~Warnings: Dead body, talk of murder, blood, hiding a murder~ Snowpelt had broken her promise. Snowpelt had broken her promise to Stormcloud. She had promised not to go after Whitestar for revenge, yet she had. What was she thinking?! Snowpelt stared at Whitestar’s bloody body. What had she been thinking? Snowpelt paused, wait, she hadn’t been thinking. She had been listening. Listening to Shadow. Oh, oh no… Had she even thought about revenge until Shadow told her it was Whitestar’s fault? What had she done? How had Shadow manipulated her so easily? How- Skylight spoke from behind her, saying a word Snowpelt didn’t recognize. Snowpelt looked over her shoulder and paused when she saw Skylight… and Goldenpelt standing there. Skylight stepped forward and snapped “What were you thinking?!” Snowpelt looked back to Whitestar’s dead body. Goldenpelt sighed and padded over, saying “That’s not important right now. Right now, we need to figure out how to hide that Snowpelt murdered Whitestar.” Snowpelt looked at Goldenpelt in confusion. Why was she helping? Goldenpelt’s eyes softened slightly as she said “Our history or not, your mother was my best friend. I’m going to help you, if you’ll let me.” Snowpelt paused, then, tears welling up in her eyes, nodded. Goldenpelt nodded and looked at Skylight. Skylight sighed and said “We need to make it look like an accident… Snowpelt.” Snowpelt flinched and looked at Skylight silently, Skylight ordered “Call the foxes.” Goldenpelt shifted and asked “What?” Skylight sighed and said “Long story, but I think there’s some twoleg trained foxes that Snowpelt figured out how to work with, something with a whistle.” Goldenpelt paused, then said “We can’t fight them. Me and Snowpelt are in no shape to do so.” Skylight glanced around, then said “There’s hiding spots around here. We just need the fox scent, especially around Whitestar. Our story can be that Whitestar and Snowpelt ran into some foxes, and Whitestar told Snowpelt to hide, she did. Whitestar died in the fight, and we showed up just a few moments too late and the three of us fought off the fox together.” Goldenpelt paused, then said “That could work. Especially if Flowersong doesn’t look at the wounds too much.” Skylight shook her head and said “She already knows what happened, or well, she knew it was coming and sent me to try and stop it.” Snowpelt softly said “I should have listened to her…” Skylight nodded and said “Yeah, you should have. But you didn’t, and now we need to fix your mess, otherwise the clan doesn’t have a leader, and you’ll get exiled at the least.” Snowpelt looked back to Whitestar’s body and quietly says “I deserve that.” Goldenpelt shook her head and said “I think we all know you weren’t thinking clearly these last seasons.” Snowpelt shook her head and said “That doesn’t matter. I still killed her. I promised not to do anything like that.” Realizations started dawning like the snowflakes falling around them. “I killed her, and ruined my life. I pushed away everyone. I hurt everyone, you, Flowersong, Brightspot… I made Whitestar paranoid enough that she killed that Shadowclan apprentice, which got Bightspot killed. The battle was my fault, I, I even told that Shadowclan kit about Sunstrike, I ruined everything!” A moment of silence passed, before Snowpelt quietly said “I let her manipulate me so easily…” Goldenpelt tensed and asked “Who is ‘her’?” Snowpelt shrunk and shook her head. Goldenpelt paused, then asked softly “Shadowfall?” Snowpelt flinched, looking at Goldenpelt in confusion. Shadowfall? Was that Shadow? Goldenpelt sighed, then said “We will talk about it later. How do you call the foxes?” Snowpelt paused, then said “A low whistle.” Skylight nodded and said “Hide, both of you.” Goldenpelt nodded and gently herded Snowpelt to an empty spot under the roots of a tree. Snowpelt slipped in and curled up. Goldenpelt slipped in beside her, their pelts pressing together. After a moment, Snowpelt heard Skylight let out a low whistle and hide somewhere else. Goldenpelt spoke quietly “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I was not a good mother to you when you needed me. Maybe if I hadn’t been wrapped up in my own grief… things might’ve turned out differently.” Snowpelt paused, then asked “What were you grieving?" Goldenpelt sighed and said “Much like you, I had just lost my family.” Snowpelt asked “What?” Goldenpelt nodded and said “My mate had died in an accident a moon before. That was hard enough, but I still had hope. To raise my kits alongside Darklight’s. We were both expecting. Mine came first. It was… bad. None of my kits survived. Then Darklight had you and Whitestar… and I lost my best friend and sister.” Snowpelt looked at Goldenpelt in surprise as he asked “Sister?” Goldenpelt nodded and said “Half-sister, but yes. We had the same father, and different mothers. Our mothers were extremely close though… like Skylight and Flowersong.”
Snowpelt slowly nodded. Goldenpelt paused, then said “Shadowfall was Darklight’s mother. She had your paw.” Snowpelt went to respond, but the scent and sound of foxes drew close and Snowpelt looked out as three foxes came into the clearing, looking around until they saw Whitestar’s body. They immediately lunged for it, clawing at her slightly before going picking her up. Snowpelt shook her head and said “That’s enough.” She let out a high whistle, and the foxes paused, then slowly dropped Whitestar’s body and left. Snowpelt and Goldenpelt left their hiding spot, and Snowpelt walked over to Whitestar’s body. She hadn’t deserved that. Snowpelt didn’t forgive her, but Whitestar didn’t deserve that. But it was too late to change anything. Goldenpelt nodded and said “Let's get her back to camp.” Snowpelt nodded and dug into the bloody snow so that she could get under Whitestar. She wasn’t hard to lift. Her frame had gotten so thin, and she was never very muscular. Snowpelt paused. Now that she thought about it, Whitestar had started losing weight when she became leader, and it had just gotten worse when the paranoia set in. A pang of pity shot through Snowpelt. Whitestar should have never become leader. She was never the type of cat that was fit for it, but Ashstar had overlooked that for his own ego, hadn’t he? Snowpelt sighed. Goldenpelt lightly touched Snowpelt’s side, nodding. Snowpelt silently started walking to camp, her mind swirling. She had broken her promise. She had killed Whitestar. She had promised Stormcloud, and Flowersong had told her just how seriously he took promises. Why had she let Shadow, Shadowfall manipulate her? Shadowfall… her grandmother. The one she had inherited her paw from. Things made more sense now, all the details about Shadow. How she seemed to know things Snowpelt didn’t. Now that Snowpelt thought about it, it felt obvious. She talked about things like she had been here, all of those looks and whispers at gatherings had been because she shared the same paw as her grandmother… that windclan cat, Crookedscar, he had been about to call Snowpelt Shadowfall, hadn’t he? What kind of cat was Shadowfall? Not a good one. How had Snowpelt been so stupid? Shadow was encouraging her to kill! She had even possessed her that one time! How had she ever thought Shadow might be a starclan cat? The grandmother part made sense too, why she looked like Snowpelt. Shadowfall had always pushed her away from certain things… she could feel it now with her absence. Shadow had been actively manipulating all of her thoughts, hadn’t she? She- Snowpelt was jolted out of her thoughts by Goldenpelt saying “Deep breath, we’re almost to the entrance. Looks like Cloudfrost is there.” Snowpelt took a deep breath and strode forward. Cloudfrost let out a yelp and rushed forward, asking “What happened?! Whitestar…” Snowpelt just shook her head. She couldn’t bring herself to speak. Cloudfrost looked at Skylight, who quietly said “Foxes. We were too late.” Cloudfrost paused, then nodded and said “O-ok. Um, do you need help carrying her?” Snowpelt shook her head and walked into camp, her eyes focused on the ground. She ignored cats’ gasps and questions, letting Skylight answer them. Snowpelt carefully laid Whitestar’s limp body on the ground. She stared at the bloodied pelt as snow fell around her and her sister. Could things have been different? If Darklight had lived, if Snowpelt wasn’t born with this paw, if Ashstar hadn’t chosen Whitestar over her, if Snowpelt hadn’t listened to Shadowfall, if Whitestar had gone against Ashstar, if Stormcloud had lived, if Snowpelt had pushed Shadowfall away, if Snowpelt had known about Shadowfall, if Snowpelt, if anyone had made a single different choice, maybe things would have been different. Maybe Whitestar wouldn’t be dead at Snowpelt’s paws. Maybe things wouldn’t have ended like this. If a single thing had been different, things could have been less tragic. But they hadn’t. Maybe this was always how it was going to be. Maybe it didn’t have to be, but it was going to. How was Snowpelt supposed to even keep going? “Snowpelt?” Snowpelt flinched at her name, the last thing Shadow had said. ‘Congrats on finally taking your revenge, Snowpelt’ Snowpelt didn’t want to hear her name anymore. Nonetheless, Snowpelt glanced up at who had spoken to her. Skylight. Skylight nodded over at high rock and said “You need to make an announcement. You're the leader now. You can’t wallow again, you need to lead.” ~First~ https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1066586971/ ~Previous~ https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1320713208/ ~Next~ Mid July Heads up, this is the last chapter you're getting before I go to work at a camp from June 14 to July 10, I may be able to write chapters, but I won't have the time to post. I was gonna post 54 before I left... but it's not gonna be finished. Love you all, and I'm excited to bring you into Act 4! Hope you liked it, and I can't wait to hear your thoughts!
