#spirekit

I decided to draw them having a quiet moment to themselves in ShadowClan territory not long after Fringewhisker won her place in the Clan, before Berryheart's rage against the pair really started rearing its head and put the two on their guard. It's a moment of relief and joy, so much dizzying joy, now that they can finally just be together without having to constantly look over their shoulder, always having one ear pricked, always ready to move away from each other at the slightest hint of an approaching patrol. All of that hiding is behind them now. For better or worse, their secret is out in the open, and they can face whatever comes next together.

I had a lot of fun with this one, and I'm actually really proud of the result.  I'm especially proud of Spireclaw, and of the background, which while not perfect, does look better than previous attempts.  I used this image as a reference for the background. I'm super proud of Spireclaw's shading, and especially of how the shading turned out on him. Fringwhisker I'm still a bit unhappy with, something about her face just doesn't look quite right (I was trying to show her looking up at Spireclaw with an adoring smile), but it looked way worse before, and I did a lot of tweaking and playing around with it, and while it's still not quite right, it looks a lot better after all the work I put into trying to fix it. I used this image as a reference for Spire and Fringe.

Spireclaw has no physical description given other than his pattern, so I came up with my own for him. I originally made a brand-new lineart for him that was just as lithe and elegant but with short hair, but it ended up feeling like that lineart fit another black-and-white tom far better, so I ended up giving the lineart to that cat instead (you'll see who when I post his ref sheet tomorrow), and I reused Sparrowtail's lineart for Spireclaw. I made his fur a bit shorter on the neck and tail, as I felt that suited Spireclaw better.

For his pattern, Spireclaw is described as a black-and-white tom. I played around with his pattern a lot, first with him being mostly white, then mostly black, then a tuxedo more similar to his mother, until I settled on his appearance here. I'm really happy with the end result, I dunno why, it just really says "Spireclaw" to me. He has no canon eye color, so I gave him the same yellow eyes that some of his aunts have.