Crowtooth
Windclan Tunneler/Fury | He/him | 51 Moons
Power Card: Cold Gust
The storyteller fully expected Bravebird to start yelling about his latest section of the story, he’d been a very ornery kit when he first heard this history and his loyalty was something that grew with age so he’d be worse hearing this now. And Bravebird was more shrill them him so he quickly cut that off at the pass and (loudly) started answering questions.
“It was a mix Mosspaw. Some patrols were lone cats hunting on a territory they thought was safe and some were full patrols ambushed by an intruding river clan patrol. It’s less of power and more of underhanded tactics.
And Willowpaw the truth is we just don’t know.” The tom shrugged “the fish know water in a way we just never will but they bragged about how they destroyed our camp later apparently. At least that’s what the elders who told me said.
Im filling in what I can from the digging I did by asking around in gatherings but the sad part of all this is little details are…. Muddy at best.”
The tunneler was sowing in as much truth (or what he was pretty sure was truth) as he could and using logic to fill in the rest but really this history was so long ago not all questions could be answered.
“We’d been focused on rebuilding, Nettlestar wishing to make sure the clan would live against all odds and that the vultures were chased away.
But where we were focusing on healing, Riverclan was collecting the dues they deserved. Maybe it was starclan on our side and maybe it was simply an ironic twist of fate but what they manipulated to hurt us turned on them.
With the water taken to destroy our camp they almost drained their own river, leaving their food flopping on the bank and perishing. They knew the water would come back in time, but not before the vultures came, tempted by the rotting fish and chased by our warriors driving them away. And once the fish were gone, either eaten or taken by the water returning, the raptors turned to riverclan.
They were weakened and hungry with their prey gone and unlike us they had no experience with killing the birds.
It wasn’t long before Riverclan showed at the gathering with drastically reduced numbers and a new cat at the helm, Dirtstar completely missing and the new leader full of new humility and apologies. They claimed their old tyrant had perished to the vultures, however the words rang hollow as with his paranoia it was known Dirtstar had more then a few lives stored and it’d take more then a bird to rob him of that…. Not that the new leader expanded on that ‘claim’ afterwards, instead content to let the ex leaders legacy tarnish.”
Perhaps it wasn’t as satisfying as it could be for some, but history was rarely as kind as tales of heroic justice and revenge were. Windclan had been brought low and focused on themself as Twilightstar probably would’ve ordered them do should she be in Nettlestars position. Especially with consequences coming to the other clan without them needing to put in the effort.
“Not that this was the last time Riverclan ever harmed us…. Nor was it the last time we couldn’t take justice into our own paws.
See that our tunnellers number so few now is the result of a different event that nearly wiped the skill from our clan completely. Eight leafbares ago another flood came, too suddenly removed from other weather to be natural and devastated the tunnels below, taking all our tunnelers with it.
By the time I was born there wasnt a single tunneler at all, and we've been slowly coming back from the brink and bringing the knowledge back into camp.
And sure, its never been confirmed if this second flood came from Riverclan (because why would they admit to that) however this flood occurred around the same time as the second evil era. A time when cats more vile then we can imagine even now attempted to repeat the darkest time of all known clan history.... And both evil eras came from Riverclan.
A history with flooding our tunnels, cats more then warped enough to commit this atrocity, and they came from riverclan.... That speaks a clear enough tale in my mind."
Crowtooth let that hang in the air for a moment before rolling his shoulders, voice lighter. "But such things are in the past. Riverclan is quiet now and despite occasional hiccups seems to have learnt from the past" Such an ironic thing to say, given what would occur the very need clan meeting that'd change everything. "so dont any of ya'll go starting quarrels while we have none. I'll track you down, tan your hide then bring you to Twilightstar so she can punish you for being an idiot.
Hey, behave and maybe Ill go digging up the relevant details of the evil era and give you a really crazy history lesson. For now though ya'll enjoy the rest of your day and remember your history for the lesson it is."
After all, if they forgot or ignored they were doomed to repeat it.