her own voice. Genuine, it is, as her paws gather beneath her. There's still a static about her pelt, the concept of winning something still buzzing between her ears. But for a moment - a single drawn out moment, punctuated by her own dainty paws drawing her closer to Juniperstar - she is not Serpentberry the medicine cat, but rather something much simpler. Her greed melts to its parts of want and need, necessities and wishes that the chocolate tabby fulfills instantaneously. "Every last breath you take... Every first gasp of life... I'll be there." No, to the best of my ability. No, as long as I am able. Serpentberry leans forward, allowing her nose to linger close to the other's for a moment. She will be there for every moment, even if she must be dead to do so.

She continues forward breathlessly, gently pressing her cheek to the other's, as if marking her place within Juniperstar's scent. Her tail lashes against the ground in a single thud, her excitement and happiness left purely to the autonomy of her extraneous actions. "I promise."

There's more. Serpentberry does not let this sense of success drown out what would be obvious to the Clan soon enough. Rumors have already begun to spin in their webs, and as long as Juni doesn't nudge her away in public, it'll only be so long until word gets across the border. She curls her muzzle into the other's neck, briefly, taking in the sizeable scar that now rends her flesh there. She twists in order to not linger, turning her gaze back towards the other's vibrant seafoam ones. "Your boys are all in ShadowClan," something she's never liked. The back-and-forth only continues to spell trouble (though, maybe now she must admit that it's not as much of a problem as it could be.) "With... their father," the implication is clear to her. For good measure she adds, "I won't meddle in your affairs. But it is something you must... eventually handle." For now..., she thinks they should just rest.

Her tail twitches again, and she follows through her path towards the nest - their nest. Her gaze flickers with excitement, the haughtiness of her demeanor returning slowly. As she peers away from Juniperstar, it doubles, triples - but when her paws find purchase of their nest, and she turns to face her new lover once more... it dampens, just a bit. "Let's... go to bed, Juni." She isn't sure if her voice carries the same sharp tone it usually does, but should the other point it out, she feels prepared to blame exhaustion. She pitches her voice once more, "You can worry about that later."
 
juniper

there is an electricity practically crackling along the serpent's spine, watchful with a gaze that sinks deep under just the chocolate-tones of the molly standing awkwardly in front of her. don't be a tease... she can't tell if Serpentberry is saying so spitefully, a comment that she's still just dangling a treat out of in front of the medicine cat without really intending to give it to her. aquamarine eyes shy away for a half second, a nervous tick or maybe just an avoidance through shame.

her plea is left to hang in the air... a pale, exposed admission. a belly laid bare, inviting the claws that would be its undoing. sink your teeth in if the taste of that warmth is the closest thing to an embrace. but there is no brace to strike, no coiling tightly in preparation to spring... and on a breath softer than downy feathers, she has her answer.

anything.

every.

boundless, reaching towards the edges of life and beyond that and still patiently holding arms outstretched. the distance, though now only metaphorical, a theory for the potential future, as Serpentberry finally permits her the right to her closeness. the privilege of her affection. her nose hesitates just in front of her, perilously close and achingly still too far. it isn't touch... just the potential for it... "Don't be a tease," she whispers, daring only to mock her moments before she punctuates eternity with the press of a cheek against her own at last.

Juniperstar presses into her with a sort of greedy impatience, a little too harsh, a little too hungry. even as she curls against the underside of her chin, bringing heat to the bare skin where new star-stitched scars had formed, the spotted molly can't help the obnoxious, rumbling purr that reaches a crescendo while bathed in her scent.

"Your boys are all in ShadowClan." she blinks, caught off guard by the change in subject- for once, it is a blessing that Asterpaw is not home to play witness to this display of commitment, knowing that it may all that much more quickly find Sablestar's ears. "Right..."

Serpentberry pulls away, whisking and phantom-like in the sway of her walk as she curls up in her rightful place. a beloved trinket placed back on its shelf to be lovingly adored. eventually.... eventually could be fine... just a little while longer, to bathe in the quiet of a newly bloomed affirmation. without souring it with the division of an old, well-worn path that no longer suited her...

she'd told him before, hadn't she? if you loved me... you'd be here. but he'd chosen the blood on his claws rather than the blood of his family. the tortoiseshell that curls up so delicately in her nest had chosen to be here, willingly... with all her attention. had devoted her energy to raising her kits until they were big enough to walk between both worlds.

there's an offer to avoid it, to run from the inevitable conflict... and she takes it selfishly, clambering into their nest with a small exhale of relief. it's almost as soothing as a mouthful of honey... a reduction of the inflammation as strong as a poppyseed. if she had to spend every first and final breath beside her... that would make them worthwhile.

"As long as you're with me... I have nothing to worry about." it would be nothing more than a momentary sting... as quick as an adder and hopefully half as lethal.

  • juniperstar
    leader of thunderclan
    seven lives remain
    ignore me