🍃🍁 TAWNYSTALK (SB) 🍂

Tawnystalk was born to the ParaClan pair Wraithblur and Amberlight. Half-heartedly named Tawny after their fiery coat, it didn't take long for the observant kitten to recognize how little their parents cared for them. Wraithblur, an abrasive and short-tempered bear of a tomcat, was alwaus jumping to chastise any action that Tawny took, often through the form of physical abuse. Amerblight, a quiet and seldom-spoken molly not unlike Tawnystalk themselves, rarely put up a fight against her sharp-tongued mate. It was under these conditions that Tawny learned to appreciate the smaller things in life. As a child, the abuse didn't seem to cut into them. After all, it was all they knew as normal. This developed Tawny into a gullible and obedient ParaClan warrior, too familiar with the horrors of what they thought was necessary discipline to try to step even one paw pad out of line. When they were named as Tawnystalk, they even began to miss the cats that had made their young life hell.

Having been killed before being able to tell anyone of the abuse that they faced as a child, Tawnystalk never truly learned that what they had experienced was not the common one. Either way, they don't miss their parents anymore. At the age of 13 moons, Tawnystalk, alongside the other newly appointed ParaClan warriors, were assigned the perilous task of retrieving the long-prophecized tooth of Sumire. Despite their initial hesitance, with new friends on their side, Tawnystalk felt ready to see what lay beyond the marked ParaClan borders.

The journey for the tooth of Sumire inevitably would have led to casualties, if not fatalities, from the start. After all, several freshly appointed warriors were still freshly appointed warriors, and they knew little of how to survive outside of their basic training - training that Tawnystalk had hardly had the privilege to receive. Of course, they did their best. But it wasn't long before the group was first separated, with Spiderbranch, Crowswoop, and Tawnystalk falling into a slippery ravine, unable to climb out. In this ravine lived trees, marked by claws in the shape of a flame - alluding to the elusive Nouveau Flame, which the journeying cats would encounter later on, without Tawnystalk. After working together to get out, though, only minor injuries were sustained, and the bond between all of the journeying patrol deepened. Tawnystalk was especially close with Fawnlight and Asterrain, having developed some affection towards both of them as the journey progressed.

Tawnystalk's death marked the first of the journey. On a moonlit stroll with Fawnlight, the pair encountered a river, tranquil and calm. As they watched the constellations in the sky, Brindlestar was quick to seize control of Fawnlight's paws, convinced that Tawnystalk had been the one, rather than Asterrain, to have killed the late leader. Brindlestar pinned Tawnystalk against the riverbed, and Tawnystalk panicked immediately. Water had always been an arguably rational fear of theirs, after having experienced the near-death experience of drowning courtesy of their father as a kitten, but Brindlestar didn't know that. The vicious spirit took their wails as a confession, that they had indeed been the one to kill her. Fawnlight attempted to take control back of her body, but it was too late: Tawnystalk's head had been split apart by a sharp rock in the river, and the last of their blood was being taken by the current by the time Fawnlight came to. Asterrain, who had accidentally witnessed the whole thing, carried Tawnystalk's body back to the ParaClan cats' temporary outpost, where they were buried.

In death, Tawnystalk decided to follow the journeying cats, to see if such a task could even be completed, and do their best to protect their beloveds if it couldn't. Tawnystalk watched as Asterrain's eye was speared out, where Fawnlight dragged them to safety. They watched as Hazelpounce was thrown off of a snowy cliffside, following the teddy bear cat down the mountain and curling gingerly around their frozen body before it finally gave up. Hazelpounce was a welcome companion for Tawnystalk, and the pair took it upon themselves to take up the job as a sort of welcome wagon for the remaining fatalities that came as a result of the journey. Now, with Sumire risen and most of the journeying cats fleeing, Tawnystalk continues to watch over Asterrain and Fawnlight, as well as their new companion, Forest, in hopes that their presence will somehow protect their lovers.