MOONLIGHT BROKEN

BY BURNING BRANCHES

Tribe of Floating Stones

a white patched she-cat with one yellow eye and one blue

Moonlight is a distinctively unimposing figure of slight build. She is shorter than the average cat, but not by much, and lacks the long limbs and agile build of many preyhunters. She is compact in her musculature, though she does not appear to be particularly strong and fast. Moonlight is a stealth hunter, slowly stalking prey or climbing trees to leap at birds and squirrels rather than chasing hares or using broad paws to catch fish.

In color, Moonlight is primarily white in color. Her fur is pale and snowy, broken by patches of tabby ginger and brown like slowly melting snow in the spring. The spots of color appear at random along her back, around her muzzle and chin, on the backs of both ears, and the majority of her plumed tail. Her fur is long but not poofy or flowing and elegant, not allowing her to seem any larger than she is as it stays relatively close to her body except for the plume of her tail.

Moonlight has a small rounded head with gently sloped cheeks and a petite muzzle and mouth. Her nose is meager upon her face, spotted with dull brown, pink, and dusty salmon. One eye is a golden amber color, and the other a pale blue. Her ears are tall and sit on the top of her head, and whisps of white fur protrude from them along a scattering of straight, short whiskers.

After being trapped in her family den during the fire, Moonlight suffered a series of burns to her back and hind legs. While they have grown much less conspicuous with time, fur is still sparse in places, and her skin is warped and is purple tinted in places where her scars remain most noticiable. Outside of occassional aches or chills from missing fur during the cold, Moonlight has never suffered any physical weakness in the areas since she was a kitten.

Moonlight values clarity and truth, whether it be in conversation or otherwise. She acts sincerely and with thought, and thinks before she talks. If someone asks her for an opinion, she will give it honestly but not necessarily cruelly. Instead, she will be forward and direct, explaining both the good and bad of what she thinks in equal measure. Despite her pessimistic nature, Moonlight does see a lot of good in the world and will not hesitate to bring it to the attention of others when she thinks it is deserved. She makes decisions quickly and effectively more often than not and acts without second-guessing herself.


It is upon instinct that Moonlight judges herself and others around her. She does not have to think about it long before she draws comparisons between herself and peers, noticing the differences between them, and either deeming herself better or worse off than they are. Having experienced many hardships, Moonlight judges those who do not appreciate the good in their lives harshly. She is quick witted and sharp tongued, more than capable of sharing such judgement with those that she doesn't like. Moonlight often imagines bad things happening to those who have wronged her, whether it be a real slight or an imagined one committed against her. She rarely forgives, and would prefer her enemies to suffer at her paws rather than be uninvolved with their futures. Of course, she judges herself just as harshly, and when her judgement is too intense for her to handle, she will project her hatred onto others.


Moonlight is extremely defensive of both those she holds dear as well as ideologies that she finds close to her heart. She is quick to act to protect, despite her noted weakness in physical combat. There are times where she will knowingly go against her logical instincts and put herself in danger if she thinks it might help someone she cares about. She will also put everything on the line for ideologies she believes strongly in, and will defend them against those who might try to change her mind or inhibit her tribe from following her ideals.


Many strong opinions are what makes Moonlight who she is. There are very few things she doesn't feel strongly about one way or the other but finds unique passion in regard to the success of her sister and child, the need to hold all cats accountable for harm they might've caused, and the necessity of a balanced tribe in regard to the divide between preyhunters and stoneguards. She does also feel strongly about the involvement of the tribe in the clan's politics instead of letting her people play as a distant pawn with no say in their future, as they have been seen by the clans in the past. Not even threat of punishment could silence her when she feels strongly about something, a fact that has gotten her and those she loves in trouble in the past. Her passions do give her something valuable to live for outside of the few close relationships she has, for she genuinely believes (sometimes incorrectly) that she knows what's best to do and wants to enact the changes that she thinks would benefit her people.

great-uncle: ridge where eagles roost (adopt)
mother: sky where thunder roars (blitz)
father: flint beneath rushing water
littermate: star shining on blackened petals (silverfire)

mate: martin that leaps from stone to stone
child: foxtail carried by wind (captain)


Everything before the fire has anyways been a blur. Occasionally, Moonlight would get brief glimpses of a happy past. She'd recall moments at her mother's warm belly, gleefully listening to stories of her ancestors. She'd practice her swipes with her father, her sister playfully leaping onto his broad back as the pair tried to tackle him to the ground. She could remember whispered conversations between herself and Star, shared while both parents were asleep, but Moonlight never could remember exactly what they had been talking about. What would a kit think to say at a mere one moon old?

And then there was the pain, the loss, the image of her father's body charred and burnt, grey and white furs turned black with soot and death. Her mother, her sister, both gone. Both leaving her, abandoning her to the loss of her entire family in one night.

For many moons, she blamed the ancestors. She heard others gossiping quietly when they thought she was asleep. She had been destined for this tragedy - it had been ordained within the vision Fog had seen within her name. That he had seen one dead, and one alive, and had named then in tandem - two kittens in the same dark vision. Of a tree, lit by the light of the moon, cradling the stars between the flowers that grew from its branches. Of the tree aflame, of the moon swallowed by the fire, of the glittering stars, shimmering stubbornly against the black and pale of ashy petals.

Her survival had not been anticipated when the news of her family's demise reached the ears of the masses. Of both of the kittens, wouldn't it be Star that lived? Instead of an omen for her own death, Moonlight was an omen of her family's ruin, a fact that haunted her more even than the memory of her father's visage. Instead, she bore the burns of her survival, reminders that would always haunt her even when the details of her childhood memories faded.

After the death of her parents, Moonlight was taken in by a kindly young kit-mother with milk to spare. She had lost both of her kits in the fire, and despite the grief, would feed Moonlight as well as two others who had lost their mother too young - Melody and Sparrow. While the queen did feed Moonlight, she did nothing to care for her, and Moonlight separated herself intently from Melody and Sparrow and their still-sizable family.

The only one left to claim her was her great uncle, a tom she had never known well before the events of the fire. It was him who brought her back to his den and gave her a home and a guiding paw to lead her to a future where she could function without her immediate family's presence.


Moonlight and Ridge grew incredibly close, and as she became a to-be, the connection grew even stronger as he helped her grow and train. With barely any happy memories of her own father, Moonlight thought of the tom as the closest thing to a father that she's ever known.

Initially a bit of a loner, Moonlight's to-be days were spent learning with older tribemates without many peers to influence her. That was until she met Martin, who immediately connected with her through shared circumstances. The young tom had lost most of his own family in the fire as well, leaving both young cats with a similar anger towards the world. In Martin's case, he directed much of his resentment towards the teller, Sumac. Not remembering a time before Sumac's reign, Moonlight listened to the young cat's stories of Fog with perked ears.

As they train further, Moonlight quickly proves to be not particularly skilled in either fighting or hunting. With practice, she becomes capable, but is secretly jealous of Martin's persistence to join the guards, as well as several of the other to-bes who seem to have predestined fates. It makes her feel even further that her survival was a mistake.

Moonlight was assigned a preyhunter fledgling promptly by Sumac, not long after Martin, Tooth, Scream, and Whisker are all assigned the rank. She is torn between hating Sumac for preventing the others from following their destinies while also feeling guilty about being content with her assignment. As she continued to train, she had become more and more skilled of a hunter, and her size and physique only made her look the part. She pretends to be angry, speaking out after her ceremony with Martin, and her rations are cut in response. Hungry, she and Martin bond further over their distrust of Sumac and his regime, slowly getting closer and closer.

That was until Martin spoke too loudly, and Sumac arrived unprompted at the tom's den. Moonlight watched Sumac leaving the den when she had been headed to gather Martin for the day, and her stomach dropped with fear. She raced to him, finding him hungry and angry but not sent to the island of prisoners with Claw and the others. Moonlight curses at him, finally admitting the feelings that had been building. They lay together all day and night, ignoring their duties to spend time with each other as lovers instead of solely friends.

It is not more than a moon before Moonlight realizes she is pregnant. She confesses this to Ridge, who's den she still lives in. The tom vows to aid her and to help her raise her kits while she continues her fledgling training in order to become a fully fledged preyhunter. Martin finds out not long after, and promises to join dens with her and move into Ridge's den, against her great-uncle's better judgement.

Martin never does make his nest in Ridge's den. Despite the full prey-pile, food rampent with the fair weather, Martin is forbidden from taking from it. He swims to the far islands in search of food when a great storm comes. A flood rises on the shores of the tribe island, once again displacing Moonlight as Ridge's den is underwater when the sky clears. Martin is never found. Moonlight has no one to blame but herself for letting him leave - for not sneaking prey for him. She cannot bear the guilt, so she blames Sumac instead.

Not long after, Moonlight gives birth in the quiet of Ridge's den without the teller's aid. For a brief while, the single bright ginger kitten is without a name as Moonlight refuses to allow Ridge to fetch Sumac. Several days later, after the news has reached the teller, Sumac arrives and declares the vision he had for the young kitten. Moonlight thanks the ancestors that the vision was so peaceful and soft and gives her child the name Foxtail carried by wind.

Slowly, Moonlight begins to leave the den once again. She notices the gossip of those around her, the whispers that follow her, the eyes that turn to her when she walks into the clearing, and she knows that the others see her as she sees herself. She was a fool, to become pregnant so young, and now, her tribe judged her for it.

Moonlight was desperate to prevent Foxtail from experiencing the life that she did. She protected Foxtail from the world and from politics, not speaking about Sumac or Fog or anything else that could lead to a conflicting view of the world as anything other than pure and kind. She played pretend with Foxtail, spoke fondly to imaginary friends, and comforted her child whenever Foxtail would whimper in her sleep with fits of nightmares. Only Ridge was allowed to get close, everyone else, Moonlight carefully decided the extent that they could interact with her daughter, only letting others speak or play with her if they swore they would not bring up the danger or sadness of the world.

Despite the taboo nature of Sumac's death, Moonlight is silently glad for it. Without Sumac to blame for her problems, she turns instead to other authority figures that were unable to protect her family from the fire, or were unable to stop Sumac from allowing Martin to die. A deep bitterness has infiltrated her, a discontentment that she struggles to manage whenever she thinks about anyone who might've stopped the world from being so harsh to her.


Moonlight can hardly believe her eyes as she sees Sky for the first time. Even moreso, she sees a version of herself and knows that, this whole time that she thought she was the only one left, her sister had been alive as well. Anger flares within her, suddenly deciding that her mother had stolen her sister away from her and left her to die in the fire. She vows to aid her sister's reintegration, and to prevent her mother from influencing her daughter too deeply.