The gathering storm

Sarafina wished she were back at the den.

It was only just after sunrise, but already the temperature was nearly unbearable, the air around her thick and feverish. Dark clouds tightly packed overhead promised the sweet release of cooling showers, but for several days now none had come – already over a month late, and still they held out, coyly taunting the thirsty creatures prowling a parched landscape below.

To be back in the dark comfort of the den, feeling cold stone underpaw...

Sarafina clenched her teeth, trying to chase such idle thoughts. There was work to do. She drew a deep breath, slowly, taking care not to make any sound, and started crawling cautiously forward through the grass, staying as close to the ground as possible. The reeds brushing up against her and crumpling under her paws made only the faintest of noise, yet it seemed to her ears like a hellish racket.

Luckily, the small herd of gazelles up ahead hadn't noticed a thing. Good. Chances were Sarafina would finally be coming home with some food for the pride again.

Gathering enough meat to feed all mouths had become more difficult as of late. With the rains being as late as they were, life in the Pridelands had been forced to follow suit. No new rains meant no new shoots, no buds, no leaves – nothing new to eat for the grazers. So the herds had begun drift and spread out in search of food, leaving the lions of the Pridelands with considerably less hunting opportunities. Mind you, the pride wasn't in any dire straits quite just yet; there was still enough food to be had, but it just wasn't as easy to get at as it once had been.

Being cut from tougher cloth than their king, however, the lionesses didn't just shrink in the face of adversity or wallow in self-pity, but simply straightened their backs and soldiered on. The lionesses adapted: they went out to hunt more often, and went after prey even when the circumstances weren't quite optimal, such as limited cover, or when there weren't any weakened or sickly animals to go after. Another way they adjusted, was to split up in smaller teams in stead of going on the prowl as one pride. That way, they could cover more ground, and find even the small or faraway herds they otherwise might have missed entirely.

Because of this, Sarafina was presently accompanied by only two other girls. It would have to do. Though she couldn't see them from her vantage point, she knew that they were positioned far ahead of her, ready to spring up from the thicket the moment she initiated the chase and, hopefully, catch the chosen target by surprise.

That wouldn't be happening quite yet, though. She still had to sneak a bit closer first, so she could minimize the distance she would have to sprint. It's always a balancing act: the closer you sneak up to a herd, the more likely it becomes one of them marks you and causes the whole bunch to bolt before you can even get going. Don't get close enough, and you'll tire yourself out trying to cover the distance, whereupon the prey either outruns you, or dodges your tired and sluggish lunges. Young lionesses usually start out erring in either one direction, and then eventually overcompensating when they realize where they went wrong. Sarafina was well beyond such rookie mistakes, however, being both an experienced and naturally gifted hunter to a degree that no other lioness in the pride could match. No wonder she'd been the chief huntress for as long as anyone cared to remember.

That said, the vagaries of fate dictated the beats of her life just as much as any other lioness', and so even Sarafina's hunting game had its limits. When the gazelles in front of her all suddenly righted their necks, flicking their narrow ears and turning their dainty snouts to the wind, the lioness knew she'd missed her shot. The very next instant, all the animals in herd dashed away as if one cue, taking wide leaps on their slender, springy legs. They'd been too far away to start with, and now they all had a head-start, too. Chasing after them would be pointless.

Letting out a loud curse, Sarafina righted herself, and she wondered what has so spooked the gazelles. It surely hadn't been her: she'd taken up position downwind, like her two companions, and from what she could tell the gazelle hadn't turned their eyes or ears in her direction anyhow. She saw one of her friends up ahead stand up out of the underbrush too, giving Sarafina a confounded shrug; she wasn't sure what exactly had gone wrong either. Sarafina wasn't entirely convinced.

Figures; it's never anyone's fault!

Before she got got so worked up she'd start to chew out the other lioness, however, Sarafina noticed something from the corner of her eye: a dark blur, coming in at some speed. When she focused in on it, the image resolved itself as a lone wildebeest, big and lumbering, lurching ahead to where the gazelles had just been.

Ah, so that's why they took off. A single wildebeest wandering around isn't exactly a threat to a herd of gazelles, but often it's enough to just have something unexpected happen to send send them fleeing. Of course, this was cold comfort to Sarafina: the knowledge that it was another grazer and not one of the lionesses that was at fault wasn't going to fill their bellies.

Or was it?

As she regarded the wildebeest, the lioness couldn't help but think something was off about the way it looked. Though its tempo was decidedly poor, the animal was heaving with exertion, damp all over and practically frothing at the mouth from the effort, and its gait was halting. If still, the beast would be positively shaking on its legs. Yet despite seeming dead tired, it continued to lumber on unsteadily, with one of its hooves dragging slightly.

The wildebeest didn't seem like it had much fight left in it, or breath. Sarafina could outrun it without breaking a sweat, and she doubted that the creature had the stamina left to match her.

Fate, it would seem, could go both ways, taking away one opportunity for a kill, only to immediately present the lionesses with an infinity better one in exchange. Taking down this wildebeest would be a cakewalk, no sneaking or sprinting required. At most a light jog.

Sarafina set out after her prey. Her two companions quickly picked up on her lead, immediately intuiting what she was going for, in the way that only hunters who know each other through and through could. They quickly gained on their quarry, and though the tired beast did try to quicken its pace as soon as it noticed these new predators, it was no match for the fresh lionesses.

Purely to gain some momentum, Srafina pulled a short sprint at the end, then leapt for the wildebeest's neck. The other lionesses, meanwhile, threw themselves at its flank with their full weight, grabbing hold with outstretched claws that dug deep in the animal's hide, trying to force it down to the ground. The wildebeest stumbled almost immediately, its knees buckled, and its head smacked into the ground, weighed down as it was by Sarafina who had by now latched onto its neck.

Now lying on the ground weighed down by three lionesses, the animal didn't have the strength to get back up again, only managing to bellow desperately. That sound was quickly reduced to a smothered gurgle, as Sarafina's jaws clamped shut round the wildebeests windpipe. The lioness mouth was soon filled with the taste and sensation of warm, thick blood oozing from where her fangs had punctured the beast's arteries, and it didn't take long for the sticky goo to start running down her neck and chest.

She paid it no heed.

By now, Sarafina's world was reduced to her claws and jaws, which she kept firmly in place, and the feeling of the wildebeest's body, now burning hot, writhing underneath hers. She was one with her prey, feeling its every exertion, its cramped muscles, its struggle for dear life, and its frantic, waning heartbeat. She did not hear, did not see or feel anything else – there was only her and the wildebeest. It was about more than deadly skill or instinct: the wildebeest would die so that Sarafina and her family might live, and it was therefore owed for a fleeting instant all of Sarafina's being, a final moment of oneness between predator and prey where the circle of life reveals itself in macabre intimacy.

The beast ceased all movement long before its heart stopped. Only then was Sarafina able to once again become aware of her surroundings, and return to the land of the living.

She was in for a shock.

Surrounding the lionesses on all sides were a dozen or more hyenas, some standing shoulder to shoulder in closed ranks, others pacing menacingly around the site of the kill. From their upraised tails and manes, Sarafina could tell they were anything but friendly – though you could also divine as much from the way most of them glared at the lionesses with bared fangs. While Sarafina had still been focused entirely on finishing the prey, her two companions had already started to confront the newcomers, who were slowly but surely closing in on the lionesses, hemming them in.

Leading the gang was the biggest hyena of the bunch, a tough female with stiff, brown manes and a squat, dark snout. One side of her face was racked with scars – a lion's clawmarks – and the white sheen in her eye probably meant she'd gone blind on that side. She didn't strike Sarafina as a particularly amicable type, owning in part to the way she was snarling at the other lionesses. As soon as she noticed that Sarafina had finished with her grim business, however, she shifted the focus of her attention. She muscled her way past the other lionesses, full of angry swagger and seemingly unafraid.

"Great, so you're finally done doing whatever it is you were doing," she growled, getting in Sarafina's face to such a degree that their muzzles almost touched, "Now would you kindly piss off!"

"If you want to keep that good eye you'd... better... back... the hell... up," Sarafina responded, emphasizing the last words and flattening her ears, contorting her face in a most fearsome manner. It must have combined well with the blood she still had all over her, because the hyena quickly took a step back. She'd lost none of her temper, though.

"You'd better call off your cronies, too – what in the blazes do you think you are doing anyway?" the lioness continued.

"What do I think I'm doing?!" the hyena exploded at her, "You three come in, steal my kill at the last moment, and then you have the gall to ask me what I'm doing? Damnation! I should have just had all three of you torn up without a warning and be done with it..."

Before Sarafina could process what was being said, she was distracted by sounds of struggle coming for the other side of the carcass. She turned to look just in time to see a duo of hyenas trying to grab hold of one of the wildebeest's hooves, before they were swatted away by the other lionesses. It was plain, however, that the rest of them were itching to try the same trick from different sides, and given their numbers there would be no way to stop them short of an outright fight.

"Hey! I said call them off! We're the ones that made this kill, don't think we'll let you steal it away from us!"

"Excuse me?" the lead-hyena hissed through clenched teeth.

"Don't think you'll get away with it because there's more of you, either. We three could take down half of you now right now if we wanted to, and you'd be hunted down as criminals anyhow..."

"You stinking lion! First you steal our kill, then you dare call us criminals when we try to take it back?"

"We stole nothing! It's ours, we made the kill – I wasn't just hugging the wildebeest out of affection, if you were wondering, scavenger."

"Unbelievable! All you lions are the same, think you're so much better than us... We've been chasing this beast almost all night, even crippled it too, and now you think it's yours just because you swoop in at the last moment, just when it was about to collapse? You act like a vulture, then turn around and dare call me scavenger!"

"Yeah right, give me a break," Sarafina snorted, "You expect me to believe you spent a whole night chasing a wildebeest, without killing it?"

The one-eyed hyena stared at the lioness with a look of total incredulity, before finally uttering: "Uh... duh! What, did you think wildebeest just sprout like that straight out from the savannah soil, dead-tired and crippled? It takes a lot of damn work! That's what hunting is – do I have to spell it out for you? You chase your prey down, bite at it a few times so it'll bleed out, and when it's too tired and weak to put up a fight – voila, bon appetit!"

That would explain why the wildebeest was such an easy target, Sarafina realized. She hadn't really had time to think about it before – there had been mere moments between failing to stalk the gazelles, seeing the wildebeest, and deciding it was a golden opportunity...

If what they were saying was true, she could see why the hyenas would be frustrated – but that didn't justify the way they were behaving, and besides, the law in this case was on the lionesses' side. Not to mention that Sarafina just didn't feel like giving those disgusting creatures even a scrap of meat – what kind of way of hunting was that, anyway? Just chasing an animal down until it tires out...

"Seems like a coward's way of hunting to me," the lioness sneered, "Just terrorizing the poor animal from a safe distance, never getting in close until it's too tired to fight back – despicable!"

"We don't need your stinking approval, and will hunt any way we damn well please," the hyena spat back, "Now get the hell away from my kill!"

Sarafina was about to point out that, by the laws of the Pridelands, ownership of a kill was determined by who dealt the final blow, and not based on who put in the most time or effort. It seemed like the hyenas were done talking however, as they all suddenly started to advance on the lionesses. Their leader, meanwhile, had jumped deftly out of Sarafina's reach, to the safety of her own ranks.

If the lionesses put their backs into it, they could have dealt the group of hyenas some serious blows. The downside of that, however, was that they'd most likely end up dead themselves. Sarafina wasn't about to die over a meal – one that had, admittedly, taken her very little effort to acquire. If given an opportunity, she'd much rather make a run for it. Their opponents, however, didn't seem keen on giving the lions a way out, and had formed a cordon around them, now more intent on the lionesses than the prey.

Then the wind picked up. The fierce gust almost threw some of the predators off their paws. Moments later, the air was suddenly aflame in a flash of bright light, followed almost immediately by deafening thunder, powerful enough to make it feel like the ground shook. It sent some of the hyenas cowering down in fright.

Seems like the rains had finally come; a violent shower broke to the accompaniment of continued lighting.

Sarafina wasn't one to waste an opportunity, and she shouted to her companions to follow her, before leaping past her opponents who'd been momentarily thrown into disarray. One hyena tried to block their path, but she sent the assailant flying sideways with a blow of her claws. Some of the others tried to give chase as the lionesses sprinted away and disappeared behind an opaque curtain of rain, but they were quickly called back by the lead-hyena.

"No, don't bother! We got what we wanted," she shouted, before bounding over to her comrade who'd taken a beating from Sarafina. The young female seemed dazed, but alive. Shallow clawmarks ran along the side of her snout and nose, leaking blood that mingled with the rain now running down her face.

"Careful now... Yeah, that's going to leave a mark – wear it with pride!" She then beckoned her still slightly woozy comrade to follow her as she planted her forepaws on the chest of the wildebeest in their midst, rising up above rest of the hyenas.

"You see, sisters? We can take on the lions just fine! All it takes is someone with the guts to do it!" the lead-hyena shouted, before stepping down from the carcass again, leaving her newly-wounded friend to soak in the adulation of the crowd. When the others started to tear into the wildebeest, the one-eye held back for a bit, licking her chops. The easy victory had whetted her appetite not for meat, but for another chance to confront the lions.