#cold bloodlines

[mothdapple]

How anthropomorphic do you write the cast? And if they're more feline, how did you do that?

There are some ways that I like to make them more anthropomorphic, and in other ways, I like to make them less.

Biologically/physically, I like to make my cats more cat-like. Like in my fics, kits open their eyes around 2 weeks old and are incapable of even really tottering out of the nursery until they are 3 weeks old at the soonest. There are no kits opening their eyes, walking, and talking at 2 days old like Bluestar did lol. You can see my "Guide to Kit Development" post here for a more detailed breakdown of how I try to translate realistic cat biology to Warrior cats. I also like to make my cats more cat-like in terms of other behaviors like body language (more slow-blinking, head bonking, lifting tail in greeting, platonic grooming, claw sharpening, etc.), sleeping patterns (my cats nap a lot more than in canon Warriors), and more physical play/wrestling, even with adult cats.

But I make my cats a bit more anthropomorphic in regard to Clan culture for the purposes of making the Clans more distinct from one another. My version of the Clans and Tribe make various types of art in the form of poetry, song, "dance," and physical art (collecting/arranging items, or cave painting.) Everything is still bounded by realistic cat biology, though— like they don't have opposable thumbs, so the physical art they can do is only done with teeth, claws, or paws. And, although I mentioned that my cats sleep more than canon, I also tweaked the Clans' sleeping patterns to make them more distinct from one another. RiverClan and ThunderClan are mostly diurnal. WindClan is truly crepuscular (like irl cats.) And ShadowClan is mostly nocturnal.

[hop-eful]

ok I like binge-read @mothdapple’s Cold Bloodlines fic in the span of like four days and it’s genuinely pulled my Warrior Cats hyperfixation out of it’s cold, dead grave so have some messy doodles! (Still getting used to drawing cats again whoops)

I WILL be drawing more of them soon istg,,,,

[panic-and-chaos]

@mothdapple I got busy so I’ve only got frostmask and autumnleap rn but their kittens are in the works (I love newtkit and mistkit)

Frosty was fun since I’ve never draw point cats with white spotting before, because I forget they can have it ha. I designed her to be super flowy and curly because it felt right

Autumnleap gets to be Big and Fluffy. He’s a classic simply because I feel like it fits him, and he’s such a cutie.

(I’ll draw more kitties as I get time for them!! This is really fun to do!)

[ballerbozo]

MORE headshots of cats from @mothdapple’s Cold Bloodlines fic. Sedgestar, Redclaw, Swoopstripe, and Paledusk!! INCREDIBLE fic that you need to read RIGHT MEOW!!!

[mothdapple]

All I'm saying Erins, is that I did it first.

(But I forgive you for copying since the Frostpaws at least don't share a warrior name.)

Here's the link, if you want to read about my Frostpaw :)

[mothdapple]

what would frostmask think of firestar?

I imagine that she would like him and would be rooting for him from StarClan! I think she'd obviously empathize a lot with what Firestar went through in his journey from being a kittypet to becoming a ThunderClan warrior (and eventual leader.) Also the awful state of ShadowClan under Brokenstar was likely painful for Frostmask and many other former-ShadowClan-now-StarClan cats to see. So I imagine many of them were relieved and grateful when Firestar helped ShadowClan drive him out.

One interesting thing that canonically ties Frostmask's era to Firestar's is that, in canon, Sedgestar is a cat who gives Tigerstar one of his nine lives. (The life he gives is for "pride in ShadowClan." The full quote from Sedgestar is this: "I give you a life for pride in ShadowClan, knowing they can stand alone through any challenge. ShadowClan needs no allegiances, no help from other Clans when times are hard. Your cats will always find a way to survive if you give them a chance, Tigerclaw.")

I like to imagine that Frostmask and Sedgestar had a big argument surrounding this-- over whether or not to support Tigerstar. I think Frostmask saw too many shades of Paledusk in Tigerstar and thought it was dangerous to hand leadership of their Clan over to him. But Sedgestar was willing to give Tigerstar a life, since despite his obvious faults, Sedgestar felt like the lessor of two evils was to gamble on Tigerstar, than risk ShadowClan falling to ruin as it was currently leaderless and weak from the Carrionplace illness.

[mothdapple]

please tell me frostMask and AutumnLeap live to be grumpy old elders telling stories about their apprentice days

I want to preface this with that I'm a strong believer in that "it's not canon until it's written down." So if you want to think about Frostmask and Autumnleap as elders telling stories about their youth, then your headcanon is as valid as mine!

(Of course, I'm still always happy to answer questions or speculate about how I see these characters' futures/past or other events that would have happened outside of the scope of Cold Bloodlines. I just don't want my opinions to invalidate anyone else's.)

So with that context, in my mind... Autumnleap is the only one who lives to be an elder :( I'm sorry!

In broad strokes, I see the future playing out like this: Pineshade becomes Pinestar when Sedgestar loses his last life around two years after the end of Cold Bloodlines. Pinestar asks Frostmask if she will consider becoming her deputy. Frostmask accepts since she feels much more well-suited to being deputy now in this different stage of her life: Her kits are grown/established warriors. Frostmask has had the time to become a more experienced warrior herself. She's familiar with the deputy's duties thanks to her time as Sedgestar's deputy. She loves Pinestar, they work well together, and Frostmask knows her strengths/flaws and what she will need for support. And (perhaps most importantly) Frostmask doesn't believe that she will ever have to inherit Clan leadership from Pinestar since they are the same age, and Pinestar is just starting her time as leader.

Frostmask is Pinestar's deputy for a little over 5 years, when in winter, there is some kind of predator attack. (I haven't fully thought it out, but I imagine it's something like a fox or dog that attacks either the camp or a patrol.) Frostmask is killed while defending her Clanmates. She would have been around nine years old. I think Autumnleap would retire a couple of moons after her death, as he'd be getting older and no longer have as much drive to keep being a warrior without Frostmask. And Poolcloud and Dewleaf probably retire not too long after him to keep him company in the elders' den. I'm sure they share plenty of stories about Frostmask, though, to the younger generations! I imagine she'd be a pretty exciting figure to the younger cats-- as a cat who was deputy to two leaders and who was key with ending seasons worth of conflict with SkyClan in her youth.

[mothdapple]

Question 1 on the ask game for Frostmask and Pineshade

Thanks for the ask! (For this ask game.)

1. What was the original thought that led to the creation of this character?

Frostmask's character creation is inextricably tied to the creation of Cold Bloodlines as a whole since my very first concept for this story was along the lines of: "I want to write about a daughter who ultimately overcomes/kills her manipulative, evil father." So I knew this story's protagonist would be the morally good daughter character and the story's main antagonist would be her father, who tries to corrupt her, but she triumphs over in the end. The rest of her character developed from there.

Pineshade has a bit of a less exciting answer because she was a character who developed significantly over the course of me writing her, as opposed to me starting out with a clear concept of where she'd end up from the beginning.

I knew that Frostmask in the beginning of the story would feel like an outsider in ShadowClan, so I needed a few primary characters who would ostracize her. I knew that Swoopstrike would be hard on Frost at first but eventually come around. And Dampfang was obviously her #1 hater and Cold Bloodlines' secondary main antagonist throughout, but I wanted Frost's initial feelings of isolation in ShadowClan to extend further than just from a critical mentor and the disdain of one warrior. So I also made Pinekit/paw a rival and bully to Frost (but who did not dislike her as vehemently as Dampfang.) It was only much later on, during the writing process, that Pineshade's character development took her in the direction of becoming an important friend for Frostmask, and she became a much more significant player in the story overall than I'd originally intended.