the leaders! a little synopsis for each of them below.
reedheart was a shoo-in. he was brave, charming, loyal, and most importantly, his clan adored him. so when the position opened up due to an unfortunate incident at sunningrocks, not a soul was surprised when hopstar chose him as deputy. and what a deputy he was! reedheart was playful with the kits, patient with the apprentices, and reverent towards the elders. he bantered with his fellow warriors, yet when battle called, he lead them without flinching.
reedheart was young. only 30 moons or so when he was chosen deputy, and still training his third apprentice. it was part of his charm, to be sure. but he simply could not have had the experience and wisdom of more senior warriors. this was a nonissue as deputy— all he really needed to do was designate patrols, train the apprentices, and serve his clan as he always had.
but hopstar was not long for this world when reedheart became deputy. she passed away a few short moons later, leaving reedheart— now reedstar— to pick up the mantle. reedstar felt almost blindsided. he always knew he might be leader, but it seemed so soon. under his confident façade, reedstar constantly doubts himself. his decision-making, his diplomacy, and most of all, his connection with starclan. reedstar’s life-giving ceremony was curt, and he seldom senses his ancestors’ approval in daily life. sometimes he wonders if they outright disapprove of his leadership.
luckily, reedstar’s mate and deputy frostwing is always by his side. frostwing’s cool head and analytical ability help reedstar where his intuition fails. the two spend hours patrolling thunderclan’s territory alone, talking of plans for the future. some critics of reedstar’s regime refer to her as froststar.
reedstar is determined to maintain thunderclan’s allegiance with shadowclan, despite beetlestar’s seeming disdain towards him. he also wants to strengthen relations with windclan, considering they’ve entered a period of relative prosperity.
reedstar is still young, his leadership short. only time will tell if he can lead thunderclan to greatness or fail when it relied most upon him.
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beetlestar is as stoic as her predecessor, crowstar. but where crowstar was gracious and diplomatic, beetlestar always puts shadowclan first. during thunderclan’s disease epidemic, she was one of the warriors who protested crowstar’s decision to allow thunderclan cats to study under fogflight, fearing disease transmission and thunderclan espionage.
beetlestar never took a mate or kits; all her attention is focused on her clan. if she were ever one to joke (though some doubt she ever would), she’d say that shadowclan was her one true love.
in the winter moons, beetlestar rations food very tightly, making absolute certain elders and nursing queens eat first (and warriors sometimes not at all). she seldom starts fights, but always finishes them. though many shadowclan cats have their own opinions on beetlestar’s leadership, the only cat she really listens to is fogflight, the medicine cat. the two have always been close— beetlestar holds the molly in tremendously high regard.
as for the other clans, beetlestar varies in begrudging respect for the scrupulous toestar to contempt for the young and inexperienced reedstar. she fears riverclan’s newfound ambition under dewstar and is glad the two clans don’t share a border.
beetlestar only ever wants the best for shadowclan. she will pursue it by any means necessary.
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dewstar is larger than life. literally. his parents were big and powerful, his siblings are big and powerful, and dewstar himself is a force to be reckoned with. but dewstar’s true gift isn’t his brawn. it’s his silver tongue. the tom has always promised his clanmates the world. even when he was a kit, he told them he’d one day be leader and elevate riverclan to a place of hegemony over the forest. “we’ll all be fat and happy,” he’d promise his clanmates. “you just wait and see.”
it doesn’t hurt that he came from a long line of outstanding warriors. his father would have been deputy, maybe even leader, had he not been so committed to his family. it was never in question that dewkit would be great; it was only a matter of how great he would be.
as riverclan’s elderly deputy ailed, dewfang’s twin sister and medicine cat coldsky recieved an omen in the form of a dewy leaf, despite it being the middle of a hot summer’s day. riverclan’s leader took it to mean that dewfang was indeed fit to be deputy.
the rest is history.
dewstar tends to regard the other clans as a homogenous mass of inferiors. they could never have what riverclan has. the traditions, the aspirations of riverclan simply dwarfs whatever the others may put forth. it is for this reason that the normally peaceful riverclan has began to encroach on both thunderclan and windclan territory. reedstar and toestar both quietly fear dewstar, and worry that his big talk may someday become actionable.
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toestar (synopsis taken from here!) trained as a tunneler before becoming warrior, deputy and then leader. during her tenure, she’s reformed windclan traditions so that every apprentice had some background in tunneling and tunneling safety whether they were tunnelers or moor-runners. she also instituted more robust rules for tunneling, like making sure no cat ever went solo and never went into the tunnels when there was a chance of flooding.
toestar loves the tunnels. she treats it as an art form and something that made windclan special, but she also knows how dangerous they could be. some believe toestar is too careful, maybe even cowardly, but windclan hasn’t lost a soul to the tunnels since she instituted reforms.
toestar has also spent her life trying to bridge the gap between tunnelers and moor-runners. she sees both practices as two sides of the same coin, and believes windclan needs both skillsets in order to thrive. as an older warrior, she trained in moor-running so that she could eventually teach both specialties.
toestar has seen young warriors grow into fine leaders. she hopes reedstar will live up to expectations, and regards him with kindness and respect. though windclan is not so friendly with shadowclan or riverclan, toestar isn’t one to start fights. still, she fears that border disputes with riverclan may soon come to a head.
thunderclan medicine cat!! i just can’t settle on how i want to do character references… or an art style for that matter lol. anyway dogtooth is contemporaneous to toestar (although a bit younger and unrelated).
dogtooth was a very capable warrior. exceedingly so, as a matter of fact. powerful in both bark and bite, dogtooth was one of thunderclan’s greatest assets when it came to battle.
but all the combat skills in the world are useless when the enemy isn’t another clan, but disease. a time came when thunderclan fell into its crosshairs; cats were dying, and the survivors were starving. dogtooth could only watch on helplessly as her clan suffered.
when thunderclan’s sole medicine cat caught the illness he was trying to save his clan from and passed away, young leader reedstar reluctantly decided to implore their closest ally, shadowclan, for help.
reedstar and the gracious crowstar came to an agreement. thunderclan would send a small group of cats to be taught by shadowclan’s medicine cat and medicine apprentice. they’d receive a crash course in healing in no more than one half-moon and, starclan willing, return to thunderclan with the skills to treat the ailing.
it was to nobody’s surprise that dogtooth’s apprentice at the time, owlpaw, was chosen. there had been talk of him training in medicine when he was a kitten. but many were shocked when dogtooth herself asked to go with him.
the way dogtooth saw it, she had a duty both to her clan and to owlpaw. her fighting skills were useless at this juncture (as the clans were in a time of relative peace), but dogtooth knew she could learn medicine. after all, she had been patched up so many times she already had a solid foundation just from spending time in the medicine den.
further, dogtooth could not stomach the idea of sending owlpaw to shadowclan without his parents, siblings, or mentor. she knew he’d be fine, but she still had a responsibility to protect him, to care for him. sending him off alone would be antithetical to her sworn duty.
so off the pair went, leaving their clanmates behind. luckily, the stars aligned. shadowclan’s medicine cat fogflight, herself a daughter of crowstar, was a fantastic teacher. owlpaw was a natural healer whose connection to starclan was unparalleled. and dogtooth herself worked unbelievably hard to learn everything she could.
dogtooth and owlpaw returned to thunderclan much different. they had undergone moon’s worth of training in so little time. but what dogtooth couldn’t remember, owlpaw could fill in the gaps. what wisdom owlpaw lacked, dogtooth could provide. the pair indeed worked to save their clan from disease, and in time, thunderclan began to recover.
owlpaw received his full name in record time. he was named owlflight in honor of shadowclan’s medicine cat, whose intelligence and teaching skills had saved thunderclan in their time of crisis. dogtooth took to monastic life like a fish to water, finding a new purpose in healing her clanmates.
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i’m not drawin these cats in any particular order bc there are so many threads running parallel to each other but i still need to draw crowstar, reedstar, owlpaw, fogflight… and so so many more 😭 why didn’t anyone tell me clans had a bunch of cats in them ??
aaand a decidedly simpler ref sheet for an even older oc!!
toestar was an ancient windclan leader back when the clans lived in the old territory. she trained as a tunneler before becoming warrior, deputy and then leader. she reformed windclan traditions so that every apprentice had some background in tunneling and tunneling safety whether they were tunnelers or moor-runners. she also instituted more robust rules for tunneling, like making sure no cat ever went solo and never went into the tunnels when there was a chance of flooding.
toestar loved the tunnels. she treated it as an art form and something that made windclan special, but she also knew how dangerous they could be.
some thought that toestar was too careful, maybe even cowardly. even so, fatalities from tunneling declined sharply under her leadership.
she also spent her life trying to bridge the gap between tunnelers and moor-runners. she saw both practices as two sides of the same coin, and windclan needed both skillsets in order to thrive. as an older warrior, she trained in moor-running so that she could eventually teach both specialties.
ironically, toestar lost her last few lives to the tunnels. believing a young warrior had broken the rules and gone tunneling alone, she took a patrol into a dangerously unstable tunnel to find them. while the patrol was underground, the ceiling of the tunnel began to collapse. her patrol was able to escape with minor injuries, but toestar herself, having taken the lead, suffocated. the missing warrior was later found alive on the other side of windclan territory, having luckily avoided the incident.
when giving lives to new leaders, toestar often gives the life of foresight or vigilance.
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