Aug 11, 2019 16:19:03 GMT -5
HERONFEATHER
jungleclan ∙ warrior ∙ female ∙ 87
Appearance
Description Sentence
An elegant black-and-white she-cat with green eyes.
Appearance
There is something about Heronfeather that screams serpentine -- something reflected in her sinuous movements, her elegant posture, her cool and calculating eyes that make the wise remember not to underestimate her. To underestimate Heronfeather is to walk blindly into a den of vipers that could have easily been avoided had you not been lulled in by the sweet words and beautiful architecture. Heronfeather is objectively beautiful, with long limbs and an elegant form, but attractive is another story. Her sleek black-and-white fur is meticulously groomed, and her green eyes are always flashing with her next plot or scheme. She walks with purpose, every paw step light as if she were in the middle of a hunt. Every movement of her body is perfectly measured, everything she does meticulous.
Personality
Please list at least three positive and three negative traits for your character below.
Positive Traits: • Protective • Level-Headed • Polite • Diplomatic • Intelligent | Negative Traits: • Cunning • Manipulative • Secretive • Cold • Unempathetic |
Personality
A lady is always polite, quiet, and calm.
She knows her place and fits there without scorn.
She is as sweet as any balm
With a tongue sharper than any thorn.
As beautiful as a flower,
but deadly as the snake that strikes from beneath it in the morn.
---
Heronfeather was once the type to attract toms like a pitcher plant attracted flies. She would seek the thrill of doing something she was not meant to do, spend her night or nights with them, and then go back to curl into Ducknose's nest before he awoke the next morning. However, she has matured since then, at least a bit. Heronfeather remains a calculating genius, able to read another cat like an open book, but nowadays she mostly puts her skills towards making sure her son Anispine is mentally sound.
Even after she stopped her escapades in the night, she remained manipulative. After all, one has to be, with a life built on lies. She is not afraid to pull strings and whisper in the ears of others to get her way, though admittedly these days she is mostly using this skill to the benefit of her family and friends. Honestly though, this is what she has always used her skills for. Even when she conspired towards the death of Tinyglow and the exile of Ducknose, it was to protect her relationship with the tom she really loved.
Heronfeather is also no stranger to responsibility. She is willing to stand up for what she believes in and face consequences whenever they come. She has not disillusioned herself -- what she did was wrong, and she understands that she will one day have to answer for herself in StarClan. For now though, she will do everything she can to keep Newtclaw and her kits safe.
Heronfeather is also polite -- painfully so. She keeps her head in every situation, and is the master of a back-handed compliment. She is unafraid to use kindness and delicacy to get her way rather than brute force and cunning. When it comes to spying and influence, she is exceptionally skilled. Of course, that is not to say that she does not also excel in combat...
Skills & Combat
Strengths • Fighting • Diplomacy • Cunning • Stealth • Swimming | Weaknesses • Healing • Digging • Collaboration • Empathy • Storytelling |
Combat
• Defense: 16
• Attack: 1d20+6
Character Background
Family
Ducknose - Ex
Newtclaw - Mate
Caiquebeak - Son of Ducknose
Orioleheart - Daughter of Ducknose
Towheefeather - Daughter of Ducknose
Gracklepool - Son of Newtclaw
Caracafrost - Son of Newtclaw
Anispine - Son of Newtclaw
History
Before, there was a she-cat and her lover. Tallflower was an elegant she-cat whom the clan thought highly of. She was on the path to becoming the deputy of JungleClan, and had every intention of following her dreams. However, caught up in herself, Tallflower spent a night with Darkfang. That was all it was meant to be. One night. Of course, things are never so simple.
Then, there was Heronkit and Tinykit. Heronkit took after Tallflower, and Tinykit after the tom she didn't bother calling her mate. The kittens were never close, and never spent hardly any time playing together. One would have been hard-pressed to find the pair of them together, even when they were small, though not for lack of trying on Tinykit's end. Heronkit idolized her mother and wanted to be the best. The tallest, the prettiest, the smartest. She wanted to be everything Tallflower was and more -- so that didn't leave her much time for playing.
Later, there was Palekit and Duck-kit, and everything changed. The two of them immediately accepted Heronkit into their friend group, and the trio started getting into trouble together right away. They'd run around in the mud and play clan, or Palekit would tell them the most interesting stories, and it was always just wonderful. Tinykit continued to watch from the sidelines, but Heronkit barely spared her sister a thought. Tinykit was the furthest thing from her mind when she could be occupied with the toms. In fact, Tinykit and Duck-kit's brother, Newtkit, were far closer than either of them were to their siblings.
Apprenticeship was a tricky time for Heronpaw. Palepaw was whisked away and named the medicine cat's apprentice, leaving her and Duckpaw to get into trouble while Palepaw and his stories became more and more occupied with responsibility. He became quieter, more observant, and ten times as cunning while Heronpaw grew into her long-leggedness and Duckpaw chased after the oblivious she-cat like a dog after a car.
Meanwhile, Tallflower was doing her best to get her daughter to shape up. Tinypaw was an energetic and bright young she-cat, albeit a bit shy, while Heronpaw was mostly just a poor imitation of her mother. Being friends with Palepaw, it was no wonder that cunning came more easily to her than diplomacy and grace.
One day she was on the territory with her mother and two other warriors when she learned a very important lesson. Both of the warriors were toms, and they had been talking under their breath about Tallflower through the entire patrol. They kept saying such horrible things about her, and about her kittens, and about what they thought of her. Heronpaw couldn't believe that her mother would just sit so quietly and take it, but she knew better than to speak out against a warrior. Then, as they passed across the border with the jungle, she noticed her mother very pointedly guide her a few mouse-lengths to the left. Heronpaw followed, and watched as the two toms tripped face-first into the thorns. Tallflower's eyes shone as she said to her daughter, "Never let them know when you are scheming."
She liked the sound of that.
In her warrior days, Heronfeather finally managed to grow into herself and her confidence. Her relationship with Palepaw had grown strained, and she couldn't shake how odd it was that she was a warrior while he still carried his apprentice name. Her and Ducknose got along better and better while she continued to be oblivious about his growing crush. She developed her skills, and learned exactly why her mother was so effective -- she was calm. Heronfeather learned not to let her emotions show unless she could fight it, but she still couldn't help but chase the thrills she so craved.
Then, Tallflower finally pulled her aside and asked her when she planned to stop stringing Ducknose along. She was confused, of course -- she'd scarcely given it any thought, and had no clue that he'd shown any sort of interest in her. How wrong she was. Tallflower explained that he'd been in love with her for moons, and insisted that she either give in or let him move on. After all, Tallflower had said, a she-cat was strongest when she had a tom to protect her interests. She could understand that.
Over the next few moons, Ducknose was ever-present in her mind. Palepaw had become Paleleaf, but they still didn't hang out together. Despite her reluctance, Heronfeather could find no reason to let Ducknose become her mate, so she gave in. However, she was... reluctant, to say the least, about giving up on her thrill-seeking. Strangely, after she became mates with Ducknose, she did not feel any guilt about her escapades across the border and her trysts with TidalClan or even other toms in JungleClan.
In fact, having a mate to hide it from made the thrill that much more addicting.
Kits were inevitable. Thankfully, they were Ducknose's -- there was no imagining otherwise when the litter was born. A litter she had never wanted, but learned to love. Three tiny kittens nursed at her belly for the next two moons, and Heronfeather was going insane. Ducknose was a wonderful father, but she quickly went stir crazy in the nursery and desperately wished for anyone other than Tallflower to break the monotony. Her mother was a wonderful she-cat and knew just what to say and do to keep her from completely losing it.
When her kits were six moons old, she could not have been more excited. She loved them all, of course, but it was so much more time-consuming than the she-cat had been used to. Heronfeather was the type of warrior who was constantly moving, and her long legs had
never been immobile for so many moons before. Immediately, she started back on her trysts. Guilt had begun to build in her heart now that she had kittens to anchor her to Ducknose, but their existence did not change the fact that she did not love him. He was her best friend, and she did not want to hurt him, but she still wasn't ready to settle down, and she certainly never would be with him.
For the past moon she had been occupying herself with Newtclaw, slipping off at his side and telling him that she loved him. However, with each escapade, she slowly had started to realize that it was true. Heronfeather had never spent enough time with the more aggressive of the brothers, but she could understand why Tinyglow was so taken with him. He was a wonderful tom, and Heronfeather could not deny her attraction.
Disaster struck -- at least, for Heronfeather. She was returning from a night with Newtclaw when Tinyglow caught them. Heronfeather looked at the lamplike eyes glowing back at her, reading disgust and betrayal and disdain. Tinyglow was going to tell Ducknose -- she knew it... but Heronfeather couldn't let that happen.
Newtclaw moved to her and tried to talk her down. To Heronfeather's relief, as she watched them talk, she realized that Tinyglow had never told Newtclaw that she loved him. Heronfeather had wondered what might have happened in another world. If she did not hate her sister, if she truly loved Ducknose, if she had stayed friends with Paleleaf. The trio returned to camp, and not a word was spoken of it, but Heronfeather's mind would not stop working.
Newtclaw was in her mind, and so was her sister. With every day that passed, she knew that Tinyglow, self-righteous and responsible Tinyglow, would see fit to tell Ducknose. Worse, she might see fit to tell Newtclaw, to tell him that she loved him, and rob Heronfeather of the only cat she had ever truly cared for more than her kits and her mother. So she acted.
Less than a half-moon after they were caught, she went to talk to her old friend Paleleaf. If anyone could help her, it would be him. She explained what was happening to the frustratingly silent medicine cat, watching his eyes sparkle in interest as he toyed with his own morals at the idea of her plan. Finally he agreed -- on the condition that they never, ever spoke of this again and Heronfeather stopped her escapades.
It was easy to agree.
That night, everything went smoothly. The evidence was laid carefully and even Abel would not have known what awaited. Paleleaf himself testified that Ducknose had attacked her, and what motivation could the medicine cat, one of Ducknose's best friends, have possibly had to lie? Nobody knew that Heronfeather's coldness, her apparent lack of focus, were to distance herself from what she had done rather than what Ducknose had supposedly done. He was exiled, and less than two days later his body was found mangled on TidalClan territory by some predator. Heronfeather had won, but at the cost of her best friend's life.
Heronfeather and Newtclaw grieved together. While some of the clan members were suspicious when they became mates, there was no real evidence to say that they had conspired. Heronfeather knew that she was ready now, that she loved Newtclaw. She also knew that she could never let him take the fall for what she had done. She swore to him one night shortly after the bond was official that she would never let herself hurt him, promising that he was different, that she would never do anything wrong by him. That she would always take the fall for him.
And she was telling the truth.
This time, she wanted the kittens given to her. Three perfect little tom-kits were born while Paleleaf watched cooly from the medicine den. Newtclaw made himself into a perfect father, and the secret that Heronfeather had bound in her own blood was kept. Paleleaf mercifully spoke nothing of it, but every time he shifted away from her or asked her to leave his den left ice settling in her core until she ultimately decided that it was no longer something worthy of speaking about. Friends grew apart, and there was no reason for her to acknowledge what she had done.
Heronfeather was not a doting mother, but she loved her kits dearly, and this time was reluctant to leave the nursery with their christening as apprentices. However, the mentors of her kits kept her in touch, and she was thankful for it as she tried not to be overbearing. She had noticed, however, that Anispine was... struggling. His mentor was constantly beating him down and picking fights. She had quietly spoken to the leader about such things, but was routinely encouraged to leave it be, as apprentices needed to learn how to deal with difficult cats.
She did not like seeing her son suffer, but did as she was told. When Kapokstorm attacked him, the surge of rage at her son being insulted would not settle. Heronfeather was willing to do anything to keep her son safe, and once more went to Paleleaf's side... only to be told in no uncertain terms to leave.
The rage settled from a boil into a simmer when Paleleaf began to spend more and more time with her son. Despite the cold distance between them, she trusted him, and knew that he would ultimately do right by Anipaw. She was more than happy to lend him to Paleleaf's company, and couldn't help the swell of pride when he was chosen as Paleleaf's apprentice. She knew rationally that this too would drive a wedge between her and Paleleaf, and the same wedge would stand between her and Anipaw, but that did not matter.
All that mattered was that he was going to be safe.
Moons passed, and then he was named Anispine, and she could not have been more proud. That is, until that night she sat awake, watching from the nest she shared with Newtclaw as Anispine and his brothers talked and laughed with their half-siblings. Heronfeather still felt guilt over the way she had nearly abandoned them; she loved her first litter, but she had never connected with Orioleheart and Towheefeather the way her mother had connected with her. She had certainly never connected with Caiquebeak, her firstborn.
She did not want them putting ideas in Anispine's head, but knew that she could not say anything. So instead, she just watched. There was no reason for any ill conclusions to be drawn. The worst that could have been assumed by anyone who was not Tinyglow or Paleleaf was that Ducknose -- though that name had been stripped upon his exile -- had died, and Heronfeather had sought out his brother as a form of replacement.
Then Paleleaf died.
She buried him, along with a few others.
StarClan knew she should have seen it as a blessing. Two could only keep a secret if one of them was dead, but... Paleleaf.
Paleleaf was her best friend.
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Adopted from Seppi!
