Duststar

Kit Name: Dustkit

Apprentice Name: Dustpaw

Warrior Name: Dustfoot

Leader Name: Duststar

Gender: Female

Rank: Leader

Status: Deceased

Place of Rest: Starclan

The last leader of the original Cliffclan and the first of the last leaders to die. Duststar was a strict but fair leader. She was not particularly close to any of the other leaders nor was her clan closely allied with any of the other clans. 

When sickness first began killing off the original clans Cliffclan was hit the hardest. Cliffclan lost many of its kits and elders as well as a number of its warriors, leaving the clan vulnerable. Later, the clan was targeted by a newly formed group of clan cats turned loners, the groups goal was to drive Cliffclan out and take over their camp but the group was unsuccessful. The few warriors Cliffclan had left fought alongside the remaining apprentices, queens, elders and even the medicine cat to fend off the group. Many cats from both sides died and at the end there was barely a Cliffclan left. 

After the group of loners was driven off it became all to clear to Duststar just how bad her clan's situation was. Duststar called a clan meeting and admitted as much to the surviving clan members and urged those who were able to leave. A number of cats did leave, joining up with fleeing cats from other clan to seek out a new home. Duststar stayed behind alongside the clan medicine cat, several apprentices who refused to leave, and a few elders and sick cats who could not leave. Duststar was the last of her clan to die, six of her nine lives were lost to the sickness as she tried to heal her clanmates alongside the clan medicine cat and later on her own once the medicine cat passed. Duststar's lost her last life to exhaustion and starvation passing only days after loosing the last of her clanmates.

Duststar carried guilt about the fate of her clan with her for years. Sometimes, she couldn't help but wonder if she had spent more time building relationships with the other leaders that her clan might have been able to band together with another clan and survived longer, as Forestclan and Moorclan had. Or that if she had put more focus on battle training that her clan would have been better fit to fight off invaders once the clans began breaking down as Marshclan had been. Duststar couldn't help but feel inferior in comparison to the other last leaders when she realized that she her clan had been the first to fall and isolated herself from the other leaders in Starclan for some time before being forced to band together with them when cat began fading.

Duststar was the last of the last leaders to agree to the plan of reviving the clans. She initially didn't feel like the plan would work and was hesitant to get any cats hope up only for everything to come crashing down. She was eventually coaxed into at least trying the plan but made it very clear that if the first attempt failed she would not be trying again.

Duststar picked Raven to be the leader of the new Cliffclan because she believed Raven's stubbornness and passion would be good for the new clan. She saw Raven as someone who could teach her clanmates how to fight and defend their territory and their lives from the other clan. She believed that Raven's fierceness would help her protect the clan and had hoped that the harsher parts of Raven's personality would be tempered during her time as leader. 

Extra Info

- Duststar was the second youngest of the last leaders and had been leader for the shortest amount of time when the great sickness hit.

- She would never admit it out loud but after seeing the destruction Raven caused Duststar couldn't help but agree that she had chosen the wrong first leader for the reformed Cliffclan