This is my last foray into this fandom. I PROMISE. XD
No, but in all seriousness, I felt like writing something sweet with these two. YES, I know LionCinder is the canon pairing. No, I don't care. This was really just an excuse to experiment with childhood nostalgia, and maintaining love across the years.
I'll just stfu and let you read.
Disclaimer- Don't own.
He still remembers that day so vividly.
In his mind's eye he can still see the dark sky, set off by StarClan's bright glow as it was, that had kept watch over the two of them.
He also remembers the bitterness in the air, as piercing as a badger's bite, that signaled leaf-bare beginning to cast its own icy shadow over the forest. The air, although unstirred by any wind, hit his face and penetrated through the barrier offered by his kit-soft, fluffy ginger fur, and he had nearly shivered before remembering that warriors weren't supposed to express weakness and firmly suppressing it.
Although the adventure with his siblings and the fox had happened only a few days before – a memory that still made him shudder to think about, due to the crushing shame at having put his blind brother in such danger – he had never really crept around the camp after the sun's welcoming light vanished.
Then again, he'd never had trouble sleeping before.
Needless to say, the change in lighting from gold to silver, along with the absence of the sun's heat, caught him off guard at first.
He blinked a couple of times to get used to it before turning his gaze onto the camp. The moonlight touched everything with a silvery pallor, and he tried to focus on that instead of lingering thoughts of tomorrow's upcoming events.
He knew it wasn't worry he felt. No, he and his siblings had looked forward to their apprenticing day practically since the moment Squirrelflight had told them what a warrior was; only excitement ever permeated his thoughts whenever he thought of padding proudly through the forest, head and tail held high and his fiery pelt gleaming in the sun, ready to defend his territory at the flick of a claw. While he would have assumed worry was keeping him awake, he knew that wasn't the case now.
So then why can't I sleep? The kit heaved out a sigh, briefly forgetting that the warrior keeping watch at the camp entrance might hear him. Thankfully, either Cloudtail was too focused on watching the forest beyond, or the sigh was soft enough for him to miss.
"Lionkit!"
…but apparently, not soft enough to escape the notice of one of his denmates.
Lionkit heard a high-pitched squeak, and nearly jumped all over himself trying to find the source before realizing it had come from him.
Guess he could kiss his pride goodbye right now.
He turned, ears burning, to see a snowy-furred she-kit slip out of the den and bounce up next to him. Seeing her demeanor, he considered asking if she had heard him squeal like a stricken shrew, but then thought better of it. "Hi, Icekit," he greeted a little more calmly.
"You couldn't sleep, either?" Icekit asked, tilting her head to the side. Without waiting for a response, she plopped down to sit beside him.
"Uh-uh." Lionkit appraised his paws, allowing the tips of his claws to scrape the earth beneath. He found himself hesitating, briefly wondering whether or not he should divulge how he felt to his younger friend, but then mentally clawed himself. This was Icekit; he could trust her. "I was thinking about tomorrow," he confessed.
"Me too!" Her words made Lionkit jolt his head up with a start and look at her with wide, amber eyes.
"Wait, why were you thinking about it?" he asked. "It's not like you're getting apprenticed tomorrow."
"I know that!" Icekit shot back immediately. At the pout that spread across her face at the reminder, Lionkit couldn't stop the tiny smile that curled his lips. Even though he wasn't that much older than she, he still drew a small amount of comfort from her instant, impetuous comeback.
Then the white she-kit's fur flattened along her spine. "It's just… after tomorrow, you and Jaykit and Hollykit will be gone," she murmured, so quietly Lionkit had to strain to hear. "It'll just be me and Foxkit after that."
Lionkit blinked. Now that he thought about it, it would probably get a little lonely for Icekit without him and his siblings there with her.
It hit him, then, why insomnia had driven him out here tonight: because he didn't want to think about not having one of his best friends within paw's reach anymore. For a moment, the force of the realization all but tore the breath from his lungs, and he found himself fluffing out his fur against the sudden chill in his bones. He knew in just a scant few quarter-moons, Icekit would be joining him and his brother in the apprentices' den – but that failed to assuage the newfound fear that rose up and threatened to choke him.
Wait… fear? Why am I afraid? Warriors should never be afraid.
And so Lionkit forced himself to relax – since Icekit looked mildly alarmed at the fear that had crossed his face – and just looked down at his paws. "Oh," was all he could say, pathetically.
It's not like we'll never see each other again, he wanted to point out, I'll still visit you, and you're not that much younger than me… But the words just wouldn't come.
For StarClan's sake, did he really miss her that much already?
Seeing her friend's subdued manner, Icekit quickly tried to remedy it. "B-but we'll still see each other," she blustered, inadvertently giving voice to Lionkit's thoughts. "And I'll be in the apprentices' den with you and Jaykit before long."
"I guess…" Lionkit mumbled.
In the next moment, though, he felt something soft yet forceful collide with his ear. Yowling in surprise, he whirled around, again trying to see what had caught him off guard, and again finding only Icekit. "W-what?" he demanded shakily, even as his friend lowered her paw.
"You weren't paying attention!" she said, as if that explained why she had just rattled his brain in his head. Lionkit's jaw dropped, but before he could respond, she continued, her voice growing into that happy tone he knew so well. "I've decided! Let's make a promise!"
Bemused, Lionkit snapped his mouth shut and appraised her. "A… promise?" he asked blankly.
Icekit huffed and sat back on her haunches; inwardly, he couldn't help but smile at the return of her normal disposition. "Yes, mousebrain, a promise. Let's…" She tilted her head to the star-speckled sky, her neck curving very slightly to the side.
"Let's promise to always stay best friends."
Always? Lionkit let out a half-hearted purr of laughter, to hide the way his heart had suddenly begun to pound. "That's a little far-fetched, don't you think?"
And yet… despite his rational words, every part of him agreed with the notion behind her idea. Because really, wouldn't what she was proposing soothe his anxiety, palliate the very fear that had sent him out here tonight instead of letting sleep wrap him in its welcoming hold?
Icekit huffed out a sigh. "What's wrong with a little craziness every once in a while? Besides…" Her voice softened, and she lowered her head to look at him with both warmth and an emotion he couldn't name brimming in her eyes. "It'll make us both feel better. Right?"
Lionkit could only stare at her, mouth slightly agape. Oddly, the chill of the leaf-fall night had completely dissipated, like a small flame in the face of a strong wind, to be replaced by a newfound heat that traced gentle fingers along his spine. That feeling only intensified when Icekit gave him a tentative smile, almost as if to say just promise me this.
Promise you'll remember me.
And so he opened his mouth and agreed.
"All right," he said. Impulsively, he leaned over and licked the top of Icekit's head; he felt her twitch in surprise and her ears flattened, brushing his cheeks, at the contact. For a moment, terror that he had done the wrong thing washed over him, but then she was relaxing and he found it in himself to continue. "I promise to always, always be your friend. No matter what happens."
The words flowed so easily, in spite of his prior objections, and he fought the sudden urge to cringe at the extremely un-warrior-like warmth attached to the assurance it brought him –
Then Icekit was leaning into him, her snowy fur stark against the darkness and blurring the bottom half of his vision. Lionkit stiffened as her warmth soaked into his fur, not knowing whether to return the embrace or to move back.
But he figured he would be a hypocrite if he shied away from her touch, so he took the neutral option and merely swept his short tail around to brush her flank.
"I promise, too." Icekit's voice vibrated against his chest. It was a more comfortable sensation than he would have expected, kind of like the late-night talks with his siblings in the nursery. The tiniest inkling of the desire to fulfill the mental image that had made him hesitate – to lean back against her, Icekit, his best friend – began to flicker in his heart, but then she was moving back and he didn't know whether to feel relieved or disappointed that she had done so.
"I'll be the first to call you by your new name tomorrow," she said, a breathless smile coming over her features. "Lionpaw… it has a nice ring to it."
Her enthusiasm was contagious, and Lionkit found himself smiling back at her.
But that was then.
This is now.
Now the two naïve kits who believed in such flimsy things as absolutes have grown up, with even names that differ drastically from each other. She became Icecloud, and he became Lionblaze – fire and ice, orange and white, chosen and mundane.
And yet as Lionblaze reminisces on that night, he can't help but miss those days. When the thought of being a warrior filled him only with a delicious anticipation, and not a desperate heaviness that weighed him down. When his thoughts had been only of becoming the best warrior in the Clans, and not of destiny's machinations and smoky gray fur and the responsibility he could never shoulder alone.
When he could have, maybe, fallen in love with his best friend.
"Lionblaze?"
It's almost an echo of that night, except this time he doesn't let out a surprised squeak at her approach. Like that night, though, he turns; sees her approaching him from the den they share, though this time with more cats than before; catches the glimmer in her dark blue eyes.
Is it strange, then, that an eerie sense of hope fills him at the thought of another repetition of that night; of another promise?
Don't be silly, he tells himself, Cinderheart left you behind barely a breath ago, you don't need to worry about another she-cat right now. And yet the thought refuses to go away.
"Icecloud," he says.
She nods in acknowledgment of his greeting and pads over to sit beside him. Watching her, Lionblaze is suddenly struck by the grace that marks her stride, as opposed to before, when she had all but bounced toward him. He's known for a while that the dexterity of most she-cats' movements belong to their gender alone, but it has never resonated as powerfully with him as now. Maybe because he remembered her as the fluffy white kit who had all but tripped over her paws on the way over to him.
Before he can say anything to mask the confusion these swirling thoughts have brought him, Icecloud speaks. "I'm sorry about Cinderheart."
He winces. She'd certainly gotten to the point rather quickly.
"It wasn't your fault," he mutters, not knowing what else to say. He's seen this situation before: one cat apologizing to another for something not even the former's fault, if only to not seem completely heartless. It normally comes with death or a loss in battle.
Not necessarily a couple splitting, like with him and Cinderheart.
Icecloud rolls her eyes. "I know that. I just thought I'd say something about it."
"Oh." Lionblaze blinks.
Another moment of silence passes, in which he unsheathes his claws very slightly and scrapes them against the earth, just for something to do. Predictably, the attempt at distraction fails, and his gaze is drawn back to Icecloud again. Though she faces away from him, he can still see something nigh unidentifiable in her eyes, indicated only by the way the moonlight sometimes pans off her face.
Now that he's thinking about it, the moon had joined its companions of StarClan in gazing down on him and Icecloud that night, what feels like so long ago. Maybe it had cast a silvery sheen on her fur that night, too; he had never noticed.
What else have I never noticed?
At that moment, she turns her head toward him, sees him staring at her, and tilts her head to the side. "What's wrong?" Though her words sound innocuous enough, wariness lurks in her voice, which strikes Lionblaze as odd, because he doesn't understand why she would feel wary of him.
"Uh, nothing," he stutters, looking away. Then – just like that night – something inside him relents, and he decides to trust her with his inner conflict. "Just…" He hesitates, before remembering he's already gotten this far and plunging on.
"Do you remember that promise we made to each other when we were kits?" he asks her.
Icecloud blinks a couple of times and straightens her neck from where she'd previously angled her head to the side at him. A thoughtful expression shadows her face, and for a brief, terrifying moment, he wonders if she even remembers.
But again, he fails to give her enough credit, as an instant later, her gaze lights up. "Oh yeah, I remember that," she says softly. "The night before you became an apprentice."
"Yeah." Lionblaze bobs his head up and down like an idiot. "We promised to always be best friends."
Either this little detail has escaped Icecloud's reminiscence, or she chose not to mention it, because his words have a visible effect on her. She draws back slightly with a startled look on her face, then relaxes, a sigh pushing itself out of her. "I remember that, too."
Awkwardly, not knowing what to say, Lionblaze takes it upon himself to thoroughly examine every ginger hair on his forepaws. Clearly, Icecloud felt more than a little apprehensive about discussing this particular memory, if her confession to remembering something she had failed to point out was any indication. For the first time, a hint of something like regret began to percolate within him.
"That feels like it happened so long ago," the white she-cat says, this time with a hint of rueful inflection to her voice. Lionblaze risks a glance up at her and sees that her prior expression had shifted from slight sorrow to what could almost be construed as wistfulness.
"Yeah," is all he can muster for a reply. Then, "It's kind of weird how we grew apart, isn't it?"
The words tumble out of him like a leaf pushed by a gale's wind. Hearing her let out a small murmur, Lionblaze tenses, briefly afraid he's said the wrong thing.
But she just shrugs. "Life happens," she says, almost wearily. "It was kind of unrealistic to expect that we would stay together forever."
Stay together forever. Lionblaze knows it's a stupidly feminine reaction, but heat begins to rush to his face at Icecloud's choice of words. It's a phrase he had used to describe his destiny with Cinderheart – and, once upon a time, Heathertail, before life and loyalty and duty had torn him away from both of them.
And even though she knows nothing of the prophecy that shackles him, he cannot help but wonder if this is Icecloud's indirect admission to her being one of the ones he could never have.
Nevertheless, he is startled into replying, even as his common sense kicks in and reminds him that he had left any thought of loving Cinderheart behind just a little while ago. "Then why did you make me promise that in the first place?" he asks the she-cat who was once his kit-hood friend.
That coaxes a reaction out of her: even though he had tried his best to keep any indignation out of his voice, those dark blue eyes of hers narrow just slightly. She blinks, briefly flexes her claws, looks away and back at him.
"I guess… because things like that mean everything when you're that young," she admits quietly. "I wanted some way to know you wouldn't leave me behind. I thought the world of you, you know? I just wanted some assurance that once you became this… this big powerful strong warrior, you'd remember the little white she-cat you used to play with and chase. Once you became an apprentice, you'd always be a step ahead of me, and I didn't want to think about that.
"Maybe…" She closes her eyes and shakes her head, smiling and letting out a closed-mouthed little chuckle. "You're going to laugh if I tell you this."
"No, I want to know," Lionblaze insists, his curiosity piqued. And yet his heartbeat thrums loudly in his ears, as if even it knows what's coming next.
The shadow of a smile crosses his companion's lips at his kit-like interest, before dying down into the night.
"You could say," she says, "that I loved you."
Lionblaze's eyes widen. It occurs to him, belatedly, that perhaps a part of him had known it all along – the part that, maybe, had pushed him into pursuing a different path than she. The idea makes confusion flit across his mind – after all, most cats spend their lives looking for love, but he had had it right next to him all this time – but the validity of it remains.
Icecloud laughs to herself, and at that moment, he realizes she has kept her eyes closed. Why? he wonders. Fear? Shame?
Nostalgia, maybe?
In that regard, perhaps they're not different after all.
"You think it's stupid, right?" she murmurs. "I can understand if you do; we were barely kits then, after all."
Hardly old enough to do anything about "love" besides toss the word around. The words never make it past her lips, never make their debut in reality and lay themselves bare for the night to witness, but Lionblaze can almost hear her voice saying it.
She opens her eyes, then, and, taking a deep breath to steel herself, swivels her head toward him. The same sense of building resolve grows inside him as well, letting him meet her eyes. That unidentifiable emotion that he had seen in her eyes earlier has returned, but now he recognizes it.
It's the same one Cinderheart had gotten as she had looked at him, on the night of that first run together. Of a desperate hope, of a desire so strong that even the strength within the heart of every warrior stepped aside to let the pitiful kit inside wail covetously for it.
"And now?" he hears himself say. "You used the past tense. What about now?"
To which Icecloud lifts her head, smiles that smile he still remembers from her five-moon-old face, and says, "You know about now."
Abrupt/open-ended endings ftw! -shot-
Um, yeah. Review, please?