Bramble Noose

**Bramble Noose** is a one-shot by Streampaw. It was posted on blogclan. The original title was Sunset Stains.

**CONTENT WARNNING: TORTURE, BLOOD AND DEATH. READ AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION**

## The Story

It’s something that never should have happened, but it did. Our thoughts are tangled when we walk through the woods, left, right, and I can smell the fear already. It’s not something I can ever forget, the way Rain’s paws are trembling and little Heather looks up at me and her eyes are wide, wide, wide;I can see the whites when she speaks and even at five moons she knows there’s something wrong. More than what any of us know.

–

The hollow they hold the trial in is woven from brambles, thorns outward. I daren’t look inside but Rain walks in without hesitation. Suspicion lingers in the air, thick and viscous, the way oil travels down the riverbank instead of water, the panel of cats expressionless and blank.

“Do you know what you have done?”

“Yes.” Her voice doesn’t tremble, but it’s smaller than a stone.

“Do you know what must be done?”

A wordless nod. I hold my breath.

“Do you know why this must be done?”

“Yes.”

–

The death of another is not something you become desensitized to, no matter how many times you saw it. Rain’s blood stains the snow that remained, red flecks that scatter across the ground, stained sunset. It’s not a sight you want to see. Her eyes flicker wildly and suddenly they’ve found me, they’ve found me and there’s nowhere to hide, to run; there’s screams and blood and then *pain pain pain*– and I run

–

The echo of a scream is something one does not forget. Heather’s eyes are closed when I found her neck snapped, hanging above a gorge by a bramble noose, her tabby pelt as pretty as ever, even in death. Her neck stains sunset. She was barely six moons old.

–

The skies stain sunset when it’s my turn. The space is dark and damp from melted snow. It squelches under my paws. Spring is not what one would call a brutal season. Leafbare is cruel, but Spring is something different entirely. Spring is about winning. Spring is about who gets there first, who wins the chance to grow and have a life- to see the sun for the first (or maybe last) time. The old are stripped from their branches to make way for the new ones. It’s a race of almost greed, and it’s worse knowing the contestants this year will become the ones to go the next. It’s beautiful, in some ways.

The skies stain sunset when it’s my turn. I jump onto thorns, I swallow roses, I climb trees with my teeth. I weigh myself down with stones and toss myself into the river, They snap my claws and tell me to run through fire, and I come back ash, inside and out. Scarlet fills my mouth as I stare down at the white shards lying on the dark, dark floor.

The skies stain sunset when it’s my turn. They hold me above the gorge by a bramble noose, red dripping down onto the pale rocks. It’s not a sight you want to see.

The skies stained sunset when it was my turn.

–

## Trivia

A/N okay this was meant to be only the 1st paragraph but i wanted to extend it.

reasoning-

The main character can be whatever gender you think, it’s not set in stone.

Rain was persecuted by the cats of the trial room for an unknown reason, but it would not be something severe enough to warrant days of torture and eventual death, which is what she went through. (personally I imagined the trial cats as homophobes)

Heather is a young cat who is very close to the main character and Rain (if you want, you can say it’s their child) but when I wrote it I imagined a very sisterly/brotherly bond.

The main character was persecuted and tortured for witnessing Rain’s death and torture and also for possibly being Rain’s accomplice in whatever crime they said she did.

The white shards were teeth.