Posts by brindlemist

Her loneliness was, ultimately, a choice. Brindlepaw was a hawk among sparrows, how was she expected to play nice with the lot of them? It wasn't as if she hadn't been on the look out for those like her, but Brindlepaw was pedantic and, if Brindlepaw was going to see someone as an equal, would need to see the other as exacting and diligent as herself. None were as alive as Brindlepaw, because none were like her. They were playthings and they were nuisances, mossballs to be smacked around until they broke or mosquitoes to be swatted away with the flick of an ear.

Brindlepaw's thoughts had consumed her, caught in a bought of introspection. It's Foxflame's voice that drags her from her mind. Loud, boisterous. He takes up space in the world and is unapologetic in it, that much Brindlepaw can appreciate. She'd never had the desire to pry her way into his head, having dismissed him when she had decided Stagheart to be a confusing thing, but Foxflame offers to spend time with her, and quite suddenly Brindlepaw is swept into the need to know. Is it simply that he doesn't understand her nature? Is it that he does understand, but is desperate enough to disregard? Or maybe he recognizes her loneliness, assumes that anyone could fill it?

"Do I have tangles?" She stretches, steps closer to Foxflame. Sharing tongues demanded a certain amount of closeness, and so Brindlepaw stood close enough that the whiskers of her left cheek curved in the middle, the tips against Foxflame's shoulder. Her previous question had been rhetorical, and while there were countless other questions Brindlepaw wanted to ask, she understood that prying too early on tended to cause the other to close up. Funny in certain situations but ultimately a frustrating block.

She didn't intend to pad out the conversation with meaningless small talk, however. Just because she had a prize in mind didn't mean she couldn't dig out whatever useful information she could along the way. It was typical to chatter while sharing tongues, and Brindlepaw decided she would bring up what was on her mind before Foxflame had interrupted her, "My warrior trails are soon. I was born under a waxing claw-shaped moon, and the twelfth since my birth has passed."

Brindlepaw isn't nervous about such things, isn't seeking comfort. No, she brings it up simply for context, for what she brings up next, "I was wondering... your warrior name, how does one know... what to expect?"

ThunderClanners indeed.

Brindlepaw has a careful way of walking as she travels along the thunderpath, each foot set down gently, the roll of her shoulders visible beneath her skin. Her curled ears perk at the voices on the other side, the only motion on her otherwise still face. Her body pauses midstride, one paw left just above the ground, her head turned just enough that the ThunderClanners were visible in her peripheral vision. The temptation to continue on walking is there, but curiosity wins out. She turns her head, sharp blue eyes focusing on the others across the border.

Curled ears? Brindlepaw's own twitch with interest.

"His warning is apt," Brindlepaw calls, and while her voice is raised so she may be heard from further away, Brindlepaw remains monotone, "I've seen someone die here. Others injured." There is a phantom feeling that coils in her gut, an echo of the fear, the excitement, she had felt witnessing such a thing.

Brindlepaw hums her appreciation at being groomed, closes her eyes. It would have been easy to sink back into her head, to be lulled into semi-sleep by the soothing feeling of being groomed, to block out Foxflame's answer, but Brindlepaw resists. When Foxflame mentions his own name, one of her blue eyes crack open. Curious. When Brindlepaw imagines Foxflame's name, she sees a burn that starts in and spreads outward. Soothing and warm up until it is all too much, and then it is a hungry, consuming thing. Is there any truth to that? Is it that Brindlepaw thinks in extremes? Knows herself and, on some level, expects others to be like her on the fundamental levels?

Foxflame is not quiet, nor is he stoic. His emotions practically spill from him with every word, all happy happy happy. Brindlepaw fears she may have caught some just by association, the jittery nervousness that settles in her gut, an excitement for her name that is so like apprentices her age that Brindlepaw is almost disappointed with herself. But there is still the possibility that Foxflame may surprise her yet, that he puts up as much as a front as Brindlepaw, only in a different way. (is it that brindlepaw is lonely enough to project? she shouldn't get her hopes up about anyone, unless she is given a good reason, and a name is not a good reason. she shouldn't, and yet-)

He asks what she thinks her name will be, and Brindlepaw doesn't think before answering, "Brindlefur," It's pragmatic, given the name she has now. Simple. Describes her adequately. If it were to be her name, Brindlepaw would not be forced to explain why it was her name because the answer would be apparent. It was also rather impersonal, the name Brindlepaw would give herself, would give someone else, instead of the sort of name that one would give her. Thinking about it in that way complicated things, if only slightly. "If you were to name me, what would it be?"

Brindlepaw acknowledges Stagheart with a small nod of her head, and she thinks his name suits him. His question is one expected, but Brindlepaw finds she appreciates the small change to it. It isn't are you nervous or are you excited, both emotions that Brindlepaw was likely to never admit having, even if she was, but are you confident, moreso a state of mind than a feeling. The smile that curls on her face is small and short lived, "I will pass. In the first I will be exemplary, and in the other two my performance will be sufficient." She knows her skill, where she can still improve. Hunting was not her strongest skill, but she could still do so.

With the arrival of Loonpaw, Brindlepaw opens her other eye to better take in his appearance. Was it the talk of names that had drawn him in, or the act of sharing tongues? Or maybe he was just drawn to any conversation? "You look pathetic like that. Like someone tried to drown you, then decided it wasn't worth the effort," Her voice never wavers from it's monotone, never sharpens into a deliberate insult. Instead it is spoken as if she was being as factual as she had been before. Brindlepaw tips her head back, gestures for Loonpaw to come closer, "We are sharing tongues. You need to join us."

Oh, oh.

Brindlepaw is enchanted, watching him. If anyone is going to be like her, it's him, and the face covering allows her mind room to play. (why cover, unless he was hiding something? is it grisly? a scar, furless skin? a burn, a cut?) The strides Brindlepaw takes to Z's side are long, elegant. Only when she comes to his flank does she slow down, her strides easily transitioning into dainty steps. "It's a nice catch," Brindlepaw says in lieu of a greeting, her monotone voice not reflecting the compliment. The catch isn't really much of anything, Brindlepaw shoots a subtle glance to the freshkill to confirm what it even was. It wouldn't have mattered if it was a bird or a frog to Brindlepaw, that wasn't the point.

"You didn't kill it with a bite," She notes. Stating the obvious seemed to be the foundation of conversation, as much as Brindlepaw hated it. She's eager to get to the question, "Is that because of this?" She leans forward as if to touch his face covering with her nose, stops short. The temptation to try and remove it somehow is powerful. She wants it. Wants it for herself, wants to know what's beneath.

He just doesn't use his teeth, does he? Brindlepaw has to doubt that. Is it that he just doesn't want her poking about his mask, (trying to turn her attention away from it? how could she when she loves it?) and while Brindlepaw very well could respect that, she doesn't. "I don't believe you," She replies simply, honestly. Would he scramble, try and convince Brindlepaw? Drop the subject? An immature part of Brindlepaw wants to snag the cloth in her teeth and yank it off, run with it. She'd need to see what was beneath, before she ran, but Brindlepaw is certain she would need to run.

Z stepping away from her is... disappointing. Brindlepaw wants to take a stride his way, close that gap again, just to see if he would get angry. Leave, run, give up? Would he lash out? But no, no, Brindlepaw shows restraint, lets the space between them remain. "No matter the reason, I like that you use your claws. You can't watch if you use your teeth," A detail Brindlepaw hadn't realized until she says it out loud. If it were up to Brindlepaw, she would make some major changes to mouth and eye placement, but Z just unknowingly offered an obvious solution to Brindlepaw's trouble. Claws, claws, why hadn't Brindlepaw thought of claws?

She steps marginally closer, only to startle away when she notices Stagheart. How much had he heard? How long was he here? Why was he asking-? Oh right, the lizard. "You aren't on a hunting patrol, if you so desire you could eat it."

Sparring was something Brindlepaw both immensely enjoyed and hated all at once. There was a certain freedom that came with sparring, the one time Brindlepaw felt she could let go of her carefully maintained facade and just be. She could snarl and hiss and let her face twist into whatever emotion it wished to, and yet, that lack of restraint made the necessary restraint that came with sparring all the more prominent. Brindlepaw couldn't dig her claws in, couldn't bite, couldn't do what her every instinct sang for her to do.

Even so, it was good practice, and any opportunity to relinquish some of that restraint was an opportunity worth taking. Her careful steps carry her to a stop besides the steadily growing crowd. "I've got next," She intones, face impassive. Until she was within the spar, Brindlepaw was locked in her previous habits. A passionless exterior, words devoid of all but the sounds needed to form them.

Brindlepaw would have to disagree that time flies. Waiting has been, insofar, just short of torturous. She could wait for as long as she needed, but that didn't mean that she had to enjoy the wait. Now that she was on the precipitous of warriorhood, the time only seemed to drag longer. Brindlepaw doubted that her clanmates rooting for her would have any affect on her trials, but the sentiment was appreciated. "You'll be sharing a den with me once again," Brindlepaw isn't sure if that's an observation or a warning. She watches Stagheart carefully, curious to his reaction at the reminder.

Her attention is drug away by Foxflame's unrelenting optimism. Didn't it ever become tiresome? Was it even genuine? "If you were leader we would all have at least four names," Brindlepaw decides dryly, "You would never be able to settle on one," Still, it takes a fair amount of creativity to come up with so many names so quickly. Once more, Brindlepaw found herself wondering how genuine Foxflame was. Did he truly like the name Brindlefur, or was he patronizing her in some way? Trying to get on her good side? "Why did you ask me to share tongues?" Aren't you tired?

Crowsleep, Brindlepaw considers with narrow blue eyes. They are similar in their shared lack of intonation, and Brindlepaw suspects those similarities run deeper, "Do you doubt that I know my limitations?" From anyone else, the words would have likely sounded hostile. Brindlepaw just wants to know what Crowsleep thinks of her. Nothing would be her down fall. She understood she wasn't perfect yet, but she had ample time to get there. Brindlepaw was unkillable, a belief she would hold until proven otherwise.

Brindlepaw hates and she hates hates hates him. Wolfshine looks different, limp like this. Not at all what she would have imagined. She hates and she hates and a small, young part of her wants to prod his side, demand he stand again. Tell him he's fooled everyone, tell him it isn't funny anymore, tell him it was never funny. Brindlepaw didn't like him but, but Wolfshine had always been there, and as little as Brindlepaw enjoyed Wolfshine, she at least enjoyed trying to curl up inside his head. Now? Now Brindlepaw is forced to approach his body with trepidation unbecoming of her. Small, hesitant steps, the way her ears pivot uncertainly.

"He's not in StarClan," Brindlepaw says, her eyes flicking from Crowsleep to the corpse, "I know something you don't about him," What was the point of all of that hoarded away information now? No use keeping it a secret anymore. No use anymore. "Him and that medicine cat apprentice before you, they were closer than they should have been. Anyone with eyes could have seen it, but no one seems to pay attention to anything around here," Well, Brindlepaw didn't know for sure, but she knew enough to have suspicions, and that was really all she needed. She'd been saving this bit of information for a day she may need to get back at Wolfshine, push him into a corner, but now? He was dead. Gone. Brindlepaw needed to drag his name through the mud, make up for the lost chance.

Comfort? Comfort? "I do not need comfort," Brindlepaw replies and, for the first time, hates her voice. The careful monotone had always been a marker of her, the lack of inflection present since she's been stringing words together, but now, her voice sounds petulant, small. The typical lacking of her voice makes the change all the more pronounced, and Brindlepaw looks away, ashamed. Weak weak weak, she is weak, and her skin flushes beneath her fur, and she hates Wolfshine, hates his stupid dead face and his stupid slack body and his stupid, stupid leg.

Right, the leg.

Brindlepaw had wanted it, didn't she?

Oliveslip speaks in Wolfshine's defense, and it's all so typical, isn't it? "He's not in StarClan," Brindlepaw repeats, her voice back to crystalline clarity. Smooth, perfect, because Brindlepaw is perfect and if she isn't so she's nothing, "I forbid it. This sort of thing is my choice, and Wolfshine wont be there because he broke a rule and he needs to be punished, and even if his thing with Gingerpaw is okay with StarClan, it isn't okay with me, and that's my choice," Wolfshine has a way of dragging her eyes back in. He looks terrible, always has, but now he looks even worse, "He wasn't supposed to die, not yet," Because Brindlepaw had wanted to kill him, and because the leg was supposed to be a trophy, but now if Brindlepaw took it, what would it be a trophy of? The time Crowsleep dragged Wolfshine back to camp and Brindlepaw had the misfortune of seeing him?

It occurs to Brindlepaw then that Wolfshine didn't just die. He had to have been killed. Wounds, and Brindlepaw is sick. From herself, from Wolfshine, "Question his mother," And she doesn't know how she feels about any of this beyond bad. Because his mother hadn't been forthcoming about the nature of Wolfshine's head injury moons ago, because Brindlepaw collects tidbits about Wolfshine like a bird does twigs. Because she could be wrong about her little theory, but the thought wont leave her now that it's here, "Or don't, I don't care. He's ugly and I don't care. I hate him," Those were contradictory, weren't they?

She's overexposed and Wolfshine is dead, and Brindlepaw feels the ground has fallen out from beneath her feet. She'd land eventually, but until then? "I'm leaving. Expect me back at sundown," Brindlepaw shoulders past Oliveslip, past Duskeye, past Crowsleep, steps on Wolfshine as she passes over him, then as soon as she is out of camp, runs.

Brindlemist has got her mother's face, or at least a close enough approximation. She stares at her reflection, murky and wavering in the surface of a puddle. The same narrow eyes, although her own are blue. A notch where her nose meets her face, a round head. Had Brindlemist had shorter fur, the soft definition of her cheekbones would also likely mirror her mother's, and yet they are irrevocably different. No one has to wonder what Tansystar (-ha! brindlemist resolves to kill her, if she must,) is feeling because every emotion is broadcast clearly. Brindlemist doesn't, every expression either purposeful or fleeting.

While watching her reflection, Brindlemist shifts her stance, squares her shoulders, lowers her chin. Her curled ears fold back, her nostrils flare, and it's a familiar sight. She's seen Tansystar angry enough to know it well, but seeing the expression on her own face creates a dissonance somewhere in her chest. It's unnerving, wrong, like seeing a summerbird in the snow. Brindlemist drops the expression, falls into something hunched and nervous. Flicking ears, whiskers pressed to her cheeks. A stance that wont settle into one position, and it looks wrong on her, but this is becoming a fun game to play.

Her attention drifts from the reflection, to the camp around her. To the clanmates about it, some of which who would have surely taken notice to Brindlemist making faces at a puddle, "I'm working on something," She says as way of explanation, then, an idea. Brindlemist makes a sound like she's hacking on a hairball stuck in her throat, then speaks, "Don't you know it's rude to stare? Come, sit sit sit if you are so interested in what I'm doing," Tansystar's voice is a little higher than her own, more nasally, but Brindlemist feels she's done it well.

She's tired.

Brindlemist's walk has taken her from camp. Above her, the sun is at it's highest, and her shadow pools at her feet. As she walks, she absentmindedly bats a stone which skitters ahead of her a few tail-lengths at a time. Brindlemist lets it guide her more than her mind does, too contemplative to focus on where she is going. The trouble is, Wolfshine has died before she was done with him. The trouble is, she thought warrior-hood would be more than what it is. The trouble is, the trouble is, Brindlemist has made a significant step in her plan and it doesn't feel like she's accomplished anything at all.

Overcome with a sudden frustration, Brindlemist strikes the stone with much more force than she had previously, and then watches as it bounces into thick brush, out of sight. The stone was stupid, the game was stupid. She hates it for wasting her time like that. Brindlemist stares at the spot where the stone had vanished for a few moments then, shaking herself like a dog dispelling water, trudges onward. She pushes her way through tall grasses, once through finds herself at the burnt sycamore. When she dies, Brindlemist hopes her corpse is as timeless as this one.

There is a prickle on the back of her neck, settling somewhere between her shoulders. Eyes on her. She doesn't allow herself to react, to do the typical of looking nervously over her back, calling out hello? Instead, she takes a few steps closer to the burnt sycamore, her plumy tail trailing behind her. Brindlemist stops two foxlengths away from the trunk. If this was an attacker, she would have ample room to defend herself while still being close enough to the tree that, if need be, she could make her escape. "I know someone is there," Her monotone voice is raised so that, even without turning her head, she may still be heard, "The question is who."

STAGHEART

"It should be apparent," Brindlemist replies to Winterpaw. She doesn't know him well and, at his question, assumes him to be stupid. Still, she could take pity on him, "When I first started my apprenticeship, I would pretend to be... different. At gatherings." Not monotone, not severe. Bubbly, open, a bit dull. It was fun, "I had earned the skill of-" She imagines Winterpaw, draws in her mind what little she knows of him, repeats the snippet of his words over and over, "-doing-" that's not it, "-voices," Closer, but not- "I fear I need to practice with..."

She trails off, coughs, then squares her shoulders, determined. A breath, two. Before she speaks, the muscles along her neck visibly tense and relax, "I just need- there it is." When she laughs, it's in her own voice. "tell me, do i make a convincing you?" Towards the end of her sentence, her voice wavers, brittle. She's had the same trouble when imitating Firedawn. Brindlemist lets out another dry cough, rubs a paw absently to her throat, "I don't know anything you to say."

It comes as a surprise. It shouldn't, but it does. She'd been sharpening her claws against the trunk of a tree when Wolfshine apparated before her. Brindlemist pauses, allows herself to drop down on all fours as she watches Wolfshine. He calls her by her apprentice name, something she had done to him before, when his memory was scattered, when she's been trying to see just how bad his memory was. He's upset with her then. Here to- what? Gloat? Wolfshine had never been outright rude to her before, even when telling her to back off. What brought this out? Was it that, now dead, he felt himself untouchable and secretly he had always wanted to speak out against her? Was there a strange side effect of death that put this urge in him?

(he's already died once, can he do so once more?)

Brindlemist does not waste her time on denials. Does not rational away with, I'm seeing things or this is only a dream. She isn't seeing things, she is seeing Wolfshine, and the grass isn't nearly sharp enough for this to be a dream. "How death has changed you, my friend," Brindlemist takes a step closer, her monotone voice clear as a bell, "I must wonder what deigned you to come visit me when there are much fatter mice to catch elsewhere. I was a bully, but I was not the one to kill you." Unfortunate, but more and more Brindlemist thinks that can be rectified. Another step closer, she just needs to get close enough, "But you and I both know that."