The Lion Queen

Chapter 16

If I didn't already have a home, I could have stayed with Malik's pride forever. I loved being with the other lionesses and running with them in their hunts. We groomed each other and for the first time in weeks, the snarls of fur in the middle of my back were gone. I didn't have to worry about starvation or hyenas. When I saw Malik, I didn't have to slink away or retreat to Mwali to make sure he didn't try anything. I felt like a member of a pride again and not just another slave to a tyrant king.

But at the same time, thoughts of that tyrant king kept me from truly settling in. Every time I saw Malik leading his pride with kindness, I thought of the others back home and what they were suffering. Every new friend I made reminded me of Mwali, and seeing Ummi with her cubs made me think of how worried Sarafina and my mother must be. With all my heart I wanted to help them, but I didn't know what to do. I could put myself at risk, but I couldn't drag my new friends with me. It didn't seem possible to find anyone to fight with me when anyone willing to do that didn't deserve to get hurt.

I wished I could be like Simba and cast my responsibilities and cares away. It would have been so easy here. I could make a new life away from all my worries and enjoy my new pride and family. Maybe I could even start a family...

Ever since I was a little cub, I knew someday I'd have a mate. Some lionesses, like Mwali, weren't interested in that. She thought it was silly to spend all your time caring for cubs and nuzzling with some male. I was different. I wanted to know someone loved me like no one else in the world, in a way my mother couldn't love me. I wanted someone to sleep beside every night and someone who would tell me I was lovely, even if I already knew it. Life was just so grand. I wanted to share it with someone else.

I couldn't deny my feelings for Malik. I didn't want to get carried away- I hardly knew him and I was so starved for affection I could have latched on to anyone. But still, something was there. I was happier when he was near me, and I always caught myself looking at him without noticing it. He was everything Scar and Simba weren't: selfless, kind, dutiful, compassionate, and affectionate. He would have made a wonderful father, and I could have gone a thousand years without wanting to leave him.

What's more, I knew he felt the same. Malik wore his heart on the outside. I could see his soul in his face and I loved him for it. I saw he liked me in the way his tail pricked and his eyes lit up whenever he saw me. At first I thought he was just being friendly, but it went beyond that. I made excuses not to leave and find help just because I knew he didn't want me to go. If he ever asked me to stay, I didn't know if I had the strength to refuse.

Malik and I liked to sit at the edge of the bushes at night before we went to sleep. We would talk about life and our pasts, and sometimes we would just sit next to each other and not say anything at all. Sometimes the lionesses teased, but we really weren't doing anything. We had only just met, and I had things to take care of. It was a lovely dream, but I had to stay in reality.

A piercing cry interrupted us suddenly. I jumped to my feet, but Malik was almost out of sight by the time I got up. I didn't know anyone could move that fast, much less a lion with three legs. He tore through the night as I ran after him.

"What happened?" I asked, but Malik didn't answer. All the relaxation and contentment from a minute ago was gone, and he looked absolutely panicked. Just seeing it in him made it spread to me. Malik crashed through the bushes and nearly collided with Munazi, who was clustered with the other lionesses around Ummi.

"Where are the cubs?" Malik shouted. There was a horrible urgency in his voice, and he was shaking as he yelled. I wanted to press against him and tell him it would be okay, but I was scared to go near him.

"It's okay. They're here," Munazi said. She flicked her tail at Ummi and I saw the cubs huddled beneath her, shivering. Ummi was bent over them, crouched low and licking them.

"He's there," Munazi said. She indicated a spot out in the gloom, and I peered closer. Who's there? I wondered. In the dim light I saw a shadowy outline of a lion. Munazi called it a "he", but I didn't see a mane. I'd heard of lions like that, strange lions from the south, but they couldn't be here, so far north of my home. Two reflective eyes glaring back at me before the lion slunk out of sight.

"Who was that?" I asked. Malik was nuzzling at the cubs and checking them over, so Laith spoke up.

"We call him She'bah, 'the darkness'. We don't know when he first came here, but he's not like us. You saw he had no mane. He's vicious and brutal. He attacks in the night and takes those who can't fight back. He's been here before," she said. When she said it, Munazi crouched low and flattened her ears. Ummi moved to her side and nuzzled her shoulder.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Only one of my cubs survived birth," Munazi said. Laith tried to go on, but Munazi continued. "She'bah took him. He's a monster. He..." she broke off and her voice clogged with tears.

"I couldn't stop him," Malik said. He bent his body around the cubs like a wall. His voice was seemed at once hollow and filled with grief. He was always full of life, but it was like saying this made him dead. "He had the cub in his mouth. I ran after him, but I wasn't fast enough. I heard the cub calling, and then he wasn't anymore." His back sagged like the memory weighed him down to the ground. He was crying as much as Munazi, and I couldn't bear it. There wasn't anything I could say to make it better.

"It was my leg. If I was a whole lion I would have saved him," he said. He sank lower to the ground, and I went to his side. I pressed against him like the leg he didn't have and held him up, silently supporting him in his grief. I couldn't imagine the amount of pain a heart as large as Malik's could hold. Everything had seemed so perfect in this new home, but it seemed they had their own painful memories. There was nothing I wouldn't have done for Malik the pride that helped me so much, and in a flash it came to me. I knew how to solve their problem and my own, but in that moment I didn't care about that. I knew how to heal Malik, and that was what mattered most.

One last new subspecies: She'bah is a Tsavo lion. They hail from- surprise- Tsavo, a region in Kenya. They're not known for cannibalism more than any other lions, but they are the most aggressive subspecies. They're most famous because of The Ghost and The Darkness, a pair of males that terrorized a group of railway workers in Kenya in 1898. Their bodies are on display in the Chicago Field Museum and tests confirmed that they ate at least 34 people between them. It's suspected they killed around 135. Tsavo males also sometimes don't join prides and remain loners. They definitely wouldn't be in the same area as Atlas lions, but Tsavo males do tend to wander, so She'bah just wandered a really long way.