It’s particularly warm today, the sun’s heat managing to melt through the frost in a few choice spots. Adele had been keeping an eye on them all morning, waiting for the spot on top of a crate outside to thaw. She’d been quick to snatch it once she deemed it dry enough, eager to finally get some time to sunbathe and rid her bones of the constant aching that plagued her during leaf-bare.

She’d been here for hours, the sun high in the sky and soon to begin its slow descent down. She’d slept, mostly, but she’d also watched the comings and goings of the barn with lazy eyes. It seemed quieter these days. There weren’t as many cats going out hunting for herbs and prey, and those that did depart tended to with a hesitant look around. Wary.

It was all that damned Cabin Sect’s fault.

The barn had lost a pawful of good, hardworking cats to their supposed ‘cause’. The thought alone had Adele scowling. They were all fools and Foxglove was the most mouse-brained of them all. She’d never understand how the tom could think starting a fight against such an overwhelming enemy would win him anything besides death.

And he’d drag them all down with him.

Adele knew how these things played out. Back on the ranch there’d been a time or two when strays thought themselves worth more than their salt, when they’d thought they could oust Adele and her family from their home. You know how she dealt with them? She’d find their loud-mouthed ringleader and beat him bloody, send him back home hobbling and broken. And if they continued? She killed them and their merry band of idiots.

It didn’t take much to realize the Clan’s would dish out the same lesson. Sure, they might stop at just the Cabin Sect but she doubted it. There were too many cats who straddled the fence, who mucked around with Foxglove and then came here for other business. The Clan’s wouldn’t know all the little details, who was a danger versus who was just trying to survive, would probably just throw them all into the same doomed lot.

She was getting too old for this fox-dung!

She’d had her fights, done her battles, gave her blood – she’d left because all she had left to give was her life and she was still interested in keeping it, dammit! She’d finally settled down and started making friends, little connections of maybe family that she cherished. Seemed like the Powers That Be didn’t want her to settle yet.

She’d heard talk of The Kingdom not long after whispers of the Cabin Sect started popping up. A group of Clan-kin that were tired of their lot and fishing for a new hand. Adele thought that sounded mighty similar to her own troubles. If she wasn’t meant to be a barn cat then maybe being a mountain cat would suit her better.

Still…

She had friends here. Cats she wanted to protect. Little blooms of family. It hurt just as much to think of leaving now as it had on her ranch. She knew her ranch family would be fine without her; their bonds were strong and their numbers rising – the same could not be said for the barn. Their numbers were slowly dropping, between cats joining Foxglove and those leaving for safer pastures, the barn wasn’t nearly as full as it once was. And that worried her. She wasn’t as spry as she had been but she could still fight with as much feral fury as before; leaving the barn meant knocking them down one more protector.

A bone-weary sigh rushed from the tortie, her head thumping down onto the crate as she scowled into the distance. Her mind was on loop with one question – what to do, what to do?