#ashfur

I call this one "squilfs became starclans sacrificing lamb because leafpool is bad at her job because of crow feather."

Story wise it serves as a sweet moment for readers about squilfs and bramble being together. Narrative wise it makes no sense. Why does starclan care to show leaf that bramble and squilf belong together? What does fire stars daughters personal relationship concern starclan? Squilfs not breaking the code. She's picking a mate from her own clan. Unless starclan NEEDS THEM TO BE TOGETHER FOR A SPECIFIC REASON.

So in starlight leafpool gets the blood will spill blood prophecy. She doesn't know what it means at the time, buuut we know that it means by sunset. Bramble kills hawk Frost to save firestar. But what if it didn't mean that situation specifically originally? What if it meant that bramble was going to kill firestar instead? Blood doesn't just have to mean related kin. Firestar and bramble are both in thunderclan. They are both thunderclan blood. In starlight bramble starts hanging out with hawk and his dad in the dark forest and starts down a darker path at the time. But why send it to leafpool?

Why not send it to cinder or fire since cinder is the elder medicine cat and fire stars life is actually in danger. The answer is squilf. Squilf was close to bramble at the time as they had just finished the great journey and were developing feelings for one another. She would be the best judge of brambles behavior at the time and would be able to tell if he was being shady. Starclan was probably hoping that leaf would mention it to her and she would start to notice bramble being off and would be concerned. that would lead her to talking with bramble or mentioning it to firestar. Or something at would help lead bramble away from murdering firestar. But leafpool DOESNT DO THAT. WHY? CROWFEATHER.

Leafpool soon becomes wrapped up and consumed by thoughts of CROWFEATHER after he saves her during the fight with windclan. Leaf kinda ends up not forgetting but really ignoring the prophecy all while bramble continues to train with tigerstar. All the while starclan is probably going "shitshitshit leaf we need you to do something here cinder is gonna die. And bramble is about to become tigerstar 2 electric boogaloo.".

So what do they do? THEY SEND HER TO SEE BRAMBLE IN THE DARK FOREST AS LIKE A HEY DEAL WITH THIS AND IT DOESN'T WORK. leaf at first is like "oh shit. Bramble might be up to something bad." BUT THEN SHE DOESN'T TELL ANYBODY? WHY? BECAUSE SHE TAKES GOING TO THE DARK FOREST AS A SIGN THAT STARCLAN IS ANGRY WITH HER FOR HAVING A FORBIDDEN ROMANCE.

I can only imagine bluestar smacking her head repeatedly on a tree as she begs her to TELL SOMEBODY. ESPECIALLY SQUILF. anyways time continues on and leaf is nowhere close to figuring out "hey maybe I should tell somebody about bramble or like talk to him?" Cause she's too focused on crowfeather. starclan is quietly freaking out that firestar is gonna die and bramble is gonna kill him and do bad things. But luckily for them squilf and bramble start to rekindle their relationship. Which leads us to the vision.

Even though squilf picked bramble she was still having doubts. She asks leaf if she did the right thing picking bramble and that she thought that she and Ash would work out. This is major make or break moment for starclan. Starclan knows that leaf isn't going to figure out brambles up to something or at least try to tell somebody cause shes now mourning over crowfeather and cinder. In leafpools wish we see that leaf wishes her sister had picked ash over bramble due to the dark forest thing. But starclan can't trust that she'll tell squilf about it and bramble needs a good influence to help get him away from the path he's on. What better way than to be like oh shit maybe I shouldn't kill my wife's dad. I don't remember if he even thinks about that but I'm sure it was there in his subconscious. Like yes fire was his mentor but let's be real I don't think that would have been enough to stop him. The two didn't seem close anymore at that time and I'm sure bramble held some kind of resent towards fire since fire admits to leaf that his face still freaks him out which I'm sure bramble picked up on it.

Anyways starclan sends leaf the vision as sure fire way to make sure squilf leads bramble away from darkness. She becomes their sacrifice because let's be real she and bramble are not good together. And in a weird way ashfurs happiness becomes starclans sacrifice too because they can't have squilf changing her mind and going back to him. In one of the ultimate guides rock mentions starclan fretting over what ashfur would do now that he's lost squilf affections. Meaning they had no idea that he would become an even bigger monster than bramble would have been if he had killed firestar and and continued to work with hawk Frost.