CLAN OF HOWLING WIND
WELCOME TO HOWLING WIND
Bravery - Determination - Wit
TERRITORY
Life in the Clan of Howling Wind is harsh, but the beauty is plentiful. Heavy fog settles over the horizon in the early mornings and the sky is an abnormally rich blue during the days. At nighttime, the forest comes to life with insects, prey, and predators alike.
Each season, color erupts across the land: winter calls for white snow and blue-glazed ice, spring for blossoming flowers, summer for dry trees and shallow water, and autumn for barren leaves. For that very reason, cats are forced to adapt quickly, and no matter how young they may be, it's their duty for the clan to survive each season.
During winter, the territory is most beautiful, especially the camp's entrance. Through a gap in the thickest branches of trees where they scrape together and the wind can hardly whistle let-alone howl, the clan resides. They live by a tall cliff-side the color of old ash and they keep off the ground by living high up in the old oaken trees.
The ground of the camp is rich with marsh-land and water, hence why cats don't sleep down there, but it does make for a good place to hunt for toads and frogs...
But the forest isn't as beautiful as it may sound on paper. Two-legs seldom venture out into it despite living rather close to the outskirts because of their fears. The forest is eery and empty at night and the howling of wind can sometimes mix with the howls of wolves, and those that live in the forest are constantly tempting death
The forest that surrounds the camp is made up of trees that shriek and howl whenever the wind blows in between them, which is where the Clan got their name from. It is also where most of the prey is found, and despite the scariness of the forest, it has enough trees and bushes to support any family of critters.
if you can get past the scariness of the territory, life is good.
CLAN DENS
The clan makes their home a little ways away from the thickest edge of the forest, where the trees are unbelievably large, heavy-set, and old. They sleep in the hollows of the bark where owls have surely nested before, and due to the closeness of each tree, it's easy to navigate from one edge of the camp to another just by climbing from branch to branch. Despite how it may sound, the holes left in the upper-trunks of the trees are actually rather large and make for perfect homes.
Inside the tree-dens, the bark ground is padded with moss and it is the apprentices' duty to change out the dens once half a moon has passed, which is a job they grumble about often.
The den that the elder's rest in is, by far, the shortest tree of them all. Only a couple of tail-lengths tall and so stout that the branches sweep the ground. It makes for the perfect home because the older cats don't have to strain their already-aching bones to leap up into the higher dens. Due to it being low to the ground, though, it gets damp quickly in summer because of the evaporation of the swamp-water and that means the apprentices have to tidy out the bedding twice as often.
Just above the elder's den, only the slightest bit taller is the nursery where queens nest with their lovely little kits. They're rather high-up for a kit but they aren't yet level with the warrior trees, and instead, are just a little bit below the apprentice trees, so the risk isn't huge. The tree overlooks the deepest part of the swamp so that if a kit falls down, they'll land in the water and not on land.
Next, is the apprentice den. It is one of the taller trees but isn't quite level with the warrior's den just yet, and compared to the other trees, its hollow is the smallest because there aren't very many apprentices at one time. By the trunk of the tree and around the roots, there are plenty of scratch marks from where cats have fallen out of the den and have had to catch themselves on their ways down, and the elders like to tell kits stories about naughty apprentices being sent to the stars after playing on the branches like an apprentice.
Strangely enough, the only den on the ground is the medicine cat's den. Each medicine cat lives underneath the leader's den, a large cliff-side. It's an open, wide space, perfect for treating injured patients and storing herbs. Of course, it floods occasionally, but otherwise remains a nice dry spot for the injured.
The largest flurry of trees would be the warrior den-trees. There is more than one scattered about the camp but the branches are all inter-twined for easy travel. These dens are typically big enough to fit three or four cats in each, and so den-mates are typically friends or mates. The deputy also sleeps here.
Just beside the tree-dens is a large cliff-side where the founder of the clan sleeps. It is perfect for sunning and surprisingly warm, even at night, and respected warriors may rest there during the day. The leader nestles themselves in the crevice between two large boulders on top of the cliff-side, which makes for a nice spot to sleep. And, when they need to make announcements, they stand on top of the two boulders, and the rest of the clan (kits and injured cats excluded) flock to the cliff-side.
The camp is strange but comfortable.