dreamer, survivor, heart full o' fire [c]

SkyClan.

It'd been a long while since Lichenwing had purposefully approached this border. Tall, towering trees rose up from the ground, Newleaf buds peeking out between otherwise skeletal branches. He swept his gaze along the lower boughs, searching for any lurking SkyClanners, but there were none to be found... right now, it was just Lichenwing and his memories. Sunpaw had gone off to hunt on his own, giving the charcoal warrior enough time to slip away and retrace the steps that had carried him to this place so many moons ago. Back then, he'd have been hoping to get caught, if only for the chance that it would be Juniperheart who caught him.

A quiet sigh left the tom, his ears drooping slightly as he forced his gaze back to the ThunderClan side of the border. Ever since Tinypaw's birth, Lichenwing's emotions had been scrambled. There was no love between him and the kit's mother, only a friendship that had gone a step further than most did... but he'd had that love once, and the longing to remember Juniperheart, to never forget the love he'd had for her... sometimes, that meant risking an earful from a cocky SkyClanner.

But for the moment, there was peace and quiet, leaving Lichenwing free to sit here and ponder again about the past... and about Juniperheart's kits, those four that had bounced around at her paws the last time he'd seen her at a Gathering. They were warriors now, he imagined, though he didn't know their names now, nor had he ever. Did they know about him? Had their mother told them about her close friend, the ThunderClanner? Lichenwing scoffed gently at his own train of thought.

Why would she have? Juniperheart and her SkyClan mate had raised those kits. The only one who knew half the extent of their friendship had been Birdstar, and now she, too, was gone. Lichenwing closed his eyes and swished his half-tail across the grass, another weary sigh escaping into the morning air. Coming here hadn't been nearly as helpful as he'd hoped, but at least now he knew that, and wouldn't be tempted again. Rising with a grunt, Lichenwing started to turn away when the sound of approaching paws stilled his own. Stars, of course they had to be coming from the SkyClan side of the border, didn't they? He had half a mind to just disappear into the undergrowth, but there was no hiding his scent, and it would be easier to explain that he was simply patrolling his own border than to have them assume he was up to no good.

Body language relaxed but every nerve on end, the gray warrior stood and fixed his gaze on the rustling bushes and whatever emerged.

Of all the borders--the small corner of river shared with RiverClan, the musky Highpine across from ShadowClan--Bubblebeam disliked the Fallen Oak the most. It wasn't any fault of the territory itself; especially now as newleaf set in, the clustering of deciduous trees offered comfortable shelter. She ought to have felt at home... if not for the memory of claws raking through the soft fur of her belly, of wet crimson closing in on her vision, of desperate screams gone unanswered. Even now, thinking of them, she still shivered. So how was it that she'd ended up here on her own? The rest of the patrol had gone to continue hunting. She'd murmured some excuse about being tired, but wandered further into the forest instead of back at camp--and before she knew it, found herself smelling the overwhelming stench of bracken and moss. Retreading this ground made her skin crawl. She didn't want to be here. There was no reason to stick around; Silverhawk wouldn't be anywhere near ThunderClan's end of the land. She should just turn around and get the bird she'd caught and go home.

But when she glanced one last time over the border before turning around, she stopped in her tracks, frozen. There was another cat--one looking right at her. Her flight response would have activated, but... that shade of gray fur, those green eyes. Save for their slightly darker hues, they looked almost exactly alike. The resemblance was uncanny. You shouldn't linger here! What if he attacks you? You're not strong enough to win a battle with a ThunderClan cat one-on-one. You should run. Yet Bubblebeam remained still, staring shocked at a shadowed pond-still image of herself. Deep within her chest, something pulled at her. She hated this border. It made her scar itch. But she couldn't move away. Her ears pinned back in a physical representation of her anxiety, but... he hadn't attacked her yet. If she couldn't move away, and going forward was unthinkable... The young SkyClan warrior swallowed nervously. "Um... hello," she squeaked.

Through the brush, a set of pale green eyes met his, and Lichenwing stilled. Not a patrol, but a single she-cat, alone at the border. Given the current tensions between their clans, it was an awkward thing for a lone cat to be checking their borders, but... he was here also, wasn't he? By himself, in a place he shouldn't be? Common sense said to leave, now that they knew he was no invader, nor trespasser, but... the longer he looked, the less he wanted to turn tail. This wasn't a random SkyClan warrior, full of vitriol and aggression, this... was one of Juniperheart's kits.

Several heartbeats passed, during which both ashen-pelted warriors staring across the border at each other, unmoving, unblinking. And then the SkyClanner spoke. To his surprise - and his relief - her voice held no edge, no suspicion. Lichenwing's ears twisted forward to catch her quiet words, but he remained where he was despite the urge to step forward. "Hullo," he responded, blinking slowly and letting his haunches drop to the ground again, a show of his own nonaggression.

Almost in spite of his cool demeanor, Lichenwing's heart fluttered against his ribs like a panicked, trapped bird. He shifted his weight anxiously from one forepaw to the other, drinking in the sight of the SkyClan warrior... stars, how she looked just like... him. Ever since the journey to the lake, where they'd all been forced into close proximity, he'd had a suspicion, an inkling, a desperate hope that maybe he and Juniperheart had shared more than just an ill-fated romance, that maybe there was some part remaining of the love they'd shared. But now that he was staring it in the face, now that this warrior, the spitting image of Lichenwing in his youth, was standing before him, it was only guilt that he felt, guilt that roiled and churned in his gut, guilt that tugged the features of his broad face into an expression that bordered fear.

He'd been right... and no amount of floundering reason could convince him otherwise. But what, now, was the answer? What could he possibly do, other than allow them to live their separate lives - hers in blissful ignorance, his in torturous acceptance? Anything else would disrupt her life, and the life of her siblings, his... his kin.

Lichenwing swallowed hard.  "I, uh... 'm not tryin' to start any trouble. I ain't here to fight. Just here to remember." The words rumbled out of his mouth with deliberate slowness, a low, easy drawl that likewise held no edge. "I... I knew yer ma, she... Juniperheart, right? She's..." His brow furrowed, eyes flicking down to look at the ground between his paws. "We were friends."

Whatever strange force had frozen Bubblebeam in place seemed to have its effect on the tom opposite her. They both stood completely still, staring at each other with near-matching eyes. He doesn't seem aggressive; he hasn't attacked me yet, at least. He seems... like me. The tip of her tail twitched anxiously, but the visceral fear began to ebb away with the lack of imminent danger. His claws were sheathed. And, eventually, he opened his mouth and spoke with a calm and non-threatening tone. As if he were trying to soothe her worries, or perhaps keep her from attacking if she had been at all thinking about it--which she hadn't. But her fur, previously standing almost on end, began to settle back against her skin. Maybe this would be an all right encounter, after all. Maybe they could just have a pleasant conversation. However, she hadn't been expecting the next thing that the ThunderClan cat said.

"I... I knew yer ma, she... Juniperheart, right?"

At that, her eyes widened further. How long had it been since she'd heard that name? Most of the cats who had known her mom--Sunfire, Rainfrost, Wolfblossom--rarely ever talked about her, probably out of grief from her absence or a desire not to reopen old wounds. She had only the haziest memories of the cat to which it belonged; something about warm fur and the smell of flowers. But for as long as she could remember, Mama had been too sick to visit... and then, one day, she was just gone. Bubblebeam hadn't known how to deal with the grief of losing a cat she'd never had the privilege of knowing, so she just... hadn't. There had been plenty of other things to worry about and keep her mind occupied, anyway. She just clung that much closer to her siblings. But to hear this tom she'd never seen before mention her mother, and how they'd been friends...

"You knew her?" she whispered, her voice colored by a combination of disbelief and joy. "I didn't know. I... she was very sick, when we were born, and I never got to see her much before she..." Oh. Maybe he didn't know about his friend's disappearance. Bubblebeam swallowed back the sick feeling that threatened to rise into her throat. "But she is--she was--my mother, you're right. Though I don't look much like her. I probably got my coloring from my Gramma." It was just another part of the distance between her and Juniperheart. She could hardly even remember her mother's pelt coloring, so different from her father's golden pelt and her own gray fur. At one point in her kithood, it had been a point of concern, but with so many other things to think about she'd left that worry far behind long ago. Her soft paws kneaded the earth beneath her as she thought. There were so many mixed feelings on the subject that she didn't know where to begin, but she knew one thing: she couldn't let this chance slip away. "Could you..." Her voice faltered, so she tried again. Hopefully this would be an okay thing to ask. "Could you tell me about her? What was she like?"