The sun was beating down on the desert, heating everything up. The watering holes the pride had made what seemed so long ago when a massive deluge had hit were drying up, ever so slowly, less pools and more puddles. The river, too, seemed to shrink, slowly sinking back into the sands through which it cut. Ogon found a spot to shelter from the intense light and heat, settling in the shade of a rock outcropping. As he prepared to settle down, his eyes adjusted to the dark and he spied somebody else already there. "Oh, my apologies. I was unaware this space was occupied."
Like anybody else, Shula had sought out the shade as the sun had risen higher and the temperatures with it. She lay half on her side, front paws crossed one over the other, eyes closed and mouth slightly open. One eye slid open at the sound of somebody else walking into the little shaded space, before the other opened, a smile spreading on her face. She had to keep from laughing at his startled expression and apologies. "Oh, you're perfectly fine! Go ahead, lay down. The sand is cool on the belly here."
"Thank you." He settled down, paws stretched out. After a moment, he glanced over. "I don't suppose you know which Shula is the mate of Kosuke, do you? I've been wondering about what the pride used to be, and I'd heard she was a daughter of one of the last lions left from back before Kidondo's father." There were... A lot of Shulas. Too many, he figured. Of course, with so narrow a guideline for naming one's children, it seemed it was bound to happen that so many shared the same name.
The lioness let out a laugh, shifting and flopping fully on her side, mirth in her eyes as she stared at the wing-marked male. "Dear boy, I am that Shula, daughter of Bodaway and Kibela, mate of Kosuke who is the son of Sinbad and Jua'taka, bringing together two royal lines." She rolled onto her back, stretching out. "And I have heard about you, Ogon'krylo, apple of your mother's eye. You ask dangerous questions in these times, but we are alone, so I'm happy to indulge your curious mind." She closed her eyes, still smiling. "It is wise to know the full extent of history, so that steps may be taken to not repeat the problems of the past."
He sat up, eyes growing wide. "Oh! I'm very hapy to find you!" He became sheepish, suddenly. "I... I try to be careful, who I ask questions to." He lifted a paw, rubbing the back of his head through his mane. Her words about history made his ears lift, curiosity returning to his eyes. "What is the full history, if I may ask? I heard that your father taught you and your siblings it, even if he sided with Kidondo in the rebellion..." Her many siblings... Some predated the rebellion, a nebulous time in the past that felt almost beyond his grasp. So, too, was the time the pride was divided. But a time before even those had him deeply curious.
She clicked her tongue, rolling over to lay stretched out on her stomach. "Sit back and listen, then. This is an old story, passed on by my father, and told, too, by Kosuke's mother and grandmother." She closed her eyes, smiling a bit. "It's a story of gods and goddesses, of a desert and a rebellious little lady." How her father had come across parts of it, she would never know. He had had a long life, and spent much of it in lands beyond the border, something she had never dreamed of doing. Her heart remained in the sands, as did her paws. "It begins, like so many stories, once upon a time, a long time ago in this very desert. There were four gods, two brothers and two sisters, lions like you and I but winged."
He felt like a cub, but Ogon found himself laying down, tucking his paws under his mane. His attention was rapt, eyes wide and full of wonder at a story old as the sand they walked upon, ears trained on Shula to catch every word of it. His mouth was open slightly, imagining the story as she told it. "What did they look like, and what were their names?" They were logical questions, in his mind. He also had to wonder if they were gods of specific things, but he had no idea what gods even DID.
Her smile broadened enough that her eyes closed. "I could not tell you what three looked like, I don't know those details! But the two brothers were Mau-ri, the God of Time, and Dhi-ji, the God of hope. Their sisters were Rhin-yi, the Goddess of the Hunt, and our once patron goddess, Finar-si. Like many of the Firekin, she was blood red, and the story goes that while there were many lesser gods in the desert of various creatures, they ruled over them all." She crossed her paws again. "But Finar-si, ever the rebellious thing, was not content to do so forever into eternity."
Ogon leaned closer, mouth opening more as his eyes grew as wide as they would go. "I never knew that! I didn't know that there were even gods here at all to begin with!" Once again, he was reminded that he barely knew anything ABOUT gods. There was so much he wanted to know, so much he wanted to find out now. He was tempted by a sojourn to seek gods out, but he also didn't want to be considered dead to the pride.
She nodded, her smile turning into a frown. "Yes... It's a sad truth about the state of things now. Discussion of gods may as well be entirely forbidden." She tilted her head back in thought. "Where was I? Oh, yes! Finar-si had always been a bit rebellious with her brothers and sister, and decided she didn't want to rule over only lesser gods and desert creatures, so she decided to make her own followers. Stepping down to the mortal world, she made some lions in her image, red as blood and fierce as the desert they lived in. She taught them a few things about living in this world they found themselves in, then stepped away, melting into mythical obscurity. They believed themselves to share in her divine blood, making them far superior than other creatures and lions." She raised a paw, propping her elbow on the sand as she rested her chin on her paw, smiling. "This is why you will hear some lions on the Safi side refer to us as The Blood, and why there is a lion named Damu. It's to show pride in our history and origin as a pride."
"Oh, wow..." The obsession with red pelts suddenly made so much more sense. Red wasn't particularly the color of fire, Kiran had showed him that much. In fact, some flames were blue and others green, so it made little sense to him that the pride would evict yellow, blue, or green lions. But with it being a connection to a goddess...
"The pride existed for many generations, enslaving those unlucky enough to enter their lands, beating them into submission... And killing the lucky ones who trespassed on the sands." Her lip quirked up in a bit of a smirk at his shocked expression. "The Firekin were not always the sort to welcome strangers in. In fact, before Kidondo was born, our pride was very xenophobic. But I digress, I'll reach that point soon enough." She gave a wave of her paw before continuing, "Eventually Dhi-ji and Rhin-yi noticed what Finar-si had done, and angry, woke up Mau-ri from one of his many slumbers to do something about her. They agreed on a punishment - She was cast down into the mortal world to live a lifetime as a mortal, enslaved by the pride of her own creation."
He drew in a sharp breath. "What happened to her?" He was dreading the answer.
Shula crossed her paws again. "You could say, her lesson was very literally beaten into her. She couldn't finish the lifetime, begging her siblings for forgiveness, so they let her free of her punishment. They began to work a plan to fix things." She smiled just a bit. "As it happened, much like their mother goddess, the king of the time, Makadari - I see that recognition in your eyes on that name - had four children of his own. Two sons, Kiu and Mwale, and two daughters, Mwezi and Jua, and Jua was herself a rebellious little creature. So much so, she got pregnant by a rogue, and bore five cubs." She made a face. "Naturally Makadari was furious and killed her, and would have killed her cubs, too, had the gods not intervened." She waved a paw. "We're not sure what happened to the cubs, only that they weren't there when Makadari went to kill them. About that time, too, a lost member of the blood, Kinja, returned, and the heir, Kiu, became smitten with him."
"And that's where Kidondo's father comes in, isn't it?" Kimeti had been the king, which meant he was surely the oldest and heir.
"Well, that time was a bit odd. Apparently one of the lesser gods had been hanging around... And for some reason, she stole the chosen heir, Kavuasi, so as the only boy in the litter besides, Kimeti was elevated to heir." Her nose wrinkled. "And then things went to s**t when a plague struck the pride. The only two slaves at the time escaped in the ensuing chaos, Makadari and Kiu both died... Those who didn't die left, and soon only Kinja and her five remaining cubs were all that remained of the once-mighty Firekin. Time passed, the plague with it, and lions trickled back in." She let out a huff. "And this is where Kidondo comes in..."
His own face wrinkled. He could only imagine the suffering of the pride during the plague. Not that he knew what it did, though. Or what it was like. What he could imagine was a pride so small, it was only six lions strong. "So what happened?"
"One of the lions to trickle back in was Karama, a priestess. Since any other lionesses were Kimeti's sisters, or in the case of another returning lioness, Nuri, already mated, Kimeti wooed her and she bore him six cubs. Bit of an irony in that it was again two sons and four daughters, and the heir was Kidondo."
"And that's when he saw the growing problem of inbreeding..." That part of the history he knew. Kidondo had seen the growing problem of inbreeding and left the pride to do some searching for a solution. It had wound up coming in the form of rogue lions agreeing to help if his attempts at negotiation failed. They had, and it escalated into war. "What was it like on the Safi side, while the pride was split in two?"
At this, Shula gave a shrug. "I have no idea. I was born to the Simo side. Kosuke came and found me because his visions led him to me, much to his mother's disapproval." She reached up, covering her left eye with one paw. "She almost took his eye out. He recovered, thankfully, and he sees just fine out of it." She became thoughtful, placing her paw back down over the other as she looked out to the horizon. The sun was shifting westward, having transitioned from noon a quarter of the way into the afternoon. "A good lion to start with would be his father, Sinbad. He was born before the split, and his sister was briefly the queen of the Safi." Her lip curled. "She got tired of Kidondo's ways, though, and left. He never let us appoint a new ruler for our side of things." Despite where she'd been born, Shula had come to count herself Safi instead of Simo. She rose to her paws, stretching out. "If you want more perspective on the war, too, you can go ask Savitri. She's very hard to miss, she's solid white, possibly with faded markings she painted on herself."
He nodded, rising to his own paws. "Thank you. Perhaps I will go find one of them, yes..." He gave a bow of his head. "Thank you for telling me that story, madame Shula." He paused, then smiled. "Your grace."
She couldn't help but smile as he left, before turning and starting her own walk home. Perhaps... There was hope for the Simo yet, the Safi just had to work hard to sway them to SOME of the old ways.