Shadowstep

Shadowstep is currently OasisClan's deputy and is well-respected as a loyal and hardworking cat, one of Songstar's most trusted warriors and formerly the mentor of her son Breezeriver. She has a reputation for being intimidating and bit closed-off, and a few of her Clanmates wonder if her withdrawn personality could ever make her into a good leader, but she serves as an excellent foil to Songstar’s more gentle nature and they operate well together. No one doubts her competence or efficiency.

## Relationships

### Parents

Snowbreeze (mother, dead) and Blackbite (father, dead)

### Other Relatives

Sorrelseed and Fennelfoot (cousins), Rosefoot, Dillpaw, Petalpaw, and Featherpaw (also cousins, but dead or irrelevant), Shortstrike and Frostroot (uncles, dead), Lilyspring (aunt, dead)

### Friends

She doesn’t really do friends, but she’s chill with Swallowfrost. Also her living cousins to a certain extent and possibly Songstar.

### Enemies

None, really. She's mostly chill and also kind of scary. She does think Crowstem is annoying, though.

## Appearance & Personality

### Appearance

Shadowstep resembles her brother Brightnight in many aspects. She has a dark gray-black pelt with swirling, angular stripes of classic tabby. Her stripes are close enough to her base color to barely be visible, though. She has a few paler markings and sharp amber eyes that stand out against her dark color scheme. Her fur is long and thick and soft, but a little bit bristly if rubbed the wrong way. The hair on her cheeks and around her paws tends to sag and there are tiny tufts on the tips of her ears, making her look a little bit like a tiny, dark bobcat.

While she shares most of Brightnight’s more squarish features, curly-haired tail, and leg tufts, she is more stocky than lanky. She has a strong, sturdy build in spite of her short stature, and while she is actually fairly slender, her long coat and well-defined muscles make her seem bigger than she actually is. She has a gray nose and gray paw pads and her right ear has a small tear in one side. There is a tiny pink scar tracing the edge of her left forepaw as well.

### Personality

(+): Sharp, steadfast, loyal, diligent, responsible

(=): Quiet, intimidating, serious (outwardly), blunt, curious

(-): Judgmental, sarcastic, guarded, stoic, somewhat narrow-minded

## Biography

### Kithood

0- born a minute before brightkit in early newleaf, snow still melting. denmates are hailkit, snowkit, dawnkit, chestnutkit, reedkit, (4 moons older), cranekit, & fawnkit (5 moons older). fledgeflutter moves into the nursery and fawnkit’s mom pondstep gets pregnant a second time. welp. Sorrelseed visits several times per moon

1- sheepkit & broomkit are born, crane & fawn become appies. there’s an OrC daylight gathering. shadow’s mom goes but her dad stays home. she n bright get to play around w/ him all day.

2- chestnut, reed, hail, snow, & dawn become appies. shadowkit discovers that she likes to harass the appies, those appies being the aforementioned five as well as songpaw and moonpaw. for whatever reason shadowkit thinks songpaw specifically is the goat. she’s actually the only one that shadowkit ever rlly follows around asking to learn things from.

3- fennel & dill are born. so is halfkit. there’s also a FC fishing thing that shadow’s parents, half’s parents, & fennel & dill’s mom go to. everyone is babysat by fennel & dill’s dad frostroot (shadow & bright’s uncle). he is kind of mean. sheep & broom’s parents might also be around though.

5- basilkit, sagekit, & elmkit are born. reedpaw dies. songfrost and moonface become warriors, meaning shadowkit can’t pester them for battle moves as often anymore. sad.

### Apprenticeship

6- apprenticed to riverburst. she hates him. at her first gathering, shadow meets all the other Clans’ appies. FallClan’s Shalepaw & Waverpaw are the same age as her & brightpaw while Sproutpaw is 5 moons older. MarshClan’s mca Mothpaw is 4 moons older than her, but she was with the meddies so shadow didnt really meet her. OrchidClan’s Sunpaw & Moonpaw (look at that accidental parallel!) were also 5 moons older and so were HorizonClan’s Thornpaw & Wrenpaw. Shadow was kind of overwhelmed by all the new faces, but she did somewhat like Wrenpaw. Anyone else she might’ve gotten along with is up to the discretion of who owns them pfft. Oh, and in other news, her mom dies of some kind of weird stomach virus over a couple of weeks. Presumably it’s because she ate bad prey. shadow is very unhappy about this. halfkit’s dad dies the same way and his mom brings him & his older sister fawnpaw to FC.

7- shadow’s dad also dies after being reckless on a hunting patrol and jumping onto a loose branch. he plummets to his instant death. shadow wasn’t there to see it, but she is still very unhappy about it. she was a daddy’s girl. brightpaw is all she has now. in other news, sheep & broom become appies & crane becomes a warrior. sorrel convinces shadow (& probably bright) to come by FC for some swimming lessons to cheer them up. it does not work. shadowpaw is convinced she almost drowned 5 times. she decides to never touch water or go to FC ever again. She does get to meet Blossompaw either here or at the gathering, though, who’s a moon younger than her. oh, and wrensong, thornstep, moonmist, suncurrent, and sproutsong are all warriors now.

8- chestnut, hail, snow, & dawn become warriors. shadow gets into the habit of taking off at night to have some time to herself. there’s also probably OaC’s big Clanwide battle training event thing at around this time. Shadowpaw probably won in the apprentices’ league or whatever because she’s Shadowpaw. And riverburst is a good teacher even though he sucks. She also probably met the two new OrC appies, Saffronpaw & Swallowpaw, either here or at the next gathering. Or maybe not Swallowpaw since she was an mca. She would’ve liked Swallowpaw though.

9- fennel & dill become appies. shadow also gets into a tangle with a raccoon one night and it results in her ear notch. oh, and it’s her first winter! she thinks the snow is very pretty. she’ll play in it with brightpaw, but only when nobody’s looking. at the gathering she gets to see Halfpaw again. Halfpaw says something funny and shadowpaw half-smirks at it and Wrensong leans over and is like “omg i cant believe you have a crush on him”. shadow is like “????”

10- ferret, adder, & mouse appear. uncle frostroot & dillpaw both die of greencough. fennel’s mom leaves to go back to being a kittypet. there is also a HC hike. shadowpaw goes, probably w/ brightpaw & sorrelseed, and discovers that she hates heights. it is not a fun experience for her. L. she gets to meet FC (or OrC?)’s new appie Drizzlepaw at that moon’s gathering. Drizzlepaw is hanging out with Halfpaw and Wrensong starts teasing Shadowpaw like “omg youre jealous arent you” and shadowpaw has no idea what she’s talking about, but she agrees just to make her go away pfft

11- fennel leaves OaC for MC. basil, sage, & elm become appies. OrC also gets new apprentices named Pansypaw & Daisypaw. She also meets Canyonpaw of MC, who hadn’t been allowed to go to his first two gatherings. Nothing rlly happens. Shadow passes her assessment easily.

### Warrior Life

12- adderpaw also moves to MC. shadow does not care. brightnight also presumably becomes a messenger around now. shadow thinks he’s crazy.

13- another OrC daylight gathering! Shadow has no interest in this but she ends up going anyways. she gets to see fennel again after missing him at the last gathering and thinks it’s cool that he’s made friends w/ canyonpaw. adderpaw is also there but shadow does not care. she sits around and has a terrible time. oh, and sheepburr becomes a warrior.

14- just chilling.

15- another FC fishing competition. Shadow really does not want to go, but Sorrel convinces her too. She spends the whole time just unhappily watching everyone else splash around. She finds out that halfpaw is delaying his warrior ceremony an extra moon so he can earn his name alongside drizzlepaw, his bff. shadow thinks that’s cute. he’s clearly smitten w/ drizzle and shadow rlly doesnt care and she confuses herself again trying to figure out if she actually did like him once or if Wrensong was just playing with her.

16- mousetail & ferretmask become warriors alongside irisfate & adoniswing, the latter two having joined OaC right after Shadow became a warrior.

17- basilpool, sagestep, & elmleap become warriors.

18- dawnflurry dies. shadowstep is probably slightly sad about this.

19- basilpool leaves for MC. shadow does not really care. sorrelseed comes over to celebrate her divorce, though, so that’s fun.

20- another OaC Clanwide battle training thing, probably. shadowstep probably did pretty great. she probably proved her strength and beat some people up or something. good for her.

21- she gets to train breezepaw!! she likes breezepaw. his bff monarchpaw is being mentored by his mom songstar, so they probably hang out a lot. that’s fun.

22- HC hike happens. shadow does not go.

23- just chilling. training breezepaw.

24- she feels bad for orphaning some baby owls and starts dropping prey off in their nest at night. she also gets her paw scar while killing their mom pfft

25- the lil owls vanish. did they leave? did they die? she’ll never know. there’s another OrC daylight gathering, though. Shadow does not go. also, minkstar of MC loses all nine lives in a short span of time to some kind of strange illness. Shadow finds that ominous.

26- dustkit dies to an owl. shadow hopes it isn’t her fault. oh, and the plague spreads from MC and officially hits everywhere else. breezepaw dies. she’s very unhappy about that, but proud of him still as he’s named breezeriver. she’s one of the cats at his vigil.

27- newtbrook dies and shadow becomes deputy. she’s surprised, but grateful for it. word also gets out that milkweedstar of FC has lost all nine lives. suddenly it’s a very real possibility that shadow might ascend instantly to leadership so she takes care to ensure that songstar is always taking proper safety precautions.

28- she gets to mentor patchpaw. she asked songstar if she could because she feels bad abt dustkit (tho she didn’t mention that part). she didnt want to mentor silverpaw bc she thought his and breezeriver’s personalities would’ve been too similar and it would’ve just made her sad pfft. she likes patchpaw, tho. she feels bad for him.

29- just chilling. mousetail dies. that’s unfortunate.

30- while strolling around at night she accidentally stumbles across patch & aster playing at silver falls one time. she’s about to bust them but then stops n sighs to herself n is like “yk what kids will be kids” and just leaves them be lol. they didnt notice she was there.

31- just chilling. training patchpaw.

32- plague ends!

33- just chilling. training patchpaw.

34- patch becomes a warrior and the borders formally open up. she gets to see everyone again at the first gathering in 8 moons! she is sad to hear that two of wrensong’s kits died. she thinks it’s swell that halfheart and drizzlesnow have kits now. she deems it cool that fennelfoot has gotten one of minkstar’s kits as his first apprentice. also, HC hike! awkward interaction w/ aspenstar, apparently he was friends w/ her mom?? shadow thinks he is a strange old man, but she’ll take it.

35- rogue war announcement! shadow is not pleased.

36- HC field trip w/ Patch & Silver to talk to the bird nerd yippee. It turns out shadowstep did *not* kill a child good job shadowstep

## Other

### Trivia

- Shadowstep likes her name very much. And she secretly thinks that Brightnight’s is hilarious.

- She’s one of OasisClan’s finest fighters. She’s excellent in battle training. Very strong and very unpredictable. She’s also a silent and graceful hunter. She’s pretty awesome at most of the important things, actually.

- Except for climbing trees and swimming. Shadowstep is very bad at trees. She is very much embarrassed by this and tries not to let anyone find out about it, but she becomes very uncharacteristically clumsy while climbing. She’s not a fan of heights. She’s scared of water, too. She had a bad experience with it as an apprentice and she also just hates the feeling of getting wet. It takes forever for her fur to dry. she likes the sound of rain and the appearance of snow, but being outside amidst either just makes her soggy and grumpy. She’s a tad more normal than she likes to let on.

- Shadowstep’s favorite prey is yellow-necked mouse. She isn’t sure what about them makes them so much better than other mice, but she will always target the yellow-necks when she can.

- This’ll be added to her bio later, but she secretly just… loves animals. She’s a buried nerd. She used to sit and observe prey as an apprentice instead of catching it sometimes. She liked to watch their behaviors and lifestyles and social habits. Mostly rodents, but sometimes birds and bugs. Nobody knows this about her except for Sorrelseed and probably Brightnight. Well, her mom did, too- she was the one who inspired her interest- but… y’know.

- Her favorite color is black. She would’ve been a goth girl in middle school. She kind of has Wednesday Addams vibes. Or Daria from that old animated sitcom. She’d write edgy poetry in public but then she’d go home and secretly just read romance novels and watch nature documentaries.

- Her favorite flowers are birthwort because they’re invasive, toxic, ugly, and smell terrible. They’re altogether spiteful little plants and Shadowstep thinks that’s rad. She respects anything with that attitude.

- The early loss of her parents gave her some attachment problems. She’s extremely protective of the few cats she still holds close, especially Brightnight. This extended to Breezeriver as well and Shadowstep was devastated to lose him. She feels like she somehow failed Songstar and hopes to make up for it by serving as her deputy.

- Shadowstep loves to watch the stars at night. Sometimes she’ll just go out of camp to pace around or hunt or drink from Silver Falls (she thinks it’s very pretty there). She’s a bit of a night owl and tends to get very little sleep. It doesn’t seem to bother her, though.

- Speaking of owls! This’ll be added to her bio in more detail later, but as a young warrior, she killed an owl on a night hunt. She then discovered that it had a nest with two chicks in it. Oops. She felt a little guilty, and against her better judgement, she proceeded to secretly drop off prey for the owlets every night for a moon until they vanished. She never found out if they had been killed by something or if they had finished growing their feathers and flown away. She was a little worried that it might have been one of them that killed Dustkit, but bringing the feathers saved by Silverclaw to HorizonClan’s bird nerd Conchsong confirmed that it was a different kind of owl. So that was a relief. She’s not gonna do that again.

- The only cats who know about that incident are Brightnight, Patchpounce, and Silverclaw. Brightnight is a given, but Patch & Silver have agreed to not let word get out just for the sake of keeping things simple between them and not starting unnecessary drama in the Clan, especially given the current situation.

- She did not have a crush on Halfheart. She likes girls. She just wondered if she did for a little while bc it seemed like she was supposed to. If anything, she actually thought dawnflurry was very pretty. she never acted on it though due to A) not ever realizing it was a crush and B) dawnflurry having a husband pfjdhfb. It wasn’t until moons after dawn died that shadow suddenly stopped and went “ohhh THATS what that was”

- I love her sm

### Quotes

*“This is not a matter to be kept private. If we are to effectively repel this threat, we must remain united in every sense of the word; with our own Clanmates as well as with each other.”*

*“Equipped we are, though we cannot be too sure about* ‘well’.”

*“You do not seem to understand me. Cats and foxes are not, in fact, the same. Hollysecret is right. We are trained to do battle with badgers, with weasels, with owls and hawks. Perhaps even the occasional eagle or coyote. We have never trained for armies.”*

*“Border patrols. Along those at our outside borders, I recommend increasing the number of cats. More eyes to keep watch and more claws for defense.”*