Ch. 2- A Mothers Anger
"Mom, mom, get up mom!" Tasas' demanding voice forced its way through Sarabis' dreams.
Five more minutes, she groaned silently to herself.
"Come on mom, you promised to take me out today!" Tasa jumped clumsily onto his mothers' back and began batting at her ear with a velvet paw. "Please?" Laughing the queen rolled to her side and scooped him onto her belly.
"Only if you promise not to laugh," she challenged the golden cub, tickling him mercilessly.
"Ahh! Not fair!" he yelped, fighting the urge to laugh and failing. Smiling the queen and prince roughhoused for a minute until Tasa couldn't breath from laughing so hard. Panting hard he grinned up at his mother, golden eyes glimmering in the dawn light just filtering into the cavern. "Now can we go?"
"Sarabi I need to talk to you," Miehka said gently as she intruded on the mother and child.
"What is it?" Sarabi asked, getting to her feet and stretching the stiffness from her muscles.
"We need someone to lead the hunting party for today."
"Didn't we already assign someone to do it?" The queen looked at the elder lionesses, confused.
Nodding her head slowly Miehkas' answering voice was quite, "Yes…Tenabi was supposed to be in charge today."
"Oh…" Sarabis' answer seemed to hang in the still air of the cave, as both lionesses stood, tears threatening in their eyes as they remembered the tragedy of yesterday. Then the queen gathered herself, lifting her head high, "Of course she needn't go then. I'll take the hunting party out myself."
"Mom you can't!" Tasa interjected, both lionesses had almost forgotten he was present. "You promised you'd take me all over the pride lands today!" The heartbroken look on the cubs face almost made Sarabi lose her resolve.
"I can take them out Sarabi," Miehka voiced, looking understandingly at Tasa. "Then you and your son can spend some time together." The look she gave the queen was meant to remind Sarabi how close she had come to losing her own cub the other day.
"No," the regal lionesses replied firmly.
"Mom!"
"Hush Tasa!" She scolded gently. "Tenabi needs some time to…." The lionesses struggled to find the right words, "to get used to Etari being…gone. You can stay and play with the other cubs today and sometime soon we'll go out and explore the pride lands." Tasa looked ready to pout and put up a fight but a fierce glare from his mother shot down any real tantrum. Instead the cub merely grumbled softly to himself, scratching angrily at the stone beneath his paws.
"Scar I need to talk to you," Sarabi held her voice steady as she walked into the dusky cavern, dropping the haunch from a freshly killed zebra near the king.
"Well Sarabi, how pleasant to see you, and you've brought me a snack!" the king replied, lazily pulling the food toward him. He gave the former queen a blank stare as he chewed, mouth open. Sarabi cringed inwardly at the disgusting sight of half chewed food, but she forced herself to continue.
"I want you to leave my son alone," she met his eyes with a hard stare.
"Now why should I need to do that, the boy is my nephew," Scar replied, taking another large bite.
"Quit playing me for a fool," Sarabi growled, straining to keep her temper in check. "I know it wasn't an accident that Etari died." Scar flicked his gaze over to her for a moment, and then turned back to his meal, pretending indifference. Despite what she had told Miehka the other night Sarabi knew that Scar was responsible for the other cubs death. But she also knew that the only way the rest of the cubs could be safe was if she struck a deal with the king.
Sarabi continued, adding in a grim mutter, "You've made your point, you are the king. But we'll only follow you on one condition…" Here the queen drew herself to her full height, towering over the king as he lay on the stone floor of the cavern. "Leave the rest of the cubs in this pride alone Scar. If you do I pledge my allegiance to you, and I will turn a blind eye to all that you have done so far. The other lionesses will follow my lead."
"It's normal for a male to kill all cubs when he gains power in a pride." The thin lion retorted nonchalantly, sucking the last juices from his toes. Sarabi almost roared in frustration, barely managing to keep herself silent, though her muscles twitched from the angry energy. "I'll think about it," Scar replied, yawning as he stood up and began to saunter out of the cave. As he passed her Sarabi refused to meet his eyes.
"You want to make this deal," she said firmly. "Otherwise you will find yourself in a sad state."
"Are you threatening me?" the king growled in anger, unsheathing his claws as she turned slowly to face him. Sarabi didn't answer his question, instead she said,
"It doesn't matter if you are king in name, the pride still follows me as their queen. Leave the cubs alone and I will continue leading them down this dreadful path you have chosen for us. Otherwise you will find yourself in a land with few hunters and just as many hungry mouths." King and former queen merely stared each other down for several minutes, neither moving a muscle. In his eyes Sarabi saw that Scar recognized that she was right, but she knew he would never admit that he needed the lionesses to follow him willingly.
"We'll see," he growled again, turning to exit. This time Sarabi kept silent as he disappeared outside, and when she could no longer see him the queen let out a shaky sigh of relief. She shivered in fear as she closed her eyes and prayed to the great kings of the past to keep her son safe.
"But why can't we go there?" a cream colored cub asked, bouncing with excess energy.
"I already told you Cali, we're going to the river." The teenaged Nala rolled her eyes and sighed already tired from the cubs' boundless energy.
"But we wanna go play hide-and-seek in the rock piles!" whined Kryptek, lashing his red-orange tail in frustration.
"Keep whining and you'll all have to go back and be stuck at Pride Rock while Miehka watches you!" another young lioness, Jarelle, growled down at the cubs. They flinched and looked down at their paws, though each shot their guardians small glares when they thought neither of the teenagers was watching.
"Hey Tasa, what's eating you?" the girl cub finally asked, tired of giving the older cubs dirty looks.
"Huh?" the prince started, flipping his tuft of red hair over one eye as he turned to look at her. "Oh, sorry Cali, I was just wondering if my mom's ever going to actually take me around the Pride Lands."
"Of course she will, you're mom's cool like that," Kryptek broke in as he pounced on an ant that was marching across their path.
"Ok we're here!" Jarelle sang out happily when they reached the rivers' edge. She and Nala reminded the cubs to stay within sight and then the two teenagers settled down on a sunny rock nearby.
"Aww man, it's so boring here!" Cali grumbled, swiping the pebbles on the shore with a paw so they skipped across the waters surface.
"Don't worry, they'll get distracted in a bit and we can sneak off." Kryptek replied, an impish grin growing on his face.
"What are you talking about?" Tasa asked his playmate, confused.
"Just pretend like we're playing," Kryptek hissed, quickly beginning to skip rocks like Cali. Tasa started scanning the ground and wandering along the beach, pretending he was looking for more stones while actually keeping an eye on their babysitters. Several gazelle suddenly bounded down to the water several yards downstream, pausing to drink deeply without seeing the young lions. Nala spotted the animals first, and signaling Jarelle with her tail slid noiselessly down from their perch to stalk the herbivores. The other young lioness hesitated, her eyes darting to the apparently busy cubs on the rivers edge, before she slipped after her companion.
"Let's go!" Cali hissed, racing up the bank and onto the edge of the savannah without waiting for a reply. The three cubs bounded towards the jumbled rock piles that dotted the landscape near the elephant graveyard border.
"It'll be forever before they realize we're gone!" Cali crowed with glee, her paws barely touching the ground before she leaped up again, so excited was she by their escape. Tasa laughed at her, running forward to brush against her side and almost knocking her over. Playfully they ran through the savannah grass, occasionally trying to trip or knock one another over as they raced.
"Hey, where's Kryptek?" Tasa suddenly said, slowing his paws and turning back the way they had come.
"I dunno," Cali answered as she looked back curiously. When they had waited for nearly a minute Tasa began to worry and started trotting back.
"Kryptek?" he called, pushing through the long dried grass. "Krypt where are you?" Cali followed after him, also calling for the red-orange cub.
"Shhh!" The sharp hiss startled both youngsters, and Cali leaped back in fear as Kryptek suddenly stuck his head through the grass. "Come see what I found!" he whispered excitedly, disappearing again into the foliage. Curiously Tasa followed him Cali hot on his heals. The grass grew progressively shorter, and when it was hardly long enough to cover the ground Kryptek motioned for them to crouch low as he led the way. The cubs belly crawled and lined up along the edge of a dried up wallow, sunk down into the ground and just starting to turn green with new grass. Two hyena pups scuffled at the bottom of the dusty hole, barking happily at each other as they wrestled.
"Let's sneak attack them!" Cali whispered to the boys, her eyes lit with excitement. Kryptek looked utterly shocked by the idea, but Tasa smiled and nodded.
"But…" Kryptek stuttered.
"Come on, it'll be fun!" Tasa encouraged him quietly, shifting from paw to paw in anticipation.
"Nala really doesn't like hyenas, I think we should stay away." Kryptek replied uncomfortably. He was the type of cub that preferred to play alone and so when he was with the others was unsure how to act in situations like this.
"I don't know what her problem is, hyenas aren't so bad, we see them every day. Come on!" The prince encouraged the sunset colored cub. Finally he nodded and they slunk away from the edge to plan their attack.