The News Must Carry (Closed During Territory, OPEN at Camp)

OoC: Continued from this topic.



It hadn't even been a full day before Kestrelstorm would return to WindClan. But not in the way that he would have liked. Hawkpaw dragged her paws as she lead the way out of ShadowClan's territory, across Four Trees, and into the WindClan territory. Her father was gone now, not just in WindClan. But in StarClan. Blue eyes shifted back to view Redpaw as he struggled to carry the tall warrior on his shoulders with the help from other warriors. He had been the one to actually kill her father. Anger and resentment built in her stomach for a second before she let it go. It was just his duty. He didn't mean it. Her brown tabbied head swung forward. Her mother didn't even see her former mate. As they reached the middle of WindCland territory, Hawkpaw halted. "I smell something." she warned the patrol quietly.

And the world came to a halt. Spiderfur could smell blood. She'd even been getting better with her anxiety issues, but all her improvement came to nothing. She stood in the tall grass, hidden, but completely frozen with shock. Was that.. Kesrelstorm? Hadn't she just seen him the day before, leaving Windclan camp for good? "What have you done to my brother." The little warrior's voice was soft in disbelief. She didn't emerge, yet her large, heather brown eyes were wide, staring only at the blood on the dead tomcat's pelt. This couldn't be happening. She didn't recognize Hawkpaw as her niece at all, as she had absolutely no clue as to what Kestrelstorm's ties were to the nocturnal clan. All she knew was that her last sibling was dead and Shadowclan had something to do with it.

Nightheart had decided to go out on a border patrol earlier that day, everything had gone fine until the scent of cats reached her nose. She could feel the fur on her neck standing on end with the proximity of the scent, especially when the breeze carried and mixed the terrifying metallic stench of fresh blood with the original scent. Without wasting a single second, she changed her route, heading straight towards the scent at the border not that far from her position, unsheathing her claws and muscles tense. After the unnecessary blushed caused by the Dark Forest not long ago she couldn’t help but feel reluctant to head straight to what could potentially be a border skirmish, to shed any more blood in a fight, but it also had forced her to craft and wear a mask cold as ice and lacking compassion when those situations seemed inevitable.

It didn’t took long for her to spot the cats past the border limits thanks to the wide open moors that made up most of the clan’s territory, narrowing her eyes and lowering her ears in a threatening way as she got closer to the small patrol that she had already recognized as ShadowClan’s thanks to their strong scent “Why have you trespassed the...” The dark warrior couldn’t finish the sentence, her words getting stuck in her throat as she recognized the cat that was being carried by the cats of the nocturnal clan, her threatening pose shattering alongside the ice mask that she had put on seconds earlier to prepare for a potential fight. There lied the cat that once she had called a half-brother, with his fur dyed bright red with his own blood “K-Kestrelstorm?” She still couldn’t give credit to her eyes as tears started to appear, only the day before she had seen him, strong and determined to prove the mistake he claimed the clan of the moors had done by exiling him. Even if she didn’t defend him when he was exiled, acknowledging the terrible treason he had committed by breaking the code and then abandoning his birth clan, only to try to return and be above consequences…but she had expected him to find a way to stay alive and strong for long even after that…not to die…

She raised her head, eyes finally leaven the body of the older warrior and then landing on the trespassing patrol “W-when…how…?” Her voice trembled as the words came out, soft as whispers, regret pressing her chest like an invisible weight.

Redpaw looked to Hawkpaw, a lump forming in his throat. "We..we feel it is our duty to return him to his birth clan. Please, don't mind us being here." He turned back towards the WindClan cats. He felt terrible as he locked eyes with Kestrelstorm's former clanmates. "It had to be done."

(Mobile)

Nutpaw had never liked sadness. Now, she was in the very midst of grief from both WindClan and ShadowClan. She stood behind Redfeather, yet peered over his shoulder to look at the WindClan cats. She was half afraid. What if the WindClan cats got angry at them for killing Kestrelstorm and ended up starting a fight? She then dipped her head sadly, agreeing fully with Redfeather. What was done was only done out of self defense, and Nutpaw was sure that any other Clan would've done the same.
Kestrelstorm was that cat's sister? She thought, lifting her brown head to look at Spiderfur with a sympathetic gaze. Nutpaw didn't know what she'd do if she didn't have her littermates.

(Shortness...lack of muse.)

Hickorypaw's green eyes held sadness, he was only here to support his brother, Redfeather. Standing next to him the brown tortoiseshell tom remained quiet, fearing a fight would break out it he said something wrong on accident,and since he himself hadn't taken part in the killing, he was a witness all the same though.

OOC: Pardon the interruption, but Redfeather and Hickorypad were both apprentices in the last topic and should still be apprentices here. The two topics are directly related in time and it would ruin the continuity to change their ranks.

Hawkpaw hung her head, avoiding eye contact with the WindClan warriors. "After you exiled him, my father came looking for a home. He was killed for trespassing..." The young apprentice shifted her weight, the emotions choking and weighing her down. "I know he was exiled but he loved WindClan and all his family is here. I thought you'd want to say goodbye and bury him in the hills." her voice cracked when she said 'all his family.' He had family in ShadowClan, but the family is what got him killed.

OoC: Was about to post the same thing, Sub. Thanks bb

(M'apologies, wasn't sure.)
Redpaw nodded. "We're sorry. I'm sorry. This was the least we could do." He tried not to break eye contact with the family of the cat he'd killed, as much as he desperately wanted to look away. He'd killed Birchpaw. He'd killed Kestrelstorm. Two cats dead at his hands, and he wasn't even a warrior. But it had been for the greater good. He'd done the wrong thing for the right reason, protecting StarClan and ShadowClan.
"He's in StarClan now. It's a better place than a long life wandering as a outcast."

Nightheart lowered her head without saying a word as she listened to the exchange of words between the other cats. Part of her felt like she should say something instead of staying quiet, instead of grieving silently for the death of what once was a clanmate and family, but something else inside her mind discouraged her from doing so. She repeated to herself that she had nothing to do with Kestrelstorm’s death, and that he was the one that had caused this to himself from straying from the code that had been given to them by StarClan itself so many generations ago, however her minds always strayed to the What ifs regardless of how much she tried to ignore them. What if she had said something instead of staying quiet as he got exiled? What if she had tried to defend him instead of stepping aside? What if she had at least tried to share some comforting words with him instead of just watching as he walked away? Many questions like those haunted her, and the invisible claws of guilt soon made themselves present for the dark warrior.

Her ice blue eyes landed on the apprentice that claimed to be Kestrelstorm’s daughter, and though she tried to act formal and calm, the sadness in her gaze was almost impossible to hide and the guilt in her words almost palpable “I…understand” Clan cats were supposed to chase intruders out and only resort to killing if the trespasser left them with no other choice, and since she hadn’t been there she had no right to judge these cats for their actions. All she could hope for was that the exiled warrior had been admitted within the ranks of StarClan even after his mistakes “I think we should take him to camp, he may had been exiled recently, but I think he still deserves a proper burial” Her eyes soon landed on Spiderfur, even if Kestrelstorm was her half-brother, the brown she-cat was his full sister, so she decided to let her have the last word. She wasn’t exactly happy with the idea of letting the cats from ShadowClan follow them there, but forcing Hawkpaw to leave without giving her the chance of grieve for her dead father, on her own opinion, would be way too cruel.

[color=#000066]"We don't even need to stay here to grieve. I wanted to bring him back home so his other son and his family and old friends could grieve for him." she shuddered. Her father was dead and nothing could bring him back.

OoC: Guys.