if the sword kills the pen [closed]

First, it was Oakpaw. Raising a kit could be difficult enough without having to manage the fallout from Asylum’s reign alongside it; the last thing Batbite and Minkstream needed was a distraction. Then it was Nettlestar. Losing her old mentor had thrown Thrushnose entirely off-course. By the time she found her way back, her father had become ThunderClan’s leader, her mother its deputy, and a warrior’s worries didn’t matter that much, really. Then it was Minkstream himself. He’d been acting strange, trailing off at odd times and looking lost on familiar territory—and then Thrushnose realized she was making excuses.

This conversation had lived and died in her head a hundred times by now. She’d tried working until she forgot it, she’d tried waiting, she’d tried reasoning herself out of it; it always came back, ever louder, insisting she speak up before some new Asylum came along. Something had to give. This way, she could ensure it happened on her terms.

A rare morning frost clung to the trees just barely starting to bud above her den. Thrushnose took it as a sign. Now or never. Resolving to help refill the fresh-kill pile later, she helped herself to a tiny finch without tasting any of it. After she finished shaking the last few feathers from her claws, she strode across camp to the Highrock and poked her nose through the lichen hiding her parents’ nest from view. The sight of two darker pelts instead of scars and silver stopped her cold for one heartbeat. Two. Three. Then she shook herself down to her paws, and the moment passed. “Mom? Dad? It’s Thrushnose.” ThunderClan had just finished being trampled under the paws of Akhluts and Erises; it didn’t feel right to be Mermurr. It hadn’t felt right for a long, long time. Behind the lichen wall, Thrushnose’s tail twitched. “Could we go for a walk? I know it’s early…” She let the sentence trail away. Lying had never been one of her strengths; her family knew that even better than she did.

The warm, quiet dark was comforting. It slipped through his fur, muffled his ears, and kept his mind in the blissful emptiness of a dreamless sleep, the barest bubbles of subconscious flickers rising up briefly before fading away - just a hint of a dull throbbing swelling and receding on the edges. And then something pulled at it, a hint of something different, the slightest flicker of his ear as a sound caught it, and he blinked open his eyes. A flicker of movement caught them above the gently shifting fur of Bat's pelt next to his muzzle, and he raised his head, a familiar scent touching his nose at the same time that he recognized Thrushnose's face poking through the lichen.

Mermurr?

Her quiet voice slipped off his brain as he shifted slightly, and he shook his head, forcing his dull mind to focus and eliciting a brief spiking of the low throb that woke with him. "A walk?" He glanced at his mate and then back to his daughter, rubbing a paw against his face and fighting off the urge to yawn. "Is something up, Murr?"

The sound of her daughter's voice managed to catch Batbite's attention, even through the peaceful haze of still being mostly asleep. One of the rare moments where she could push aside all her thoughts and concerns and simply exist - a haven from the rest of the world; or at least the small corner of it in which she'd settled - but she couldn't find it in herself to be irritated at the interruption. Slowly shifting to look at her daughter, she only processed the question a few moments later. "You want to go for a walk?"

Just as Thrushnose expected, her parents (her father for sure; her mother still didn’t look entirely conscious, but that would wear off soon) picked up on the strangeness in the air. Even as a newly-named apprentice, she’d never barged into their den asking favors. Especially before sunrise. In a way, she found comfort in having her intentions known without needing to explain them. On the other paw, it was alarming. She’d planned her half of this as much as one could, but conversations had gotten away from her before. More often than not, to be honest.

“Is something up” wasn’t a question she could answer, not here, not yet. She brushed past it in her usual manner, a glance aside and a heartbeat’s silence the only signs she’d heard it at all. “To the Great Sycamore. The snakes won’t be out yet, and…” Thrushnose’s paws skimmed through the dust. “I don’t want to be overheard. It’s important.” It sounded too much like please for her liking. Her gaze slowly shifted between them—first her mother, then her father, back and forth as she waited.

Something was definitely up. A ping of dread curled up in his stomach, brief flashing visions of every other time someone had said something similar to that dancing through his mind. Almost always it was something that shook everyone to the ground. Stars, please don't let it be anything like that. Easing up into a sitting position and staving off a wince at the throbbing that awoke in his head, he searched her face for a moment - as if trying to probe the answers from her expression - before casting another glance at Bat. "...Alright."

So long as a pinecone didn't inexplicably fall on any of their heads, it sounded like a good place for a private conversation. Hopefully one that wouldn't involve forbidden mates or territory hopping, or anything like that. He stretched, putting on a casual attitude even as his stomach internally clenched at the thought.

Batbite's thoughts were still somewhat hazy, but she snapped almost immediately to attention at the mention of snakes. She relaxed after a moment, realizing that Thrush was merely mentioning that they weren't likely to be out just yet - and not that there were somehow any in the leader's den, an irrational fear that nonetheless haunted her after what had once happened to Oakstar - and sighed with resignation as her daughter made it very clear that this was an important conversation. What sort of important, though?

...Was she going to leave them, too?

Wordlessly, she rose to her paws with a slight nod before finally giving an answer of her own. "If it's important to you, then it must be."

Truthfully, she wasn't all too eager for this apparent serious conversation to be overheard either. It was best to keep certain things quiet, after all. At the very least until they knew what they were dealing with.