[BlooRey DVD]

[smear:999999]Feathercloud[/smear:ffffff]

~~~~~~~~~

The silver feline had long since blocked out the steady trickling sound of the Sparkling Brook. She enjoyed hunting here because that steady background noise had a tendency to block out the sound of her paw steps. It gave prey a false sense of security, masking the telltale signs that a predator was closing in on the helpless creatures. Feathercloud's silver ears were pricked forward, flicking to and fro, trying to pick out the sound of the closest prey. She could hear signs of life all around her, birds calling to one another in the tree tops, unaware that she was listening to their conversation.

It didn't matter that she couldn't understand even the smallest fraction of whatever it was they were screeching at one another. Every sound they made gave Feathercloud a better idea of just where they were. Slowly, she was honing in on the location of a particularly noisy blackbird, one that had been grating on her nerves since she had first arrived at the Sparkling Brook to do some hunting. She glanced around slowly, keeping herself hidden in the undergrowth. She was certain that the particular bird she was chasing was close by. She just had to wait for her confirmation...

A loud screech sounded directly above her, and the silver cat shot into action. Her hind legs bunched beneath her as she prepared herself, claws slipping out of their sheaths. When she pushed forward, leaping upwards, her pin-sharp claws latched into the bark of the tree. Ice blue eyes snapped to the lowest branch, calculating the distance she would have to shimmy up the trunk in order to get there. Figuring it was about three or four of her body when stretched out, she gritted her teeth, forcing herself to stretch, clawing her way steadily up the trunk.

When her claws finally made contact with the lowest tree branch, the silver she-cat gave a silent sigh of relief. The hardest part was over. Flexing her claws to give them a break, Feathercloud tipped her head upwards, squinting to peek through the foliage, hoping to glimpse the bird she was chasing. When she spotted it, the silver feline focused on the best way to get herself there. Her claws hooked into the tree trunk once more, using it as a safety method as she stretched upwards for the next branch. Her tall frame made reaching branches easy, and her lithe build meant she didn't have too much bulk to haul either.

Using the hind claws that were hooking into the trunk as leverage, Feathercloud hauled herself another branch higher, and then another. Steadily, she weaved among the branches of the tree, her speed increasing as the space between branches diminished the higher she climbed. Soon enough she was at the same height as the bird. It glanced about, thinking it might have heard something, but the silver feline was on the overside of the main trunk, keeping herself well out of sight as she continued to climb to a height that was higher than her intended prey.

Once she was a good branch or two above the bird, she circled the trunk, trying to pinpoint the perfect branch to fall from in order to snag the blackbird. The bird wasn't on a particularly skinny portion of a branch, and over all the branch looked fairly sturdy. She figured it would take her weight when she fell onto it. Shuffling out onto the branch above it, timing her movements with the cries emitted by her prey as it answer the call that was further off, Feathercloud soon found herself in the prime position.

She waited a moment, waited as the bird puffed out its chest, preparing to make its reply. When it gave a cawing sound. the silver warrioress dropped from the branch, landing as lightly as she could manage. Paws aimed for its neck, eliminating the possibility for it to sound its alarm call. Moving swiftly, Feathercloud killed the bird, ignoring the call of the bird her prey had been conversing with. Making sure she had a good hold of it, the silver she-cat began her climb down, the confused cries of the other bird her background noise.

Finally her paws made contact with the ground below, and Feathercloud stretched slightly, blackbird still clenched in her jaws.

Tags: Phoenix

[Phoenix]

Wormpaw
and you ask me what i want this year
and i try to make this kind and clear
just a chance that maybe we'll find better days

- - -

Wow.

When he had decided to walk along the Sparkling Brook, he had hardly expected to see an example of Feathercloud’s prowess when it came to tree climbing. As yellow-green eyes spotted the familiar shape of the she-cat whom he no longer made an active effort to avoid, he had stopped dead when she leapt toward the trunk of the tree, simply watching as she appeared to be hunting something. A bird? No, it couldn’t be, could it? But there she was, scaling the tree as if she had done so all her life, with an ease and comfortable air that he sorely lacked when it came to taking his paws off of solid ground. Her lean frame seemed to fly from branch to branch as his jaw dropped and he brushed away the jealousy beginning to coil in his gut. There was no need for that emotion, not when this was an ability that either came naturally or one that she had obviously worked long and hard to refine and perfect. Startled squawks alerted him to her success – she had been hunting a bird – and his eyes grew wide as she landed easily on the ground moments later, completely unshaken by her venture into the trees. In her jaws rested the limp form of her victim: a bird plucked from its element by the jaws of death.

The striped tom moved forward from the undergrowth in which he had paused to watch, revealing his position to the she-cat somewhat awkwardly. Despite their heart-warming confession session, he still felt slightly odd around the she-cat – less so than he did Lionstar, however – because a small part of him wondered if Feathercloud truly believed that he had forgiven her. She seemed to have been rather hard on herself that day, and though she might have accepted his forgiveness then, he knew that opinions could easily change after a few days to really consider the event. Still, he thought it worthwhile to compliment her on her climbing prowess, which he had had the honor of witnessing.

”That—That was a really good catch, Feathercloud,” Wormpaw spoke up by way of greeting, voice soft and awe in his eyes. He wished he could climb like that, with the confidence and ease that she had. If he could, then there was no way he would have missed that squirrel, which had symbolized far more than a squirrel, in his hunt with Crimsonpaw. The disappointment in himself at that particular failure still rested on the forefront of his mind, and even though she was now a warrior and himself still an apprentice, he could not help but to think that the silver she-cat before him would not have played right into the spotted apprentice’s paws. It was what Crimsonpaw had wanted, of course – he had hinted at it the whole time, what with his liberal use of insults toward Lionstar – to find a shortcoming of the leader’s apprentice and use it to reflect back on the golden tom, but Wormpaw couldn’t help but feel guilty that he had done such a bad job of representing the leader.

He was glad, of course, that Crimsonpaw was satisfied, but he only wished that that satisfaction had not been at the expense of another cat.

With a small smile drawing the corners of his lips upward, the young tom looked up at the older she-cat. ”You’re really good at climbing,” He complimented her easily, earnestly. The words rolled off his tongue with little thought, even though he meant every one of them. If only I could be that good.

- - -

i wish everyone was loved tonight
and somehow stop this endless fight
just a chance that maybe we'll find better days

[BlooRey DVD]

[smear:999999]Feathercloud[/smear:ffffff]

~~~~~~~~~

To say that the silver she-cat had been expecting the tom to appear from the undergrowth would have been a lie. She'd been so caught up in her hunt that all her senses had been trained upon the bird, and as she had begun her climb down, she'd had nothing but a face full of feathers. Her silver paws had landed as delicately as was possible when you couldn't quite see them, her muscles bunching to accommodate the sudden weight. Ice blue eyes flicked up just in time to see Lionstar's current apprentice exiting the bushes, and seemingly headed her way.

Her eyes were wide it surprise for a moment, mainly because she hadn't been aware that Wormpaw had been there at all. Despite her surprise, there was a warmth, if not a slight awkwardness, in her gaze. She remembered the conversation that they had had, accompanied by Lionstar, just before her ceremony. She hadn't seen the wall they had unintentionally been building between each other. Now that it had been destroyed, or at least begun to be destroyed... The silver feline felt a lot less stressed, and a little more comfortable around the younger tom. It helped to learn the reason behind Lionstar's choice too.

When he spoke up, silver ears rotated forwards as she blinked at him for a moment. Lowering her head so that she might drop her catch and face the tom once more, she offered him a genuine, warm smile. "Oh! Well.. Thank you Wormpaw, it was a lucky catch, I guess. The bird really could have flown away at any moment, but something tells me they aren't exactly the smartest creatures." She grinned as she spoke, the tension leaving her with every word she said. Her silver tail danced contently behind her as she regarded Wormpaw with kind blue eyes.

The tall feline glanced up towards the tree she'd just climbed, something akin to fondness in her eyes. "Means a lot to hear someone say that. To be honest... There is nothing that I like more than climbing trees. I could give up running, fighting, everything, as long as I could keep on climbing. I'm not much good if I can't scale these trees." Tipping her head back down to look at him, she offered a warm smile. "I'm too tall to squeeze into tight spaces, and I'm not strong enough to fight paw to paw against warriors of similar height to mine. Not often that I find a great spar partner. But trees... They give me an advantage, that's for sure."

With one paw, she rolled her catch slightly, obviously not fully aware of her motions. She wasn't ruining the bird, barely touching it really, she was simply fiddling mindlessly as she spoke. After considering Wormpaw for a minute, she let herself lower into a seated position, tipping her head to the side and regarding the tom cat with a rather fascinated stare. "Say... Do you climb trees very often? I've seen a lot of cats climb, but I don't think I've ever seen you climb... You and Crimsonpaw are the two that stand out for me in that department."

At the mention of Crimsonpaw's name, a flash of distrust slunk through her eyes. She could still remember her spar with him, her notion that something wasn't right with him. The wounds she had walked away from that fight with were evidence enough. Even though she had never once pulled out her claws against him, he had continued attacking her with a merciless brutality. There was something within her that told her that if she hadn't have won that spar, he would have done a significant amount of damage. And yet... How could she prove that?