Parsley

Parsley is currently a young (apprentice-aged) loner living in an abandoned rabbit burrow not far from OrchidClan's outer border.

Name- Parsley

Gender- Tom

Clan- None

Rank- Loner

Family- Tern (brother), Auk (sister, deceased), Lunis (mother), Snatch (father), Myrtlepelt (unofficial adoptive mother, sort of), Aloe (unofficial adoptive sister, sort of)

Friends- technically also Aloe

Enemies- Myrtlepelt

## Appearance & Personality

#### Appearance

Parsley is a small, skinny black tom mottled with white spots and flecks, mostly along his back and tail, but there is also a flash of white on his chest. His eyes are amber, and he has a small, thin scar across the back of his neck, as well as a slit in each ear-tip. All three marks came from Myrtlepelt.

#### Personality

Parsley used to be relatively calm and happy, but he has since grown much more reserved and somber. He is serious and distrustful now, suspicious and anxious of almost everything, although if he is with someone he's comfortable around, he'll become more of his old relaxed, humorous self. He also has a bit of a hotter temper than Tern, and is considerably bolder.

## Backstory

#### Kithood/ Early Life

Parsley, Tern, and Auk were all born as loners to Lunis and Snatch. For the first two and a half moons of their life, everything was fine. They lived in a little den dug out of the side of a hill, and Snatch would catch prey and bring wet moss for them and for Lunis, as well as nuts and feathers and leaves to play with and other such things. They all got along great. One day, though, Snatch brought them a rat that turned out to be diseased. Auk fell ill and died, and Lunis also developed a horrid sickness from it. Snatch was mortified and felt extremely guilty, because he hadn't known the rat was sick. Lunis was afraid that the disease had to be contagious, so she told Snatch to take Parsley and Tern and leave her to die. He refused, though. This infuriated Lunis, and she accused him of wanting to get the rest of their kits killed just so he could stay with her. This accusation upset Snatch to the point where he ran off on his own, without even taking his sons with him. Lunis knew she had to care for her surviving kits somehow, but she didn't want to infect them. The next half-moon was a great struggle. It was hard on Parsley, and he didn't understand where Snatch had gone, or even what exactly had happened to Auk. He grew very close with Tern.

When they were three moons old, Lunis decided she was too sick and too weak to risk staying with her sons anymore. She snuck out of the den one night and laid down somewhere near OrchidClan's border to die alone. Parsley and Tern were pretty freaked out in the morning and went looking for her, and they were understandably distressed upon finding her dead body. While they huddled there, a young OrchidClan exile named Myrtlepelt came across them. She decided to take them in, and take them in she did.

Myrtlepelt moved the two kits to an abandoned rabbit burrow not far from the edge of OrchidClan. It is in constant danger of collapsing and suffocating them all, but Myrtlepelt seemed completely unbothered by that fact. She was a harsh cat, and while she cared about Parsley and Tern, she was still cruel. She forced them to "practice-fight" with each other, claws unsheathed, which they both hated. Parsley was (and still is) larger than Tern, and used to always be very careful not to accidentally hurt him. This aggravated Myrtlepelt, and she gave him a slit in each ear as punishment for holding back. He then attacked his brother with full force, although he felt terribly guilty about it. He once compared Myrtlepelt to Lunis, saying that his *real* mother had been far kinder, and Myrtlepelt was once more angered, clawing him across the back of the neck and leaving another scar. He no longer dares to speak up against her. Not very much, anyways.

One day, while Myrtlepelt was away, Parsley and Tern tried to sneak out and escape. While on their way toward Clan territory, however, they found the dead bodies of Laurel, Acacia, and Agave, with Aloe still alive and mewling between them. Parsley really did not want to try taking care of the yet-to-be-named Aloe, for it meant returning to Myrtlepelt so she could be cared for, but Tern eventually convinced him. They went back, and Myrtlepelt eventually agreed to watch over Aloe.

They lived with her for a few moons. She stopped hunting for them eventually, leaving Parsley and Tern to figure out how to hunt by themselves if they wanted to survive. He got into a tangle with a possum on his first attempt at hunting, but he managed to kill it. Good job, Parsley. He yelled at Myrtlepelt and called her crazy once, and subsequently got clawed across the muzzle. Way to go.

For a while, Parsley just lived in the burrow and suffered through the practice-fights. He was very dismayed once Aloe was forced to participate in them and did his best to avoid hurting her. He was always somewhat afraid of Myrtlepelt, but was determined to protect Tern and Aloe to the best of his ability. He wanted nothing more than to get away, and often wondered if there were any other ways for them to live.

When he and Tern were eight moons old, Myrtlepelt took them outside of the burrow and tried to force them to fight to the death. They of course refused to comply, and the then-four-moon-old Aloe began protesting as well. Predictably, that didn't sit well with Myrtlepelt. Deciding to take the opportunity as an escape attempt, Parsley attempted to attack Myrtlepelt. Tern and Aloe followed suit. Parsley was able to avoid being harmed, but Tern got clawed along the flank and Aloe was caught in the face, seriously injuring one of her eyes. Myrtlepelt backed off after that, to Parsley's surprise, and just yelled at them to get out. They didn't need to be told twice. The three of them took off, and Parsley suggested fleeing to the Clans to avoid being tracked down. They didn't have any better ideas, and Aloe in particular was in desperate need of medical attention, so that's what they did.

They kind of just struggled along until they were found by two OrchidClan warriors, Suncurrent and Lionspark, who took them back to OrchidClan's camp. Once there, they were seen to by the medicine cat, Swallowfrost, and learned a bit about Clan life and all that stuff. Parsley was pretty unhappy to learn that Aloe's right eye was going to be permanently blinded, but that shock was sort of nulled by the fact that there was food in the camp and it had been a while since he'd had food. They were also relieved to realize that they weren't in danger there, and after talking to the deputy, Leafshine, as well as a couple of other warriors (namely Piperskip and to some extent Beestripe), Parsley decided that he wouldn't mind staying in the Clans. He talked to Tern and Aloe about it and they agreed that they ought to at least try, because they needed *somewhere* to stay.

That's pretty much where we're at now.

## Other

#### Trivia

* He's not as much of a good boy as Tern, but he's still a good boy.
* He was named by Snatch. Auk and Tern were named by Lunis, hence the seabird theme, but Snatch didn’t pick up on that.
* Lunis wanted to name him Petrel (specifically after cape petrels). That didn't happen. Thank you, Snatch.
* Tern sometimes calls him "Pars" for short. Pronounced 'pärse'.

#### Quotes

*"What?"*

.

*"No, no. The kit's newborn. We can't do anything with it. We gotta go, Tern, we have to take care of ourselves."*

.

*"We... we're so close to getting away from Myrtlepelt, Tern. Do you really want to go back to her?"*

.

**Tern:** *"She needs a name."*

**Parsley:** *"We're not naming her. Are you--"*

**Tern:** *"How about Tiny? She's tiny. Or Softie, 'cause she's soft? Or--"*

**Parsley:** *"No, no, no. You are not allowed to name this cat."*

.

**Parsley:** *"Why d--"*

**Tern:** *"Shush, she's sleeping!"*

**Parsley:** *"You aren't her mother. We just* saw *her mother, and you're certainly not her."*

**Tern:** *"Shh."*

.

*"She's coming."*

.

*"As soon as Aloe can handle solid prey, we're getting out of here."*

.

*"Myrtlepelt was out hunting, wasn’t she? She didn’t bring anything back for us, though. She might just starve us until we try hunting on our own or something.”*

.