The Lion Queen

Chapter 13

"You have no mane," Laith said curiously. She looked at my bare neck as she waited for my response.

"Where I come from, only male lions have manes," I said. She tilted her head and her eyes grew round.

"That must make them terribly proud," she said. I thought of how fine a figure Mufasa cut standing on the edge of pride rock, and how Simba piled red leaves around his neck to imitate his father.

"Sometimes," I said, and we both laughed. Already I was starting to think of Laith as a friend, though she looked at least a year older than I was and I'd barely met her. It had been so long, I probably would have been friends with anyone.

"There are eleven lions in my pride. Are prides the same size here?" I asked. I wanted to see how many reinforcements I could gather, but I was also genuinely curious.

"There are seven of us. Six of us lionesses, and then our leader. He'll be pleased to meet you, I'm sure. He's very friendly," Laith said. "He'll want to know why you came, though. I do, too, but we should wait. We're almost there." She looked ahead to a clump of bushes that blocked the blazing sun. Two lionesses were visible in its shade, and I assumed the others were hidden behind them. My feet felt lighter and I smiled widely when I saw them. Laith noticed and smiled back.

"You must really have been lonely," she said. I kept my eyes on the lionesses as they noticed us and stood up. One of them called over her shoulder, and I heard more lions rising.

"Laith! Who's that?" the closest one called. She and the other lioness I'd seen were walking toward us with their tails lifted welcomingly. More heads poked out of the bushes until I saw all the lionesses, and only the male remained hidden. Five of them were grown, and two cubs ran at me and stared.

"Why doesn't she have a mane?" one whispered to the other. The adults all started asking questions, and Laith cut them off.

"This is Nala. She came here from far away," she said, and she shushed another volley of questions. "Our king will want to speak with her." She led me toward the bushed as the lionesses crowded around me, sniffing and butting their heads on me. The cubs darted around underfoot and I had to watch to avoid stepping on them. I hadn't felt so special since the peace ceremony so long ago.

"What's all this ruckus?" I heard a deep voice coming from the shady spot. I would have thought the king would want to be the first to greet me, but perhaps he was too dignified to come to me. I had no idea what to expect, and I certainly didn't expect what I saw.

Whatever kind of lions these were, manes must have been their more important feature. The lion lying on the ground before me had a mane the color of pale savannah grass, and in that feature it was much less striking than Mufasa's. However, I'd never seen a lion with a mane as large around as a baobab tree and reaching all the way down his belly and to his back legs. It would have been magnificent, along with the rest of his pleasing form, if it didn't make him look just a little comical. The lion saw me and straightened up imperiously.

"A newcomer? What a wonderful surprise! I am Malik- uh, king Malik. Welcome to my pride," he shifted forward to get up, and I saw why he hadn't earlier. His prodigious mane had hidden his hindquarters, but as he moved, I saw that his right hind leg ended in a stump right before the paw. For a moment I thought he would have trouble rising, but he scooted forward and raised himself up on the other three legs with nothing out of the ordinary but a slight hop. I tried not to stare, but he caught me.

"Oh, that's nothing. I still have another spare," he said. He lifted his left front paw and balanced on the two remaining legs, and surely my face showed how impressed I was. "But more importantly, what brings you here? You must have traveled very far, and all alone." I was about to answer when he interrupted his own thought and broke in.

"What am I saying? That can wait! First we must welcome you. Seyaad! Take our your hunting party and bring back a feast! We will celebrate long into the night, and we will all know you better. But you stay here with me. You must be weary, and you are our guest. Lie here in the shade with me, and you can tell me why you came," he said. The lionesses gathered and set off, whispering and peeking over their shoulders at me as they protested the separation. The two cubs crept near us and pretended not to be listening. Malik looked pointedly at them and they retreated a few steps and pretended not to listen from there.

I didn't even know where to start. I'd never thought about what I'd do after finding another pride. Now that the moment had come, I couldn't just turn around and expect them to follow me back home. I was lucky they didn't tear me apart as a dangerous rogue. They didn't know anything about my situation. I'd have to explain about Scar, and the hyenas (do they even have hyenas here?) and Simba...

"Can I sit down for a minute?" I asked. It was all very overwhelming. Just seeing other lions was enough to change my world.

"Oh dear, how thoughtless of me," Malik said. "You're probably exhausted. You rest as long as you want. There is plenty of time to talk later."

As welcoming as Malik and the others were, I felt strange venturing far into their camp, so I stretched out by the nearest tree. I really wasn't tired so much as overwhelmed, and I didn't close my eyes right away. I just collected my thoughts and assured myself again and again that the others were real and I was with a pride again. For the first time in a month, there were eyes on me when I slept, and I relished them.

I just wanted to tell everyone I don't dislike Simba. Of course he and Nala are the real pairing. I just wondered what would happen if he was different that he was in the movie. If he'd been sort of an immature man-child instead of what he really was, something like this could have happened. This is a what-if, not me trying to "improve" the story.