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Finding out she was pregnant had been an unpleasant shock, at least at first. She knew very well who the little brats’ father was and knowing she was carrying Tadpole’s kits after how he’d treated her made her more than a little furious. And the realization that her mother and father wouldn’t be there for her through it hit hard shortly after, tempering fury with another wave of pain. But in the days since moving to the nursery she had grown to like doing as she pleased and having apprentices bring her prey whenever she liked. She didn’t have to go on any stupid patrols either. Though it did get a little boring, considering how it was getting harder and harder to move, and she was tired more often than not from just moving around camp. She was quite ready to not be pregnant anymore.

That was the thought she had as she lazed outside the nursery, tail flicking with her restlessness as she watched the activity of the Clan through narrowed, envious ice blue eyes. How easily they all trotted about without some stupid tom’s stupid kits weighing down their bellies. It didn’t exactly register with her just yet that they were her kits too. She kept thinking of them as Tadpole’s alone, a curse he had left her with, that she’d be stuck with for the rest of her life.

“MROW!” the surprised yowl escaped her jaws before she even realized it as a ripple of pain went through her all of a sudden, interrupting her sour musing on the father of her kits. Several cats stopped what they were doing to look at her and she bristled under the scrutiny, glaring back as she pushed with some effort to her paws and disappeared back into the nursery. Her legs trembled as another ripple of pain passed through her and she clenched her teeth on it as she settled slowly into her nest. The pain passed, leaving her panting. What in StarClan’s name!?

She lay on her side, panting, but lifted her head as she heard another cat enter the den, seeing Duskflower, the old former queen, now elder. She set a mossball down near her head, dripping water, “I’ve told Sandblaze and Ebonyheart. I do believe you’re kitting, dear.” Her eyes were kind, sympathetic, and glistening with excitement to meet StoneClan’s newest additions. Minkfire’s ears flattened against her head and she hissed as another spasm brought more pain, “Ya think?” Duskflower took the young queen’s bad mood in stride, moving to her head so the medicine cats would have room when they arrived, “Don’t worry, your body knows what to do. Just let it.”

The first kit that came had Duskflower moving away from her to tend to it, but Minkfire was too lost in the process of kitting to worry about it too much. The calico elder never returned to her place at Minkfire’s head, however. Two more kits came before it was over and she was utterly exhausted. Still, she pushed herself up slightly to turn and look at the two kits at her belly, ears flicking in confusion until she turned a tired gaze over to Duskflower, where the old queen sat with a tiny body between her paws, looking sad, “I’m sorry, Minkfire. This one… didn’t make it. It’s a tom… if you’d like to name it. We didn’t want to distress you in the middle of your kitting so we didn’t tell you….”

Minkfire stared at the dead kit, feeling something sick roil in her belly, “Take it away.” She turned her gaze quickly to the two living kits suckling in the curve of her belly and felt an indescribable wave of protectiveness for them, “Go away… leave me alone.” She curled around them, blocking them from any other cat’s view, glaring at Duskflower as if her presence might kill them as well. Duskflower complied quietly, picking up the little bundle and carrying it away. When she was alone again she relaxed a little, pulling back to take a better look at her kits. Tadpole was the farthest thing from her mind. She rasped her tongue first over one and then the other. Maybe they weren’t so bad. They were hers, after all.

Taxx
Newleaf 9 - Dark, sullen clouds crowd the horizon throughout the entire day, with the evening ending in light rain showers that last through the night.