These kits had fallen slowly into its life, instead of all at once, like the others had. The first time Jessaminefaith saw the kits, the sun was setting. Mewls came from the nursery, came from kits who no queen had returned to camp to comfort. Mei sat with them then, calming their mournful mewls. Their mother came back, sure. But late that night. Jessaminefaith was awake when the gray she-cat's face finally poked through the nursery entrance, when she came and replaced the deputy at the kits' side without a word of acknowledgement between them. Mei arrived in the morning to check on them, and watched at their mother and her mate, their father, abandoned their daughters, not even close to a moon old, to go for a walk in the woods. It shrugged, and went to sit with the kits once again, keeping them warm as the morning's cold air settling into their bones. Their heartbeats small and steady at eir side. Their mother didn't come back that night, instead returning, laughing with their father as they sat together in a spot of sunshine. They didn't even come to check on the kits. Mei didn't quite know how to process this. What parent would care so little for two perfect daughters? It learned their names from other nursery queens. Not the kits' names, no one seemed to know those, but their parents. Appleblossom and Twigfoot. The day after and after, and after, for half a moon, Jessamine had taken these kits as one of its duties. E was there for the things their parents should have been there for. For when eyes fluttered open. For when mewls became words. For when wobbles became steps. For when their small paws first stumbled over each other on their way out of the nursery. Jessaminefaith didn't know their names, but it started calling them by new ones, or perhaps their first ones, is the parents hadn't yet named them. Fantasykit and Historykit. E didn't remember when the kits slumbering at eir side became its own. Perhaps it was when they first clung to eir pelt as it tried to step out of the nursery, or maybe not until the kits' parents walked out of camp for the last time. Oh, that day... Jessaminefaith saw no difference that time, when Appleblossom and Twigfoot left. Their pawprints led off the territory, winding far into the unknown territories. When the sun set, Jessaminefaith had to tell these kits, wide-eyed and confused that their parents weren't coming back. That it wasn't that they'd died, but they'd simply not loved them enough to stay. And remembered, how the kits had been quiet. And how that night, for the very first time, they called it Lullaby before they drifted off to sleep. And Mei loved them so, so much.
