Chapter 6: Leopard Road Block
Jayden did have fun with her brother and Drayden as they scouted ahead of the rest of the Pride. They had already raced twice. Drayden won the first time and Koru the second. Jayden decided running was not her strong suit, but she did have fun trying anyway.
The three walked for a bit, not talking about much of anything. After a while, Jayden asked, "When do we turn back?"
Koru shrugged, "Whenever. We can go now, we've probably gone far enough."
"Alright." She said, and they began turning the opposite way.
"Wait." Drayden said, "Look." His ice blue eyes trained on something in the grass in the direction they had been walking.
Jayden looked, and saw nothing at first, but then the tall yellow grass some yards away shifted a bit. An animal must be laying there, but she couldn't see what. The grasses shifted again.
"Who's there?" Koru said. When there was no reply, only grasses shifting again, Koru added, "We know you're there, we can see you."
"You can't see me, Lion-boy." Came a gruff voice.
Well that's true. Jayden thought. They only knew someone had been there because of the grass. Jayden still couldn't make out any shape of the animal.
"Who are you? Come out." Koru continued.
"Why should I? Why don't you come over here?" the mysterious voice from the grass said. The way he said the last question sounded threatening. It sounded like he was going to give them a nasty surprise if one of them walked over.
"It's a leopard." Drayden murmured to the other two.
A leopard! Jayden thought, squinting her eyes, looking for the mysterious big-cat. No wonder I can't see him. Leopard's spots help them camouflage in tall grass. And when they're laying in it, they pretty much disappear. How was Drayden able to tell so quickly?
Jayden finally saw an amber eye. It was staring at her and it blinked slowly. She grimaced when she remembered what else she knew about leopards.
Males are especially sensitive about their territory and aggressive. Not to mention: huge. Maybe not as big as a full grown lion, but still, a male leopard is no idle threat.
"You kids aren't thinking about coming in my territory, are you?" the leopard said, standing up.
Now Jayden could see everything above his legs clearly. Indeed he was large. Mostly a light orange color with lots of handsome black spots everywhere. His face was rather broad, especially the nose. He was attractive-for a leopard.
"We'll just be passing through." Koru said evenly.
"Not through my lands." The leopard said, starting to growl.
"Let me handle this." Jayden said, "Well if it's alright with you," she addressed the big-cat, "We can simply go around your lands. We have the rest of our pride coming behind us, we just need to pass through so we can get to the Pride Lands."
She mentioned the Pride Lands just incase he had heard of them. Maybe the Pride Lands' prestige would help them out with the aggressive leopard. But the leopard sneered at her.
"You can't intimidate me by pretending there's a whole pride of lions behind you."
"I wasn't trying to intim-"
"No one's coming through my lands!" The leopard shouted, baring his teeth and extending his claws.
"Then tell us how far we have to go around so we aren't going through your lands!" Jayden said, shouting back.
"Yeah, just calm down, buddy." Drayden added.
"I can't calm down, there's three morons in my face, threatening my lands!"
Jayden was losing her temper, "We don't want to take your crappy lands! We want to go around!"
The leopard leaped forward at Jayden with claws lashing. He hadn't met his mark, but Koru and Drayden still jumped forward to block him from hurting her. The leopard only bared his teeth and glared at them.
"He obviously can't come to reason." Drayden said.
"These types only understand one thing. Violence." Koru said.
"So fight." the leopard dared.
Koru rose his head, still meeting his rival's glare, then spoke to his sister, "Jayden, go back to the others, tell them to hurry through here. Drayden and I will have to chase this guy off."
"You can try!" he spat. "I'll never flee!"
"But they might be miles away." Jayden said, "It'll take me a while to get there."
"She did seem like the slow type to me." The leopard quipped, with a mean toothy grin.
Jayden growled. "Besides, I'd love to tear this jerk a new one."
"Fine, Drayden, you go. You're faster anyway. Go now." Koru said.
The peach lion nodded, "Be careful." he said to them both, then he was gone.
"One down, two to go." the leopard said. "So come get some if you really want it."
"Why can't you be sensible?" Koru snarled. "Is it beyond your skill level to understand we mean not to take your lands?"
The spotted cat bared his teeth and jumped at Koru with claws outstretched. Koru was surprised by the leopard's sudden attack, so he wasn't prepared. His opponent's claws did rake the side of his face a little before Koru rose up to meet him. Koru roared and bit the leopard's neck. The leopard pulled away easily before the yellow lion got a good hold, and his spotted paws batted Koru's head repeatedly.
Koru backed up, dazed. The leopard's paws were huge, they had knocked Koru pretty hard. Jayden took this opportunity to jump in. She leaped on the spotted cat's large back. The brown lioness dug in her claws as hard as she could and tried to leave a few gashes with her teeth. The leopard didn't make it easy for her, of course, and he threw her off. She missed her feet and laded on her side. The leopard whirled and leaped on the lioness's exposed belly. Jayden roared in pain as the opponent's long claws pricked her tender belly.
Koru had recovered by now and rammed his own huge paw on the spotted cat's shoulder to unbalance him, then Koru quickly swiped again, this time in his opponent's face. The hit landed hard, the leopard screeched, and now had claw shaped wounds on his face just like Koru. The leopard roared in anger and pain, trying to use a paw to wipe blood that had splattered from the wound into his eye.
Koru stood before him. "Just give up. There's two of us and you're wounded."
"I won't give my lands to you!" snarled the leopard. He leaped at Koru again, but Koru batted him aside.
Jayden shouted, "We DON'T want to take them!"
The leopard either didn't hear, or didn't listen and tried again to leap at Koru. Koru slashed him with his claws, and Jayden jumped in too. Dodging his flinging back feet, Jayden managed to grab his thick spotted tail in her mouth. She sunk her teeth in and yanked as hard as she could. Their opponent yowled and whirled his head around, slashing without looking. Jayden moved quickly, staying behind the furious leopard, the tail still in her mouth. She could tell it was really hurting him. Maybe he had injured it in the past and Jayden's biting and yanking was bringing back old pains.
"Let go of my tail!" The leopard half ordered, half begged her.
"Nuh um." Jayden said, her voice muffled by the thick tail.
The leopard let out a shrieking yowl that pierced Jayden's ears. She could hear Koru chuckling a bit. She knew she must look pretty silly, but she knew she had to get the big-cat to surrender or leave the scene until the Pride could pass through.
"Ahhhhhrrrrr!" The spotted cat yowled. "Let GO!"
"Let our family pass, and she'll let go." Koru said.
The leopard made one last attempt to attack Jayden with his claws, he did slice her shoulder a little before she dodged around him again. She yanked again. He repeated his shriek and made an attempt to get away from Jayden. She took this as his way of surrendering, so she let go. The leopard bolted away and didn't look back.
Jayden and Koru both chased after him for several paces, just to make their point. They stopped when they were sure the leopard was gone.
They stared after the spotted cat for a while in silence. Then Koru spoke, "Well that was easy."
"Easy?" Jayden gaped at her older brother. "that was the most stubborn creature I've ever come across!"
"Second most for me." he said giving her a meaningful look. She rolled her eyes.
"Funny. Let's go."
"Who knew Leopards were so sensitive about their tails?" Koru said as he and his sister headed back to where they first met the leopard.
"I think it had just mended from being broken." Jayden said. "It had an odd bulge in the middle. Sort of crooked too."
"No wonder it was so tender."
Jayden nodded in agreement.
When the two got back to the place where they fought the leopard, they rested and cleaned their wounds. The damage was minimal: just a few shallow scratches on Koru's face, and Jayden's stomach and shoulder. They rested until their family, led by Drayden approached with quickness in their steps.
"Is he gone?" Drayden asked.
"Yes, he's been taken care of." Koru replied. Tome walked up to his son and daughter.
"You fought the leopard?"
Koru and Jayden nodded.
Tome inspected them. "Well, only a few scratches here and there. So I don't need to ask if you're okay. Let's keep moving everyone."
Jayden didn't expect to be coddled by her father. He was the type of lion that believed any scratches or wounds were earned. Unless of course they were serious wounds like the one on Tempest's back.
The brown lioness paced to Tempest's side. She was moving along with the Pride, looking a little tired.
"How are you doing?" she asked her older sister.
"Alright." Tempest sighed. "I just wish we'd get there already. How much father is it?"
Jayden appreciated Tempest asked her even though Tempest knew the way just as well as she did. "Well we are five days in. I predict two to three more days at the pace we're going with all the rests." Jayden stopped. I hope I didn't make Tempest think we are inconvenienced because of her…
"I wish we could go faster…" Tempest said. "But I just don't think I can."
"Oh, no Tempest, no one expects you to. You need all the rests you can get. Rushing will only worsen your condition."
"I know."
"We'll get there and Mairu will get you all fixed up."
Dayya came trotting over from where she was walking with Vitani.
"Are we there yet?" she said comically. Her sisters laughed. "Mother asked me to ask you if you needed a rest." Dayya said, looking at Tempest.
She seemed to think about it for a moment, then, "No I can keep going for a while."
Jayden could tell the light cream lioness did want to stop, but her desire to get there made her keep going. "No rushing, remember, Temp?" Jayden said.
"Yes, yes, I know. I'll say when I need to rest, I promise."
"Good." Dayya said, then changed the subject. "By the way, Jayden, what was the leopard like?"
Jayden took on a light tone, "Oh he was tall… handsome…."
Dayya's eyes got dreamy, "Really?"
"No! Jeez! He was a pompous stubborn brat. He kept thinking we were trying to take over his lands. I tried explaining we were only passing through, or could even go around, but he wouldn't hear it."
"Oh… so he wasn't handsome?" Dayya asked.
Tempest laughed and Jayden rolled her eyes. Why did Dayya always think about boys? Well I'm NOT mentioning that he was slightly handsome, cuz then I'll have to go into a perfect description of his features.
"Speaking of handsome… I have a new subject to bring up. And I can finally say it since Mani is walking over by Father and Drayden." The red-cream lioness said, smiling and green eyes shining.
"Oh Kings, this must be a fun subject about boys if Mani wasn't allowed." Tempest said with a smirk.
"Yes of course boys! We're about to see all our old friends again, aren't we? Some of them boys! What if they're cute now?"
Jayden gulped. "Like who?"
"Did you forget? All the boys in the Pride, Malowa, Clous, Dark, Kivu, Jai…Duh!"
Jayden's heart leaped when Dark's name was said, but she remembered her promise she made to herself about acting as if Dark was just any old friend, so she played along.
"Well Clous and Kivu are our cousins." Jayden said.
"Yeah, so?" The red-cream lioness replied. "They can still be cute. That doesn't mean I want them to be my boyfriend or something! Who do you think will be the cutest?"
Jayden tried to imagine all the boys as a adults. Full manes, large chins. Large muscles…broad backs and large paws. It was hard, and she got stuck on Malowa. He seemed like such a young cub, though he wasn't that much younger than herself. He was kind of known as the "mamma's boy" so it was hard to imagine him grown up.
"Jai." Tempest said.
"Huh?"
"That's who I think would be the cutest."
"Jay!" Dayya exclaimed. "Well maybe. Who do you think, Jayden?"
"Um…" She knew her answer. And it wasn't just because she used to be in love with him. She knew Dark would be the most handsome. Likely, he would be the most muscular too. His lineage would make sure of that.
But she didn't want to say it. She felt like she was about to blush. Why shouldn't I say it though? Just cuz I say he's handsome doesn't mean I'm saying I'm in love with him. Tempest just said Jai would be cute, and of course we don't think anything of it. This is an innocent enough conversation to just say he's cute and be done…
Just when Jayden was about to open her mouth, Dayya spoke first,
"My vote would be for Dark."
Jayden shut her mouth and sighed quietly.
"I think black manes are hot!" Dayya said, adding a little jump to her pace.
"All black manes?" Tempest cut in, "You mean like Dad's? Or Koru's?"
"Er… no! Not them. And Koru's hair is brown!"
"Well there's a bit of black at the bottom."
"I guess. But I don't mean them, I just mean Dark."
"We'll see when we get there, I guess." Jayden finally spoke, kind of relieved. She was even more relieved when Mani started to walk over.
"Looks like this convo has to be shortened, cuz here comes Mani." Tempest said. "He's the cutest lion ever, by the way!"
"Aw how sweet." Mani said as he arrived, and licked Tempest's cheek. "You doin' okay?"
"Yes, Mani."
"Your dad says we are taking a break soon weather you say you're ready or not."
Tempest growled softly.
"Hang in there." Mani said, looking off into the distance. "We're getting there."