bonefall - Tumblr blog

[bonefall]

I know you don’t rewrite arcs until they’re done, but I love hearing about your early ideas while I brood over how badly this arc has let me down. Do you have any like super vague ideas about Splashtail’s motivations yet? He’s like a way worse Hawkfrost in my mind, because they’re both very young cats who Are Just Evil. But Hawkfrost had a genuinely interesting backstory that the Erin’s simply fumbled, meanwhile Splashtail is a cartoonishly evil atheist. I feel nothing towards him, he’s not intimidating or interesting or even funny. Save me Bonefall save me (if I got something wrong please ignore it, these books are so disappointing my brain is making me forget them to protect itself.)

If it helps at all, I'm staying sane with the observation that Hawkfrost is a high charisma character making critical failure rolls, while Splashtail is a cringefail loser with no stats rolling nat20s. He becomes 50% more sufferable when you imagine a long, pungent pause after anything he says, broken only by the sound of an offscreen player tossing some dice. When the silence is broken, it's whatever NPC has been charmed speaking in the beleaguered voice of the dungeon master.

SO my early thoughts are shaping up to be that I'd like to do a slightly more serious version of that.

BB!Splashtail is the Clan equivalent of a 19-year-old, desperate for more power and respect in his society. In terms of his stats, he's promising but not outstanding. A decent fighter, a competent leader. Even in terms of lineage; his father is Sneezecloud, a respected trader and negotiator, but his mother is Havenpelt. An ex-rogue who has sworn to live by the ways of RiverClan.

Curlfeather is the one with the plans. She's the one with vision. Daughter of Reedwhisker, grandchild of Mistystar, with grand leaders like Bluestar, Oakheart, and Crookedstar in her past, greatness runs in her blood. Scandal, too-- but for some reason it's acceptable that her great-grandparents were codebreaking traitors.

Splashtail hates Curlfeather, but he can't get anywhere unless he tries to be her. He steals HER plans. He acts like SHE does. Manages to snatch power from her paws, and then has no idea what to do with it.

I'm thinking that I want his reign to be going smoothly at first, actually, going from a bit of a bossy jerk, to trying to enact Curlfeather's ambitions by launching fights and doing it badly, to active tyranny as he tries to keep control over RiverClan. Depending on how Star goes, I might have Berryheart make some kind of move to seize power over him.

At the core of how I see him though, is that Splashtail has no plan. His ideology leans Thistle Law... in a sort of dumbass 4Channer kind of way. He talks a big game about the glory of battle, but folds fast when his enemy can punch back. The only person he could successfully manipulate was a traumatized child. He will bring back pureblooded glory to the Clan, except his personal family of course

As for the Evil Atheism stuff... lol. Lmao, even. Not needed. If I need to make him a more powerful and serious danger, it's not going to come from the fact he's godless. If being an atheist gave you super murder powers, Bill Nye would have used them to obliterate half of the US government by now.

Depending on how the last book of ASC goes,

The Harelight kill is probably going to get changed to Hallowflight. Harelight watches his dad die, and Splashstar is drenched in the blood of one of RiverClan's most famous heroes. No turning back after that.

On that note I'd also make the fight longer and bloodier. A butchery of an execution showcasing Splashtail fighting like a beast and Hallowflight like a trained warrior.

I REAALLY want to make Splashtail's death a drowning. Curlfeather, demon she is now, finishes him off by dragging him under. To protect her daughter. They will have to do something VERY satisfying for me to not do this.

[bonefall]

wait kin sympathizer frecklewing goes crazy. as a former daylight warrior AND a cleric, she could be used as a case study on how extremist groups will end up recruiting the minorities theyre targeting because said minorities have issues with their culture and then are groomed into hating that part of themselves. maybe frecklewing starts out as part-time and during skyclans destiny or its bb equivalent leaves that behind

@thesnailphilosopher

Aaauugh this is getting me feeling devious

A daylight warrior during Sharpclaw's controversy, Echosong probably takes her as an apprentice because she wants to make a point about their validity. Freckle was promising, bright, and compassionate, and a Cleric has much skills and knowledge to share.

But Sharpclaw and those like him make a point she slowly finds more and more convincing. Echosong trained her, SkyClan has given her all these resources and opportunities, and yet her loyalty is "divided." She has a human who calls for her at night.

She "knows better than anyone" that Sharpclaw has a "point." That it's humiliating to live divided in this way. So she gives up her other half, coming to resent the ones who didn't.

But she's still always just the junior, even after making a real sacrifice. She craves the respect that Echosong has, the power. And when it comes time, Darktail sews a special seed in her head; "Leafstar values her Cleric, one of her mates, more than you. Echosong will always be above you, until the day they're both gone."

Frecklewing has given up everything for SkyClan. Echosong does nothing but benefit. Her mentor was just a loner before Brokenstar and Firestar brought the spark back to them-- what does SHE know about what will make SkyClan truly strong again? For her, even a weak Clan is better than no Clan.

Plus now I can plan a cool fight between them, I LOVE "pupil of mine has turned to darkness" lmao

Maybe even have Fidgetflake have to weigh in on which side he plans to choose.

Sorry if this has been answered already but I know you don’t want two cats to share a name, so which Frecklewish is the true Frecklewish? Med cat or warrior, and what’s the other one’s new name?

Imo, Frecklewish MV is absolutely iconic because of her bizarre canon placement, and she's even more notable in BB as an example of how StarClan can often unfairly damn cats when they're upset. So as a result, she's the winner in the battle of two conflict names.

Frecklewish SkyClan is now Frecklewing. I'm so used to this change that I sometimes forget her canon name lmao. In addition, I'm also not sure if she's going to survive The Kin's attack on SkyClan, honestly, since I just kinda dig the vibe of an ancient Echosong instead.

Might get devious and make her a Kin sympathizer lmao

[bonefall]

Sorry if this has been answered already but I know you don’t want two cats to share a name, so which Frecklewish is the true Frecklewish? Med cat or warrior, and what’s the other one’s new name?

Imo, Frecklewish MV is absolutely iconic because of her bizarre canon placement, and she's even more notable in BB as an example of how StarClan can often unfairly damn cats when they're upset. So as a result, she's the winner in the battle of two conflict names.

Frecklewish SkyClan is now Frecklewing. I'm so used to this change that I sometimes forget her canon name lmao. In addition, I'm also not sure if she's going to survive The Kin's attack on SkyClan, honestly, since I just kinda dig the vibe of an ancient Echosong instead.

Might get devious and make her a Kin sympathizer lmao

[bonefall]

Do you have anything about Perchpaw in BB? The Final Girl of the story?

Yeah I have a lot actually, that plump little blackberry is what's holding up Darkstar's Commandment. I'm on like, the last two chapters and there's a climactic moment where Perchpaw decides he's going to leave the Clans, but his dialogue doesn't sound right. 33 dead 542 injured

[bonefall]

When Frecklewish followed Mapleshade and her kittens out of that camp, I like to think it wasn't on orders. She just followed, quietly.

If you asked her why, she wouldn't be able to tell you. She was burning with fury, and the cold didn't douse it. The rain washed the blood off her claws, but not the itch in her quicks. She hated Mapleshade. She hated the kits. She hated what they did to her.

The fierce warrior would make sure they leave-- by force, if necessary.

Yet, when little Petalkit tripped and scraped herself, Frecklewish's heart luched. She had to prevent her body from springing out.

She let go of the tension in her muscles and her chest, and continued stalking them through the undergrowth. All the way to the riverbank.

When Mapleshade ushered the kits into the swollen river, Frecklewish didn't stop them. Just watched. RiverClan kits can swim, they were doing just fine, even with the current being so strong. ThunderClan kittens would have been swept away by now.

If they float they're RiverClan. If they sink they're ThunderClan. She's assured in her feelings-- until the rumble of the upcoming wave floods her thoughts.

Those kits were swept away in the blink of an eye, under the froth and debris, screams drowning under the roar of the river and the rain. If she knew about the patrol on the other side of the river, she HAD to have chased them.

But why bother? If she didn't care at all? And more importantly, why didn't she stay?

I think when the "halfclan mistakes" were washed off the stones, she heard the children she raised crying for help. The phrase "love is stronger than hate" downplays its sharp agony; reality is colder than malice. All her "justifications" shattered like ice, for that brief, painful moment.

She didn't stay because she couldn't. Her heart knew the only thing that they were going to pull out of the water was corpses... but as long as she didn't see it, her brain could believe that there was a chance they survived.

She loved those kits and told herself she hated them. Lied to herself that this was okay, that it was going to turn out all right. Saw them marching right into their watery graves, and convinced herself she wasn't part of the procession.

[bonefall]

I’ve been sketching some of @bonefall ‘s BB!au character designs as warm ups recently.

It’s always fun drawing other people’s designs and compromising with style to adapt to suit them; I think it’s a good learning experience and these headshots are a lot more diverse in terms of features than my typical designs.

I really enjoy how these characters have changed in this au btw, recommend checking it out if you haven’t already.

[bonefall]

Are there any cats you want to draw a design for but can't due to any reason?

Designs I want to draw: All of them

Reason why not: ADHD said no :(

[bonefall]

Bit of a random one but rereading the parable of the squirrels got me curious: how would clan cats (or just thunderclan in particular) view black/melanistic squirrels? Have any of them ever seen one? Im not sure how common they are in the uk, but i know they can be relatively prevalent in areas that have them sometimes

Black squirrels are nothing more than a simple morph! They get common in areas that have melanistic genes present as a result of simple genetic drift, though I've seen it proposed that black fur is an advantage in cold areas.

The gene is rare in the populations the Warriors come across, so they almost never see it. In spite of ShadowClan's unwillingness to control the gray squirrel population, ThunderClan is so aggressive about it that the pool stays shallow. Red Squirrels (pishkaf) do not have this gene. Only Gray Squirrels (chakchak) do.

So every time a black squirrel manages to occur, it's treated like a dire omen. Even ShadowClan takes it seriously.

Black as a color is associated with day and night cycles, because of Moon Shadow, Sun Shadow, and Shadowstar. Gray Squirrels are associated with war and benefit at the suffering of others. These things together herald great upheaval-- so cataclysmic that it would likely not be an "honorable conflict."

If you came to your Cleric with this omen, they would be struck with a look of terrible alarm. They'd be interested in its context, what it was doing, if it was eating anything, what its surroundings looked like. Someone like BB!Runningnose, interested in supporting Brokenstar's ambitions, might spin it as a positive sign.

Most Clerics would announce that the squirrel needs to be killed IMMEDIATELY, and launch a massive hunt to destroy it. What would come next would likely depend on the culture of the time, but for the most part I can imagine some sort of mass "purification" ritual. The whole Clan trying to identify how they can avoid the cataclysm, one of the few times where they see a glorious war as a bad thing.

The cat who kills the squirrel would likely earn an Honor Title. It's also very likely that the body of the animal is treated as a very powerful material-- burned to ash to prevent its use in forbidden magic or carefully preserved and made into something special, no in-between.

(Thinking about it... thanks for the idea I'll totally do this for Brokenstar's Cataclysm lmao. The sinew of the black squirrel is probably used to re-string Runny's acorn necklace.)

[bonefall]

Warriors game where you play as a group of researchers trying to collect data on the cats as they sabotage every attempt for you to observe them. AND you're on a budget.

[bonefall]

a couple of leafstar questions! 1) is the process of selecting her to be new!skyclan’s leader changed at all by the fact that brokenstar is now firestar’s travelling buddy? 2) is billyleaf sticking around as a ship, and how will it change, if at all? 3) is leafstar going to be as… notably dumb in her reactions to everything happening so far in ASC?

The list of SkyClan changes is probably longer than the list of things that are staying the same. Cultural expansions, a very different culture, unique politics, even an alternate Warrior Code. Real fans of SkyClan want them to be completely different <3

Leafstar's not an exception. I HATE canon Leafstar. Every action they've taken with her has felt absolutely awful since Firestar's Quest so I'm just overwriting her completely.

SkyClan's Leadership

The part of Firestar's Quietus where Firestar and Brokenstar actually CHOOSE who the new leader is going to be is a bit up in the air. I have the beginning and end with the rats figured out-- but the middle has been evading me.

I know that Brokenstar prefers Sharpclaw, at first. Probably because Sharpclaw is so aggressive and dedicated to the old ways.

So it makes sense that Firestar prefers Leafdapple. She's making him realize things about his own way of ruling, parts of Clan culture he's come to accept uncritically.

She straight up blows past his thought-terminating cliches;

Firestar: "You see, Leafdapple... you can't live with a paw in both worlds."

Leafdapple: "Pardon? I don't understand what that means?"

Firestar: "It means... um... hmm ._."

In the end, she's probably chosen exactly because she's not committed to bringing back the past. SkyClan has not been the Clan of Skystar for a long time. It's the Clan of Skywatcher.

It is no longer the Clan-in-the-Canopy, it is the Clan-in-the-Stones.

I feel that the first Leader and Deputy were chosen by Firestar and Brokenstar. Though Brokenstar's mind changes over the course of Firestar's Quietus, I think they ultimately still agree that there were two "sides" of SkyClan that should live in balance.

Leafstar, committed to fairness, abides this. Until Sharpclaw ultimately betrays her for The Kin. (Repeat link from above but if your eyes just popped out of your head it explains everything about how PROFOUNDLY differently I'm approaching The Kin lmaoo)

I hadn't planned explicitly for the deputy system to work a bit differently here, BUT it does also feel in line for Leafstar to decide it on a whim after regrouping. Surrounded by the remnants of her Clan, deputy having just turned half of their warriors against them, SkyClan's protector oak ripping itself off the cliffside and destroying their camp, she jumps up on top of a rock like, "Ok team, that sure was a doozy. Let's try to pick a better deputy this time 8)"

It feels better that deputies are popularly "elected," or at the very least nominated by the Clan. Might make for a nice climactic moment in a rework of Hawkwing's Journey.

Is Billyleaf sticking around?

Yes! But it's actually a bit different.

First of all, Leafstar is actually in a constellation with Billystorm and Echosong, the Cleric. Leafstar is mates with Billystorm and a partner of Echosong. Echosong is not romantically involved with Billystorm. SkyClan actually split off from the main Clans before the Cleric's Vow was codified by Larkstripe's strike. They don't have the same taboo against Clerics having mates or raising kittens.

Billystorm is also a massive himbo now lmao, I'm not a huge fan of him in-canon. I'm still reworking stuff here though-- I'm planning to change SkyClan and the Stranger into Sol's Game, a darker story diving into Sol, the Entity, and Harry, the vessel it courts.

But it's been a while and I need to revamp my old drafts, so that's on the backburner for now.

Is Leafstar going to remain an idiot?

absolutely not. christ. I Don't Rewrite Arcs Until They Are Done but if I ever produce something as brainless as "An entire society believes that a child is lying because her accused murderer says he heard her mother snoring evil manipulation plans in her sleep" then explode me to bits with 10000 pounds of nitroglycerin

instead of just having her and everyone else be dumb, it's an easy enough small change to just have Splashstar already be in power and show the beginning of his reign having gone smoothly. Everyone's desperate for RiverClan to have a leader again. Have Leafstar's bias be against ShadowClan specifically, because Heartstar's nephew Juniperclaw mass-poisoned her entire Clan.

Even before then, too. I don't like how the Erins seem to treat Leafstar as this "unreasonable" character who's usually some shade of wrong. I don't like how she just has to accept that Sharpclaw was undermining her for her own good in SkyClan's Destiny. I don't like how Dodge dragged SkyClan into his stupid conflict. Or how she went back to the Gorge after Juniperclaw's poisoning, only to be herded back by the noble Clan cats when a sudden flood makes their old home unsafe for some reason.

I don't like how she only seems to get a "win" when she's accepting or asserting that the Clans have the perfect way of life and she should resemble it more-- see the opening of AVoS, where it's strongly implied that Daylight Warriors being unable to fight to defend the camp at night was how The Kin was able to throw everyone out, and thus the practice has been abolished since then. I think these conflicts are frustrating in the way they're written and presented.

So quite frankly I'm tossing a lot of it. First and foremost, SkyClan's primary conflicts should be trying to keep its unique cultural identity. Secondary conflicts should be based around its political interactions with the other Clans at the lake, particularly ShadowClan and ThunderClan, which it shares borders with.

BB!Leafstar's personality is that she's assertive, fair, and polite. In my head I lovingly imagine her always speaking in the tone of a corporate manager trying to keep control of her team as the office goes up in flames around her. While she always tries to consider all perspectives and stay approachable to all her warriors, she's often misinterpreted as being passive-aggressive or not genuine.

In a nutshell: I am personally making sure she's not the sort of dumb she is in canon. I have a vision for this version of SkyClan.

[bonefall]

Any thoughts on Nettlepaw? The apprentice who helps Mapleshade out and tells her Frecklewish saw/knew her kits drowned? He's a complete nothing later but he sits in my head as the one clan cat willing to show compassion to a mother who just lost her children, and I wonder how he felt when she went on to murder his clan mates. Because the obvious way, he feels bad and hates her. But I could also see the opposite, where he sees it a hypocritical of Oakstar to cry for murder after his son's drowning, then be horrified his daughter was injured/killed by a mother whose children died because of him. Idk, I like that he's one of only two people to reach out to help Mapleshade and I think he deserves some more attention

I have a really strong headcanon that Nettlepaw is actually the brother of Flowerpaw, the apprentice who died trying to save Birchface from the river. I really like the idea that the simple reason he helped Mapleshade in that moment was because he was so very tired of hearing about innocent people dying.

So... who cares if Ravenwing is going to be upset I lost some herbs, or my mentor might make me pick ticks off the elders? I can't do this anymore. Please, let there just be a small moment of kindness. Even if it doesn't last.

In BB, Nettlepaw is the son of Beetail, the deputy. He also happens to be the half-brother of Birchface and Frecklewish.

Beetail's first mate was Shinecloud, who is the sister of BB!Oakstar. She fell from a tree, and Oakstar helped raise his nespring with Beetail in her absence.

Eventually, Beetail fell in love with Dawnfeather, and Flower and Nettle came along. The two were close with their older half-siblings, it was a happy blended family.

So when Flowerpaw and Birchface died in the same night, it was a devastating blow. Nettlepaw took it better than Frecklewish did, though.

He's got Dawnfeather, alive and well at the moment. Frecklewish lost her brother, the one who remembered their mother.

So Nettlepaw doesn't really know how to help, even though he wants to. Superficially it looks like the same kind of grief, but it's very different underneath.

When Mapleshade's kittens came around, everything looked so much brighter. It was like Frecklewish was her old self again.

I don't see Nettlebreeze as being a very abstract thinker. He's not particularly poetic or eloquent, he's very straightforward and honest in how he assesses the world. The code is the code... but it's very sad that Mapleshade is all alone and the children are dead. It's not right.

Something feels wrong that the kittens lived thinking he was their half-uncle, and died thinking he hated them now. That the answer to so much death was even more death. And, sadly, it's not about to get any better.

Sad character, basically. He yearns for kindness in a cruel world, just before a rampage that will take his last sibling from him, and with the Crusades looming on the horizon.

[bonefall]

LITERALLY like its people discussing the characters as living people and not plot tools. no matter what mapleshade did her kits would die because the plot NEEDS them to die. they were doomed the second they were out of camp lol

(i would say the bridge route would probably just have the kits succumb to hypothermia from being out in leaffall rain though, given how fragile kittens are. then people would whine about how she didnt take the faster route. also also doesnt getting to the bridge require crossing the stream near fourtrees, which is also capable of flooding. like fireheart almost dies there in one book. i just checked the map again and it looms like you need to hop the stream to get there)

From what I understand of that particular creek, it's a "syke." A syke is a seasonal stream fed by extra rain, floodwater, and snowmelt, usually only seen in spring and early autumn. A syke is also called a "bourne" further south in England.

So the syke could be active because of the extra flooding, yeah. Which would make it dangerous to take that detour. Mapleshade on her 4th playthrough of MV trying to get 100% completion so she takes the long way around, only for the plot wave to follow her all the way down there too lmao. SYKE!

[bonefall]

I appreciate you changed Ravenwing's sign to being from Birchface because despite the fandom recognizing it's unfair Starclan put Leafpool on trial when she was told to "follow her heart" and give up the kits, nobody puts together that Ravenwing getting that sign is a "Starclan are bastards" moment. If you think about how Thunderclan and Riverclan were at war, there's no reason to tell Ravenwing they're half-clan unless Starclan *wanted* something bad to happen to Mapleshade's kits.

While I will strongly argue that Ravenwing had a lot more power in the situation than Frecklewish, I still blame StarClan for his choice more than Canon!Ravenwing himself. You're right; StarClan sending that sign in the first place had no other obvious outcome than putting Mapleshade and her children in harm's way.

Though my stance is still, hopefully, pretty clear about "orders." Ultimately, Ravenwing chose to reveal that omen and thus I do believe that still makes him somewhat responsible for what happened that night. StarClan was either incompetent or malicious when it sent that sign, but no one would have been hurt if he'd kept that secret a little longer.

So, for BB, StarClan IS full of bastards but not quite in this way. I like them being unfair, proud, and overemotional, not incompetent. The sign was Birchface's, without approval from wider StarClan, and Ravenwing was damned in blind fury for following a "false omen." I'm actually pretty fond of BB!Ravenwing, regretful demon whose ruling was unfair, but comes to feel like it was fitting in an unintended sort of way.

"Maybe I couldn't have known if the omen was holy or not, but even if StarClan did send that sign... they would not have been orders worth following. The Dark Forest is where I belong."

[bonefall]

“It was Mapleshade’s fault for making her kits cross the river during a storm!”

Who exiled her and her babies into the storm? Who forced her and her very young kits out where she would be forced to cross a river, cross a thunderpath, or cross enemy territory in order to leave? Sure there’s the Twolegplace, a very safe place for kits, what with the many cars and few prey and lots of dogs and potentially dangerous Twolegs, all while their sense of sight and smell is obscured by the storm and their fragile bodies would probably freeze

Frecklewish was following her anyway and I doubt that, especially in that moment, she would have let Maple take a break before they crossed the border

There is a universe for every random alternative route she could have taken, and each one ends in a gruesome yet comedic end for those kids like some kind of cosmic joke.

"Cross the stepping stones!"

A big wave of plot barrels down the river, they drown.

"Detour around the bridge!"

They cross over into RiverClan territory as night falls during a rainstorm, a plot fox leaps out of a bush and gulps them all down in one bite.

"Go to the twolegplace!"

BEEP BEEP IT'S THE PLOTMOBILE

[bonefall]

This Mapleshade Discourse once again reveals how people, even those who will cheer ACAB, cannot envision a world in which unjust laws of society do not have to be followed, and that rules do not have to be enforced with punishment. "She broke the law, so she has to face the consequences!" How about you take my hand, and I point out the flaws in the rules that govern our society to you and what we can do to combat them, and I show you the research on punitive vs restorative justice, and together we look upon this silly little battle cat story through this political lens to analyze the messages it intentionally and inadvertently sends with its treatment of Mapleshade's character and the characters of other codebreakers, and we kiss softly under the moonlight.

And then we cut open Oakstar and Appledusk and leave them to die from infection. Together. ❤️

LIKE... "She broke the law so she must face the consequences" is such a cold take it's still defrosting. Maybe the law is bad. Perhaps unjust rules ought to be disobeyed. Consider, the consequences are unacceptable; I simply do not think you should be thrown out of your house for having the wrong lover.

Like deadass what do they want her to do. Go back in time and not give birth to them. Do they want her to unfuck that sleazy twink. Insane.

[bonefall]

I don't have much to add to the Maplecourse aside from the fact that if I was mapleshade I would've done the exact same things. Unfortunately including not killing Oakstar cause let's be real killing a man, who you'd have to kill multiple times because he has Cat God Powers, and who would most likely have at least a few other cats with him the majority of the time to defend him, is not easy.

I think it would have been cool if Frecklewish actually got rolled up in a trap set for Oakstar tbh. Like, Mapleshade knows he'll probably have to die multiple times so she sets up a Snake Encounter, but Frecklewish finds Mapleshade first and their skirmish causes the trap to go off on the wrong target.

(Maybe even lampshade the fact a random adder in England is green by making her interpret it as a sign. It is revenge-colored.)

[bonefall]

one of the most frustrating things to me with the mapleshade/birchfall situation is its like. the only time since into the wild where the books acknowledge queens don't have to reveal the fathers of their litters. when mapleshade tells beetail (? the deputy whats-his-face) shell be raising the kittens alone, he accepts it without question. this implies her lying about birchface being the father was unnecessary, but in Bluestar’s prophecy everybody immediately assumes thrushpelt is the father the minute bluefur is known to be pregnant, and bluefur not correcting this is treated as a reasonable decision despite it being the SAME situation! it's just the authors want mapleshade to be unreasonable so this time it's bad actually.

The in-universe Queen's Rights are so poorly defined and utilized that the BB!Queen's Rights are essentially an entirely original framework. They sometimes exist in the books and sometimes don't, depending on if the writer remembers them or not.

They actually seem to not be a thing in Bluestar's Prophecy, from what I remember. Thrushpelt offers to be the pretend-father as a result.

It seems to have protected Fallowtail though, until Reedfeather decided to kidnap his kids.

Featherstorm's first litter, Raggedpelt and Scorchwind, are bullied for being fatherless and face constant speculation.

Same with Flintfang, Blackstar, and Fernshade. They're not even actually halfclan, Blackpaw holds his tongue and refuses to reveal the truth to stop bullies.

Brokenstar faces open bullying from his adopted siblings for not knowing who his mother is (but also he stops Yellowfang from telling Lizardstripe about it because he overheard a conversation where she told her friend she feels like the baby is stealing milk)

StarClan pushed for Squilf to lie to Brambleclaw for this reason, because they assumed (correctly) that having HalfClan suspicion would make it harder for The Three to be accepted into ThunderClan

So if a queen has "a right" to not reveal parents, it's not very protective. Your kids are going to face bullying and discrimination regardless of how loyal you actually are, or who the dad is.

But yeah suuuure Mapleshade was evil and horrible for not correcting Frecklewish. I can totally accept that in this completely arbitrary situation that somehow it would have turned out better if she told her No and left the whole Clan speculating.