kit

---

His life began quietly. He and his sister both entered this world hushed, but breathing, nothing but the smallest of mewls for only their mother to hear. Even then, they must have known. They must have inherited their mother’s survival instinct: do not draw him to the den. Quiet Dawn stayed as he was fervently groomed. Quiet he stayed as he was tucked against his mother’s belly to drink.

He came anyways.

The first memory Dawnkit has of Him, he was blocking the evening sun, standing there in the den’s mouth. He said his mother’s name. Hemlockheart. He was impossibly large, and his blazing orange eyes were locked on him and his sister. Duskkit shrank down behind him. Her tiny voice squeaked out the question: “Who is that?”

His eyes are fixed on him when Hemlockheart says, “That is Sunstorm, your father. He is the… he is the strongest warrior in RidgeClan.”

He looked the part. Sunstorm said nothing as he looked to Duskkit. On some instinct, Dawnkit straightened up bigger, and Sunstorm looked at him instead. He did not look at him like a kit - he looked with a flinty glint of respect.

From that moment, Dawn would crave his respect, his approval, like a life-supporting drug.


apprenticeship

---

Sunstorm started training Dawn and Dusk long before their ceremony, and still, he could not shake his excitement. He had been brutal and violent, but now he was damn good. It was his father’s brutality that had made Dawnkit as talented as he was, and he was ready to advance further than ever. He would have more than one trainer now, and Hemlockheart had taught him everything about loyalty and love and taking pride in his Clan, how to love and devote himself to StarClan. He and Duskkit were ready to take the forest by storm.

The ceremony was a blur. Their mother was there, but she had grown brittle, and not even the medicine cat could tell anyone why. But today, Dawnpaw and Duskpaw hardly noticed, so elated she was, so proud of them both. They didn’t even notice the hateful stares between their mother and father, and Dawn didn’t flinch when Sunstorm looked at him. He was finally an apprentice.

He was given to a mentor called Stoatfang, personally suggested by none other than his father. Training began immediately, first with a tour of the territory, and then the first tests of mettle.

Stoatfang was as brutal as Sunstorm. Claws came out in sparring more often than not, and Dawnpaw was grateful for his father’s early training, or he would have lost more than just fur. He and Duskpaw picked up on everything rapidly, forging their way through training and leaving a blaze of amazement in their wakes.

An assessment day came, one requested by Sunstorm, just for a status report. Dawnpaw was thrilled to show his father how great he was becoming. As he left the camp, he said to his mother that he would make her proud. She promised she was already proud.

He returned that night exhausted with his sister. He headed for the elder’s den, where their mother had retired two moons ago when she became too frail. He and his sister needed to tell her everything about their day. Dawnpaw was pulled up short when an elder exited the den, and he didn’t want to believe the dread that seized him at the mournful look he was given.

He demanded they move. They did not. He demanded again, louder, and he was drawing attention. The elder still wouldn’t move, and he shoved past them with a pounding heart, ears already ringing.

He did not need anyone to tell him when he saw the elders gathered around Hemlockheart’s body. Her ribs did not rise or fall. Her glazed eyes stared at the wall, unblinking. Dusk flew past him, wailing, but Dawn was frozen in place.

Sunstorm endered the den with the medicine cat and the oracle. He ushed the apprentices out, both numb - in shock.

We all die, their father told them. But you will not die weak and useless as she. You will die and kill for your Clan, in the name of StarClan.

Or you will die as nothing at all.


warriorhood

---

There was thunder outside, a pounding and beating sound of a pounding heart when he work from a fitful night’s sleep. It was still dark, and his eyes took a bit longer to adjust to the feeble light of dawn that lined the den mouth. He sat himself up, eyes glazing for a moment as he realized what day it was. And he realized why he can’t sleep. Claws dug into the moss beneath him.

He wished they had more time. Always be ready to die, Sunstorm said. He had been unfair and harder on Dawnpaw and Duskpaw since their mother died, and he made sure they knew of their mortality, and that one day, they would die warriors.

Dawnpaw wasn’t ready to die.

His end could be today, it might have been tomorrow, it might be the day after. But certainly, within that deep hardened heart of his, he knew he was not ready. He knew he couldn’t face the warriors of other Clans who had trained just as long as him and longer, and emerge victorious. His father and his mentor both tried their best to prepare him, to make sure he had all the tools he could. Beaten and beaten and beaten until he could really beat back. He had an edge the other didn’t, but he didn’t believe in himself enough to follow through.

He had never killed before. It was against the code, but his father taught him how to do it anyway. And part of it scared him.

A darkness lingered in his heart, shadowed and hidden, and he knew he’d do it to survive. He knew he would, because if he didn’t, they would.

He would never be ready to die.

He knew he should have been getting as much sleep as he could before his ceremony, before he was set down into a gladiator’s ring, waiting in the wings for his turn to shine. But he had always been a coal in comparison to the diamonds of others. He may have been the first born sun of a strong bloodline, but he was the dullest of them all. And he knew it, as much as it hurt to admit - as much as he would never admit to others.

Sunstorm was cruel and made sure Dawn and Dusk knew how hard it was to care for them. He wondered, always, how their pure hearted mother had mated with him. It must have been a job of necessity and never love. And he wondered what was in store for him. He wondered if that was what was in store for Duskpaw. Dusk, his beautiful and gentle soul of a sister, with a flame beneath her outer chill. He would do anything for her. She would do anything for him.

And yet here he was, planning his own death vigil before he was even given his name.

He would not let it happen to Duskpaw. He would die first. He constantly told himself, finding it within him to give up before he’s started. But he could hear the echos of the beatings he endured when he spoke up about that before, and he would swallow the words down. Hard. Hard enough to let them sit in the churning of his gut until he couldn’t drown out the rain anymore with his own thoughts.

And before he knew it, the sun was rising, painting sapphire hues behind the thick clouds. And nobody had come for him yet. He looked at Duskpaw beside him, sleeping. They were safe, safe, safe.

Until they weren’t. Until they were given their warrior names: Dawnclaw - Duskfang.


war

---

He was a respected and well-liked warrior now, 18 moons old, and life as a warrior was not yet killing and war like Sunstorm made it out to be. His father was paranoid, he soon understood, from losing his brother to a border skirmish in apprenticehood. Dawnclaw, unfortunately, had inherited this paranoia, always watching out for them - for his sister - waiting for the moment he would be called to arms.

And one day, he was.

They were called out of the den for the attack. Sunstorm made sure he and his sister were well groomed and stretched to be a shining example for his family. But he didn’t feel like one, he never had. He’d felt like a tom following dreams not his own. He knew his father thought he was the pride of the family. He was ready to prove him wrong.

As warriors gathered, he wondered what new scars he would collect. There was one on his leg, from when he learned to swim and was trapped under a log beneath the rapids. He wondered if he’d feel that same helplessness again, and if this time it would get him killed faster. There was another one on his left side, from where he fell from a tree when he watched a hawk-hunting lesson. He was five moons old, watching warriors and apprentices tempt death. He knew he had been training for something grand.

He felt like a scared, soft kitten. He did not want to do this, but he had to. His leader commanded it. There was no other way.

He looked to the other warriors gathered, some the same age as him. He looked to the one with mottled fur and eyes like glaciers that sized him up. He had yet to truly prove himself, and he knew it. His gentle heart couldn’t help but yearn for everyone there. Not all of them would return that night, and he prayed to StarClan that he would be brave enough to make the ultimate sacrifice to make sure as many of them returned as possible.

Like the good son he was, he drifted toward Sunstorm to stand before him, ever the picture perfect, willing son, but he bit his cheek when his father’s claws stretched out to gently set down on Dawnclaw’s paw. They didn’t speak. There was nothing to say.

He only started to tremble when he locked eyes with his sister, when she met his sunlight gaze from across camp, tense and unsteady as she approached to lean against his side. They were silent. He told himself it could be the last they see of each other, and he needed to make sure she knew he wasn’t afraid, even if he was. He needed to embody the strength he didn’t feel, if for nobody else but for her. He could do it, he could be that warrior. He tried, and he tried harder.

Before he knew it, the he was marching with the rest of them, marching toward that mysterious territory that harbored the window that peered through the veil and into StarClan. Everyone is either solemn or fervent, and he mentally told himself he stood with him, that he understood, despite his inexperience. He wouldn’t wish this on anyone. Yet here he was, following in the footsteps of warrior after warrior. Padding toward his own death.

The MistClan camp was large, and it was overwhelming. But he knew his father made sure he had the right training. He wondered if it would enrage him when he failed.

The call to charge rang out, and he was moving. Already, there were murderous caterwauls, screeches of pain and rage. He slipped from cover to cover, following his own wardrum. And he went to move again, ready to spring into the fray and embrace his demise, when claws hook into his back leg.

His eyes went wide like the moon, spinning to rake his claws in an automatic reaction, and he registered a dark-furred PrarieClanner, a grin on his face as his claws came down and scores deeply, carving up his shoulder in a haphazard attempt at slashing his throat.

The darkness in him surged, and he didn’t even know it was there until too late. Despite the blood, despite the pain, he cried out with a warrior’s roar. He pushed back, using the leverage of the ground to his advantage. His opponent’s eyes went wide in shock at the strength of him, and Dawnclaw did not pause. He was surviving, he was fighting. Somewhere in the background, he heard his father’s yowl. He would know that voice anywhere.

There was a struggle. This warrior was older and far more experienced, and he was damn fast. The tom pins him, and he looked up in shock at the snarling cat.

He didn’t fully understand what happened next. One moment, he was struggling to get on his paws, the next he could feel his back legs pushing under the PrarieClanner’s belly. Things happened in a blink, and time slowed at the same time. Adrenaline had taken over. Killing was against the code, he knew that, but everyone was doing it anyways. He would be an idiot not to. He got his claws into that soft belly.

The next thing he saw was shocked eyes of the tom above, and the spray of red, warm on his body with his kick, kick, kick, kick. He kicked him off finally, and he scrambled back, his war paint a mix of his own blood and his opponent’s. He didn’t have time to process what he’d done, but he knew somewhere deep in him that he had killed him.

And something in him changed forever.

His eyes lift from the struggling body of the gutted tom, and he found more warriors coming.

And suddenly, he was fearless.

He fought and he fought, and he tried to avoid the killing, though knew now he would do it to live. One more went down at his claws - he didn’t know if it was Prairie or Mist. He knew that soft part in him had broken, cracked, and could never be recovered. He wasn’t the same, and he regret it all immediately when the call for retreat came.

He survived. He joined the rest of RidgeClan, and find his father and sister miraculously made it through. But he started to feel numb as the death toll is taken, and he realized those there were all that was left. He wanted to kick and scream, run or throw up, but he was his father’s son. And he knew punishment awaited if he didn’t act proper while the Clan picked up the pieces. So he followed his sister, numb and bleeding and broken, to the busy medicine cat. He didn’t even flinch when tended to his shoulder. He couldn’t feel anything other than the ringing in his ears and an eerie silence that was ringing in uncomfortable circles around his mind.

Dawnclaw thought he might be afraid of himself now.

And he began to grow angry, somewhere in that gut of his. A roiling, stormy feeling of guilt and frustration; why, why, why that won’t go away. Why did it have to be him, any of them? Maybe, because it needed to be? As Wolfstar died of his wounds and the Clan divided, he knew that true corruption existed. He knew that cruel warriors filled the ranks of his Clan, cruel warriors like Stoatfang and Wolfstar and Sunstorm. He could see the crookedness in their smiles, the extra fangs in their mouths. He could see that hardness in so many that his father wore. And he could see the way they ate him up, to teach and ingrain, to chew and spit out.

He didn’t know what was left of him in the end. But he knew he was not the same.


dissent

---

He did not come to terms with it; and the Clan was moving on. The world always moved on. The families of the cats who died went back to work, rebuilding the Clan. Wolfstar and StarClan zealots against the ones who saw Wolfstar’s folly divided the Clan, an insult to RidgeClan’s grief. And he knew it was wrong, he knew he wanted to be apart of some kind of change.

But his father was a Wolfstar loyalist, his family seen as such, even him. How could he not be? He had played the part of dutiful son for so long.

It took him some time before he left. Duskfang refused to go, still locked in Sunstorm’s claws. Still, he left.

He sneaked his way through PrairieClan, along the river, into MistClan. He made it a point to be easily found by them, somehow, anyway, pleading for them to give him a chance to atone.

And in some way, they do. He was treated like a prisoner first, and rightfully so. He had to prove he was not a spy, becuase they knew him and they didn’t trust them. And he had to let them sit with their distrust until he could prove it. It began with small things, extra time reinforcing dens in the boughs here, cleaning fresh kill piles there. He was sent on patrol for the first time with another warrior, who gave him his first shove into a pile of wet leaves, leaving them both laughing.

And MistClan began to open up as he proved his dedication, his devotion, his commitment to learning their ways and paying for what RidgeClan had done. He worked for the new community he wanted to call his family.

Until the kits were taken, and all eyes turned on him.


mistclan : the beginning

---

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paint my spirit gold