Rising Shadows[Open after parent & kits post]

Most births would involve shrieks of pain and clamor, but that would have just been disturbing the careful peace of the camp, wouldn't it? Tawnyshadow laid in her nest, not uttering a single sound save for a few low hisses as the kits were birthed. The last thing she needed was to wake up everyone else when they were sleeping so soundly in their own nests. Of course, the medicine cats were at her side, and her mate was waiting outside the nursery. She wasn't unreasonable, just a litter stubborn.
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Three kits, each as black as the forest at night, with glossy fur and slender figures. They clung to the curve of her belly, suckling quietly. Tawnyshadow felt her heart melt just enough to purr as she watched her daughters. They looked so precious, as if they might break any moment. Her tail-tip rested on each of them in turn, memorizing how one's ear had tufts at the end, while another's tip was slightly folded. "Sagekit," She whispered fiercley. It was the only name that she had longed to give her kit, and it would be given. Her first friend, her first family, the cat that had stuck to her through day and night. Sagestone was now residing in Starclan, but he could have done so much more. Perhaps this kit, Sagekit, could fulfill the things her late friend had never had a chance to.

The praise from her mate was enough, in that moment, for her to resist sleep long enough to give her daughters their proper names. She brushed her tail-tip against the newly-named she-kit, one that was just slightly smaller than the rest. "I was thinking Sagekit for the smallest one, and maybe Moonkit for  the biggest?" She answered, moving her tail to touch the largest kit gently on the head. Moonkit was by far the fluffiest, even by a little bit, with tiny ears poking out like petals. Moondancer had been the closest thing Tawnyshadow had had to a friend after Sagestone's passing, so it was only fitting to name one of her kits after the late warrior. "Would you like to name our last daughter?" She prompted.

"Sloekit is a beautiful name," Tawnyshadow purred wearily. Her whole body ached from birthing these three kits, but she didn't want to sleep yet. For the first time in her life, the she-cat was content with just watching the kits' figures rising and falling slowly. Was this what love felt like? Surely it must be. She had felt the same when she was but a kit with Sagestone, who had seemed like her only family back then, and once again when she became mates with Sunflare. The queen wrapped her tail more tightly around her three daughters, as if suddenly afraid that the war would wash them away as it did to her clanmates. She raised her head to look at her mate's face. "They're beautiful, aren't they?" She purred softly.