The Huntress at Sunset
16. The Return
The languorous, bloated flood of the river had gone, replaced by a jostling, rushing, roaring, cascading mass of muddied browns and whites. As the lion and baboon took each step forward, the river overtook them, flowing urgently onward. Nengwalamwe looked down the trail, and realised that he was no different from the river. What was left of his mane sagged down about him, full of mud, leaves and probably even a few twigs. Like the river, even his whitest fur was stained brown. He could only go one way, onward. He felt for the river, as he too knew not where he was going; he was following a trail laid out for him and following it wherever it led. So the great lion and the great river, both full of confusion and forces beyond their control, flowed onward and ever downward. The earth itself drew the river. Nengwalamwe had no idea what was drawing him on.
He had had ideas about leaving Falana and the rock far behind, yet the rock barrier called to him through the mist and spray; called to him to conquer them, to force his will on them, to cast them aside. And they invited him, spoke soft words to him, needed him and wanted him. Even if they had not, then there was nowhere else to go but down the riverside trail. Occasionally he caught glimpses of the far bank. Though it was not open savannah, it was not dense forest, the grass really was greener over the river, not that any lion ever cared much about grass.
As the river dropped ever lower it sped up, gaining strength and power from the fall. The surface broke, sending the water up in snow-white shoots and sheets, only to fall in a million droplets a few lengths further downstream. The flow seemed purposeful, organised, but in haphazard way. It was no longer smooth and even, it was increasingly broken into channels that flowed around and into each other, though why it should be so was more than Nengwalamwe could comprehend. Even Mtundu was at a loss to explain it. With the change in the flow came another - the sound of the river. A gentle flowing stream burbles pleasantly, seemingly enjoying its course, yet the river now crashed and roared continuously in an anger more fierce than any lion. Nengwalamwe reacted powerfully to the sounds of the river; he kept low and silent, fearful of the river reaching out to strike him. Like his father's rage, he could not escape the river's anger and hoped it would not notice him cowering at its paws. Yet the river's rage was growing as it was confined to an ever narrower and rougher channel. Soon, thought Nengwalamwe, its anger would break free to smash all around it. The rage of thought would turn to the rage of action, and nothing, certainly no lion, would be able to stand in its way.
The slope steepened, gently at first, so that Nengwalamwe and Mtundu barely noticed the change, then suddenly it seemed to drop away before them. The path ran close to the river; the air was thick with mist. The rain had long since stopped, yet the ground beneath Nengwalamwe's pads was damp and slippery. He extended his claws a little when his pads alone could no longer hold. Mtundu slid to his side, grabbing hold of the woody stems of a shrubby bush to stop himself.
"Nengwe! Where'a we goin'? This aint goin' nowhere but down fast!"
The lion tried to stop. His foreclaws gripped, his hind caught for a moment, then his momentum carried his hindquarters on, dragging through the soft clay slip. His hind legs buckled underneath him. The lion twisted round involuntarily. His back tightened and he struck out at the ground with his hindlegs, claws fully extended, only to feel the clay slide, clammy and gritty, beneath him. Then, filled with pain at being twisted around each other, his forepaws lost grip, and Nengwalamwe, the mighty would-be king, slid uncontrollably down the slope on his belly and near side.
Mtundu clung onto a bush, watching his friend slide from him. The expression on the receding lion's face was of terror and surprise.
"Nengwe!" Mtundu lurched back as mud spray, sent up by the lion's fall, splattered over him. Then, his grip loosened by his instinctive reaction, he too succumbed. "Ooh SHI..I…T!"
~oOOo~
Pain, stabbing pain in uncountable places. Back, upper hind legs, ribs, shoulder. Lie still. Lie and never get up. Lie….
"Nengwe?"
Lie still.
"Nengwe? Are you OK?"
Lie and move an ear.
"Nengwalamwe? Come on! Get up!"
Open an eye; wish I hadn't.
"You're ok. Wow! That was some ride huh? Do you wanna go again?"
Feel like eating baboon: if my sides didn't hurt so much.
"No… I guess not… Say, y'all feeling all right ain't ya? "
Lift head. Open mouth, let teeth glint in one of the few beams of sunlight that reach the ground here. Roar!
"Is that a yes?"
Keep mouth wide open. Show him who the meat eater around here is.
"Why's your tongue's all rough?"
Why bother? Close mouth. Look around. See the slope I fell down. Notice the smooth band of mud. Feel the rock that stopped me. Feel the pain it gave me. Thank the stars it saved me. Can't hear anything but noise, noise, rushing, roaring noise. Taste the moist air, cool on my tongue. Smell the water, on everything, everywhere. Reach out to the baboon before he has a chance to back away. Lick his foreleg; now he knows. Glad to be alive.
~oOOo~
"Can we go now?"
Nengwalamwe looked around again. Through the swirling mist he could see the forest, dense and dark about them on three sides, the river flooding past them and plunging down amongst the glistening rocks on the fourth. A sinking feeling enveloped him as he eyed the slope they had so abruptly descended. No way back. The path they had been following along had vanished before his paws, cut away by the angrily pounding water. He had fallen just once, yet the river fell over and over filling the air with a hissing flume of spray and sound, its soft patience cutting away at the hard rock. Lions, however, are notoriously short on patience.
"Mtundu, where can we go? Where else is left?"
Mtundu raised an arm to the river. "There, Nengwe. There!"
Nengwalamwe lay still on the ground by the rock that had broken his fall; thankfully without breaking his back; lifted and turned his head to the raging flow below the falls. Was it raging? No, not quite; the river opened out into a wider, calmer, probably much deeper pool at the fall's foot, but was it swimmable? No, no baboon could ever survive that, and few lion. Certainly, Nengwalamwe would not have jumped into that water out of choice. "No way Mtundu. There's no way we're crossing that!"
"In case you ain't noticed, we've gotta cross it. Here's as good as anywhere. Tell me Fuzzbutt, what's so wrong with here?"
"Mtundu, it's too deep, too wide and too strong for you."
"Yeah Fuzzbutt? You're just scared. We're here, Falana's over there, how else are we gonna get you two together?"
"Quit this Falana stuff Baldarse!"
"What would your mother think of her little cubbie running from a lioness eh?"
"She'd… hey cut it out! I know what you're after! Don't think I don't. You want me to swim across that with you on my back. You're trying to blackmail me into it aren't you?"
"Me? Do'ya think I'd do that to you Nengwe?" Mtundu's voice rose almost to an insistent screech, "Come on, would I after all we'd been through?"
"Well…"
"Huh?" Mtundu said waving his arms about his head. "Huh Fuzzbutt?"
"Ok, Ok! Calm down. We're not going no place all fired up, not if they are waiting for me."
Mtundu's upper lip curled back to cover his teeth again. "Who are they?"
"Them, you know - them!"
Mtundu half closed his eyes and tilted his head upwards. "No. Who?"
"Them." Nengwalamwe's mane shook. "All teeth, jaws and knobbly bits. They're gonna eat me!"
Mtundu passed his hand over his face. "Not while I'm around they ain't. Anyways this isn't croc country. There ain't none here."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah."
"Are you sure you're sure? I see those jaws of teeth in my sleep and they frighten me." At the thought of sleep Nengwalamwe yawned.
"Yeeesh. From where I'm sittin' I can understand how ya feel. You'll get over it," Mtundu said, waving at Nengwalamwe dismissively, "I sure did." Lowering his arms, he eyed Nengwalamwe squarely. "Anyway who said anything about crossing right here?"
"What?"
"I think we should look around first and see if there's anywhere better."
"Where?"
"I dunno Fuzzy. I ain't had a good look round yet! Come on; let's try over there by the falls."
"Mtundu! You're crazy! What's there but a load of rocks?"
"Yeah," said Mtundu with a smile. "Rocks…."
When Nengwalamwe finally got up he was surprised, not at the pains, which were as sharp as ever, but at the aches and stiffness of his legs. It felt almost as if he'd been lying there for hours. He wanted desperately to stretch but knew the pain would intensify if he attempted anything but the most basic motions of standing and walking. He felt the damp ground beneath his pads. Then he floated away, his paws growing invisible to his feeling. His sight veiled in red. He could do nothing to hold himself upright. He felt himself fall from paws that were no longer his.
"Whoa! Steady there boy!"
"What's happening to me Mtundu?" He pleaded plaintively, "Help me, please!"
"You'll be ok in a minute. You're legs have probably just gone dead."
"Dead! Mtundu, help me! I'll do anything, just do something. I don't want to die."
"You're not going to die!" Mtundu said with a gentle smile spreading over his face. "You weren't out for long, a few moments only. Try to move your paws."
Nengwalamwe dared not try.
"Go on Fuzzbutt. Gimme them claws!"
Nengwalamwe pleaded with his eyes. Mtundu insisted with his teeth. Suddenly the lion roared in pain.
"Ah…" Mtundu backed away, his eyes darting from side to side. "I guess the feeling's commin' back, ain't it?"
~oOOo~
Nengwalamwe roared, "Wait! I'm slipping all over the place back here!" His voice, that could carry further than the eye could see over the open savannah, was all but drowned by the falling white water. Ahead, Mtundu stopped and looked back mouthing something which the lion's delicate ears, completely filled by the power of the falls, couldn't catch. The baboon beckoned the lion on, then moved into the wall of water. Nengwalamwe looked on, his eyes filled with terror, his ears flattened down to block out a little of the fall's anger. Mtundu had disappeared, swallowed by the cascading water, surely never to return.
Yet moments later he did, or at least a hairy hand and forearm did. It emerged magically from behind the spray, soaked and dripping, and waggled a finger towards Nengwe in a beckoning motion. When the lion failed to move, it uncurled and did it again. Still the lion stood, afraid and bemused at the vision of the disembodied hand. He was about to lie down when a head appeared to join the hand. The hand waved again, the head smiled then mouthed something unmistakable, "Come on Fuzzbutt! What you waitin' for?"
The rocks beneath Nengwalamwe's paws felt cold and slimy as he picked his way forward, the deep black surface under him covered with garish green filaments. A strange plant, thick leaved, lushly green and rooted in a crack in the rock face, brushed against the lion's side as he passed. He paused, standing no more than three lengths from the security of the banks yet feeling days away. He tentatively reached forward with a forepaw. It slipped on the rounded green-slimed head of the boulder. He reached out again, frightened to touch it. He knew he must get on it, over it and over everything. All he needed was to get out of this place. Everywhere was rock and hard places and he was caught in amongst them all, threading his was, being lead and driven. Chilling spray blew on to his face and whiskers with each gust of buffeting wind that swirled around the rocks. Each drop told him that he was past the point of no return, yet he couldn't really remember how it had all happened, other than that Mtundu featured at every moment. Here he was again, beckoning him on into the water; calling him on, on, on. So on it was, though to what, Nengwalamwe had no idea. The lion knew now that Mtundu's world was so much larger and more complex than his own and that despite being the strongest and most powerful animal for days in any direction Nengwalamwe was the weak one. His father, he thought, might have been proud at what his son had become, yet the son now took no pride in what his father had been. Maybe Mtundu held Nengwalamwe's future in that wrinkled olive brown haired hand of his. Maybe it was time to stop questioning and to just trust the baboon. Against all his instincts, Nengwalamwe drew himself up proudly, growled loudly but silently in the roar of the falls, raised a foreleg and then stepped forward to follow the mysterious vanishing monkey.
Nengwalamwe pressed himself against the drenched, slime covered rock face. He looked down, watching intently for the right spot to place each unsteady pawfall. The rock curved away slightly; instead of going into the cascade of falling water, ready to cut any animal's back in two in a moment, Nengwalamwe felt himself slip past the white knives, behind almost. No, it was behind. Here there was no sound, other than the deafening fall of the water. No wonder Mtundu had beckoned; no sound made by any animal could be heard here. The rock curved away into a large cavern, strewn with rock fragments. Only a fragment of the dazzling daylight penetrated the white wall of water, chasing fleeting patterns down the dry walls and floor.
A length ahead Mtundu sat precariously on the sharply sloping yet remarkably dry rock half a length from the water. He was smiling, pleased perhaps that he had persuaded the wary lion to go behind the falls. He tipped his head, drawing his lips back to show his teeth in the way with which Nengwalamwe had grown so familiar. "Come on Fuzzbutt!" they said. "Cain't hang around yappin' here all day!" He raised a forearm and beckoned again. Nengwalamwe held back, standing in awe and wonder of the sights around him. Mtundu drew his lips back further, normally they would have been accompanied by some kind of excruciating screech, but here there was none. Instead, his arms grew more expressive, more furious, and more mobile.
Nengwalamwe's eyes, already wide taking in the incredible half-lit, flickered sights that surrounded him, flared in terror as Mtundu's flailing hand was engulfed by the water, flipping the monkey over instantly down from the cavern into the falls. One moment Mtundu had been sitting there before the lion, the next he was gone far faster than any crocodile could have struck.
Nengwalamwe didn't stop to think. Baboons could not swim; lions could. Mtundu probably would not survive the fall, Nengwalamwe might. The next moment Nengwalamwe sprang forward, leaving only a pair of wet paw prints on the dry floor. He launched himself into the flow; it instantly slammed into him and pummelled him down. It drew him below the frothing water to where there was little light and no air, and then took him further still. The pressure of the flow, even deep into the ground, carried Nengwalamwe down and held him tight so that he could not struggle. Yet he knew he must if he was to save Mtundu.
Whereas the crocodile's grip had been deathly firm, the water's weakened as the light dimmed. Above, or what Nengwalamwe assumed must have been above, the water swarmed and swirled. The sky, a brown stain in the darkness, was even and unbroken. He kicked his legs, only succeeding in turning himself over in the water. He saw the sky turn to darkness, and then grow lighter again. This time there was a shadow on it, a black monkey-like silhouette. The fall's hold was gone; the light grew as Nengwalamwe kicked repeatedly. Changing from brown to dull silver, the surface came down to greet the lion.
He broke surface nose first, expelling a huge lungful of spent air in bubbles and foam. The instant his mouth cleared the water he drew in life and air. The rest of him, hanging and flowing in hopelessly waterlogged tresses, stayed beneath the surface. All around the water flowed languorously, almost relaxing after its exertions in the rapids and falls.
Nengwalamwe could not relax. He could see little but the silver water's surface just below his eyes. A bank, sandy and gently shelving, swung into view, but Mtundu did not. The lion swum about in circles, lurching forward with each kick of his legs. Everywhere there was deep water, slow and even, but no baboon. The falls must have taken him, Nengwalamwe thought. Now he was alone once again.
He swum about for as long as his legs would keep on kicking; looking, searching, hoping desperately for Mtundu to show a wrinkled hand yet there was none. Nengwalamwe saw the falls, some way off now, and the spot where he'd hesitated before going behind them. He imagined Mtundu's arm beckoning once more, then he knew it would never do so again. The lion knew that few lesser animals could have survived the plunging forces of the falls. 'Not that Mtundu was less than me,' he thought, 'just smaller, that's all. Why didn't I listen to him when he said we should cross before? What's the point of being a lion now if I can't even save a damn baboon?'
His father called to chastise him. "Nengwalamwe! Don't save him boy, eat him!"
"No, Nengwe dear. Are you hungry?"
'No mother,' he thought.
"Then you don't need to eat him, do you?"
"No mother," he replied sadly.
"What sort of a lesson is that for a lion?" his father blustered. "If it's edible eat it! Every lion knows that!"
"And if it's mountable mount it I suppose!" Melakwe's voice lowered, "Nengwe?"
Nengwalamwe opened his eyes. His body lay exhausted around him on the sands.
"Yes Mother," he said weakly.
"Nengwe? Come on, there's things to do, it's time we went home."
"No mother. I've got to find Mtundu. I've got to find him."
"Who? Is he a new friend of yours? He's not from the Upper Kolata is he? You know how your father is about them."
"No, he's not from the Upper Kolata. He's from…." He thought for a moment. "You know I don't really know where he's from, but he's my friend and I've got to know if he's still alive."
"What about your other friends? Are they still alive too? What about that lioness… you like her don't you?"
''Lioness…' Nengwalamwe thought; half smiling. 'Which lioness?' His words disappeared into the sand. The sun slipped down to touch the forest canopy on the far side of the river. Melakwe was gone. He stood alone, his mane dripping and full of silt. "What have I done?" he said sighing to himself. "Where do I go now?"
"Back I guess, fuzzy guy."
The lion turned his head round to his left. He stared hard at the dripping form huddled beside him, scrunching down his eyes tight. The olive grey head raised his eyebrows in a way the lion often wished he could. The lion leaned over and licked the baboon, licked him over and over. Drying, cleaning him, showing him why his tongue was so rough. Welcoming him back.
"You know we gotta go back doan'ya?" the baboon giggled as the lion licked somewhere sensitive.
"Why?"
"Because Nengwe, I think ya do give a damn."
"Caring is… weakness."
"What? You…" Mtundu shivered. "Hey, careful there with that thing!" The lion rubbed his head against Mtundu reassuringly. "…you doan' actually believe that do ya?"
"I don't know. Maybe…" Then, shaking his head, "No."
On this side of the river; sheltered by an escarpment, grey and hulking; the ground was a little more open. The day was pressing on, heating up towards noon, the sun pressing into every crack and fissure of the sandstone rock face. There was nowhere to rest, to recuperate: to groom and plan.
The pair walked slowly through the lush green undergrowth at the foot of the escarpment. Above them lay the very fringes of what had been the lion's world. Ahead and on their nearside lay unknown terrain: strange vegetation filled with frightening noises. Such was becoming almost normal to the lion, yet that couldn't completely allay his fear. Nor indeed could the baboon, for whom this too was a strange, unsettling land. They had no choice but to follow the cliffs southwest: there was nowhere to climb up to the plateau above, with the great rock at its heart.
Once away from the roar and fresh spray of the falls, the pair's thoughts turned to finding some shade to wait out the searing, cloyingly humid heat below the cliffs. It was Mtundu who found the ledge, just a lazy jump above the ground. Above it, the cliff hung over, formed by searing winds long before. He called to Nengwalamwe, who briskly loped up, then looked all around, craning to look above. The overhang unsettled him. Its shadow, casting deep into the rock, promised so much and reminded him of the great rock that he gladly settled alongside the baboon. He lay to the outside, sheltering Mtundu who, for the first time for some days, soon fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. Nengwalamwe kept watch through the hottest part of the day, thinking of what the cave in his rock, the great rock, would be like once it was open. Would it be like this place? Nothing having approached since they arrived, he too finally fell into sleep. His mother did not disturb him.
When Nengwalamwe woke it was dusk. He had missed the dramatic slanting sunset that set the bush briefly aflame. He had missed the bats flitting forth from the cliff above. He had missed the taut heavily-set male leopard that had slunk past just a few lengths away on the ground below. The leopard paused as he passed, catching scent of an unfamiliar animal, possibly a monkey of some sort. Unable to locate its source, he shook his head and soon moved on.
As the lion stretched he felt the first pats of new rain. He was soon surrounded by dark spots on the rock. Nengwalamwe walked to the ledge, paused momentarily to spot his landing and stepped off heavily, slipping away into the bush. He soon returned. The rain was falling heavily now, but the overhang shed the worst of it. The monkey slept on, even as heavier drops began spit-spattering down on to him from the rock above. Nengwalamwe found the least wet patch and settled in as best he could. With each laden drop he grew to thinking: about Mtundu, the dogs and the rains. What had really happened at the water's edge? How had Eddie found him? What, if any, was Mtundu's part in all this? Especially now that he had shown, by his survival at the waterfall that, unlike the others of his kind the lion had encountered in Kolata, he was a more than competent swimmer.
The rain was long past. The midnight air was stickily humid. Shafts of hazy-misted moonlight slanted through the treetops, filled now with swooping, whooping and clacking calls. Shadows rustled and cracked in the nearby bush. Mtundu at last stirred. Nengwalamwe eased over to let him stretch and get up. The lion let the monkey take a few unsteady steps forward before voicing his thoughts.
"Who are you?"
"Eh Nengwe? Wha'dya mean who am I? Ya 'naw who I am."
"Are you my friend, or my enemy?"
"Whoa now! Ya'll frightening me now. What's got inta ya all a'sudden?"
"I don't like having my tail pulled Mtundu. So, who, or should I say what are you?"
"I'm your friend, that's who. 'Course I am. Cummon now, whaat'is all about?"
"You've been asleep a long time."
"Yeah, nearly getting' drowned kinda takes it out o'ya."
"Where are we going?"
"Back, you know that Nengwe." Mtundu's shoulder twitched as he shuffled from foreleg to foreleg. "We're going back."
"Are we going to be met when we get there?"
"How am I supposed to know?"
"Yes. Exactly. And do you?" Then glanced down to his dark tail tuft. It flicked and jerked. For a moment Mtundu looked as if he might run, but he stood his ground. Maybe he realised he would be struck down before he'd even turned. Maybe he decided this was indeed the time to explain. Maybe…
"Yeah. They won't be there. They don't know we're here." Nengwalamwe raised a forepaw, extending his claws as it came up. "Look Fuzzbutt, they don't think we're here. Honest, they probably think we're still on the other side; still running away."
The lion's sides breathed twice. He lowered his paw, letting his claws return. "Tell me more."
"Like what Nengwe?"
"Like everything, from the beginning. When did it start?"
"From the beginning. Yeah, it started then."
"I wondered why a monkey like you would hang about a lion like me. At first I thought you were mad, or ill. I mean, why would a monkey want to get himself eaten like that? Putting yourself in my way all the time. But then, everything here was upside down and sideways. Who knew what normal was anymore? Not me."
"We're… how ya say…"
"Spies?"
"Naah, intelligence gatherers."
"You, intelligent!" Nengwalamwe smiled for the first time since the waterfall.
"Yeah, OK, OK. Look baboons are everywhere right? Chattering away here, squabbling over something there. Playing around trees, scurrying around rocks. Running across tracks. Ya know. We get around."
"OK. So?"
"We hear stuff, we see things. No one takes any notice of us. 'Oh it's only another of those baboons again.'"
"Right…."
"So, the stuff we hear is… kinda valuable to the dogs, ya see? Ya, ya all right' so we're spies."
"You too?"
"It's kinda the family business. Ain't no way to get out o'it." Nengwalamwe humphed and nodded. "My older brother tried, but the dogs found out. Got 'im real good."
"How?"
"They've got animals to do that sort of thing for them. The sort who'll do anything and not ask too many questions. They… they did real bad stuff to him… left him dying there as a message to everyone. Then…" He hung his head, breathing heavily. "Then you came and ended it for him."
Nengwalamwe said nothing. Silence seemed to say it all.
"That's when Miss Elizabeth decided I should be the one to trail you. Kinda punishment I guess."
"Trail me? You literally stood in front of me! You're either mad or stupid. At least that's what I reckoned. I could so easily have caught and eaten you. Why not just follow me?"
"Because… ya know this is gonna sound really stupid… I knew you were on the right side. You weren't from round here. You weren't part of this madness. Nengwe, I thought you were a real lion."
"I guess you were wrong."
"Oh no Nengwalamwe, I was right. I'm still right. You do care, that's why you're not running away."
"Not running away? What do you call this? What are we doing right now?"
"We're going back."
"Into a trap most likely."
"No Nengwe. No, they think you're long gone and me with you most likely. They don't know we're going back. They don' know where we at. That way they'll leave Falana and Shaha alone for a while."
"They will? Are you sure?"
"Yeah, pretty sure. They don' dare mess with Shaha. Never have. Falana… well, yeah, they've not always let her alone. That's why they left the last time."
Nengwalamwe's eyes darted about. His ears twitched round. "What? Left?"
"Yeah, they've only recently come back. A while before you showed up. They were both born here, and they'll always keep coming back, no matter how often they have to go away."
"Why? Why did they go? Where?"
"No idea where, but why? Maybes it was because they killed Falana's mate and her cubs."
"Her cubs? She's had cubs?"
"Yeah. She's probably not wantin' to go through all that again, so it ain't past supposin' she's not keen on males these days, if ya'll see wha' I mean."
"Who killed her mate? The dogs?"
"Oh yeah. Sure they did. It took nine of them but he sure went down a'right. It took a while, but Miss Elizabeth enjoyed every moment of it. Says he begged to be killed in the end."
"…And her cubs?"
"No one knows what happened to them. At least no one's tellin'. Some say Falana left them on that knoll she lies on and when she got back they were dead. Some bits gone too…. That's why she lies there, waitin'… but they ain't never gonna come home."
Nengwalamwe sat up, looking down on his paws. He closed his eyes. "Come on Mtundu. We're leaving." He got up and walked off. Moments later Mtundu hurriedly struck out after him. For some time neither spoke. Eventually, with the bush thinning around them they came to a stream running down from the cliffs. Nengwalamwe stopped.
"What have I got myself into Mtundu?" He looked the baboon square in the eye. "What madness is here in this place?"
"When we get back, we gotta make it count. Nengwe, do ya understan'it? We gotta take them down. There's no way else to end this. The dogs, especially Elizabeth, they ain't for backin' down, and they ain't gonna give up."
"Eddie said I'd have to take them down one by one. How many are left?"
"Ten maybes more."
"How many took down Falana's mate?"
"Nine. He was all that too, and it weren't like it was hard or nuffin'."
"So, I can't just go in there all claws out, can I?"
"Naah. We're gonna have to play this clever; take our time."
"We? Are you on my side now?"
"Well, OK you, and yeah, I'm on our side. I've always been on your side."
"Even when you've been telling the other side everything I've been saying, everything I've done and everyone I've met?"
"Yeah… but I didn't always tell them everythin' right and somethin's I said were way wrong."
Mtundu stepped closer to the lion and placed a hand gently on the lion's forepaw. He slipped his head under the lion's chin, snuggling under. Had Nengwalamwe wanted he could have crushed the baboon instantly. Instead he raised his free foreleg and slipped it over the baboon's far shoulder, resting it. Each felt the other's body moving in time with their breath, Mtundu felt moments of Nengwe's slow and calm heartbeat through his forelegs. No one was going to eat anyone just yet. While the conversation had stopped for now, there would be much more to say later.