Azaleamask

Lichenclan

tortoiseshell and white she-cat with gold eyes

Dainty and fair, Azaleamask's posture is nothing if not underwhelming, a petite package with very few extruding angles or shapes. The tortoiseshell possesses a rather delicate stature, even when compared to her clanmates. Her stature consists of gentle curves and slender bends. Only occasionally does the she-cat come up to the shoulder of the average lichen-clan cat. Her limbs are slender and bird-like, emphasizing her narrow build. Even the fur on her tail does not extend outwards by far, a slim appendage with few feathers.

Dwarfed by some taller cats, the difference between Azaleamask and her clanmates is further accentuated by the voluptuous length of her fur. Her pelt is feathery in texture, clinging densely to her sides in soft, wispy strands. It hangs loosely near the base of her tail and flares out near her chest. The she-cat is predominantly covered in a swath of nighttime black and adorned with bands and speckles of ginger, gold, and other autumnal hues in tortoiseshell patterns. The stripes are most prominent near her breast and neck-scruff before reducing in intensity near her backside. Her tail is entirely black. Her ruff is snowy white, as well as her belly and the irregular patches on her sides.

Distinctive chiseled lines come together to form a captivating face, small but deceptively soft. Azaleamask's visage features the same explosion of vibrant colors that bear greater resemblance to her woodland neighbors. While primarily an ebony expanse, patches of bright russet and orange appear above her eyes and the bottom of her chin, and the top of her chin is snowy white.

Azaleamask's personality belies her diminutive size. In a clan fond of cold hearts and quiet whispers, she stands out as a beacon of warmth. Highly gregarious, the she-cat thrives in group settings, where her knack for conversation and easygoing charisma make her a skilled conversationalist. Due to the fact that she grew up as an only child, Azaleamask grew up with a communal viewpoint on clan life. She believes that she does not merely owe her duties to her family and name, but her clan too. The she-cat can often be found assisting other warriors in their duties, whether it's towards a rebellious apprentice or a communal hunt.

With half of her life-time spent under oppression, the she-cat has developed a rather jaded view of Lichenclan. She loves her clan, sure, but she refuses to be relegated to a mere drone. Azaleamask defies the gender stereotypes conferred upon most she-cats with open criticism of the status quo. Throughout her life, she found that falling in line with oppression felt stifling instead of freeing. A fiercely defiant individual, Azaleamask's temper is hard to quell, and once provoked, the she-cat can be hard to calm down again.

Additionally, her dislike for Lichenclan traditions and her experience under Minnowstar's oppression have forged her into a rather cynical cat that views blind obedience with disdain. Azaleamask's outspoken approach has garnered a few enemies over the years, including staunch conservatives and traditionalists within Lichenclan. The she-cat has learned to remain guarded over the years, mostly for her safety. However, underneath the surface, her fire has not diminished.

After the war, Azaleamask has learned to cherish the family she has left: easier to focus on those close to her than those she had lost. Feeling like it was her duty to protect the younger generation from the negative consequences rebels like her faced under tyranny, she's been forced to balance her independent nature with their safety. Defiant words formerly uttered so freely have been toned down, meaning hidden in the subtext. Some things simply cannot be said out loud. Still, Azaleamask longs for a life without fetters, and struggles to balance the need for safety with independence.

A single she-cat born to her two prodigious parents, Azaleakit survived where her siblings Warblerkit and Raptorkit did not. The weakened Sandpelt only barely had the strength to lap at her daughter's pelt, her form listless and exhausted. Not only had she lost two kits, but her labor had nearly killed her. She gazed upon her sole surviving daughter, already moving about and squalling for milk. She would be the only hope for the family now.

As an only child, Azaleakit found herself facing significant pressure from her strict parents. She reluctantly sat through stories of Starclan's glorious path for all the she-cats of Lichenclan, their rightful role in Clan life. Namely, that all she-cats were destined to bear good, strong kits - like herself - to the nursery. She would have a loving mate who would watch over her for all her moons; best of all, she would be happy and comfortable. It was the life any mother would want for her kits. And this knowledge should have been easy to impart upon her, for she was an only child with no sisters to look after and no brothers to make her envious.

But she remembered the words Sandpelt uttered in her critique of her daughter, how Azaleakit was always behaving so "un-she-cat-like." The she-cat trained her daughter tirelessly, not in the arts of a warrior but instead of those of courtship and care. Her destiny had been determined by her birth, and her mother was determined to prepare her for her future as a queen. It was the destiny of her mother, and her mother before her.

Like the majority of she-cats, Azaleapaw's training was restricted to that which would benefit her as a future queen. The she-cat was assigned to Ivyflower. The gentle she-cat was full of warm smiles and guidance, a welcomed break from her cold mother. Mentor and apprentice forged a strong bond. However, even Ivyflower's warm presence was unable to shield the apprentice from Lichenclan's unstable environment. Fear loomed over every cat. At any moment, one of them could be dragged forth by Minnowstar's loyalists and questioned. Any cat worthy of suspicion was either demoted from rank, thrown into the stone catacombs, or worse, banished. All done in the name of Starclan and Their holy vision. The persecution every Lichenclan cat faced was not lost on the she-cat. She began to question the veracity of her parent's teachings.

Having the "right" mate in Lichenclan could determine one's fate and social standing for the rest of one's life. Much of a she-cat's value came from her ability to marry well. As the only surviving kit in her litter, the fate of her family's reputation rested entirely on Azaleapaw's shoulders. Initially, Sandpelt urged her daughter to look within her age group to see if there were any male apprentices she was attracted to. Only a female apprentice one moon her senior, Cranepaw, caught her eye. Azaleapaw was drawn to the she-cats graceful poise, easy laugh, and elegance. The two grew closer as the she-cat's fondness evolved into borderline infatuation.

Cranepaw even promised that the two of them could become warriors together.

It wasn't long before Azaleapaw realized that she was not into toms. At all. She would much rather have a molly be her mate. She would much rather have Cranepaw.

Incentivized by her friend's offer, Azaleapaw passed her assessment with flying colors and gained her warrior name at 12 moons old. Azaleamask. A strange name; perhaps given with some insight into how she so cleverly concealed her rebellious tendencies from the watchful eyes of those around her. During her confession, she looked around eagerly for her mother or father, but her parents were no where to be found. Her heart sunk. She turned around to go celebrate with Cranefeather.

Two weeks later, Azaleamask decided to break the news to her friend with wildflowers in tow. It did not go as planned. Her friend only shook her head. Whether because of duty or personal choice, her friend could only reject her offer. But Azaleamask decided to respect Cranefeather's choice and turned away from her permanently. So much for being a bleeding heart. As she cried herself to sleep that night, anger festered in her heart.

For two whole moons, Azaleamask pushed herself farther into her role as a warrior. She became a regular at Bristlefur's training sessions, honing her claws and muscles fastidiously. The she-cat admired the tenacity of the other female warriors, Duckpuddle and Emberscorch, even if they were fighting to keep Minnowstar in power.

But Azaleamask still had a duty to fulfil to her clan. All the better to hide the appearance of rebellious thoughts. It wasn't long before her mother told her only daughter of both her arrangement to Crowflight, the grandson to the blue-blooded Caveflower. Sandpelt knew the value of their bloodline. Under the watch of her hawkish mother, the she-cat could only put a smile on her face, despite knowing that she would never love him back.

Despite her best attempts to connect with her mate, their relationship soured. Especially when she revealed that she would not have biological kits for the rest of her life. While the couple tried to put on a civil front in public, the tom would demean and belittle her in private. His temper was short, leading to no shortage of confrontations and shouting matches. It wasn't long before the normally upbeat shecat became emotionally drained and fatigued. Resentment strained her relationship with her parents, especially her mother.

Still, Sandpelt decided to give her wayward daughter one more chance to fall in line. If she would not have kits, then perhaps at the very least, she could help raise them. The she-cat soon birthed her second litter, a litter of four daughters: Flowerkit, Tulipkit, Petalkit, and Petuniakit.

Azaleamask never wanted to be a queen, but she loved her sisters to the ends of the earth. Devotion, not duty kept her around the nursery. It was a welcome distraction from her mate's cruelty after all. But her ears were not ignorant to the conservative rhetoric Sandpelt fed her daughters. Her mouth set in a stubborn line. Too much was going on in the clan for her sisters to be raised with ignorance and passivity. This wasn't the time for her dear sisters to sit back as pretty obedient queens hoping to woo the first tom that caught their eye.

Cats like Lavendermist, and Emberscorch were living proof of this fact.

There was only so much she could say in front of the overly watchful Sandpelt. But whenever the kits came to visit her on their own terms, Azaleamask made her opinions clear. Copious hours in the nursery were spent disputing or outright rejecting the traditional ideals spouted by her mother. Opinions she was not afraid to fight over.

Eventually, Sandpelt caught on. And what she heard her kits bravely spout from their little mouths infuriated her. She turned on her eldest daughter, going on a lengthy verbal tirade about how such indelicate ideals were not fit for the young minds of her kits. Her insults exploded across the nursery, where the other queens clicked their tongues and muttered in disapproval. Azaleamask's tail lashed from side to side as her mother spat horrible insults before proceeding to disown her altogether.

Her eyes went wide with shock as the emotional and political implications sank in. Up until now, she had her mother's status to protect her from any potential consequences of her rebellious actions. In muted horror, she watched as her mother took the she-cat's nest and threw it in her face. She had no place in the nursery now. Not with Sandpelt. Not with her siblings. She didn't stay to hear her mother assert her love over her wayward child.

Azaleamask continued forward in a state of heightened emotional turmoil. Connections that she had cherished in the past soon went cold as she began to distance herself from her companions. Lichenclan's increasingly unstable political condition and duties to her mate were all that kept the numbness at bay. Plagued by insomnia, she often spent nights alone in the sea-caves, training in the fighting arts. Anger previously suppressed on the surface came rushing out on the solemn stones, fueling the swipes of her claws. Minnowstar's increasingly feral demeanor promised one thing: war would be coming soon.

As inevitable as the newleaf rains, war swept across the horizon. Rogues swept into every crevice of Lichenclan, a literal embodiment of the corruption of the Dark Forest at work. But this strangely excited the she-cat. These were the examples of cats that she was working to eliminate. It was easier to fight an enemy right in front of her than one that lurked in the shadows. Inviting the rogues would be Minnostar's undoing. The last straw.

The final battle came like some physical manifestation of Starclan's will, at once horrible and divine. The battle stripped Crowflight from her side, and he died defending his clan, as any good Lichenclan tom would. When the fighting ceased, Minnowstar was dead. Starclan had set Lichenclan free from the punishing wrath of the Heron line in a single breath. Azaleamask let her yowls be heard loud and clear as she cheered to her new future, bright as the morning sun.


The waters came in the dead of night. Breaking into camp and pouring into their dens with a horrible and unstoppable wrath. Cries of horror erupted in the caverns as more and more cats became aware of the sudden flood. The leafbare before this had brought with it a voluminous amount of snow, and all of the melt had to go somewhere.

But hadn't the clan suffered enough already? Azaleamask could only watch in horror as many of her clanmates were swept under, limbs previously adapted to swimming helpless against the fury of the raging tide. Suddenly, it seemed as if Starclan's punishment was upon them. Somehow, they made it to shore, resting under the shadows of the towering boughs of Redwoodclan territory. But in the wake of the floodwater's fury, only the screams of two cats mattered.

Horror drenched Azaleamask when Petalpaw led her to the waterlogged figures of her mother, father, and sisters. They were all dead. Her sisters had no one now. Remembering their time together in the nursery, she drew Petalpaw and Petuniapaw into an awkward embrace. She was no queen. But she was their big sister.

After that, however, relationships remained stilted. Forced into the caretaker role, Azaleamask felt awkward and out-of-place. This wasn't her element. She had little idea how to be a caring cat after all, having spent so long taking care of herself. But, she took it one day at a time, facing the future and all it had to bring.