A tall, chocolate brown tom with faint tabby markings.

-

Though at first glance Sanguine looks nothing like his father, it only takes a lingering look to realize all the traits they share. He inherited his father's tall, imposing stature, as well as his angular features and large paws. Unlike his father, Sanguine isn't a particularly muscular cat. His dark features and height give him a looming, shadowy presence that he wields to his advantage, knowing when he can intimidate another cat just by standing too close.

Sanguine's fur is a rich brown, marked by the faintest tabby pattern that's more visible on his chest and stomach, where his fur is lighter. His smoke coloration is most prominent in winter, when his fur grows thicker, revealing the lighter undertones. His eyes are bright green, but with how often Sanguine smiles, crinkling his eyes as he does, not many cats would know it. He bears a few scars all across his body, but most of them are shallow or well enough healed that you'd only notice if you were close. The exception is a scar on his tail, where the tip was severed as a youth.

Growing up far away, Sanguine doesn't quite speak the same language in the forest, though he's learning quickly. He struggles the most with more complicated sentences, cultural references, metaphors, idioms, and sayings. He will mess up common words, and then laugh at how silly he sounds. Compared to most cats in the forest, he has an accent - something cloying and round, like French.

CW: Grooming of a child for violence. Very mild descriptions of torture.

-

My mother traded me away when I was a kit. Oh, don't look at me like that. It doesn't bother me anymore. You get used to it - being a bargaining chip. Here, say it with me: my mother never loved me, and she traded me away when I was a kit. My mother never loved me, and she traded me away when I was a kit. My mother never-

Maybe I'm being unkind to her. Perhaps there was a moment when she loved me. Right after I was born? When I nuzzled against her stomach, seeking milk and warmth, pressed between the pelts of my many siblings? Or maybe she loved me during my first moon, when I was a wriggling bundle of fur and naivety, ignorant of the world I would soon be thrust into. My second moon seems less likely. I had a personality then, so that must be when she decided I was less worthy of her love than my siblings.

Certainly, she didn't love me by my third moon, because that's when my father came to take me away.

-

"What do you mean, sick?" The word is spat, like a curse. Feuilly shies back from her once-mate, his odd-colored eyes digging into her like the barbs on wires.

"They're sick, Calypso," she said. "I don't think they'll live a fortnight."

Calypso, towering like the snow-capped mountains further north, hisses in displeasure as he paces in front of the only cat to ever earn his affection. That affection is a curse now, he thinks, as he can't get mad at Feuilly for the news she delivers him. "All of them? All six?" Feuilly nods, and Calypso curses the fates that led to this. "You disappoint me, Feuilly."

"You disappoint me," Feuilly snaps back. "You promised me children. And you give me death. You'll be long gone when I grieve their precious, lost lives."

It's Calypso's turn to shy back from his mate's anger. He blinks at her, lost for words, before slinking back into the shadows he came from. The next time he returns, the kits are nearly two moons old, and all six of them still live. "So much for sick," he says from the shadows, watching the children play. Feuilly does not immediately respond to his disembodied voice. Not until her children are far enough to not pay attention to her.

"They're still sick," she says. "But, they're miracles. For now."

"If they live another moon, I'll come back for them. And you."

Feuilly's ears flatten, but she doesn't respond. Calypso makes good on his promise. He returns the morning after the kit's third moon, flanked by two cats she once trained alongside. "The white one died," she says, as she'd never told Calypso what she named their kits. Calypso searches her face, looking for the lie, but struggles to read Feuilly's expression. "The rest are still sick." He opens his mouth to protest, but Feuilly cuts him off. "Except the darkest one."

Most of their kits took after neither parent in particular, except for the white one, with Feuilly's stature and Calypso's pelt, and the dark one, who inherited the opposite. "He's healthy?"

"Very." The two parents watch the darkest kit, who Feuilly sometimes calls Sasha before reminding herself it was dangerous to get attached, pounce on one of his sisters. The clearing fills with kitten-laughter as the sister pounces back. "Take him."

"I will."

"And never come back." Calypso's fur begins to rise along his spine. "That's the deal I make you, Calypso. Take him and never return to me." One healthy kit in exchange for the maybe-lives of the remaining four sick ones. It's a twisted bargain, even for Calypso, who dealt in currency of life or death since he'd been a kit himself. It's the exact sort of bargain he expects from Feuilly - his bitter, calculating Feuilly, who never wanted motherhood, but wanted to herald the next generation of the shadow's loyalest followers.

That isn't the Feuilly he looks at now. This Feuilly isn't soft, but he can see light in her eyes, bright enough to chase the shadows away. Something changed her. "Fine," he says. "I accept your deal."

-

Despite coming to collect me, I still don't meet my father. Not really. I see him at a distance, talking to my mother, and then I'm approached by the two cats that flanked him. They couldn't be more opposite each other. One was broad and burly, pelt covered in thick tabby stripes, only broken by the dozens of scars he wears. The other was small and nimble, darker than night. They introduced themself as Aymeric. Apparently, they were my mother's sibling - I suppose we had the same eyes.

The burly one was Gulch. He didn't speak much, which meant I could speak at him. I was good at it, or so my mother once told me. Speaking. Where my siblings were slow to develop, I was quick. With speech, with walking, with size - I grew, and my siblings didn't. Maybe that's why Mother got rid of me. I imagine I was an annoying child, always asking questions.

Gulch didn't seem bothered. He didn't answer any of my questions, but he didn't tell me to shut up, either. Aymeric did. They were mean about it, cuffing my ear until it stung, leaving claw marks behind in my kitten-soft fur. They called me Tick, for the bug Gulch pulled off me the next morning, fastened to the same scratch they left on me. 

The three of us traveled in Calypso's footsteps. I still didn't know his name, nor that he was my father. All I knew was the reverence in Aymeric's voice whenever they spoke about him.

We traveled for two full days before arriving at the pack. It was more cats than I'd ever seen before, huddled together in makeshift dens of fallen logs, abandoned burrows, and high-reaching branches. Most cats were lounging, except for the ones posted on guard. Everyone stood to attention when Gulch led Aymeric and me into the center of camp. Have you ever been surrounded by hundreds of judgmental eyes? That's what it was like on that first day. Dozens of cats, loyal to my father and the shadows and no one else, staring at me like I was standing trial.

Eventually, I was led away to one of the dens, a burrow, and given to a swollen-bellied queen. She wasn't pregnant, not anymore, but clearly she had no kits to nurse. Back then, I had no tact. I asked her if her kits died and she said no, they'd been taken.

Taken, like me? I asked her in response.

She - her name was Cardie, she was a sweet lady - shook her head and told me it was different. I was taken because I was to be trained in the way of the shadows. Her kits were taken because they were too young and they wouldn't survive the march north. Her mate took them to nearby two-legs. She said she could've gone with them, but she feared the shadows leaving her behind.

Her fears were right. She died a moon later, weakened from labor, spilling blood that never stopped. The pack did not mourn her. Her mate did not bury her. She was merely left behind.

-

"Is he sick?" Calypso is waiting for Gulch as the raider slips out of the burrow full of younger cats. New bloods, mostly, plus the kit they took from Feuilly. Tick, he thinks Aymeric is calling the brat. "Feuilly's boy."

Gulch shakes his head. "Healthy."

"Good." He wonders if the kit was ever sick. If any of the kits were. The missing white one might haunt him forever, a ghost of his own lineage, but this one will do. He won't bear Calypso's name, nor will he ever speak for the shadows, but with Calypso's blood in his veins - and the blood of all the Calypsos before him, a long line of white cats leading the pack - the kit will surely be good for something. "Watch him. Train him. Let me know if he should train under Dancer when he's old."

"Yes, sir."

Tick is soon pushed to the back of Calypso's mind when he hears another mate of his gave birth. He doesn't care about this she-cat, but his ears perk up when he learns of the circumstances of the birth. A litter of dark furred kits, all of whom died, except for the sole white kitten she still nursed. His augur, the only other cat blessed enough to speak to the shadows, though their conversation is limited to signs and dreams, tells him this news with a cruel, curling smile. Calypso agrees with his augur's unspoken words. This kit, this sole surviving kit, will be his successor. 

The pack sets off, only its speaker and its augur realizing they're giving chase to a mother who doesn't want to be found.

-

My first few moons in the pack were unremarkable. There were no expectations of me, no responsibilities. I trained with Gulch almost every day and slept separate from the other young cats. Gulch told me the young ones, like myself, were called new blood. There were older new bloods, too, but those weren't cats with pack blood. They were loners who decided to join, and so they always had the worst status, at least until they became raiders. Sometimes, if they were lucky, they were offered to train as shadow walkers.

That's what Aymeric was - a shadow walker. And before he was the speaker, Calypso was a shadow walker, too. There's nothing more evil than a shadow walker. They're trained in two things: to do whatever the shadows say, and to take kits from their homes. And since the shadows speak through the speaker, shadow walkers are nothing more than the speaker's personal soldiers, lacking any free will of their own.

I should know. I'm a shadow walker.

But, before I became one of those, I was just new blood.

I was kept separate from other kits my age only for a short while. Now, I know it was meant to break me. It's a common tactic we use for kits stolen from home; isolate them, and they'll do whatever it takes to have attention. But I didn't fall for it - I didn't need to fall for it. After being bargained away, I had no problems doing whatever my new family (not family, Gulch always said) wanted of me. I trained with Gulch. I worshipped the shadows. I listened to the older cats. It was all so easy.

When they let me join the other new blood, I followed my namesake and latched on to the first bleeding cat I saw. They told me their old name - Caius, beautiful name, not at all what the pack wanted them to be called - and then told me the new name Gulch gave them: Worm. Not too different from Tick. Worm was still roughed up from the shadow walker who brought them here. A scratch over the eye, another on their flank. The healer had seen to them, but stubbornness kept them from healing. I still remember what they told me about bleeding. I don't mind it. Maybe they'll leave me for dead, then I can go home.

The wound closed eventually. Caius never left - well, they left, but they left with me. That's a story for later.

Caius and I befriended a cat named Quail. I liked him right away - he was a little older, a little wiser, and spoke in a rumbling way that soothed me. He still speaks like that, but it rarely makes me feel better. Few things do, these days. Quail wasn't given a new name when he joined the pack. He never took a new name, either, proud of the name his father - a raider, who only left the pack to give birth - gave him.

My last friend was Anya. It's strange now to think of her as a friend now, but back then, you couldn't find two closer cats.

-

"Tick doesn't mind killing." Calypso looks up from the river to lock eyes with Gulch. "A lot of kits don't like it. Hunting. Killing small animals. Tick doesn't mind." It's the longest string of words Calypso has ever heard Gulch say in one breath, and it brings a smile to his face. After moons of a chase leaving him with empty paws, it's nice to get some good news.

"That's wonderful to hear. I'll take over his training, then."

Gulch is right, not that Calypso doubted him. Tick has a hunter's instinct. Calypso feels a little disappointment during the moments he trains with his son. He was hoping for a kit with a killer's instinct, not a hunter's, and this boy isn't it. But neither was the daughter before him, or any of his older children. Calypso wasn't running out of time - not yet - but it wouldn't be long.

He decides to make a hunter's instinct work. With Gulch's help, he teaches Tick how to pin down a cat twice his size, or escape the grasp of a much stronger cat. Then, when Tick is a little older, he teaches him anatomy - where to strike a cat to make them bleed, where to strike to cause the most pain, where to strike to kill. It's all theoretical (not even Calypso feels cruel enough to sacrifice some pack member for Tick's training), but Tick's curious eyes tell him all he needs to know. His son is listening. Absorbing. Molding.

Alongside Tick is a she-cat, Anya, who he trains as a favor to an old friend - Anya's mother, who died of cough last winter. He likes how his son and her look together. He likes her pale colored pelt, and the chance of her producing cats that could carry his line - his line through Tick, that is. Calypso's eyes are still set on the kit marked by the shadows, the lone survivor, but if Tick were to have a child one day... It never hurt to have options, at least.

"I'm proud of you," he tells Tick for the first time after a long patrol. His son must be eight, maybe nine moons. "The shadows were right."

Tick smiles at him, clueless. "The shadows?"

"They led me to your mother, and I gave her kits. In return, she gave me you." Still smiling. Less clueless. Calypso can see acknowledgement in his son's eyes. "Did you not know?"

"Mother said the shadows gave us to her."

"She's not wrong. I speak for them."

"So... you're my father?"

There it is - a glimmer in Tick's green eyes. Calypso purrs and bumps his head against his son's shoulder. He wants his son to harness this. The moment where he feels special. One of the shadow's chosen. "I am."

-

I was nine moons old when Mite was found. My father told me my brother was coming home. I brightened, remembering the brothers I played with under my mother's care, but Calypso shook his head and corrected me. Not those brothers. His other son, who he'd been looking for. I thought it was so wonderful Father finally found him. I told him that - that it was wonderful. His smile was dark when he responded, but it didn't bother me. I remember his response perfectly. How could I forget? Those words defined me then, and they still define me now. Terrible, I think, to be bestowed with a purpose when you're so young. You never really know how to live.

You'll protect him, my father told me. My brother, Mite, was to be Calypso's successor, and it was my job to keep him safe. To help him grow strong. To find his place among the shadows, like I had found mine.

Such an honor to be given. It was like the weight of the pack was in my paws. I could hear that in my father's words, the sudden responsibility thrust upon me. And I could hear the threat if I failed.

I was only nine moons old.

-

"When can I see Mite?" Calypso turns to face his son, who nearly matches his height now. Tick has grown faster than any of his children before. It's a shame, he thinks, that he looks too much like his mother. 

"When the shadow walkers are done with him."

"It's almost been a whole moon." Calypso chuckles at Tick's impatience. "Please? I've been doing well in Dancer's lessons." Dancer, Calypso's left-hand, and the head shadow walker. His son makes a good argument. He ponders it for some time, then nods.

"Very well. Pass Dancer's next test, and you can meet your brother."

-

Dancer's first test involved creeping through the night, becoming one with the shadows. Her second test had been to pin down another shadow walker when they were on duty. I passed both easily. Her third test, the one my father asked me to pass, was to accompany her and another shadow walker on a catch - at least, that was what she told me.

The other shadow walker was called Ainsley. I thought it was odd that Ainsley was selected. Last my father spoke about her, Ainsley had disappointed him. He didn't explain why but I knew Ainsley had fallen out of favor with the shadows. I spent the whole hunt justifying to myself that this was Ainsley's chance to prove herself, too. She was being tested just like I was.

How naive of me.

The real test, I learned when my father slipped out of the shadows, joining us on the empty hunt, was to kill Ainsley.

I passed that test, of course.

-

"You'll need a new name," Calypso says, joining his son's side as the young tom stares at the dead shadow walker, her blood soaking in to his large paws. "No shadow walker still bears their old name." Tick isn't speaking. His green eyes are dark, lifeless, like the eyes of the dead shadow walker. Irritation bubbles in Calypso's throat as he thinks back to his first assessment of his son - a hunter's instinct, not a killer's. All those moons of training, wasted on this failure of a boy-

"Sanguine," his son purrs, eyes crinkled in mirth as he finally turns to face Calypso. The expression takes Calypso back. His shoulders straighten, but soon his matches his son's smile. "Like blood from a tick bite."

And there, hidden in Sanguine's languid expression, is the instinct Calypso always failed to see. Sanguine had what every Calypso before him had: the admiration of the shadows, the instinct of a killer, and the power to take whatever it was he wanted. The only thing he lacked was Calypso's ghostly coat.

No matter. He could think of other uses for the boy.

-

In retrospect, it's sort of a strange name, isn't it? Sanguine. I've never found anything that fits me more, but what sort of child names themself after blood? I wish I knew what my mother called me. I might find comfort in it, rather than the blood-red optimism I now wear. There was a moment, only days ago, where I could've changed it. But my mouth ran dry when the Kingdom-dweller asked me my name, and all I could supply was the grim one I chose for myself as a child.

As promised, my father let me see my brother after Ainsley's death. Mite was scared. Small. I knew the torture they were putting him through, because I'd see it happen to other kits who were brought to the pack. Kits who didn't embrace the shadows like I had. There was rebellion in Mite's mismatched eyes. Despite my own loyalties to the shadows, my heart still warmed to see some fight in him. I knew then that I would do as my father asked. I would always protect this sad scrap of a kit, no matter what sides of my father's war we found ourselves on.

Mite didn't like me very much. I think I scared him - no, I know I scared him. That was fine. I didn't need his love, even if I wanted it.

So many moons of my life are just a blur now, especially after Ainsley's death. Caius graduated at my side, a fellow shadow walker, taking back the name they preferred and shedding the worm moniker that made them feel like dirt. Quail was with us, too, though his training had him under the augur's wing, searching for signs of the shadows' will. He started losing his sight around this time. I remembered thinking Calypso would leave him behind, but it never happened. In fact, the opposite did. Calypso demanded he train harder with the augur. Blindness, my father thought, was a gift. A way for the shadows, for darkness, to always be with you.

He's an idiot. Quail's blindness was not the sort that took his sight away completely, though he let others believe that for the status. No, Quail once described it to me as a narrowing of his vision, limiting it to just the space in front of him, and blurring everything else. Colors were muted. Movement was slow to register. I imagine it like looking through several drops of water at dusk, but that's neither here nor there.

Anya became a raider, her strength too great to waste it on snatching kits under the guise of night. She climbed her ranks nearly as quickly as I did mine. Her growth was more impressive, of course. My success was little more than nepotism, not that I didn't have the physical ability to back it up. Everything she earned, she earned on her own merit. Mostly. I suppose her mother's status in my father's eyes might be a form of nepotism, too.

What I do remember clearly was my eighth kill. It stood out from the others. My father ordered it done, like he'd done with every kill before, but the target was a cat I held fondness for. I hadn't killed someone I cared about up until that point.

I watched Gulch die with just a trickle of remorse in my chest.

I stopped counting the deaths after that.

-

"I don't like that you hesitated," Calypso says, pacing around Sanguine with narrow eyes. "Do you doubt the shadows?"

"No," Sanguine insists, his eyes fully open for the first time in moons. How old is he now? 15? 16? He's taller than most cats in the pack, giving him the illusion of being much older. "I just-"

"Cared about him?" Calypso shakes his head. "He betrayed us. Aymeric died because of him. The shadows willed his death."

"I understand, but-"

"I don't think you do. Have you lost sight of your loyalties?"

"No-"

Fear fills every inch of Sanguine's body. Good. Fear carved a chasm into cats that could be filled with shadow. Calypso looms over his son, violence dripping from every word. "Prove you remain loyal to me."

And Sanguine obliges, even as Calypso's claws rake through his pelt.

-

If there's one thing my father knows, it's how to maim a cat. Any moment I showed weakness or hesitation (which wasn't often, not after this), he would lash out at me, reminding me with his claws why he was the shadow's chosen speaker. The time after Gulch's death was the worst. His claws dug into my flank, my tail, until the pain was so bad he was forced to send me to the healer. 

Unfortunately for me, there was nothing the healer could do for my tail. I bit down on burdock while they amputated the tip. Caius stayed with me through it all. They groomed me in the days that followed, when I was too weary from blood loss to do anything. Quail brought us news from outside the healer's den. And later, when I returned to my duties, my father looked at me as if nothing had happened.

The whole thing was stupid. Aymeric wasn't even dead - my father only thought so, because he didn't overhear Aymeric scheming with Gulch for them to both leave the pack. You see, the Aymeric who brought me to my father had finally grown tired of the shadows. At the time, I assumed they were fed up with never being chosen. The only cat who gave them any real attention was Gulch - their mate. And so they planned to leave. Gulch was supposed to help them fake their death, and then Gulch would follow after them a few moons later.

Poor Gulch. Always roped into someone else's schemes. I think Aymeric was pregnant, too. Their kits would never know their father.

I wish I'd been smart enough to question why exactly Aymeric left, but I wasn't. Anya was. It took her many more moons before she came to me with her suspicions - probably because we weren't friends anymore. It was sometime after my fourth kill, you see, that she approached me to say she was disappointed. I laughed at her. She flinched back. I called her a coward and she called me a murderer.

She's right, but it wasn't my fault Calypso asked me to kill her brother. He wasn't loyal enough.

-

Calypso watches his son groom the frail night walker called Caius with a frown. He doesn't like Sanguine's chosen company anymore; not when Sanguine has stopped spending time with Anya. He finds the raider a few days later and invites her to patrol with him. "Have you and Sanguine agreed to a litter yet?" 

To her credit, Anya only hesitates for a moment. "Sanguine and I haven't spoken on such things."

"Mm. You should soon. Otherwise, he'll be distracted with others." His ears flick back toward their current camp, and Anya nods in understanding. "You're so talented, Anya. I don't think we need you pregnant now. Just ensure Sanguine is untethered, for when the time comes."

-

We hadn't spoken in moons when Anya approached me. Out of the blue, or at least it felt out of the blue, she told me we would be mates. She didn't want kits yet, but she made it abundantly clear that was our future. Embarrassingly, I said yes without asking more questions.

Idiot, she called me. Do you do this to everyone?

Be their mate? I said, and then I laughed at my own joke. No, only you, Anya.

I knew I had her then, because Anya laughed, too. And then she grew serious, her face drawn into a tight line. Caius is in trouble, she told me. Calypso didn't like how close we were. I wanted to laugh at that. Yes, Caius and I were close, as were Quail and I. But we were all like brothers, not mates. I never looked at Cauis that way. Not that I wouldn't - they're a perfectly handsome cat. Anyone would be lucky to call them mate.

But Anya continued, and I realized how serious it was. Calypso wanted her and me to have children, and if he saw Caius as something in the way of that, he would want to get rid of Caius.

And I was the cat he made get rid of his problems. 

So we were mates, Anya and I. She made it clear she didn't like me. Didn't trust me. But she spent time around me so Calypso wouldn't be suspicious, and eventually the scrutiny around Caius went away.

-

"The shadows are unsure of things." The augur is speaking. Calypso twitches his ears in annoyance, not wanting to hear the same warning from the same signs for the sixth time. He knew the shadows were unsure. They spoke to him, too, much clearer than they spoke to his augur. "It may be time for your successor."

"Nyx isn't ready." Nyx, once called Mite, his chosen son, the only survivor of his litter. Every sign in the universe points to Nyx as his successor, except Nyx doesn't want it. It's easy to see, even if Nyx does a damn good job pretending. "He's too young. And I'm having doubts, anyway."

"You can't have doubts." The augur is, predictably, scandalized. "The shadows were clear. They-"

"They were clear to you. They said nothing to me. And am I not their speaker?"

Later, after the augur slinks away, Calypso calls for Sanguine.

-

I killed the augur that night. It's easy to make these things look like an accident, when you live near two-leg hunting grounds. I pushed them into a bear trap and left them to die. My father told me it was the shadows' will, and I accepted it. I always accepted it. What was it about him that made me willing to accept it all, every lie, every violent request? I thought of Gulch when I killed the augur. I thought of his patience.

Anya cornered me once news of the augur's death reached the rest of the pack. She knew it was me right away. Her words were barely an accusation, but I felt guilty nonetheless. It was a strange feeling. Except for Gulch, I'd never felt guilty over a kill before.

I miss those days. The guiltless one. Now, I feel guilt for every cat that died at my paws. It crawls under my skin, and I fear I'll never be rid of it. Sometimes, it feels like there aren't enough lives to save for the deaths I caused.

I was 25 moons when Anya cornered me. When the augur died. She tried to break me, and she succeeded. I hardly remember the words she said but I remember the moment I realized what she meant: Calypso was lying. My father was no speaker. Rather, he was just one cat in a long line of violent leaders, wielding the pack for their own desire, rather than promoting the will of the shadows.

The augur had been catching on to Calypso's selfishness. That was why he had me kill them.

And I had so foolishly done it, not a single question asked.

Rage washed over me. It gave me the strength to storm over to Calypso, but Anya held me back. Stop, she hissed. Don't be an idiot. I didn't know what she wanted from me. I was an idiot for doing as Calypso asked, but I was an idiot for trying to dispose of him, too? My claws itched to take his life, as if that might repent for all the other lives lost at my paws.

Anya explained herself, and each word calmed me. She was so focused. Determined. I wondered how long she'd been thinking of this plan. Next moon, Calypso's current right-hand would step down, and Anya would be promoted in her place. Everyone in the pack knew this. From there, she'd be one step closer to what she called a legitimate coup. That made me laugh. Since when did coups need to be legitimate?

But, when you think of it from a devout cat's perspective, I suppose it makes sense. An Anya who let Calypso die just to see him die would not be worthy of the shadows. An Anya who dedicated her whole life to removing an imposter would be. That's what she was striving for. And on that night, augur's blood still on my paws, she made me swear that I would dedicate my life to making her plan work. She said it'd be the only way to atone for my sins.

I agreed.

Because that's what I always did.

-

Sanguine is smiling when Calypso approaches him, like he usually is. It's a haunting look. One that doesn't betray all the negativity his son harbors under the expression. He wonders how many people can see the angry shadow of a cat pressed tight to Sanguine's bones. "Dancer is retiring," he tells his son. There, nearly imperceptible, is the shiver down his spine. Cats didn't retire from the pack, they both knew. Sanguine dealt with them after Calypso no longer needed them.

This time, he was happy to let Dancer go. She'd served him faithfully for so long. "I wish her well." Sanguine blinks at him and Calypso knows he's waiting for instructions. "It won't be right away. Four, maybe five more moons. Have you any desire to take her place?"

"Yes," Sanguine breathes, ambition evident in his voice even if his eyes are still nigh-unreadable.

"I'll consult with the augur, of course." The new augur. "But I won't forget how important you are to me. I think it could be excellent, you and Anya serving as my left and right hand."

"Until she has kits."

Good. "Yes. Until then."

-

A moon went by. Another. And then the pack shattered under the weight of Calypso's anger. I was 28 moons old when Nyx ran away, leaving behind the legacy everyone knew he never wanted. Calypso raged, left death in his wake. Death by his own paws - what a rare treat. For once, he didn't ask me to do any of it. And then he made me a deal. Find Nyx, bring him home, and the left-hand spot is mine. Guaranteed.

When I told Anya, she was delighted. You have to do it, she said. Then we can get rid of him. You swore it to me, she reminded. You swore.

She's right. I did swear.

But I also swore to protect my brother.

How was I supposed to uphold both promises? Nyx didn't want to come home. And if I returned from my hunt without my brother, only the shadows know what Calypso would do.

Despite the conflict raging in my head, I departed on my hunt. Caius and Quail came with me. Companions for the journey, but also friends to soothe my head. I waited before telling them my conflict - we needed to be far from the pack when I revealed it. Their responses were the same. And they were so simple.

Just leave.

Like Nyx did. Just leave.

-

Calypso stares down his new augur as the cat watches shapes move in a puddle of blood. Off to the side, Anya is bleeding, her breath coming heavy as she tries to steady herself. The wound won't kill her, Calypso knows. All he wanted was her blood, dark and pooling, so the augur could look for signs of Sanguine. It's been a moon since both his sons left and Calypso hated the creeping, sour feeling in his stomach that made him think they'd never come back.  "He's far," the augur says. "Very far. But he's still loyal."

"What direction?" Both Calypso and Anya ask. Her loyalty pleases him. He almost regrets injuring her. The augur answers, and Calypso nods. It's further than the pack has ever been - he's not sure if it's worth it to take them there.

Maybe, he should forget he ever had sons. There are still cats out their carrying his children, or tending to his kits. And Anya is still here, her nearly white coat gleaming in the moonlight, only marred by her own blood. "We'll give Sanguine another moon."

-

We followed Nyx for moons. He thought he was clever, taking a new name everywhere he went. (He was clever, actually - it nearly put us off his trail.) First he was Vesper, then Hoshi, then Scorpius. He has a new name now in this forest we've found ourselves in, but I haven't learned it yet. I know he's here. I know he's close. The shadows tell me, late at night, that my brother is not far from me. That he's settled down somewhere in this forest full of clan warriors and barn cats. I'm just not sure where.

The first thing I learned when we arrived in the forest was, like my pack, it had recently splintered. Only days ago, under the light of the full moon, a group had split from the clans - they called themselves The Kingdom, headed by three leaders. Or at least, there would be three leaders. What can I say? My curiosity was piqued. I met one of these Kingdom cats, a tight-lipped she-cat called Cherry, and after some negotiation - Caius' skillset, bless them - I was let into the Kingdom.

I wouldn't say I fell in love with it immediately. But I did... That is to say, I mean-

I'm not used to a group designed to care about each other, that's all. And I can see my friends struggle with it, too. And Caius, sweet Caius, they're trying so hard to pretend they don't love it here. No matter what happens with Nyx and Anya and my father and the pack, one thing is certain: I'll never let Caius leave this Kingdom, not when they feel so safe.

It's winter, now. The cats around here call it leaf-bare. Sometimes, it feels like we speak different languages - I struggle to understand them, even for the simplest sentences. Quail says it's because they do speak another language. Similar to ours, but different enough that the three of us have to puzzle sentences together before we're understood. It's almost fun, really. Like a game.

After winter, when the snow thaws and it's easier to move around the forest, I'll track my brother down. I don't know what I'll tell him yet. Maybe I'll force him home. Maybe I'll tell him Anya's plans, and he can come with me to kill Calypso. Maybe I'll kill him, so my father can never hurt him again.

I probably won't do that.

What I will do is enjoy this vacation. Learn about these clans. Learn about the barn. See if I can make Cherry's icy exterior melt under my smile. Build a home for Caius and Quail.

And for me, too, if I decide to stay.

I want to stay.

Pre-Plotting: Having met clans and similar groups before, Sanguine has a neutral view toward them - he's seen them at their worst, and at their best. Thus, upon arriving in the forest, he aligns with the Bumblebee view. However, after he meets new friends in the clans, and learns about MistClan's strange relationship with their foggy forest, Sanguine's beliefs will evolve into the Dragonfly view, eventually to the point where he'll ask to join MistClan. 

Because the first non-clan group he encountered when he came to the forest happened to be the Kingdom, Sanguine has little involvement in the barn and Foxglove's cabin sect. Should he come to learn more about them, he would eventually side with cats of the Temperance/Prudence beliefs.

Additionally, Sanguine is Starling's half-brother.

Family: Sanguine has no faith in family. His mother bartered him away, his father raised him to be a killer, and the pack taught him the only bond that truly mattered was the loyalty of a cat to the pack. He's so detached from the concept of family that he can't even begin to understand why other cats care about it. Deep down, he hopes this changes, but has little faith it ever will. 

Friends: Like family, the pack taught Sanguine that only his loyalty to the pack mattered. It tried to beat out all other connections. However, unlike with family, it failed with friendship, as even the cruelest of the pack's cats understood the value of companionship. Sanguine considers himself friendly on the surface level, but only has two cats he views as friends: Caius and Quail. This he has more faith will change the longer he spends outside of the pack's grasp. 

Romance: Sanguine has no concept of romantic love. He understands mateships to form allegiances, such as what he has with Anya, and he understands the desire for physical connection, but that's it. Sanguine's mate is listed as soft-open because he's open to very casual relationships.

Rivals: What's the point? In the past, if a cat crossed him, Sanguine killed them. The only exception to this is his father, who he's determined to kill one day, and Anya, who's less a rival and more someone who has power over him in a way he's not fully comfortable with.