Ceata may have been a huntress, but her heart wasn’t in it tonight. She had always been a little soft, she thought, and though she did dedicate many hours to perfecting her abilities, she would never be the best, nor even end up average. Most days she considered herself lucky to catch anything at all. She couldn’t help it - she was tough enough, but her mind wandered. She made careless mistakes.
She often practiced at night, when she didn’t expect anyone to see her. She wasn’t embarrassed, and yet she also didn’t want to be seen, afraid she might disturb one of the higher ranks and be berated for it. The eye of the great lion had been only a sliver when she was born, and thus had chosen this role for her. Perhaps the God knew that she would be very challenged in this role, and had some purpose for her there.
Ceata was standing alone, and the moon was full tonight and high in the sky above her. It gave her the eerie feeling of being watched… or was that something else? The lioness wasn’t looking around, simply trying to concentrate on what she was doing. She was moving, slowly, and trying to be noiseless. It wasn’t going well.
He was a hunter. That's what he told himself again and again. Despite his mother in this pride, Malik felt like he was completely apart from it. His colors made him feel like a blood stain on a white sand beach; ugly and unsightly. No one seemed to have a problem with it but him. It was the weirdest thing. As the pink and yellow male made his way through the pride tonight, he had to stop and admire the big full moon. It helped to think his siblings were looking up at the same moon.
Sighing, he turned his head to start wandering aimlessly in a different direction. That's when his eyes came up on a slow moving lioness who wasn't doing so well being sneaky. He moved right over to her, gave her a look and bit on his lip before clearing his throat. ".....You... you look like your lost?"
Ceata had thought she heard a noise, suddenly. She didn’t look up, thinking it wasn’t anything to be bothered with. That is, until a voice spoke up, very close by. She jumped a little, and the pebbles under her feet clattered from the force of it, making a very audible sound that surely would have frightened away any prey she might have been stalking. Catching her breath from her fright, she finally collected herself and told the rouge-colored male before her, “I’m not lost. Unless you mean a lost cause? Because I might be that.”
Ceata straightened up out of her crouch and looked the male over. She thought she’d seen him before… he looked very familiar, anyway. And then it clicked. “Oh! You’re a Mwezi’Johari too, aren’t you?” she asked, feeling relieved that she hadn’t just been snuck up on by some rogue. “What are you doing out here so late?” She looked him over again, as though searching for a clue.
He hadn't meant to startle her that bad! Now he felt bad and a frown formed on his face before he sighed and backed away a bit. "....Yes, I am... My name is Malik," he said in a way that made him seem really apologetic. Which he was. Golden eyes looked at her with concern until she calmed down and shrugged to the question. ".....I can't sleep. I keep thinking of my siblings back in the other pride. I want to know if.... if they're safe and happy..." Being the oldest boy out of the litter, he often worried about them.. They were getting picked on pretty bad when he decided his life would be easier with his mother.
"I feel like such a coward for leaving them there to deal with what I dealt with.." The whispers, lies and rumors that were spread beind their backs... He'd been able to run away and escape it all. They hadn't had a chance too. Not yet, anyway. Maybe one day...
Ceata heard the apologetic tone in the male’s voice and she listened, growing concerned. He seemed so sad… and then he mentioned siblings and she understood.
“I know how you feel,” she said, nodding after he was done speaking, “Most of my family is here in the pride with me, but my mother and one of my sisters isn’t. I often wonder about what their lives are like… and I wish I could visit them. It was so long ago though…” Ceata hoped she sounded compassionate and not self-centered, but she felt like she could relate to the male and how he suffered. She had no idea how much greater his was.
“Was it bad? In that pride, I mean? Is that why you left?” Ceata, remembering her manners, also added, “Oh! And I’m Ceata, by the way. Sorry I forgot to say that earlier.” Her yellow-gold eyes watched him now with interest, but also sympathy.
Gold met a softer shade as he offered her a sympathetic smile and a nod. "Ceata... It's a pretty name." He wasn't trying to flirt, he didn't even know how to flirt. But he didn't want to answer her question right now, so he thought of other things to talk about. Or he tried too. However, all of the topics he could come up with didn't seem to be good enough.
"....It was the whispers... the lies and rumors. No one ever did anything. Everyone just.. acted like they hated us and kept their cubs away. Even our den mothers. Saying we were bad blood and bad luck...." He shrugged. He should have built up a thick skin from this, but it still got to him every time he thought about it. "My sisters... they're sweet tempered and very shy. I worry about.... if they are getting bullied or worse from the males..."
She felt bad because it seemed to her that he didn’t want to talk about it, but Ceata had to admire the way he was handling such an obviously stressful topic. She listened and wished there was a way she could make him feel better, but she didn’t know a lot about these things.
“I’m so sorry!” She murmured, not sure what else she could say, “Maybe it’s different now? If they’ve been there all this time the other might have gotten used to them…” She was just guessing, and Ceata realized she might actually be making him feel worse, and so she shut up and shyly looked at the ground. She batted some pebbles around, and after a few seconds of this she coyly looked up at him again and froze. For a moment, while she looked at his eyes, she got a strange look on her features, as though she was staring past him to the sky beyond. It lasted only a second, and then her focus returned as though nothing had happened.
Ceata sighed, looking suddenly even shyer and rather breathless. Now she avoided his gaze, as though she had a secret she was trying to keep hidden. “Uh, forgive me for asking, but… you don’t have a mate or anything, do you?”
He didn't want her to feel bad for him. That's why Malik didn't want to talk about it, but now she knew. Instead of making him feel worse however, Malik couldn't help but think positive like a cub. "Yeah. I bet they're all happy in the pride now. You don't stay an outcast forever, right? Eventually.... you get accept-" he stopped talking as he looked over that glazed expression of hers.
Now he was getting worried about her. But as soon as he opened his mouth, she seemed to snap out of it and become really shy. It threw him for a complete loop! "...Ceata? Uhm... I don't have anything like that... I never have... I mean, I liked this one girl in the pride because she was nice to me when no one was around or looking.... but... Uh.. When I came here I couldn't bring her with, so she's probably mated with cubs by now.." That thought depressed him. His ears flattened a little before he could think about it and sighed. ".....Why? What happened? You looked.... out of it..." Now he felt like he was making assumptions of her! He was a complete idiot tonight.
Ceata looked a little relieved as Malik told her that he didn’t have a mate or a love interest. What she had seen just a moment ago had made her feel so shy, and now that he had mentioned it she was sure he had noticed her odd behavior. She supposed she should explain herself… though if she hadn’t been covered in dark fur she would be blushing right now from head to toe.
“It’s just that… sometimes I get these… visions. Usually at night.” She stopped herself right there, figuring she sounded like a crazy lioness already. Instead of explaining the visions themselves, she just went on with that the one she’d seen had been. “I saw myself, and you, together. We were sitting side by side and we looked… happy.” She averted her eyes again, feeling mortified, and added, “And kind of like we were in love or something.”
That was why she had asked, because if she had learned that he already had a mate maybe her vision would have just meant nothing. Well… maybe it still did! Maybe she was just crazy, she thought to herself. And for a split second she looked back at Malik and felt so sure he must think she was mad, she didn’t even know what to say. And so she did the only thing she could think of right at that moment. She turned and ran away, as fast as she could!
He listened as she talked, watching her and then bit down on his lip when she finished explaining. Them? Together and... in love? It wasn't a hard concept to grasp, but when someone said they SAW it and believed it? Well, it was a hard pill to swollow.
Still, he wasn't mad at her. Just as he was about to say something she turned and ran away. He couldn't even muster up enough sense to call after her; he was so shocked by her running away. "....Bye... Ceata," he said to the wind, a small smile tugging it's way to his lips. Lions got visions, and often times they came true, so maybe.... his life was going to start changing from this moment on. Maybe there would be happiness there. ....If he could find her and talk to her.
In the morning. It would all wait. Right now, he was tired and now exhausted as he headed back for his den next to his mother's.
