Four Clans and Four Trees

Four Clans and Four Trees is a tale concocted to explain why the clans live where they do. It was originally told by Gingertail to a group of wide-eyed ThunderClan kits.

Out of character, it was created by Kitsufox on 26 September 2006.

Four Clans & Four Trees

Long ago in the days of the great clans lived two cats who belonged to LionClan. The tom was called Cynelic and was tawny with long, dark hair on his neck and around his head. The she-cat was called Cwen, and she was large and golden like Cynelic but lacked the rough of hair the tom had.

Legends say that these two cats were the Leader and Medicine Cat of LionClan. For many seasons the story tells of a coming of beasts with spotted pelts that looked very strange. Their necks were long and strong, but the ears small and round. The forelegs were longer than the hind and they had little more than a stump for a tail. These beasts, however, traveled in a great tribe and possessed a ferocious bite that they used to drive LionClan from the lands they lived in then.

Cynelic led LionClan to a place not too far away that was the safest he could find quickly. Once they managed to get settled, Cwen went forth to seek answers. Lost to us are the ancestors the Great Clans looked to, but they came to her and told her to travel towards the Moon for the three days that proceeded its half-full state. She did as they asked, and found herself in a place where a tiny tunnel drew her attention.

She squeezed down, feeling that this was the place she was meant to come to. The cave she found was dominated by the stone that came to be called the Moonstone. By it she laid in exhaustion next to the stone, where she dozed. When she next opened her eyes it was to the gleam of the moon in the cave and the full power of the Moonstone. She was visited again by the ancestors who led StarClan in those days, who told her to bring the Medicine Cats of all the other Great Clans to this place by the time the moon was growing full again, and they would tell how the savage and forbidden crossbreed of dog, cat and bear could be banished from their homelands.

Once again, she did as she was bidden. Cwen journeyed back to where LionClan had moved, and then back to where they had originally lived. She found and told the Medicine Cats of all the Clans. Though they fought the idea, the night after she came to each, the ancestors sent their call, and they gathered at LionClan’s new place to prepare for the journey.

Agile and spotted was Prica of JaguarClan. Swift and graceful was Hraed of CheetahClan. Fierce and Powerful was Reoc of TigerClan. The four traveled together and arrived at the tunnel Cwen had found the day of the Half-Moon. This was the first of what would grow to be the Tradition of the Medicine Cats to meet at the Half-moon to honor and share-tongues with StarClan.

Cwen, Prica, and Hraed all were able to pass through the tunnel, but at a glance savage Reoc knew he would not fit. In his anger he attacked the rocks that surrounded the tunnel, and tore at it like a monster. It did not take him long to tear a great hole into the ground and open the tunnel into a great cave. It was by Reoc’s claws that Highstones and Mothermouth were born. When the four descended, the ancestors spoke again, this time instructing them to bring delegations from each Clan, to a place they must find together, near the stone they currently gathered around.

The leaders of the Great Clans selected the strongest of their warriors, for the sacrilegious beasts had begun to invade all the clans. They followed the visions of the Medicine Cats to a place where four great oaks grew, and the first gathering commenced at the appointed time in the first Truce the full moon had ever seen. The ancestors visited again, one of the rare visits they make in which they are not bound to the Moonstone, but instead to the some great cause that the earthbound cats still need guidance for.

Instead of fighting the beasts, the Clans were told to move, to gather and honor the Truce in the land between the four trees every full moon. It was said that outsiders, beasts and monsters would never be permitted to destroy the four clans so long as the Truce was honored and the Medicine Cats stayed true to the tasks that were set to them.