Budding Daffodil, North Mire’s Matriarch, returned to camp one evening and placed a strange kitten beside her youngest daughter, Larkspur Bloom.
At first light, Budding Daffodil presented her to the Colony, proclaiming the circumstances of her discovery; the ground strewn with the unburied and the smell of sickness clinging to the dead like a second skin, a single healthy she-kitten found alive, to be a divine message from The Mother.
Clearly, this kit was blessed despite being born among heretics, chosen by The Mother to be raised alongside the Matriarchal bloodline. Despite her vehement protests, Rootkit was renamed Orchid Petal in a grand ceremony, and was formally adopted by Budding Daffodil and her mate, Little Marigold.
From that day on, Orchid Petal was integrated with the rest of her new family; her older sisters Fallen Sun, Jasmine Whisker, and Blazing Strawflower, her younger sister Larkspur Bloom, and her older brother Bluebell Fur. She was rigorously trained in the ways of power in the Colony, on how to gain it, how to use it, and how to keep it.
She learnt quickly that a silver tongue and a few well-placed gestures of kindness goes farther than any show of force can, but force is sometimes necessary to keep dissenters in line. She also gently, carefully had her idea of being “StarClan’s Favoured” shifted into being “The Mother’s Favoured”.
She was among the most opposed and outspoken against Budding Daffodil’s later attempts to soften the laws surrounding the Unwanted.
After Jasmine Whisker and Bluebell Fur died of Greencough, and Blazing Strawflower died of hunger in the same terrible Coldwind, Orchid Petal and Larkspur Bloom grew very close.
When Budding Daffodil died of stress and prolonged sickness, and Larkspur Bloom took the position of Matriarch, Orchid Petal was her younger sister’s biggest supporter and advisor.
Timeline:
Adoption and Renaming: 3 moons old
Budding Daffodil suggests reform: 13 moons old
The worst Coldwind in generations: 15 moons old
Budding Daffodil’s death and Larkspur Bloom’s ascension: 21 moons old
Moon Zero of Cavern Clan (You are Here): 24 moons old
@rooted-clangen
