Cold Day, Cold Heart {OPENOPENOPEN}

[soliel]

COLD DAY, COLD HEART

Whitethroat felt without feeling. It was like a acquired taste - after the initial experience she felt discomfort, but she became accustomed to it quickly. The only difference was that Whitethroat did it out of necessity.
The cold wind ruffled her coat, and the cold from the snow was seeping into her paws. She was intently focused on a lone mouse, the vast meadows stretching out into the far distance. She was a black speck in the whiteness, frozen still as if a part of the hushed, unmoving surroundings. The mouse nibbled some seed, sitting in a depression where the bare snow met the now muddy ground, up on its hind legs with the seed in its paws. Whitethroat had positioned herself down-wind of the creature, and slowly, ever so slowly crept forward.
The mouse didn't notice Whitethroat's presence until it was too late; with a quick dash forward she trapped it with a paw and ended its life.
This was her only solitude, away from the grating, witless and mindless fools that awaited her back at camp. She savored being away from dullness that surrounded the stand of trees, the badger sets where she lived.
Whitethroat could not comprehend how the cats could follow such ignorant lives. The had petty fights, petty loves, petty woes that only concerned them. But there was no reason that Whitethroat could understand for them doing these things, these vapid, imbecilic things. Was it simply for its own sake? For the sake of felinity?

To Whitethroat that seemed like a poor excuse.

Even so, she had to put on a face and bear it through until she succeeded in her goal; to one day control all these cats and put them to good use. To become leader of this dull clan, where she was safe from petty rivalry and shepherd these stupid cats into an era of greatness. Whitethroat had come across this conclusion when listening to the clan leaders squabble before the clans were fully formed; before, she had believed that the role of leader was one only for those stupid enough to care for their clans, to sacrifice their goals for the sake of the clan.
Hah, for the sake of the clan. How often she had heard these words from the mouth of her imbecilic leader, from the mouthes of the leader at the gatherings.
Whitethroat realized then that the leaders showed enormous potential for selfish gain, the only kind of gain that Whitethroat recognized, the only kind that mattered. Whitethroat felt without feeling to masquerade that fact that she did not, in fact, care in the slightest for these petty cats' petty problems. Meadowclan was blessed in full-leaf, but doomed in bare-leaf. The meadows became snowed in, and little prey was to be found anywhere at all in the plains, reserving the cats to hunt only in the small stands of trees that dotted the landscape, and by the streams that made their border with Streamclan. In addition to that, Whitethroat kept a fear close to her heart, behind the many walls that surrounded her mind. A fear of the cold. Starving, hungry, and mindless like the fools that so surrounded her, there was a time that she wanted to forget but could not.

Whitethroat picked up her dead mouse and doubled her tracks out of the pristine snow field and into the comforting pine needles and forest debris of the stand of trees that encircled the meadow.

[Pyro]

If it was at all possible, Raccoontail was finally starting to feel at home with MeadowClan. He couldn't quite forget the railway...hell, he doubted he ever would. The time he spent living by the whistles and moves of railway trains was too significant to forget, and no matter how homey the feeling got back in MeadowClan he just couldn't stay away from the rumble of a coming train. However, he wasn't 'staying out' as long. Granted, that was more because he finally had the times down for when the local train headed out, but at least he was making an effort to be around his clanmates more. The tom was also making more of an effort to provide for more than himself. There was something strangely pleasing about giving a queen a piece of prey caught by your own paws. The way their eyes would light up at the gesture of kindness...There was something to be said about all this sharing business. That didn't mean he was over and done with his loner ways, though. It'd be hard to get rid of the many lessons that had been all but burned into his brain during his gang days...chief among them 'take care of yourself before you take care of others.' Raccoontail was still inclined to make sure he had caught prey for himself before he started looking for a meal for another less fortunate cat. That was what he was doing now. He'd already managed to find a vole for his own meal, and was currently on the hunt for something else to add to the freshkill pile. The fresh scent of mouse was in the air, and he was determined to find its source. Unfortunately for him, he was a little slow on the draw, and another cat, a she-cat, beat him to it. Up for a chat, he made his way over to her as she drew closer to the trees. "That was some fine huntin', ma'am, if you don't mind me sayin' so." Speaking [bg=ffd28f][atrb=width,375,true] [atrb=border,0,true]

[soliel]

Whitethroat looked up and dropped her mouse, alarmed. She hadn't heard Raccoontail come up, but as she sniffed the wind she could clearly find his scent drafting towards her. She berated herself for not paying attention more.

"Oh, Raccoontail! I didn't see you there!" She hid every sign of her surprise from her voice, and instead filled it with a gentle warmth. "I don't suppose you were following this mouse as well, were you? It seems like this is the only prey still living in the forest. I couldn't find the darnedest thing back in the trees. D'you manage to catch anything today?" She purred in amusement, but her eyes were away from him as she picked the mouse back up, and betrayed her contempt for the tom. She padded forward without waiting for his answer, back deeper into the trees where she had heard a lone chaffinch calling. She called out again, over her shoulder.

"You wouldn't mind joining me now, dear, would you? Perhaps we would find more prey and catch some of the blasted birds up in those sycamores." Her voice was sweet and she flicked her tail for him to join her as she padded away. These loners she would have preferred any day over the mindless, pious clan cats, but they still showed no sign of outward intelligence. She did, however, respect them for their self-reliance and their introversion. These were traits she admired in any cat, and detested cats that sacrificed themselves 'for the sake of the clan'. Which is why she felt contempt for Raccoontail, who was attempting to lose his precious separation and trying to be a part of the clan. To her it was going against every fiber of her natural instinct to so much as share her prey. The clan didn't care much; she was a loner and new to the clan, so they allowed her to hunt for herself more often than not. She doubted that if their leader knew, though, she would be forced to give up her meals. And Whitethroat was trying, disgustingly, to share her prey from the fresh-kill pile with her suitors, so she wouldn't alienate them.

[Cloud of Diamonds]

Looks don't matter. Looking does.

At least, that's what Grayheart had told her. She'd rarely seen her parents when she'd been an apprentice, barely even thought about them because she'd been so busy. Now BOOM they shared a den again, which hadn't happened since the Journey. It was great to see them again - she felt guilty, too - but it was almost awkward. It was almost strange having her own parents around, because practically all of her former peers didn't. She almost felt guilty twice over because their parents must be dead or gone or lost, or they'd be here with their children.

Maybe that was the real reason she hadn't visited them; she hadn't wanted to seem abnormal, and unfortunately Palefoot knew she was weird enough already.

Absorbed in her own musings as she ran across the meadow (one of her favorite pastimes) she nearly crashed into Raccoontail and skidded to a stop only paw-lengths from his gray face. Brilliant. Embarrassed again.

"Hi there! Uh, well hi to both of you, I guess. Definitely. How ya doin'?"

Her tabby tail twitched, betraying only a slight hint of her nervousness. Besides the fact of her obvious clumsiness, (strange how she could run gracefully yet trip socially) there was the unspoken political tension. Dim-witted she might be at times, but even the spotted ForestClan-born she-cat had noticed the mutterings against Cedarstar. Unfair they were, too! How dare these former rogues and kittypets think such treacherous thoughts? And yet...and yet she knew they weren't all bad. Some of her friends weren't Clanborn, after all.

Still, she felt it was ungrateful of them, even if she felt a little guilty feeling that, and knew it was probably more complex than she cared to think about.

Which is why she was so nervous in front of these former loner/rogues. What if they were conspiring against ForestClanners, which technically included her, even if she'd been raised in MeadowClan all her life? What if they secretly hated her? She didn't hate them...

Looks don't matter. Looking does.