as beautiful as silverpelt(silver&starling)

Slipping free from the medicine cat’s den, Silverflower’s ears were folded back with worry. It seemed that her daughter, Drizzlepaw, had eaten a bad piece of prey, and now she was quite ill. Nest-ridden under Brackenfang’s care, Silverflower’s daughter simply had to rest and keep drinking water from the soggy moss bundles she was given, and eventually the waves of nausea would work themselves out.

In the end, the situation was nowhere near as bad as it could had been, and Silverflower counted herself lucky that Drizzlepaw hadn’t eaten something completely rotten or spoiled.

Sighing, the light-furred queen’s head lowered until the top of it dipped below the peaks of her shoulder blades. She needed a task to work out her anxieties, and she needed a cat to confide her worries to. A quick sweep of her eyes across the camp revealed a target that seemed to need her attentive care just as much as she needed to give it—Starlingflight. His fur messy and filthy from his time spent hunting in the forests with Wasppaw, the tom didn’t seem to be paying any mind to his condition as he picked at a piece of prey in front of him.

With a soft merwl of protest, the she-cat slipped across Thunderclan’s camp until she padded up alongside the black furred tom cat. Of similar ages, she had known Starlingflight for quite some time, though it seemed that their interests had always been elsewhere from each other for one reason or another... at least, until Silverflower had found herself very much alone inside of the nursery, abandoned by her former mate more than ten moons prior. Since then, she'd begun to notice things she never had before, like how much she admired his drive to work and the way he mentored his apprentice. Hovering near one of his forelegs, Silverflower hunkered down and blinked slowly, ears folding back lazily.

”It must have been quite the hunting trip with Wasppaw,” she remarked, laughing lightly and stretching her neck out to sniff at a stray, crinkled leaf that had gotten itself trapped in his shadow fury, ”H-here, I can—if you just…” Silverflower’s quiet voice trailed off, and it wasn’t long before the she-cat was preparing to pick bits and burrs out of the warrior’s fur coat unless the tom cat had something to say about it.

Sighing with relief at his accommodating posture, Silverflower inched her way closer until she sat alongside him with her medium length fur brushing against his any time she had to crane her neck to reach another messy spot in his coat. She doesn’t purr at first, but there’s a feathery hint to each tiny exhale that wafts out across Starlingflight’s shoulder—and then it all stops as a raspy tongue glides over the top of her ear.

Mnrrmrnrwl? Silverflower couldn’t help the startled squeak of a purr. Most of the time, whenever she groomed another clan mate, the experience was rather one-sided. A cat might allow her to vent her worries to an ear that would half-listen at best, but the unspoken agreement seemed to be that Silverflower’s grooming took priority. It felt strange to have someone think of her first and foremost—even if it was for a simple moment of thanks. Clearing her throat and smiling almost shyly, the petite queen returned to the task at paw until she had a very tiny pile of bits of the forest that had clung stubbornly to Starlingflight’s fur. Exactly what he had done out there to get himself in such a state, she wasn’t sure she would ever know. Each time the older tom’s tongue swipes through her own silky coat, Silverflower shuffles closer and relaxes further. This wasn’t so bad at all—and he didn’t even seem to be in a rush to go anywhere.

Her ears perk at the question regarding her kits, and as a smile pulls at the corners of her mouth, Silverflower goes so far as to draw in a deeper breath to prepare her most recent slew of updates—surely there was no prouder mother.

”Stonepaw’s been doing very well with battle training. He’s growing so fast, too, I’ll bet it won’t be long before he’s mistaken for a warrior at the gatherings,” her purrs quickly grew in volumes and intensity until they seemed to course through her entire frame, ”Ashpaw caught a bird out of the air not long ago, but something’s got his moods soured lately,” she paused in the middle of her grooming, staring down at the ground for a moment before she could rally herself again, ”I’m sure he’ll pull himself out of it, though… he doesn’t like it when I try to help anymore, so I try to give him his space… Drizzlepaw would be doing perfectly well, if she hadn’t eaten spoiled prey. She’s…” Silverflower spared a hesitant smile and a soft, quiet laugh, ”She’s not making the best patient for Brackenfang, I’m afraid.” Her forepaws stretched out until one rested on Starlingflight's closest shoulder, and very gently, her grey little pads began to knead his pelt. "I-- I'm sorry, I wasn't going on too much, was I...?" she worried.

With the evidence of her handiwork plain in the new gleam to her clan mates coat, Silverflower’s frayed worries began to slowly knit themselves back into place and settle down. Once she had finished grooming her companion, Silverflower glanced briefly at the tiny pile of debris before she swiped it away lazily with a forepaw, scattering across a few mouse lengths of dirt before them. ”You do?” she voiced, surprise evident in both her tone as well as the expression on her face. It was no secret what had happened with Silverflower’s litter—the tom that had sired them, Lynxclaw, had held no interest in fatherhood and quickly drifted from Silverflower once she came to be expecting. She had never raised much fuss when her former mate put his attentions elsewhere, but it was unknown how the event had truly affected the soft-natured she-cat.


”They can be quite the pawful, sometimes,” Silverflower said, her voice soft. Even still, the pride she felt for her kits was obvious, and the younger of the pair spared a sweeping glance around the camp’s clearing to see if she could spot one of her offspring. With no such luck, Silverflower’s sides deflated with a gentle sigh, and she let her chin dip comfortably down towards her chest. Feeling Starlingflight gift a lick between the ears, her eyes slid open once more, blinking slowly as the beginnings of a purr coiled inside of her throat. With praise being levied at her children, a feeling of warmth and ease settled inside of her. She knew that she had been a good mother to them, and that she had given Thunderclan a strong litter in a time when it had been needed.

It just didn’t stop her from worrying over their safety each time they slipped out of the main entrance to join another patrol.

”I know…” Silverflower nodded her head as her companion tried to reassure her about her more difficult son’s behavior. ”There’s just so much trouble that they could get into these days… There’s always been tension in the forest, but I never remember it being quite like this,” as his tail settled around her, it quelled the beginnings of the anxious shivers that had been threatening her. With the grooming that followed, she found she only had it in her to sigh with a hint of relief.

When her only daughter was referenced, a smile broke over the queen’s face, and a giggle that was almost mischievous left her.

”She, ah… she spit up the meat, right on top of the clean moss and cobwebs Brackenfang and I had gathered earlier,” though ultimately a set back and additional work for everyone involved, the messy incident had reminded her quite strongly of similar times in the nursery when one of her kits had drank far too much milk.

The soft weight of Starlingflight’s head set itself on top of her shoulders, and Silverflower turned her head so that most of it was facing his side, quiet purrs tumbling forth. She missed it—more and more as the days turned into weeks and her kits shot up in size, strength, and age. It was hard to let go of that time in the nursery. As though he had been reading her thoughts—though, truthfully, many cats in Thunderclan all held the same question—Starlingflight’s voice brought her back to the present.

”I…” slowly, her ears began to fold back. Whenwas she returning? It had been so long since she had hunted or gone patrolling, and so much had changed since then… ”I don’t know,” she confided in him. It was a simple, short statement, but the weight of her tone of voice made it quite clear that there was more to it than what appeared on a surface level. ”A fluff-“ her ears perked as he continued, and Silverflower tossed her head, shuffling in place and looking away shyly, ”Well maybe I like having my nest all to myself,” she teased him, dipping her chin quite low to try and hide her bashful smile, ”I’ve had the nursery all to myself for so long now.”