searching for answers [o]

Patience, although it was a trait that every cat should have, was something that Ceres did not possess. Her sister, Shira, a little less than a moon ago, had decided to venture out further into Clan territory with her mate in order to find their mother and their home. Ceres and Mirae had stayed behind, waiting for a word or a sign that Shira was safe and their parents were found. However, there was no such luck. Worry was beginning to gnaw at her heart. There were plenty of Clan cats that held a deep hatred for the Asylum in their hearts, and rightfully so, but what if one of them decided to take out their rage on Shira and Spark? What if they were hurt? What if something had happened to the kits that Shira was carrying? There was no use in helplessly lying around and waiting for an answer anymore. It was time to take initiative. It was extremely difficult to change Ceres' mind once she had set her heart to something, especially when it came to family, so that night she had prodded Mirae in the side with a forepaw to wake her sister up after forming a plan.

Despite the time she had spent stationed in the Clans, Ceres was unfamiliar with the layout of the entire forest. If their mother had been from SkyClan, which was where she and Shira had been stationed, surely she would've known that by now. That ruled out one of the Clans, but there were still four left. She figured that it only made sense to start walking until they came upon a camp. Realistically, the plan was flawed, and strutting into a Clan camp despite the fact that they were both outsiders was dangerous, but Ceres vowed that she would explain herself before any of them decided to attack.

So, with a determined heart, she began their journey.
"Come on, Mirae. We've gotta go."

Eventually, the sun began to poke its head over the horizon as they trekked through the grass. The extra light made it easier to find their way around. That was when Ceres was able to pick up the details of this territory. Thin streams of water cut and twisted through the ground, and she assumed that they joined together further up to create a bigger body of water. It was a new environment, but at least it was better than the tall trees that made her sick whenever she had padded through SkyClan's territory to hunt. The scent of cats grew stronger with every step she took, which led her to believe that they were close to finding a camp.

Ceres began to pick up the pace, and before she knew it, she was practically sprinting forwards. There was a possibility that Shira was up ahead... and if she was there, that meant that their mother was there, too. When she padded in, the camp seemed awfully empty. Sunrise meant that cats were still tucked away in their nests and dens, catching up on any last bit of sleep they could get before they had to start working. It would've been polite of Ceres to keep the noise down or retreat until they had all woken from their slumber.

However, as mentioned before, patience was something that Ceres didn't possess.

"Hey! Hello?" The calico shouted, glancing around with wide eyes before slightly quieting her voice, "Surely one of you are awake... please, I need to see my sister."

Sneezingpaw's wide ears, while odd looking, served a purpose. Twitching, she sleepily arose, mumbling a tired "wha--? Who'sa ther'?" Yawning, she clumsily untangled her limbs away from Mountainpaw. Stumbling, she waddled out of the den, and upon seeing two pretty cats she'd never seen before, all traces of sleepiness disappeared.

"Hiya! Hi! I'm Sneezingpaw and my sister Mountainpaw is sleepin'! You're real purdy! Are you here to see moms? She's sleepin' I think, but I can get Mister Hoo Hoo for you! He's probab'y awake! Did I say you're pretty already?"

Loonwhisper hardly ever slept through the night. The starlight distracted him, in how it danced and twinkled across his vision hypnotically. All through the night, into the morning, he stared through the gaps in the warrior den, watching the sky loop around and around...

In the early morning, he heard the sniffling and caw-cawing of a distinct apprentice's voice, her dialect betraying her to Loonwhisper's ears. Whoever she was talking to, it was not a familiar cat, and that could only mean sincere trouble. The deputy remembered the horrific morning of his warrior vigil and grit his teeth as he jogged out of his den to meet her. And, yes, the cat in the clearing before Sneezingpaw was not familiar at all. She carried a terrible stink on her, once that Loonwhisper began to associate with cages and despair. It was a stench he thought he was well over with.

"I will take care of this," Loonwhisper murmured softly to Sneezingpaw upon his approach. "But, I do hope you remember for next time... you're meant to chase out intruders, not express your admiration. But thank you for using a rooster-voice, Sneezingpaw. You have done me a great service." The deputy stepped out in front of the apprentice and gestured for her to fetch Ivystar for him.

He cleared his throat. Even as he was odd, Loonwhisper was not meek, and the sight of an Asylum cat deeply upset him, though it did not come across clearly in his facial expression, which remained quite blank, except for a twitching ear. "I must express to you that you are lucky," he crooned to the two cats. "Had any other cat found you first, you would not be greeted so pleasantly. I suspect that you may have left this camp with a little less blood than you had entered with. You are trespassing in a place where kits and elders sleep. You have committed a grievous crime by coming to this place. You will explain to me your intentions, please, or your warm welcome will reach an abrupt end. You may find you are unable to swim back the way you came."

The deputy's curtness was jarring, and very nearly unsettling. He was unreadable in body language and in tone, but his words were clear. They were almost morbid. He knew the effect his phantom-like demeanor had on cats he didn't mean to startle... and on these most unwelcome characters, he had no qualms with using this power to his advantage.

Ceres quietly peered down at the apprentice in front of her, taken aback by the unprovoked kindness that she was showing her and Mirae. She tilted her head in an attempt to hide any confusion that she felt.
"Mr. who? Uh, I don't know who that is. We're here to look for-"

The scent of this Clan was beginning to overwhelm her. While it wasn't necessary unpleasant, it was unfamiliar to her, but if Shira and Spark were somewhere here... she supposed that she would have to get used to it eventually. Her nose twitched as a new cat arrived to join the fray. He was far bigger than the apprentice in front of her, and probably older, and his demeanor suggested that he held a much higher status that the majority of the cats in this Clan. Ceres' puzzled expression melted away to give way to one of sobriety. She remained unmoving as the other cat addressed them. It was unsurprising that there would be cats that were displeased with their arrival. The Clans would forever speak the name of the Asylum with bitterness in their maw, and Ceres would do the exact same.

"Our intentions..." Ceres trailed off slightly as she lifted her head to scan the camp, hoping to see the form of her sister within the clearing.
Perhaps this wasn't the right Clan... perhaps she wasn't here. There was always a chance that she and Spark and their mother were peacefully residing within the walls of another Clan's camp.
"We're looking for our sister, Shira, and her mate, Spark. I'm Ceres, and this is my other sister, Mirae. We are two of the cats that were taken from the Clans by the Asylum when we were kits. Once the Asylum fell, Shira told us that she was going to find our family, but she hasn't returned yet... so we decided to go and look for her. We don't have an ulterior motive or an evil scheme, I swear."

For the first time in far too long, Ivystar had found herself sleeping- not quite soundly, but it was sleep nonetheless. As the sun began to stretch out above the horizon, bathing the sandy campground in light, she slowly blinked her eyes open and yawned quietly as not to wake her mates. For a few moments, she simply lay there admiring the two of them, recalling fond memories of when they were younger and didn't have much of a care in the world. They soon became bogged down with responsibilities and hardships but at the time, they were naive enough not to realize what awaited them. That was a blissful ignorance that Ivystar wished they could experience and enjoy together once again.

After some time, she heard the slightest commotion outside the warriors den, and with her curiosity piqued, she untangled herself from the mess of limbs and tails she had found herself cuddled up with the night prior and stretched. Just as Ivystar was about to exit the den, a dreadfully familiar scent hit her nose- it was almost stale, but still enough to make her hackles raised. Asylum. With a newfound sense of urgency she pushed herself forward and found Loonwhisper, Sneezingpaw, and... Two Asylum cats. That's not all they were, though.

Immediately, Ivystar recognized the two of them as Shira's sisters- her kits. The silver tabby leader had managed to catch the tail end of Ceres explaining her intentions- "... for her. We don't have an ulterior motive or an evil scheme, I swear." Ivystar's emerald eyes began to well up with tears, but she forced the lump in her throat down and approached the two of them quietly, signaling to Loonwhisper that everything was alright. "Ceres, Mirae... Shria... She told me about you. She's not here anymore, and neither is Spark. They left, both of them, in the night... We haven't seen them since." She shared quietly. Wrapping her tail nervously over her paws, she lifted her gaze and carefully shifted it between the two of them. Tears still pricked at her eyes, but she forced herself to go on. "My name is Ivystar... Your mother, one of them." She mewed hesitantly. The kits had been so young when they disappeared that neither Honeytongue nor Stormbringer had gotten a chance to bond with them as she had, but they were still their mothers just as much as she was. Nervously, Ivystar sat and looked between the two of them. She didn't know if they were here just for Shira, or to find their family... So she'd wait for them to explain to avoid stepping on any toes. She'd failed them enough as it was.

Moonpaw, who had a bad habit of staying awake looked at Loonwhisper. "Surely they didn't create that big of a crime. They are searching to help and for answers. We can give them an enterance to Ivystar, if only a few minutes." he said to the deputy looking at him with his strange eyes.
Indeed, the moon had this type of effect on him. Often making him weird and somewhat medicine cat like in the ways that he talked.

The calico felt a shiver race down her spine as the Clan's leader made her presence known. The tentative stares of the surrounding Clan cats seemed to burn into Ceres' skin, and even though she had convinced herself that there was no reason to be afraid, she quietly pressed her ears against the top of her head as a wordless symbol of unease. There was a lump in her throat, a small one, but it seemed to expand as Ivystar began to speak. Shira and Spark weren't here... which means that she and Mirae would have to take their journey into another Clan's camp. Her head slowly began to lower in slight defeat before the next set of words reached her ears.

"My name is Ivystar... Your mother, one of them."

Her head instantly snapped up and her yellow eyes widened enough to rival an owl's. For Ceres, being at a loss for words was rare. It seemed that the calico always had something to say, but when she opened her jaw to conjure up a response, nothing could to come out. All she could manage to do was glance over at Mirae in an attempt to gauge her sister's reaction. It was unfortunate that Shira had left so mysteriously in the middle of the night, and Ceres couldn't help but pray that her littermate was safe and sound, but perhaps their mission hadn't ended up being a complete failure. Here she was... her mother... well, one of her mothers. That only meant that there were still more to meet. Her family was here, how could she possibly leave without getting to know them more?

"You're..." Ceres was finally able to cough up some words, "...my mother? I don't- I don't know what to say."
The she-cat took a small step forward.
"I'm not sure why Shira would leave when our family is right here." Ceres muttered to herself, tilting her head to the side.

Perhaps they had left to come back and get her and Mirae, but their paths hadn't crossed along the way. The two of them would return eventually, right? Truthfully, Ceres was simply searching for any excuse she could to stay. Ever since the very second that she had found out the truth about her origins, she had wanted to know where and who she came from. Now that she knew, the last thing she wanted to do was leave. Besides, she would have to settle down in a Clan eventually. Living as a loner was a lifestyle that Ceres wasn't the slightest bit interested in.

"Um, well, I'm sure Shira and Spark will be back eventually. I know how everyone feels about Asylum cats, so if you'd like Mirae and I to leave then we can, but if you let us stay then I think... I-I think it'd be a nice chance for us to get to know you better, and our other mothers, of course."

Sneezingpaw had bounded off to find her mother when Ivystar appeared on her own. "Mama! Mom! There'sa real pretty cat in camp! Two of 'em!" She squeaked excitedly and bounded alongside her mother back to the pretty cats. She listened, nodding her head sagely as her mom spoke, eyes widening at the mention of Shira. "Oh, oh! D'ya know Shira? She's my big sis!" Sneezingpaw chirped.

Her wide green eyes seem to get even wider. "Wowie! You're both my sis too! Eep! That's so coolio! Are you gonna stay in RiverClan with us? I can show you how'ta fish for fishies!"

Moonpaw shot a cross glance at Sneezingpaw. "Be quiet." he said with a warning glance. Although he was an apprentice as well, he was older and had the 'authority' to boss around the older apprentices. "Let your mother handle such matters little one." he said and swished his fluffy tail in front of her. "Suppose you want to play a game in the quiet corner while Ivystar welcome's them?" he said. He knew from personal experience that when cats came into the clan he was to stand to the side and not get in the way of the adults speaking.

Loonwhisper allowed himself a little time to process the many things he was hearing. He had not met Ivystar's kits before their disappearance. It was unbecoming of a young tom to sneak around the nursery unprompted. He felt a pant of guilt for nearly chasing the she-cat out, but Ivystar seemed to have long forgotten the transgression. She was quite quick to welcome them into her open heart... Loonwhisper lamented that he was not nearly as trusting. He had little understanding of these cats and their ways, despite how long they had spent in close quarters.

"I am not so certain we will see their return," he interrupted, jaw set. "Though in so many ways we are ruled by our blood and ancestry, this is not what makes a clanmate. Shura was clanborn, yet she... seemed malcontented. To leave in such a whisper on the night wind? It speaks to loyalties elsewhere. Perhaps not here. Trouble upbringings, it seems, are apt to cause such confusions."

Though there was little more than matter-of-factness to the way Loonwhisper's tail now curled around him, and his musings were abjectly depressing, the way in which he slowly blinked at Ivystar revealed his true intentions in speaking so freely: We should not get attached. They have not decided if they belong here.

And, in another sense, the twitch of his scarred shoulders revealed another: And I have not decided so, either.

A dull silence cling to the air, and Loonwhisper spoke again. "What skin did you wear, Ceres?"