It wasn’t an odd day for Durin, not at all. He had encountered a goddess months ago and had encounter with a few lionesses only but a week ago. Two of which had opted to stay with him. Friends as far as he could tell and there was already talk of them departed. Something that made the aging male almost weep. In his age, he had had many females stay in company but at this point still no children. It was likely many females who stayed with him had already gone out and birthed children via another male. Durin’s ears fell backward as he lowered his head onto his paws while he laid on his basking rock. Golden eyes looked towards the cluster of trees that made up his home and where he and the two lionesses slept. The two forms were missing.
“Ah, they must be out hunting.” Durin spoke out, obviously speaking to himself, but unknown to him, he would not be alone for much longer.
Ares, a red pelted female was on the prowl for what she hoped to be a meal for herself. With her belly empty, everything rode on her catching something. Golden and amber eyes searched the black and white sea of zebra, trying to single out one that the weary lioness could actually hope to catch.
Ah, there was one! Her claws flexed, scraping the ground beneath her as her muscles tensed, poised to begin to hunt.
She was off. Her paws and legs working with one another to begin chasing down the particular beast she had been eyeing. With some kind of luck that the gods gave her, Ares had managed to keep her eyes on one and only one zebra through the frenzy. With her teeth in its flesh, she made her kill as she wore a large grin. She would eat well tonight!
Durin’s head popped up as he heard what he knew to be the sound of panicked zebra. Someone was hunting within his land. The large male pushed himself onto his equally as large paws, a scowl on his face as he made his way towards the point of origin of the sound. What he expected to find was a rogue male or a pair of them.
‘What nerve they have,’ The brown lion thought to himself as he moved through the grass. ‘Scaring off my herds. I’ll teach them a thing or two about manners.’
What he expected was not what he got though. While Durin had been expecting one or two males instead his golden orbs found a black and red lioness gorging herself on the meat of a seemingly healthy female zebra. Unknown to him though, she had suffered some kind of accident, likely from crossing a river or something and have hurt one of her legs. Exactly the reason Ares had gone for her. Heterochromatic eyes suddenly turned upward, meeting the other feline’s gaze. For a few seconds that seemed like minutes, the two stared at one another. One awkwardly standing in the brush and the other with blood covering her maw.
Ares’ surprise and confusion quickly turned to anger as her expression changed to bare her blood-stained fangs towards the male while her body moved in front of her kill with her claws already unsheathed, showing that she willingness to fight. “Yai!” She called out through a growl. “Wha ulo avai?!”
Rightfully so, Durin was confused. He had never heard that dialect before. “Just...where are you from?” The male asked as he raised a paw, taking one step towards the obviously scared lioness.
“Sdak!”
That word sounded enough like one that Durin knew. Stop. He stared at her, his movements frozen as he pondered how to handle the situation as he couldn’t speak to her and she wasn’t speaking in a way he could truly understand. “I’m not here to hurt you.” Durin replied as he lowered his head a bit while the rest of him laid down in the grass where he already was. “What’s your name?”
“Ares.”
He couldn’t help but smile. Progress at least! “I’m Durin. It’s nice to meet you Ares. So you understand me?”
“Understand you...a bit.” Her words were broken while her voice was fragile. A huge difference from the feral female he had just seen. Ares crouched down in front of her meal, her fur still on end as she was obviously still cautious about the male in front of her.
He made his move too fast. She had understood him and he had taken that as a sign he could approach. A horrible mistake that he would soon regret. As he moved, it was obvious that Ares was beginning to get more agitated the closer he got with her growling getting more and more pronounced and louder in volume. It wasn’t until he was within five feet that the young female finally acted.
Ares lashed out, closing the gap between the two body. Her claws, having been extended through most of the ordeal, slashed against his face; the only part of him in which she could actually reach at the time. The male reared back, roaring in agony as his face began to burn and blood began to trickle down his face. His eyes flared with anger as he stared at the younger lion, his mind telling him to raise a paw against her. To teach her her place in the world; at the paw of a male. For whatever reason though, the larger of the two had mercy and did none of that. Instead, he turned and moved away from the frightened adolescent. He turned his head around, to take one more look at her. She was such an anomaly. Her dialect, her manners. This lioness was...odd to say the least. Perhaps he’d meet her again and then truly learn about where she was from.
“I’m sorry I disturbed you.” Durin apologized, his head dipping down as his eyes slid closed while turned to face her while his body was turned away. He stayed like this a moment before leaving the bewildered lioness there by herself.
Ares wasn’t exactly complaining as the strange male left her presence. She waited several minutes after the brown pelt was out of sight, thinking he would come back with more males or just more bodies in general to beat her for making him bleed. When it never came, she went back to her meal, purposely leaving a haunch at the top of the hill overlooking where she had been eating in hopes that he would find it.
An apology.
[Word Count: 1106]
