Warrior Cat Clans 2 (WCC2 aka Classic) is a roleplay site inspired by the Warrior series by Erin Hunter. Whether you are a fan of the books or new to the Warrior cats world, WCC2 offers a diverse environment with over a decade’s worth of lore for you - and your characters - to explore. Join us today and become a part of our ongoing story!
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The waters receded from her mind, leaving it curiously... blank.
Images flashed across her vision, disappearing as quickly as they arrived- a blood soaked moss nest, tiny squirming masses, milk and herbs, violence and life. Rocks and currents, breath and death and breath again. A soft-handed twoleg, a warm bed and food pellets, an open door and towering trees. She couldn't make sense of any of it, and surrendered the images as mysteries that evaded understanding. Time was timeless, direction was meaningless, and her paws followed paths that led in circles.
Her instincts never failed her, though. With grace that spoke of ingrained training, she hunted and ate and slept beneath the stars. Her body healed, her mind steadied, and one day she found herself in full consciousness again. A blank slate, a spectre, an observer in a world that was familiar and foreign. The night sky stretched above her, splattered with silver stars, and pine trees sprawled before her.
Why had her delirious journey led her here?
In the silence of deep dark, the russet tabby's ears detected movement. Her small stature shifted into a defensive pose, out of habit more than out of choice, and her honey-colored eyes narrowed, sweeping the bushes before her and waiting for her fellow traveler to make themself known.
Kier padded out of the bushes, completely off his guard and wrapped up in his head, eyes on the ground as he thought; he looked more like a harmless, book-worm apprentice than a leader. Then suddenly, glimpsing a figure just ahead, he looked up and started, flinching backwards like he’d been faced with a spectre from some laid to rest past, a character from a story he’d thought the final page had closed on. Sagebristle was gone, dead — he had her kits. He’d planned a world, a future, without her and her kind in it.
“Sagebristle!” He blurted out in surprise. His voice was slightly panicked; if there was any cat he was slightly frightened of, any cat he knew would be fearless enough to attack him, it was her — and he didn’t have a bodyguard with him now. For the first time in a long while, by himself in the dark woods, and despite his best attempts to laugh it off and seem as confident, as blasé, as ever, Kier looked uneasy; he glanced behind him, ears slightly flattened. He tried to make his voice welcoming, like he was pleased as anything to find her safe and well, like he was just about to send out a search party — it really is such funny timing that you reappeared before I could! “I hadn’t been expecting to see you again!”
Much had happened since her disappearance, the disappearance that, like Aspenstar’s, he hadn’t refuted rumours that he’d been involved in. Let them wonder; let them fear him. Eris’ miscarriage and the birth of his bastard kits; his sister imprisoned in the dungeons; the Class system, the dissolution and renaming of the Royal Guard; treason trials, executions, a growing feud with the League that was building slowly into something dark and vicious and momentous — all of this had happened since she’d been gone. And now here she stood, like she’d never left. Frustrated fear ached in his chest — would he never be free of the Loyal Guards? Would they always be there to ruin his plans?
The she-cat shifted slightly on her paws, registering with faint surprise how natural the movement felt- how keenly tuned her body was to the possibility of violence. She knew without testing the theory that she could dispatch this tom in one-on-one combat, but she had no memory of training to fight. His posture wasn't hostile, though, and she found herself relaxing slightly.
Then he was speaking, and his words made no sense. Sagebristle? Seeing her again? There wasn't a flicker of recognition in her gaze- no hint of fear or joy or anger. Just confusion. "Do I know you?" She blurted, surveying his form with a growing sense of unease. He seemed to recognize her, but the sight of him stirred up no emotions or memories. Quite suddenly, she was aware of how much was absent from her mind, how vulnerable she felt in that area.
"Sorry if that's rude... I just... I can't remember much of anything," she spoke softly, brow wrinkling with the mental strain of searching a void for something that made sense. This tom spoke in a friendly tone- he must know her, must be a friend of sorts. "I think I was ill, or injured- and then I found myself here."
Understanding, tinged with suspicion, began to dawn on him. His mind raced a mile a minute. “I’m Kier,” he told her experimentally, testing the waters — cautious, careful, tentative. He took a small step forward. “That,” he peered at her, “name doesn’t mean anything to you?” When it provoked no obvious reaction, his eyes lit with excitement and he barely resisted the urge to rush closer; instead, he bowed his head and slowly closed the space between them. When he continued, his voice was so gentle, so sorrowful, so softly sad, like his heart broke for her; he brushed his tail reassuringly along her flank, instantly taking advantage to turn the situation to his side before she could recover, before Moonblight could find her. What a shame, that Kier had found her first.
“Oh, it was terrible,” he told her, head still bowed and voice thick with the grief, the regret, the guilt, of a wound pulled at afresh. “A terrible thing — a tragedy.” He looked up at her, met her gaze, and his eyes were tormented. Pleading for her forgiveness, and knowing he deserved no such thing. “You come from a Clan called NightClan, and you were the most loyal warrior of them all. You had a mate, a mate you loved dearly,” he spoke like he had loved this mate as well, like they had all been such close friends, “and he betrayed you. Betrayed his Clan.” He looked down again, overcome. “You lost your kits, and he didn’t care one bit, and after that…” His eyes found hers, glistening with pained admiration, like her bravery, the suffering she’d faced at the hands of her mate, was such a tragic, noble thing still spoken of in reverence. “Your pain was too great to bear. You fled, and we couldn’t find you. We looked, but eventually we had to give you up as dead. It broke our hearts, Sagebristle.” Kier stared into her eyes, imploring and guilty. “I’m more sorry than I can ever say that we stopped looking. You must know that if we’d had any idea you were still alive…” His voice broke and he bowed his head, eyes squeezing shut. When he spoke again, his voice was fractured, quiet, thick and fragile with guilt, with pain. They’d been the best of friends, and he’d abandoned her. “All I can ask is your forgiveness, much as none of us deserve it.”
Kier had inserted himself into Sagebristle and Moonblight’s lives, the slimy third wheel in their relationship, the villain who popped his head out of the sewer grate when they were on a date and failed, with comic melodrama and with his victims perfectly oblivious to his meddling, crushing the manhole back onto his head as they waltzed over it, at his elaborate schemes. And he wouldn’t stop until one of them had come out on top. He had every intention of it being him — and this had been handed to him on a silver platter. His gaze didn’t waver as he raised his eyes to hold Sagebristle’s, head bowed in guilty, tortured submission. Only she could relieve him of his suffering.
"And I'm... Sagebristle?" She spoke mostly to herself, trying to place the word as her own name. Her eyes were wide, overwhelmed with the presentation of her life story. Those confusing puzzle pieces that she held within her mind started to make sense, forming a half-constructed image. Milk and herbs, pain throughout her form- that must have been her kits. Rage and sorrow- their loss? Her mate's betrayal? The sweeping currents and rough-sided rocks could've been an accident, or an attempt to end her own life.
This tom, Kier, said that she was a warrior. That made sense, accounted for the surety of her fighting pose and the instinctual movements she'd made when hunting. Though she had no way of knowing this, Sagebristle had been touch-starved for most of her life, and her body retained that hunger for affection even now. Kier's tail along her side, and his concerned and kind gaze, undid the last of her reserve and she shifted infinitesimally into his caress.
Everything he was saying made sense with the limited information in her mind, and she found herself half-grieving for kits she didn't remember, fully furious at the one cat who was supposed to protect her. Sagebristle recognized the guilt in his gaze, and instinctively moved to comfort him the way she would've comforted the one tom who'd been this gentle with her before. Her cheek brushed his, her nose pressing to his shoulder. "Of course I forgive you," she said, still trying to process all these new revelations. All she knew now was her friend, the only one who could help her make sense of her remaining pieces, was hurting. "It's all so confusing to me... but I can't imagine how hard this has been on you, when you can still remember it all."
After a moment she retracted, meeting his gaze with a solidified look of trust in her gaze. "I don't... I don't know what to do now. I don't know where to go. I'm so glad I found you- so glad I wasn't wandering around for moons by myself. I want to hear everything soon, but I mostly want to sleep. Is Nightclan- is it still my home? Is... he still around?" The unknown tom drew out a hint of hatred in her voice.
this got so long and im so sorry, let me massage your feet to make up for it babycakes
“You’re Sagebristle,” he agreed softly, brushing his cheek against hers and growing still with their muzzles touching, the thick air between them warm and close. It didn’t repulse him the way it usually did, this physical touch — not when this was Moonblight’s mate.
Well, this was an unexpected turn of events! An utter twist to the story! What a perfect revenge against Moonblight this could be, even if he never found out, even if he were dead out there on his mission — Kier would know. To own Moonblight’s greatest prize, to have her care, have her give herself to the tom he hated more than anything. It was cruel, even he knew that — not to Moonblight, but to Sagebristle. But he wasn’t hurting her; she didn’t despise him now, and, really, let us not pretend she wouldn’t be happier in her obliviousness than she had been under Aspenstar’s reign or under his. This was the finest thing that could have happened to her. A kindness. When Sagebristle nuzzled into him, he didn’t reciprocate, but nor did he pull away, letting her comfort herself against him like a merciful king would let someone warm themselves in his mantle. He stayed silent, and Sagebristle, with her face buried in his shoulder, didn’t see the grin twitching across his face.
“Of course it’s still your home!” he replied, drawing back to look at her, brows drawn together like to think otherwise was unthinkable. “It’s there waiting for you, just as it always has been. But not tonight.” His voice grew gentler. “It’s too much to expect you to go back now, when you’re so tired. The Clan will have so many questions; you’ll be a celebrity. You need your energy to cope with their excitement. Rest first, and tomorrow night we can go back together.” He smiled, like he was asking yes? At her question, the smile stayed on his face as he shook his head, small and final and so sickeningly triumphant. “No,” he assured her. “He’s gone. Come,” he nudged her gently towards a dark bank of ferns, padding along slowly at her side — like he was the only one she could rely on; like he’d never leave her. “Make yourself comfortable, and I’ll be right back.”
With that, he turned — and, as soon as he was out of her sight, broke into a frantic sprint. Oh, this was too perfect — oh, this was too much. Racing back to camp, he skidded to a halt in front of the sentry posted outside, with no thought to decorum as he sent earth flying, and ordered him, with unusual friendliness, to tell Eris he wouldn’t be home till tomorrow and not to wait up for him. Then he’d tell her everything. He had no doubt she’d be thrilled — he hoped, like he hoped every little thing would bring her back a little more, she would be. Everything he did was just a desperate stab in the dark to see if that violence, that evil, would reawaken her. It took everything in him not to go now, not to burst into their den and blurt out so excitedly what he’d found — they’d plan how to corrupt Sagebristle together, plan what he should and shouldn’t do: make Sagebristle a Royal Guard, tell her she helped him to build all of this, that all of this, this cruelty, this oppression, was her idea. And then how could she argue? How could she argue when the Sagebristle she used to be was a villain? Whatever Eris encouraged him to do, he would do; he was a perfect, willing puppet for his mate, equal parts king and awed devotee. She was the director and he the actor; and, at times, lauded actors sharing the limelight. They talked about everything together, about every scrap of gossip, staying up late into the night discussing things that would sound so terrible, so heartless, to the outside world and giggling over it. She was just as much his best friend as she was his mate, and whenever something happened, however big or however small, she was the one he couldn’t wait to get home to so he could tell her about it. Even in her current state, he still shared the world with her. She was the only one he wanted to tell about his day, about his successes and failures. Months after taking power, he had come to realise how crucial it was to have cats from before — cats who knew who he was before. Eris. Laertes. Being able to lie beside Eris, away from prying eyes, with his muzzle buried in her white chest and his eyes closed and her breathing, her warmth, the only thing he could hear, feel — it was what kept him going. If he didn’t have that, he would be unspeakably lonely. No matter what he did out there, in here he was just Kier, annoying Kier she’d met in the tearoom, infatuated Kier who’s bitten his tail-tip off to impress her, Kier who’d been a trainee when she’d been a hunter and who’d thought she held the entire world. He still did. If he didn’t have that, he’d go insane. They knew him. They didn’t treat him any differently. There could never be such a thing as unfaithfulness between Eris and himself because he told her everything, let her encourage or deny him; one day she might start choosing girls for him herself. And this was an opportunity for them like no other. Villains joined in holy matrimony, corrupting unsuspecting innocents like the devil’s own couple.
But, as much as he was buzzing with the childish desperation to tell her everything, to conspire together about how best to exploit the she-cat who had just fallen into their laps, about how best to use Kier to use her, that would have to wait. Turning away, he raced back to Sagebristle, slowing to compose himself and smooth his fur before he rounded the final tree between them. “Now,” he greeted her gently, settling down opposite her in the bed of ferns. Let her come to him if she wanted to; let them be two souls who must have been so close back then, oppressed by the cruelty of Sagebristle’s mate, longing eyes meeting and then looking away under his wrath, seeking a finale now that they'd once been denied — he wouldn’t make any first move. His voice was so quiet, so worried, so soft. Hypnotic. His gentle eyes never left hers, never blinked. “Rest, or talk, or dream — whatever will bring you peace. Don’t worry yourself for a second. You’re safe now. You’re safe.” He smiled, and it was sorrowful. “There’ll be plenty of time to talk into the early hours later. Sleep,” he murmured into the dark, “and I’ll be here when you wake up.”
Sagebristle watched Kier go, grateful for the few minutes she'd have to mull things over in silence. The fern bank was cool and soft, and she nestled her small frame in among the plants, letting out a soft exhale as she waited for Kier's return. It was a relief to avoid the excitement of a return to camp, she had to admit. She was barely recovered from her delirium, and the strenuous journey had drained her more than she cared to admit. Plus... well, she'd had to have given birth a few moons ago, right?
Perhaps it was a blessing to not remember her children, that they were also gone from this world. It made her grief more abstract than tangible, left less of a gouge upon her heart. This morning she'd been a lost and nameless traveler- now she had been named and learned her history, but the sheer weight of the revelations weighed on her shoulders.
Rest first, she reminded herself. There were plenty of days and weeks to come in which she could deal with this. For now, she could lean on Kier, rely on him to fill in the gaps and lead her back into her old life. Her eyelids fluttered softly, her head drifting closer to her paws as she waited. It was with a large effort that she jerked back to awareness when Kier returned, settling down in front of her. Gone was the russet warrior with gritted teeth and loathing in her gaze- this Sagebristle looked at Kier with soft gratitude, and the kind of trust that came from dependency. "Thank you," she mumbled, letting her head drift back to her paws, trying and failing to soothe the shivering from her still-weakened form in the cool spring night air. After a moment, and with a sheepish look that sought and found Kier's permission to do so, she shifted her spot to his side, seeking warmth from her found friend.
The old Sagebristle would've seethed at the ease with which she fell for Kier's constructed narrative, playing right into his paws. But the current Sagebristle was cold and alone and had found solace in an old friend who looked at her so kindly. So she slept, and slept well, through the sunlit hours, awakening when the sun was low on the western horizon. Sagebristle shifted groggily, turning to orient herself and remembering with a start that she had not fallen asleep alone. Her honey-colored eyes scanned the fern bank, looking to see if Kier had kept his promise or if it had all been some fever dream.
Sagebristle slunk over to tuck herself in against him, and he smiled in gentle welcome. That smile didn't leave his face as she turned away and gave into sleep; he kept watching her like that for a long, long time. Slowly, as the night darkened and the shadows engulfed them, it began to look far less like comfort and far more like keepsake. Patient. Boastful. Victorious.
Here was the great Loyal Guard, Aspenstar's little pet soldier, tamed against him. Exhaling into his fur as docile as a kit. What a thing.
Kier hadn't slept, not for any great deal of time — he'd dozed off, once or twice, when his thoughts had tied themselves up so neatly, so serenely, that his head had bobbed slowly down to rest his nose on his forepaws; but for the lion's share of the hours, he was awake. Awake and smiling. It was a feat, what he was planning to accomplish. Indoctrination of kits was simple — try indoctrination of a warrior who'd once smashed his face into the ground. He rubbed his cheek with a soft, idle paw at the thought. But mostly, everything felt remarkably simple — all his thoughts, all the things that really ought to have been terribly complex, were as calm as could be. He felt confident to the point of utter calmness, and it was precisely what he'd needed in the carnage of his reign. Because what could go wrong? Moonblight might come back — let him face an army. Sagebristle might remember who she really was — cast her out, then. Her kits may recognise her — kits were such fanciful creatures. Every problem was as simple as its solution. It was... He could have wept with the joy of it. Instead, he just lay there on his stomach with Sagebristle sleeping against him, his forepaws tucked under his chest and a smile on his face as he gazed out at the lush forest that gave way to grimleens, to twilight, to the insect song of black night. She was remarkably warm, a little bundle of heat — what a thing, to get a slice of what Moonblight had experienced every night. Eventually it became uncomfortably warm, but still he didn't move; lapping up tastes of everything Moonblight had was more important than comfort, if only so, if he ever came back, he would have to live with the knowledge there was nothing sacred that Kier didn't know as well. He felt no attraction to Sagebristle the way he did Eris, but even so he couldn't deny Moonblight was a lucky tom to have a prize like this. He quite liked having it himself.
When she stirred and looked over at him, Kier met her gaze with a smile. He looked visibly tired, but he didn't feel it; he felt electrified. Good morning, my dear, was what immediately popped into his head, but he pushed it out of his mouth. This was a far gentler Kier. "Did you sleep well?" he asked softly. "You twitched a little — I worried you might be having nightmares."
"It was a deep sleep," Sagebristle said groggily, pushing herself to a seated position and blinking the last of the sleep from her eyes. "My body is still recovering, I think. Thank you for staying."
She wasn't entirely caught up on her rest, but she felt far more steady now that she'd slept uninterrupted. Her body and mind were both hungry- one for food, and one for information. Despite her empty stomach, her mind won out. "Tell me about Nightclan as we go back home- I want to know everything I can't remember." Eventually, she knew she would question him about her former mate and the loss of her kits, but for the time being she found herself desperately needing to orient herself to the where and what of her situation.
"Do I have family there? Parents? Friends? You said I was a warrior, right?" Abruptly, she cut herself off, grinning faintly. "Sorry, that's a lot of questions."
Thank you for staying. Kier smiled, soft and genuine, like she needn't have said anything at all. "Of course." I want to know everything I can't remember. He nodded, pert and business-like, rising to his paws beside her and silently thinking.
When he'd first been made deputy, Kier had used all his little birds in all the Clans, and a great amount of his own insomniac brainpower, to piece together an intricate outline of everyone in NightClan — names, relations, backgrounds, secrets they would have been mortified — or terrified — to know he knew. Sagebristle had been no different. And now, at last, he had a chance to use it. What wonderful friends they must have been, if she'd entrusted so much of herself to him, if he knew so much about her. "No family, I'm afraid," he replied as they walked, brushing through tall, overhanging ferns dripping with dew. He walked along close at her side, padding along at her pace through the dark, tall woods; ordinarily, Kier would have made a great show of holding aside ferns with his paw for a she-cat to pass through, watching with an expectant smile for a thank you — but now, he thought it far better to be of equal standing to her, them against the world, brushing through damp undergrowth together, both of their pelts growing damper and damper with clinging droplets. He stopped to shake out his fur, scattering droplets of dew everywhere, and gave Sagebristle a little laugh at the messiness of it. "You were born a loner, beyond NightClan's borders, and your father left you when you were a kit. The medicine cat at the time found you. That was before I came to NightClan — we're both outsiders." He cast her a smile.
Friends? You said I was a warrior, right? Kier's voice became more guiltily evasive. Flustered. He frowned down at the damp, mossy earth, like he was distracted, like he was trying to find some way to break it to her. "A warrior... Yes, yes, a warrior." Like he was softening the blow. "You weren't..." He raised his head to look at her, and his gaze was imploring, like he was begging her not to be upset. He rushed over the words like that would make them hurt less. "You weren't particularly well-liked. That's why we were such friends, before..." He looked down again, licking his lips. "Before your mate. There's something I've neglected to mention — I'm sorry I didn't mention it earlier. It's... It's just it's difficult." His pleading gaze found hers again. "I'm the leader. Of NightClan. And you were... Well, when I — when we —" his ears pressed back anxiously, self-consciously, "took power, we remodelled the Clan. It was for its own benefit — it still is — but there are those who say that what we did was cruel. It was all necessary — we came to power at a time of great upheaval, when trust and loyalty were worthless, easy to buy, and we changed that. We took a Clan decimated by something close to civil war and transformed it into a Clan of strength, of conviction. Through fear — yes, through fear. But it was for their own good. And you." Kier stopped, turning to place his paw on Sagebristle's foreleg, gazing into her eyes devotedly. "You were my greatest adviser. Treason trials, because the alternative was to have your throat slit in your nest. Executions, because the alternative was to have kit-killers living amongst us. Class systems, because cats who had committed such unnameable cruelties had to be punished — had to be put at the bottom so they could work their way back up. And it worked." A tearful grin spread across his face, trembling at the edges; his eyes sparkled, overcome by emotion. "Thanks to you, it worked. Necessary cruelty made us safe. But I just..." His paw drifted down her foreleg and rejoined his other one upon the damp ground. Fearful. Hopeless. He bowed his head. "I wanted you to know what you're going to walk into."
What a way to spin the story, from sadistic tyranny to a noble fight against oppression.
Sagebristle nodded slowly, motioning with her head for them to keep walking. Her mind whirled, and she kept silent for a long time, mulling over all the information Kier had fed her, carefully and cautiously repackaged. Futilely, she wished for a standard to compare this information to- she had no basis from which to work, to know if this sort of civil and violent unrest was normal. It must not be entirely typical, since Kier had presented it so anxiously.
But still... it must be normal for her, right? She had been betrayed, she had ended up among the rocks and water, she had witnessed the violence of hunting even after waking from her delirium. It wasn't much of a shock to connect that to her former way of life. Necessary cruelty was part of nature, part of who she was. Protecting the weak must come at a cost to someone's conscience, right? If no one rose up to meet the oppressors with surpassing strength, then all would be lost. Sagebristle found that she could reconcile that to her questions and objections.
Part of her knew she had to accept it- or else she'd lose the only friend she'd found, the only home she'd had. Starting over with the unknown was worse than entering into a flawed reality. She'd revert to a blank slate, a powerless and rankless wanderer. "I see," she said finally, simply, turning to look at Kier with a faint smile. Pushing her concern down, she nodded. "I understand- what should I expect, when we get back? What are my... responsibilities?"
"Oh, my dear," Kier replied immediately, turning his head to look at her with a concerned, fond frown, like she mustn't push herself too much just yet, "they're whatever you want them to be. There will be the initial excitement, of course. But once that subsides, as all things must, then you'll be free to partake in NightClan life however you wish." He paused briefly, and then added, "by my side or otherwise. You were a fearsome Guard before," he went on with relish, shooting her an awed half-grin like she ought to be proud. "There wasn't a cat who didn't fear you. You could have that again. I understand it must sound a terrible thing, coming at it so fresh — but once you have it, once you have their fear..." He fell silent for a moment, overcome, and looked up at the stars through the canopy. When he continued, his voice was as genuine as it had ever sounded. There were dreams held within it. "It's like nothing else in the world."
Gathering himself again, he went on a little more brusquely. "You loved it just as much as I — you used to say power was everything you'd once been denied, and in that we're the same. The perfect same. The safety of it, the comfort, the rush — it all has to come at someone else's expense, but when that someone is a criminal, where's the room for guilt? After all you've been through, Sagebristle, I think that safety is all you need. A chance to be cared for. To relax. Strictly speaking, a she-cat ought to be in the nursery. But where would we be if we didn't make exceptions for the exceptional among us?" Kier tilted his head towards her, casting another smile at her. "You've been with me since the start, and nothing would," give me greater pleasure, "make me happier than," having you, "you being there again. You can reclaim your Guard duties — light at first, of course. Sit in on some Classes with my deputy Snowblister," he managed to make her name sound breezy, careless, untainted by the bitterness that flooded his mouth when he thought of her, "attend a few meetings — I won't saddle you with guarding the prisons, my dear," he laughed, "that's quite beneath you. And once you're ready again, we can attend a trial together — it's best to get there early, to get a good seat." He said it so cheerily, so easily, and for the first time, it was by accident: he'd forgotten, as he slipped further and further into tyranny and violence, that it wasn't seen by all as a peaceable weekend amusement. "But really," he went on, casting her a warm, friendly smile, "your responsibilities are whatever you say they are. There's nothing like the freedom of the NightClan aristocracy." His smile widened, ever so slightly; his eyes didn't leave hers. "As long as you're near me."
Sagebristle found that she believed his words- she could sense the power returning to her limbs the more she rested, could feel the moons of training and battle in the ease of her motions. It was easy to believe she'd been fearsome and strong, harder to believe that she'd been some kind of power junkie. Still, Kier was her friend- her only one, if she understood correctly. He wouldn't lie to her, right?
It wouldn't hurt to return, to try on the old clothes she'd once worn. If she'd liked it as much as he said, then she would like it again, certainly. Sagebristle didn't doubt that it would take time to re-adjust, but Kier promised she could start light. If she didn't like it, if she found no place for herself there, then she could leave... and find whatever the unknown world outside offered. And for all she knew, the outside world was worse.
"That sounds good to me," Sagebristle said, returning the smile Kier offered her, noting the way her stomach churned at the extended eye contact. Was there something between them... before? The way her body reacted to him made her suspect so, unaware of her love-starved childhood. "I trust you, Kier. We'll start slow, but I'm sure I'll be up and at it in full force again soon. Are we almost home?" Her home, their home... a place she could begin solidifying the shifting pieces of her identity, could begin rebuilding a lost life.
My, well! Kier thought as Sagebristle gave him that acquiescing look, one step away from bedroom eyes. If winning her affections was as easy as all this, there really was no mystery to how Moonblight had made a mate of her — without all that fire to blind everyone, she was so docile, so eager, the little coquette, that she'd fall into bed with anyone who looked at her twice. All Moonblight had to do was be in the right place at the right time and offer her a sparkly ring. It was almost disappointing, as far as getting even went — Moonblight must have known, must have been aware, and so it was hardly a challenge at all to exploit her, to get to him through her. She must have been round with half the toms in NightClan. Half the she-cats, too. Well, that was off the table then — as gratified as he was about her surprising, unexpected attentions towards him, he felt his respect for her plummet. She was just a two-bit unmentionable.
Well, just look at all that was revealed when the protective walls were down; who might have guessed?
He smiled, glancing away from her and down to the ground, and the wide, thin smile was considerably more disinterested. "Yes," he agreed, looking up again to give her that same, plastered smile, and stepped slightly away from her. Such was his misogyny; it was all a she-cat was good for, but the second she showed any sort of talent for it, bar Eris, she was blemished. Of course he'd still use her, he'd still enjoy her; it just wasn't the thrilling conquest it had been a second ago, before she'd burst his fantasies. Are we almost home? "Quite, quite," he replied, looking vaguely ahead through the trees. And they were — after only a few moments more, the stone dome of the entrance tunnel rose from the damp earth. Kier stopped beside it and smiled at Sagebristle; it was a clear 'ladies first', but lady didn't seem quite so applicable anymore. "Mind your step, my dear," he added, voice regaining its cloying, over-exaggerated tenderness. "It'll take your eyes a moment to adjust." Too quiet for her to hear, he added in a breath to the sentry on duty, "get the kits out of the way" and with a nod, the sentry slipped past Sagebristle and disappeared quickly down the slope ahead of them. After a moment, and with another reassuring smile to Sagebristle, Kier followed after her and was swallowed by the slick gloom.
Before even his eyes had had a chance to acclimatise, a quiet whisper had gone up around the cavern; all the cats in camp, down in the dark for hours, could see everything they couldn't. "Sagebristle," they whispered — they, the ones who had been there before, who had been silenced, who had bowed and laid down Aspenstar's banner to pick up Kier's own; the ones who still remembered. "It's Sagebristle." Kier stayed silent, padding with dangerous, attentive slowness behind her, listening. Until he knew how everything would go, he felt tense, wary, quietly hateful, the way he'd always felt around Sagebristle and Moonblight — if anyone could ruin things, it was them. Her kits were tucked away — Kier's eyes flicked quickly around the cavern as they began to slowly adjust, making sure the sentry had done his job and they were nowhere to be seen; they weren't there to recognise her. He hardly dared breathe, padding slightly hunched, waiting for the moment that would either make or ruin him. She would remember or she wouldn't. It was good that the Clan was here to greet her, to reinforce the fact that she was remembered, that she was from here, that she did belong. But it also brushed dangerously close to that fine, sensitive line. It might reawaken something; it might plunge her deeper into this false story. He didn't know. He couldn't know. And he hated not knowing. He hated not wielding all the puppet strings. He hated leaving it up to other people — other, stupider outside forces. Incompetents, while he was brilliant. Oh, he just wanted to be able to control everything.
He also bitterly resented the turncoats who were the ones whispering her name; he knew they would revert to happier times in a heartbeat if he weakened and he hated the distrust of them with silent, seething, murderous anger. They were a convenient pawn now, and having to let them whisper her name, having to let them remember prior times, made his stomach prickle with the weak, furious feeling of it. He was purposefully allowing treason for his own interests — and the second they were done helping along his story with Sagebristle, he would turn around and put them on the traitor's podium. The mere thought of future recompense was a comfort; the feeling in his gut, anger and jealousy, loosened slightly. He forced himself to let out a quiet breath; it shook slightly with burning hate he had to allow. As he padded along behind Sagebristle with slow, creeping steps, his narrow, seething eyes that roamed about above her head, his silence, was a clear warning — he was still here; put on a show, but don't push it. It will be remembered.
Sagebristle sensed that something was off. That much was clear; but without the context that she should've had, she couldn't figure out what had gone wrong or how to fix it. It didn't seem the right time to do so anyway, with the Nightclan camp entrance fast approaching. So she turned her attention forward, letting herself take in the sights and scents and emotions that permeated the camp.
The gazes, and the murmurs, served a two-fold purpose. They confirmed Kier's story, that she was named Sagebristle, that she was a respected and revered she-cat. They placed her here, among these cats, solidifying that she belonged. They also cemented her trust in Kier, since the things he'd told her were now obviously true. If he'd been beside her, she would've shifted closer to him, but as it was she kept her eyes forward. If she were to stay, she'd have to take on the role he told her that she played. Fearsome, collected, cool. A high ranking guard of her leader. Nothing new sprang up in her memory- some faces looked vaguely familiar, like ones she'd seen in dreams, but they stirred no emotions of disgust or admiration or love.
Her steady and smooth pace didn't falter until they reached the den that they were headed to. Once she was safely out of sight of the masses, Sagebristle sagged slightly, turning to look at Kier. "I don't remember them- not really, anyway... but they looked familiar, at least. Are they really as bad as you said?" The air in camp had been tinged with misery, and she wasn't sure how she felt about it yet. So she reverted back to relying on Kier, the tom who had found her and enlightened her and brought her back to safety. She watched him with wide eyes, wondering if he'd come closer- and wondering if that was what she wanted him to do.
As soon as a minute passed, two, and Sagebristle seemed none the wiser, Kier let out a breath and almost physically sagged with relief. He trotted along behind her, bright and perky, and the leader’s cheerfulness was enough to keep the rest of the Clan fearfully silent. He slipped in after her, nodding faintly to the guard who’d offered Sagebristle a beacon of direction amid the chaos and ushered her very nobly towards the den that had been set aside in advance — and, as soon as she looked uncertain, softened his expression from gloating exuberance to anxious sympathy. “It’ll come back,” he assured her gently, lingering in the doorway. Are they really as bad as you said? “Well, that’s the wonderful thing about the reforms we made — every day it gets easier. The worst offenders, the most terrible dangers to the Clan — they can’t hurt them anymore. And for the ones left it’s just a matter of sympathetic education. They’re not bad, they’ve never been bad — they were just misguided. They had a tyrant guiding their paws, and they became lost. It’s a tricky thing to unlearn that, especially when you’re young. Deeply painful, more often than not. What healing isn’t? But they’re getting better. Every day they’re getting better. And soon, the punishments won’t be necessary at all.” He smiled. “The horse, the carrot, the whip — one day the whip will be nothing more than a thing of the past. A little sternness now so there can be a world of kindness in the future.”
He padded closer and, faltering slightly, with feigned, awkward shyness that came off as more endearing than anything, as if all his leaderly confidence had suddenly fallen short now that they were alone, touched his nose to her cheek. If they’d been in another world, he’d have played the gentleman and taken her coat, slipped it from her arms from behind with touches that lingered just a little too long, with breaths that washed close over the back of her neck. Kier stayed for a moment, brushing his muzzle down to tickle the soft fur at the base of her ear, and then suddenly seemed to remember himself and fumbled backwards. “You did well,” he told her quietly, shyly, drawing back to look at her with earnest, worried admiration. The insides of his ears, usually a dusky grey in the gloom and riddled with red veins when backlit, had dusted themselves pink. “It’ll—it’ll get better. Easier. You— I mean, for you, it’ll get easier. It’ll come back.” He laughed, embarrassed and sheepish, his ears pinning back slightly. “Did I say that already?”
Really, this was a chore, he hated this; all he could think was how desperately he wanted to go to Eris and tell her everything — it was torture, being within shouting distance, just a few dens over, and having to instead be in here with Sagebristle. Back when she was… well, back when she was really Sagebristle, he’d enjoyed her presence tremendously — truthfully, he’d always thought that if they had met at any other time, under any under circumstances, they’d have been great friends. A wonderful platonic pair. He didn’t resent her hostility the same way he resented Moonblight’s — he admired it, found her fiery one-liners genuinely funny, respected her strength, stubbornness, animosity, even when it had been directed at him, even when it had been interfering with his plans. He’d liked her, even when he’d been holding her captive — and, in a strange way, he’d always thought she liked him, just in that they were equals of intelligence, of passion. Their talks in his den during her captivity, when she’d still been trying to hide her pregnancy from him — they’d been stimulating! The insults, the back-and-forth, the mutual respect for, if not each other, then at least for their capabilities; he’d truly liked her. Really, truly liked her. He’d have killed her, but he liked her. And she, he thought, him. Now, though, she was just a shell of that fire. And it was good — it was convenient — it was helpful. But he did miss it. If this were that Sagebristle giving him these looks, he’d be beside himself with eagerness.
Ah, well. This one was certainly nicer. And it made a curious part of him wonder if, in among all the hatred, she’d ever felt something for him back then. Clearly she hadn’t, but it was an enticing little fantasy.
The sentiments Kier was expressing made sense. Reform, lessening of punishments, remolding a group of misguided cats... it suddenly clicked, seemed noble and good in her mind. Already it was getting better, he said, and she could sign onto his vision of the future without an issue. "I see," she breathed, nodding eagerly. "We really are helping them. That's good- I want to help." Maybe in helping the others, she would find more of herself. It was a motivating notion, but her train of thought was derailed by Kier's sudden nearness, the brush of his nose against her cheek.
Her stomach churned again, the heat of his touch sending flames along her spine. There were images that flashed through her brain at the soft gesture- warm darkness, a body curled beside hers, a gentle caress. She leaned into it, trying to fit the pieces together, to find in Kier someone she could give herself over to. Sagebristle was there, on the precipice, as his muzzle brushed by her ear, and her eyes fluttered close before-
His eyes are the wrong color.
The thought sprang unbidden to her mind, and the flames were extinguished. Confusion swarmed her mind- what was wrong with his eyes? Was she that shallow, that she had some type she had to stick to? Before she could puzzle it out, Kier was pulling back, and Sagebristle listened to his praise with a faintly dazed edge to her vision. "Yes, you did say that," she said with a strained laugh, retreating a few steps under the guise of examining the den. "I'm sure it'll be easy again before we can blink. Is this my den?" She asked, turning her gaze back to Kier. The smile remained on her face, but there was an almost imperceptible layer of guardedness around her, springing from her new confusion.
When she drew back, retreating and clearly unwilling, Kier's eyes widened in worry; internally, frustration bloomed in his chest, tinged with concern — not for her, but for his lie. She had been so eager a second to go; if snippets of memory began to re-emerge, he had to know what they looked like, what form they took. He couldn't know everything, but he had to know enough, so he could deflect. Already he had started to craft an idea in his mind of what their story had been; he just had to stick to it, and then, hopefully, every memory would find its place in that tale. Any happy time, every warm, intimate moment — they could all be accounted for. There were always the gentle times before any betrayal. They weren't an obstacle to the imagined truth of his story; they were proof. He just had to spin it like that. "What's wrong?" he asked so softly, so worriedly, taking a small step forward like he was trying to understand. And then his gaze grew grieving, lost in the shared trauma of the past. His voice gave way to a mournful whisper, his eyes swimming with tormented sorrow. "Are you thinking of him?"
Immediately, Kier swung around, like he was over-burdened by guilt, and padded a few paces away, his back to Sagebristle. He shook his head. He didn't answer her question. "I'm sorry, it's too soon — I knew it was too soon. I was just so happy to see you, so relieved. But he... He's never going to leave us alone, not even now." He turned back to her, and there was pain in his eyes. "I loved him too, Sage — we both did. So much. And he betrayed us. He took so much from us and now," his voice broke; he looked away, tearful and overwhelmed, his voice thick with stifled sobs, "he still won't stop. He's still taking." He sat down heavily, crumpled, and brushed the back of his paw across his face, like he was trying to hide his trembling grief from her. "I'm sorry — I'll leave you. This isn't fair to you, you've just come back and I'm completely," he wiped his eyes again, "completely monopolising what's supposed to be a nice—a nice homecoming. I'm sorry, Sage." He stood and made for the den entrance, still not looking at her.
"Kier, wait, please," Sagebristle implored, stepping after him. "Please don't leave. You're not monopolizing anything, I just... I don't know what I was thinking of. I can't even picture anything about... him. My former mate, right? I don't- I don't even know his name, or what he looked like. I was just caught up in my thoughts."
It was true, wasn't it? She hadn't even thought of a specific eye color, just noticed that Kier's wasn't the one she was used to. That didn't mean she had to jerk away from him like she had. Guilt flooded her own gaze, settling heavy on her bones. Was she so loyal to a half-memory of a traitor that she couldn't enjoy the moment with Kier? "You've been nothing but generous and kind to me," she said, her voice quieter and more apologetic. "Please don't go now- not when I need you."
Sagebristle let out a soft breathe, steadying her roiling emotions. "Tell me what happened," she said after a moment. "What his name was, what he did to betray me, betray us. Let me know the worst of it, so I can set it all aside and make sure it doesn't keep taking from us now that he's gone. And please... please don't feel like any of this is your fault."
Kier stopped, still facing away from her, and he couldn’t help but smile, his tail-tip twitching slightly as he listened to her. You’ve been nothing but generous and kind to me. It was true! He hadn’t! Even when she had truly been Sagebristle, he could’ve killed her — he could’ve done far worse. That was generous, that was kind. The smile grew into a faint grin, his heart feeling like an expanding balloon at the blind, unknowing praise of him. Not when I need you. He shivered involuntarily. Oh — oh, god, he wished, he wished more than anything, that Moonblight could be here right now, that he could be bound up in the corner, eyes pried open and mouth gagged, made to watch, to listen, to all the things his mate would happily let Kier do to her. When she asked about what had happened, at first he was slightly irritated — my, but she did ask a lot of questions; he supposed he ought to have been glad these were such asinine ones instead of the stinging rebukes she used to fire off; Sagebristle without all that made her Sagebristle really was such a soft, needy thing; he wondered if she begged like this for Moonblight or if Kier were just particularly lucky to hear her keen and whine — but it faded to excitement, to the ready determination to drag out his old acting flair and make a real story of it. All of it on the spot, too. No time like the present!
Finally, taking a second to hold his breath and conjure up some tears, he turned back to her. Slowly. Mournfully. Head bowed, eyes downcast. After a moment more, he glanced up at her, just his eyes, like he were unwilling, like he were pleading with her not to make him relive it. But, finally, he dropped his gaze again and, letting out a quiet breath, padded weakly around, all bony shoulders and low-bowed head, such a broken thing, to lie in the nest that had been prepared for Sagebristle. Soft enough for royalty. He purposefully left enough room for her to join him, though of course this good, noble Kier wasn’t thinking of such things.
“Moonblight,” he began, and his voice was so quiet, so vulnerable, so unwilling. He looked down and fiddled with the moss with his paw. “His name was Moonblight.” His name tasted like sweet, fizzing poison on his tongue, and he hoped — oh, he hoped — that wherever Moonblight was right now, he could feel him talking about him, could feel the lie dripping, could feel Kier and his mate together. He hoped it burned like foul jealousy in his chest; he hoped it was like fire, hoped it left him dull and hollowed out and aching, hoped it left him given up in a ditch. Poor Moonblight, unloved, alone, no home, no kits, with his mate warming the underbelly of his tyrant. He looked up at Sagebristle with a smile, so sad, so brave, so small. His eyes were damp, screened by mist. Haunted. What did Moonblight do? What could leave such horror in its wake? Kier’s brain began to lay out a script behind his eyes, like a news anchor’s teleprompter. There was a whole world for him to play with, no rules but the need to keep it vague enough for Sagebristle’s memory to fill in the blanks. What a remarkable opportunity.
“When you first met him, you were both kits.” He knew all this; he’d done his homework. He could almost see it all as he said it, could manufacture Larkspur and Phantomfox in his mind from the few glimpses he’d caught of them. “You didn’t get along at all. Everyone thought he would grow out of it — he was just a kit; he was harmless, he was good — but he always had a certain…” He thought around for the word, dropping his gaze and pawing at the moss again, like he was insecure, like he was so gently self-conscious. Like he was guilty to even be saying these things about someone who’d once been his friend. More than a friend. Or like he was guilty about still feeling sympathy, still feeling love, for someone he should have hated for a villain. Such were the messes of hearts: even after all this time, he was still making excuses for him… Oh, he was really feeling this character! Method acting at its finest; he’d almost forgotten it wasn’t real. Maybe for some true method acting he’d have to have a little… ménage with the two, you know, just to really get into character. “A certain… Well, the adults called it darkness. He used to like… hurting. And when you both became apprentices, you were paired together. Aspenstar, the leader at the time — she saw something in you both, something she could turn into soldiers, and she…” His voice broke slightly and he bowed his head closer to his chest, clearing his throat. “Well, Moonblight didn’t mind. It was all he’d ever wanted, to be given free rein. And he was certainly given that. You were so young, but you went along, because Moonblight was your friend — maybe he was more than that to you by then, I don’t know. I came to NightClan around this time and you were…” He smiled, but it was the memory of a smile. “Spectacular. Everyone loved you. And eventually, he became more forceful. Jealous. Because even with all he had, he didn’t have that love. You’d grown up, you’d become beautiful.” The insides of his ears washed slightly pink, like he was embarrassed to have admitted it, but the hollow sadness of him didn’t change. “He wanted you for himself, this great soldier of the leader’s, and so all your friends, all your personal ambitions, all your freedom… Me…” For a long time he was silent, overcome by the memory of losing her. Lost in it.
Finally, he looked up, leaned forward, locked eyes with her — implored her to understand. His voice was thick and shaky with grief. “I saw the change in you. I saw what he did to you. I saw the bruises when you did something he didn’t like, even though you tried to hide them from me — from me. You were so afraid. He didn’t want to love you; he wanted to own you. And when you fell pregnant, when the kits were born —“ His voice became hushed with terror, eyes so miserable, so desperate, “I was so afraid he was going to hurt them, too. But Aspenstar fled after all her crimes, after all her tyranny, all her butchery, and I became leader — and he went with her. Like a loyal dog. Like a soldier. All this fear, all this abuse, all the debris — he just left it behind because his mistress beckoned. Like he hadn’t destroyed whatever good there used to be here.” His voice was raw with trauma, with grief. He’d supplemented much of this Moonblight’s character with Phantomfox’s, with what he’d heard he’d done to Rosethorn, but Sagebristle wasn’t to know. Kier looked down again. “I loved you both. I think… you…” He glanced up, uncertain, like he was shy, like he was testing the waters of her feelings. Then, ears reddening, he looked back down. He shook his head. “But what he became… It was like neither of us had ever meant anything to him at all.” His nose sniffled; he wiped it with the back of his paw and looked away, looking so small, so lonely, so sad.
Well. That was all rather good, wasn’t it? He had to bite back a glowing smile, had to stop his tail-tip from twitching with delight in time with the warm ball in his chest. He’d been careful to add in enough truth — nothing whatsoever in there was false; it just hadn’t happened to these particular players — that it could safely blur the lines. And bits about himself, like the fact he hadn’t been Clan-born — everything added up. Yes. Nicely done, he thought; very fine. Some of his best work.
