“I do.”
Kubali came back. “It was nothing. Just a rabbit.”
Gamu made a show of an overly affectionate greeting, kissing and rubbing Kubali full length. Innocently, Kubali closed his eyes and enjoyed the closeness. Elanna’s chin trembled.
Kubali came to Elanna and tried to rub her but she backed away from him.
“Don’t you TOUCH me!”
“Lannie, honey tree, what’s wrong??”
“You know EXACTLY what’s wrong!”
Kubali looked at Gamu. “What have you been telling her??”
“Not what you think. Only about how we used to play as cubs.”
Elanna snarled at Kubali. “I never want to see you again. Get out!”
“Out of what?? We’re out in the corridors, remember?? Now Lannie, don’t pull this nice-again, mad-again crap on me! I’ve tried hard to be a good mate, and I’ve put up with a lot from you!”
“Well no longer! No more putting up with me! Get out!”
“Aren’t you going to at least tell me what I did?”
“You know what you did!”
“Fine!”
“OK!”
Kubali turned in a huff and charged off into the savanna.
CHAPTER: STORMY WEATHER
Gamu watched Kubali disappear into the distance, then when it was too late for her to cry out, he looked back around at her. “Lannie, will you ever get over this?”
“Someday. Not today.”
“Yeah, I suppose so.” Gamu sighed and rolled on his back.
Elanna needed the comfort of another living Ka next to her. She came and laid next to Gamu and began to pine for Kubali. Then suddenly she looked about with a start. “You’re trembling.”
“Am I?”
“You feel like a leaf in the wind.”
“So I do.”
She rose and came about to face him. “What’s wrong, Gamu? Are you sick?”
“I was never more well in my whole life.”
“Then are you afraid?”
“Afraid?” He shrugged. “Don’t worry about it.”
“If you’re not afraid, why are you trembling?”
He looked at her hungrily and intently. “You’re the one that said you hated a liar. You’re the one that wants the truth all the time. I asked you if you could ever get over him. You said someday.” He rose to his feet and faced her. “You are many things, but foolish is not one of them. I inhale the fragrance of a beautiful lioness in her receptive days and feel her warm body next to mine. Oh gods, I’m not made of stone! Ever since I first saw you, I fought my inclinations for Kubali’s sake. But now he’s gone, and I look at you lying there, so alone, so sad, so vulnerable, so very beautiful.”
She backed back a step, but he advanced another two, bringing him almost nose to nose with her. “Here’s the truth, if you can handle it. I breathe in your essence and it spreads like fire through my being. Ever since I met you, I have had passionate fantasies of your soft, beautiful body under mine while I explore you and tremble. Oh gods, to know this pleasure would heal a world of hurts for me.”
Her tail clamped firmly down and she trembled. “There’s no law against dreams. Not as long as they end when you wake up. I will defend myself if I must!”
“Who said I would force myself on you? Lannie, I love you! Did you not question me in depth about my personal feelings? Did you not say you’d leave me if I lied to you? Gods, you’re beautiful and exciting and intelligent and so kind! You’ve had two lovers that I know of, while I am still as I came from my mother’s belly. You saved Taka from total dispair, and you pulled Kubali from the depths of his misery. You see before you a broken lion who has faced pain and hardship, much of it due to Kubali. I cry out for your redeeming love. Be my conscience, my faith, my principles. You could save me! Do you blame me if I tremble before you?? Teach me how to love, Elanna! To love deeply and well. Crouch for me! Please!”
She looked at him with mixed pity and disgust. “Maybe I should remove the temptation. I will go away--far away. Maybe you’ll find someone else to crouch with.”
“Why? Am I ugly?”
“No.”
“Stupid??”
“No! Of course not.”
“Then why not??”
“You are great for a story or a joke, but the thought of you mounting me makes me sick. Even pity won’t make me crouch for the likes of you. Understand?”
She turned to leave.
“You never know how long a single female can make it in this land.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
Then, as if on cue, a hyena came up from the grass and growled menacingly. Gamu stood protectively in front of Elanna, then with a snarl chased the hyena off ferociously into the bushes.
Behind some bushes Gamu began to beat the earth, while Griz’nik began to shriek horribly. Gamu growled and tore into the earth, and Griz’nik made one heart-rending yip, then fell silent. Griz’nik got the rabbit he had cached away and watched with amusement as Gamu minced it in his jaws, soaking his face in blood, then wiping his mane with his paws to bloody them. “Not bad,” Gamu whispered.
Gamu returned to the shocked Elanna a bloody mess. “I saved you that time. But they will be back, and in greater numbers. You need me. Someday you’ll come to love me.” He nuzzled her, getting a spot of blood on her cheek.
She shrank from his touch. “If you respect me at all, you’ll keep this locked away inside of you and never mention it again. And unill I’m through my period, I’d really prefer that you sleep apart from me. Stay nearby, but don’t touch me.”
The icy silence that she began continued for some hours. Gamu was beginning to feel the isolation of his old rogue life coming back on him again, and he was listless and miserable. Finally, when hunger began to set in, he said, “Elanna, it’s time we tried to hunt, don’t you think?”
“I guess so.”
She had spoken! Hearing her voice again was a balm for his woes, and he did anything to hold her in conversation, becoming too talkative to seriously stalk prey. Instead they settled for making a new kill by watching the buzzards. Elanna knew how to watch the skies, and she soon spotted the wounded gazelle that had escaped one lion only to fall to another.
Gamu, who was very hungry, roughly grabbed the shrieking beast by the hindquarters and began to tear into the muscles of its haunch, satisfying his hunger with living flesh.
“Stop!” Elanna shouted. She drew close to the weakly-panting gazelle and said softly, “Think about Aiheu’s realm. Soon you will be out of pain.” She took the gazelle’s neck between her teeth and cut off its breath. And in a few moments, when the body had slumped into a final slumber, she looked up at Gamu. “What’s with you, anyway?? Can’t you wait for a clean kill? You hunt the way you woo females!”
The birds began to gather, but Gamu looked up hatefully. He was already angry, and their unwanted company set him off. “Stupid birds! Piss off!”
The vultures looked at each other, stunned.
“I said piss off!”
They took to the air before he had a chance to charge them, but then they circled maddeningly just out of reach of his leaps and shouted at him, “Gamu, Gamu! Naughty boy! We know who you are and we know what you did!”
He was mortified. He shouted “I’ll pluck you and eat you!”
“You can’t fly!”
“And you can’t fly forever! You’ll have to land sooner or later!”
“Promises, promises! Look at the naughty kitty! Time someone taught him some manners!” They flew off, laughing.
Gamu stalked back to Elanna who stared at him. “So, what are YOU looking at!”
“What did they mean? They know who you are and what you did?”
“It’s between them and me. Besides, how should I know? Maybe he saw Kubali trying to seduce me. Just drop it.”
She looked away from him. “If you say so.”
“I didn’t mean to snap. Sorry, my dear. I just hate buzzards,
that’s all.”
CHAPTER: A WAR OF ATTRITION
A lone lion made his way through the grass with the fearful, empty tread of the recently exiled. His old friends, his family, and his familiar grounds were behind him, perhaps forever, but this time he did not seek solace in a new beginning. He bore an extra weight on his shoulders that made his ears a little flatter, his tail a little lower and his step a little slower than most.
“Oh gods,” he muttered to himself, for he was once again his only audience. “Oh gods, what could I have done? What could I have said differently? I was happy, truly happy and willing to spend my life with her! She wouldn’t even tell me what I did? One moment she loved me, and now she has driven me away, and all I want to do is go to sleep and never have to wake up!”
Memories of the blissful moments he had spent with Elanna came crowding over him, torturing him in his loneliness. If only Gamu had known what his lie had caused, he would have reveled in perverse satisfaction. Kubali fell to the ground and sobbed. “Oh gods, you’ve taken away everything I lived for! Why not let me die! Oh gods!”
Unaware of the extent of his mischief, Gamu was busy trying to solidify his claim on Elanna. He felt victory, complete victory, waited for him over the next rise or behind the next rock.
Gamu alternated fear and tenderness, playing on Elanna’s helplessness and setting himself up as her one salvation. So far it had not resulted in a mating with Elanna, the mark of his absolute and utter destruction of Kubali. Knowing that Kubali had something that had eluded his grasp was more frustrating than his unfulfilled desire.
She refused him consistently. Once, in the throes of passion, he followed her about with a tense purring in his throat. He reached out with a paw and shoved her rump down, starting to mount her willingly or unwillingly. She turned about smartly and cuffed his face with all her might. As he lay stunned on the ground, she snarled at him. “Touch me there again and I’ll leave scars visible at night!”
She got very little sleep throughout the next day and night. She was afraid of him, almost as afraid as she was of the hyenas.
The end of her receptive period offered Elanna some relief from his constant entreaties, but his war of attrition shifted to other fronts. He went from a prospective lover to a caretaker.
“Lannie, if you will pledge to me, I will find a pride where you can be a queen again. You could hunt with pride sisters again as you once did. You can be respected.”
It went on subtly, day after day. Like water running across once baked earth, he began to gently, patiently wear gullies in her firm resolve. She did not grow to find him handsome, but she began to submit to his kissing her. She never kissed him back, but Gamu felt that would come with time. “It’s like that hyena game, whatever in hell that little weasel called it.”
Flush with what he perceived as signs of success, Gamu was more bold in taking leave of Elanna to chat with Griz’nik and keep him apprised of his progress. With a plan that ingenious, Gamu had to brag to someone or he would burst at the seams.
Never did Gamu pay any head to the circling buzzard overhead who watched--and listened carefully.
CHAPTER: MARKAAAGH’S ERRAND
Markaaagh saw what he thought was a dying lion. He had a personal preference, hoping it was not Kubali. Despite his professional detachment, he had grown rather fond of the polite, intelligent lion. He lighted next to him, hoping to at least say something to ease his torment at the end.
“Hey Fuzzy, are you OK?”
“I’m not ready to be the guest of honor at your dinner party.”
“For once I’m relieved.” The buzzard regarded him closely. “Where is your lady friend?”
“Gone. She dumped me.”
Markaaagh looked surprised and disappointed. “Tell me it ain’t so! Brother, I know how you feel.”
“How could you?”
“Oyeghegh left me without so much as a pinfeather.”
“Oh? I’m sorry.”
“Of course, I take these things in stride. In my younger days, I was quite the rage among the young ladies, and I still haven’t lost it entirely! Har har!”
Kubali covered his eyes with a paw.
“You poor boy, I was happy for you. I was hoping this match would work out. I’m really sorry.”
Markaaagh trundled across a bit of savanna, flapping his huge wings until he was airborne and could put some distance between himself and the lion. He embraced the buzzard policy of not getting involved with animals he could eat. It was only courting pain and conflict. Still, he felt he had to get to the bottom of this. If only to find some dirt on Gamu that would give him the satisfaction of ripping out his liver when Fuzzy got through with him.
It took a while. In fact, it took several days. Then by patience and silent soaring, Markaaagh caught Gamu in a bragging mood, talking with a “dead” hyena about his imminent conquest. He heard Gamu tell the story for probably the hundredth time, though it was the first time he could put all the pieces together.
He had heard enough. “We can eat three day old carcasses, but some things we just can’t stomach.” He smiled a nauseating vulture smile. “Today, greedy gut, you get yours! Drive me off with insults, will ya?? I’ll see you ripped like a gazelle!”
Markaaagh flew quickly to find the moping lion. He told Kubali what he had heard.
“You have earned yourself FIRST RIGHTS at my next five kills!”
Kubali rallied. Suddenly he stood tall and straight and proud. It did Markaaagh’s heart good.
CHAPTER: THE CONFRONTATION
Gamu’s fear campaign had worked too well. Elanna was truly afraid to remain alone for even a moment with hyenas about. If only she had known that the nearby clan was the histrionic attempts of Griz’nik to be seen in several different places in quick succession, using variations on his voice with every territorial yip! He would call out “Ta’bliz!” (Attention!) and answer himself, “Mar roh!” (Yes milord!). The sound of the dark tongue would send chills down Elanna’s spine as she worried about those hyenas. Not used to freeloading off the lions, these were surely hunters of the first order, fierce and coldly efficient.
When Gamu left her with strict orders to remain behind, he really expected her to stay put. Though it was supposedly for her own good, Gamu’s ordering about was intended to complete his domination of her and to give him free reign to contact Griz’nik for further orders. Without careful coordination with the hyena, Gamu’s main trump card of fear of the hyenas would become worthless, for a frightened lioness can run faster than an angry lion.
Elanna used all her stalking skills to stay within hearing range of Gamu that she might be a simple shout away if intruders targeted her. Little did she know what she would hear that fateful day!
Elanna saw Gamu talking to the hyena. She overheard what he was saying.
Griz’nik was laughing when Gamu told him again about the deception. That Elanna was foolish enough to believe Kubali loved Gamu after making love to her all night!
She knew that was the hyena that Gamu said he killed. She recognized the voice as one of those that called about her in the night. And she gritted her teeth to keep from crying out.
Griz’nik asked Gamu what would happen to him when Elanna pledged to him.
Gamu said, “I was just about to tell you that myself.” He started forward. “Old friend, I had three great ambitions. One was to have her warm my belly. One was to see Kubali dead in the dust. My third wish is of great interest to you. It’s to keep you from ever telling my secrets to Lannie. I’ve practiced your little cries. Ta’bliz! Mar roh! En’khet koi, Roh’mach! In fact, I think I can get along without you.”
“You’re sending me away??”
“Clear to whatever hell you believe in.”
The hyena backed back. “Oh gods, don’t do this! Let me run away, Gamu! Oh gods, don’t hurt me! Please!”
Griz’nik had backed back into the corner of the small shelter as far as he could go. “I’ll do anything! Oh gods, t
his is madness! Stop!!”
Gamu was about to bite the hyena’s neck through when suddenly in burst Elanna.
“Griz’nik, I should have recognized your smell anywhere! If you want to live, you better tell the truth!”
Griz’nik urinated freely in his utter panic. “He wanted to kill me! Have mercy and I’ll tell all! Gamu is a cheat and a liar! He invented that story about Kubali being in love with him, and he told Kubali you had betrayed your husband!”
She raised her face in an agony of extreme hate, roaring to shake the walls of the small cavern. Her eyes glowed red with fierce bloodlust, and she sprang on Gamu. “I’ll kill you, you devil!”
For all her determination, Gamu was a young adult male, and he outweighed her by half again her bulk. Her claws tore hunks of fur from his mane but barely grazed the skin beneath. He raked her shoulder and easily brought blood.
Elanna did not really care. If she could only mark him before she died, she could look down from the stars on him and feel revenged. Gamu, who had so often tried to make love to her, was bringing the terrible brunt of his anger on her.
Then a lion announced his presence with a terrible roar. “Keep your paws off of her!”
Gamu looked about. It proved to be his undoing. Elanna clubbed Gamu on the back of the head with one massive blow of her paw and sent him sprawling.
In an instant, Kubali was all over him, battering him and covering him in small cuts and scratches.
From seemingly nowhere, a gallery of buzzards had gathered to watch the fray. One of them yelled, “Give it to him, Kubali! Tell him who’s the stupid bird NOW!” It was Markaaagh. Somewhere, somehow, Kubali would remember that the bird used his real name. He was “Fuzzy” no longer.
Kubali wanted to kill Gamu, and with the rival pinned to the ground, he started to inflict a killing bite to the skull. Elanna stopped him.
“No, honey tree. There are fates worse than death.” She looked at the pathetic lion You wanted to take Taka’s place. So be it.”
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