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One of the great strengths of the Warriors series is its ability, because of its cute and utterly non-human characters, to portray deep tragedy, gruesome conflict, and heart-wrenching decisions the likes of which are not often found in children’s books. In my opinion, few characters exemplify this aspect of Warriors better than Ivypool.
The World Of Warriors
First, it’s important that readers have some context for the world and situations Ivypool lives in. The Warriors series is a sprawling, multi-arc saga following four Clans of wild cats. The Clans are known as ThunderClan, ShadowClan, WindClan, and RiverClan. These Clans all look up to and worship StarClan, their warrior ancestors. Cats go to StarClan when they die and from there watch over the living cats, sometimes sending signs and dreams to them. Conversely, evil cats go to the Dark Forest upon death.
Each Clan has a leader (who is given nine lives by StarClan), a deputy, and a medicine cat, who interprets signs from StarClan and cares for sick and injured cats. Most cats become apprentices at six moons (or months) old and train to become warriors. Warriors hunt and fight to protect their Clan. Each cat has a two-part name. The first part stays the same throughout their whole life, and the second changes to fit their status. For example, Ivypool is known as Ivykit when young and Ivypaw when training. While all cats have the suffix “kit” when they are young, and all apprentices have the suffix “paw,” warriors can have many different suffixes (Ivypool, Dovewing, Hawkfrost, Lionblaze). Ivypool appears primarily in the fourth arc of the series, called “Omen of the Stars.” She lives in ThunderClan and has a fairly normal kithood. Things start to change when she turns six moons old and becomes an apprentice.
Immaturity & Jealousy
From the beginning of her life, Ivypool feels overshadowed by her sister Dovewing. Unbeknownst to Ivypool (then Ivypaw), her sister is part of an important prophecy and has special powers that allow her to hear things from very far away. All Ivypaw sees, however, is her sister being fawned over by the Clan leader and being allowed to go on important journeys to save the Clan. She grows increasingly jealous and bad-tempered, sniping at her sister and the other apprentices. She feels like she is ignored by her Clan or seen as second-best. And these bitter emotions are noticed by a cat who will change the course of her life forever.
Unbeknownst to most of the Clan cats, dead and evil cats from the Dark Forest have been training certain living cats in their dreams. The Dark Forest cats seek out Clan cats who feel undervalued or like outsiders and train them in vicious battle tactics. The Dark Forest cats are planning to use this army to destroy the living Clans for good. However, most of the Clan cats training in the Dark Forest are unaware that this is the ultimate goal. Ivypaw’s jealousy and feelings of unimportance catch the attention of Hawkfrost, a Dark Forest cat. He lures her into the Dark Forest with promises to make her a better warrior than her sister could ever be. Ivypaw accepts, believing he is a StarClan cat. She willfully blinds herself to the brutal training she witnesses and experiences in the Dark Forest. During her dreams, the wounds she incurs are still there when she wakes up, prompting questions from her Clanmates, but Ivypaw is glad to have a secret of her own finally.
A Fatal Mistake
Ivypaw’s poor choices do not come without a serious price. The Dark Forest cats convince her that ShadowClan, ThunderClan’s longtime rival, is going to attack ThunderClan and steal their territory. The only way for ThunderClan to protect itself, they say, is to take back a worthless strip of territory that currently belongs to ShadowClan, having been given to them as a gift by ThunderClan. Ivypaw goes to Firestar, the leader of ThunderClan, to tell him the news, claiming that she had a prophetic dream. She vividly describes ShadowClan destroying ThunderClan, and Firestar decides that reclaiming the territory he once gave to them is the right thing to do.
ShadowClan fights for their territory, and this bloody conflict results in Firestar losing one of his nine lives and the death of the ShadowClan deputy. Ivypaw remains unrepentant, believing that she did the right thing. At this point in the series, Ivypaw is deeply immature. She has allowed her jealousy of her sister to cloud her judgment and ultimately causes two deaths through her naiveté. These initial struggles and flaws are part of what makes Ivypool such a fantastic character. She begins the series with significant flaws that have profound consequences on the plot of the series. Only by beginning as such a foolish and thoughtless apprentice can Ivypool mature into the powerful and fascinating warrior she will ultimately become.
Waking Up
Ivypaw’s claim that she dreamed about ShadowClan attacking ThunderClan arouses the suspicions of Jayfeather, the ThunderClan medicine cat. Jayfeather is part of the same prophecy that Dovepaw belongs to, and his power gives him the ability to walk in other cats’ dreams. He follows Ivypaw into her dream about the Dark Forest and realizes what’s going on. Dovepaw overhears Jayfeather telling the third prophecy cat, his brother Lionblaze, about Ivypaw and decides to confront Ivypaw herself. Over Dovepaw’s objections, Ivypaw insists that the cats in the Dark Forest aren’t truly evil and have learned from their mistakes when they were alive. She continues to visit the Dark Forest, feeling slight pangs of guilt over lying to her Clanmates.
But Ivypaw’s innocence comes to an end when she spots Tigerstar, a leader among the Dark Forest cats, training a living ShadowClan warrior to fight ThunderClan. Ivypaw realizes that the Dark Forest cats aren’t loyal to ThunderClan at all. She tells Dovepaw, Jayfeather, and Lionblaze that she never plans to go back to the Dark Forest, but Jayfeather points out that she may not be able to stop going there in her dreams.
To Dovepaw’s horror, Jayfeather and Lionblaze suggest that Ivypaw spy for them in the Dark Forest. Ivypaw instantly refuses, but after Dovepaw reveals the nature of her power and the prophecy, Ivypaw begins to see a bigger picture. Despite admitting that she is scared and that she wishes she didn’t have to do this, Ivypaw realizes that she must help the Clans in whatever way she can, thinking that “this wasn’t just about her now—in fact, it wasn’t about her at all. It was about every cat who lived beside the lake” (( Erin Hunter, Night Whispers. New York: Working Partners Ltd, 2010. Page 272. )).
Spy
Ivypaw’s decision to spy for ThunderClan changes her for good. She is no longer an angry and lonely apprentice desperately searching for recognition in the wrong place. She is ready and willing to risk everything, even and especially her life, to save her Clan and atone for her past mistakes.
Despite feeling disgusted, fear, and horror every time she returns to the Dark Forest, Ivypaw does so anyway, a great step in her maturity and development as a character. And her new role as a spy puts her in the position to become one of the best characters in all of Warriors, because of the choices she is forced to make.
Impossible Choices
What makes Ivypool such a great character above all else is the fact that she is repeatedly confronted with impossible choices. Having a character make difficult choices is an extremely impactful way to get readers to connect with the character. It is also a way to illustrate who that character truly is when placed under pressure.
Flametail
Flametail is the ShadowClan medicine cat. He accidentally drowns in the lake one day but winds up wandering from StarClan into the Dark Forest. In order for her to prove her loyalty, Ivypaw is ordered to kill his spirit, meaning that he would be completely gone, his spirit not even living on in StarClan. Ivypaw is horrified and refuses. Even when she believes the Dark Forest leaders are about to kill her for her refusal, she stands firm, “ready to die” rather than kill an innocent cat. But then another thought crosses her mind. Ivypaw thinks, “If she [dies] here, who [will] warn the Clans?” She decides that “there [was] only one thing to do.” Steeling herself to kill Flametail “for the sake of [the] Clans,” she silently begs for StarClan to forgive her (( Erin Hunter, Night Whispers. New York: Working Partners Ltd, 2010. Page 294. )).
While Flametail is ultimately saved by his living brother, who trains alongside Ivypaw in the Dark Forest, Ivypaw’s decision to kill him is still a powerful moment for her character. Ivypaw’s decision works in her favor, as the Dark Forest leaders believe she is loyal after she attacks Flametail. Whether or not the importance of having a spy in the Dark Forest truly outweighs the evil of killing Flametail, Ivypaw’s willingness to sacrifice not only her life but her own morality and sense of goodness in order to rescue the Clans is a complex and fascinating decision. Not many characters in children’s fiction are asked to make such a horrific and consequential choice, and even fewer children’s heroes would actually attempt to kill an innocent. The full ramifications of such a decision can be seen in an episode from a later book in the series when Ivypaw becomes a warrior named Ivypool.
Antpelt
Antpelt is a WindClan warrior who trains alongside Ivypool in the Dark Forest until one night he is murdered for showing mercy to Ivypool during a training skirmish. Upon death, he goes to the Dark Forest rather than StarClan and becomes crueler and more vicious. Ivypool becomes desperate to know when the Dark Forest cats plan to attack the Clans to be prepared for the battle. To try to get the information, she asks the leaders to make her an official Dark Forest warrior, unprepared for the vicious test they have in store for her.
To prove her loyalty and abilities, she is ordered to fight Antpelt and kill his spirit. Ivypool tells herself that Antpelt is dead already and that by killing him, she would be doing him a favor by taking him out of the final battle. During their fight, when Antpelt is holding her down, and it seems like he is about to kill her, Ivypool makes “a wild, bee-brained promise to herself” and thinks, “If I win this fight now, then the Clans will win the final battle” (( Erin Hunter, The Forgotten Warrior. New York: Working Partners Ltd., 2011. Page 226. )). Imagining her Clanmates, the cats she is fighting for, gives Ivypool the strength to defeat Antpelt. She kills him brutally and stands “numb with horror,” wondering if she did the right thing as his spirit fades (( Erin Hunter, The Forgotten Warrior. New York: Working Partners Ltd., 2011. Page 227. )).
She is made a Dark Forest warrior, though the leaders still do not tell her when the final battle is. Ivypool knows that she cannot escape the consequences of her actions, which incur the wrath of one of Antpelt’s Clanmates and give her horrific flashbacks to the moment of killing him. Even more so, she cannot “hide from what she [has] done” (( Erin Hunter, The Forgotten Warrior. New York: Working Partners Ltd., 2011. Page 228. )). She has killed another cat, which is a violation of Clan law. Ivypool thinks to herself, “Every sacrifice I make is for the good of my Clan—and for the other Clans around the lake. Even if that means sacrificing myself” (( Erin Hunter, The Forgotten Warrior. New York: Working Partners Ltd., 2011. Page 229. ))
Here, the idea of sacrificing herself does not only mean potentially losing her life but losing who she is as well. By killing Antpelt, Ivypool has become a murderer and has to try to live with that fact, believing it was for the good of the Clans. Once again, the books do not condemn or condone Ivypool’s actions. They simply present them for readers to assess. Putting characters in excruciatingly difficult positions, where they are forced to make life-altering choices that sometimes go against who they believe themselves to be, is a powerful writing strategy. Having characters make these choices is a way to show who they truly are when things are at their darkest. Ivypool’s choices prove that she is willing to put the good of the Clans as a whole above individual cats, or even her sense of self. She is a unique character in this way, and I believe she is an important one in children’s fiction.
The Final Battle
Ivypool’s spying is crucial to the Clans’ ability to defeat the Dark Forest in the final battle. When the time is near, she alerts ThunderClan, telling them all of the Dark Forest’s plan. The Clan is able to train to fight the most vicious cats to have lived and died, all thanks to Ivypool’s nightly sacrifices. She pretends to be loyal to the Dark Forest as they attack, then turns on them as the battle begins, convincing other living Clan cats to do the same.
Neither Ivypool nor the readers ever get a full resolution of the trauma she incurs in the Dark Forest or the thin line between good and evil that she has walked. As another article on The Daily Fandom mentions, truly great characters often have a level of moral ambiguity, as every one of us does in real life. Ivypool did what she believed she had to do and faced the consequences on more than one occasion, and is rewarded with the knowledge that her actions, however horrific, kept the Clans from sure destruction.
Settling Down
Ivypool is only a POV character for the fourth Warriors arc, but the fifth arc still allows readers to see how she is doing. She becomes mates with a kind tom named Fernsong, who offers to live in the nursery and care for their kits since Ivypool doesn’t want to give up her warrior duties the way she-cats usually do while nursing kits. Is Fernsong’s offer realistic for cats? Not at all, but neither are many things in Warriors. But it shows him to be the perfect mate for Ivypool: a cat who understands her personality and wishes and whose gentler personality complements hers beautifully. The sixth arc, The Broken Code, follows Ivypool and Fernsong’s daughter, so it seems Ivypool’s legacy will live on.
Ivypool grows from a jealous, insecure apprentice who causes death by placing her trust in evil cats to a courageous, self-sacrificing spy determined to save everyone she loves and atone for her previous actions. The growth and change her arc shows make her one of the most compelling characters in Warriors, and the unimaginable choices she faces make her stand out among children’s characters. Ivypool’s dedication to what she knows to be right is unmatched, and whether or not we agree with her ultimate choices, we should all be able to appreciate her valor and the strength of her love for her Clan and kin.