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It had been some time since Juhudi had arrived in the ela lands with Nafasi and the others, then they had been but cubs, now the light-colored lion had grown to an adolescent. He was far from the bumbling mischieves cub he had once been, though he had grown up far sooner than one his age should have.

This land made a good home, it was fairly quiet and the mountains were protected. In all their time here he had seen signs of others but had never actually seen any, no one had bothered them.

But...there was something missing, he wanted to meet others. And even though their travels had been hard, a part of him missed that, maybe he wasn't meant to stay here after all. Perhaps this is what had driven him to wander off for a bit, he just wanted to wander, to think.

Tail flicking behind him, dark paws stirring up the dust with each step, he wasn't really paying much attention to where he was going, simply letting his paws carry him where they would.

Dark ears flicked at the sound of a distance voice and the steps of paws, his nose twitching at the scent of another approaching, icey eyes narrowing, his stance crouched should he have to act. Whatever was approaching could be friendly, or it could be hostile, and it would be foolish to be unprepared.

But when the gray lioness came into view, all he could do was stand there, blinking in surprise as she sputtered her words.

"Huh? No...I'm a stranger here just like you are."

The lion just blinked, still rather startled that there was a lioness standing in front of him, not to mention that she was rambling. He'd never met anyone like this before...was that odd? Realizing that he was staring, Juhudi shook his head to clear it and decided to focus instead on her questions.

"I...don't know. I came here with some friends, but we've never seen anyone else though I guess there are other lions here."

His tail flicked, dark ears lowering. This place had become their home, yet he still knew nothing about it or it's other residents. Oh he knew his way around well enough, but did this place have a history that he didn't know of?

"I'm Juhudi."

Juhudi took a few steps toward the rock, ice blue eyes looking over the marks there...why hadn't he seen that before? Maybe he'd just never thought to look, maybe it hadn't mattered to a young cub that only wanted to find a place to call home.

"Really? I haven't heard many stories."

An orphan, the only stories Juhudi remembered were those his mother had told him before she died, mostly stories about the stars and the animals. Since then he'd really only met a few other creatures, and most of those had been orphans too.

Tufted tail flicking behind him, his ears perked a bit. The lioness seemed nice, and it was nice to meet someone new. Sure, why not, exploring would be a refreshing change.

"Um...okay, where should we start?"

The lion blinked, turning to look at the lioness, his head tilted curiously. What was it he had seen in her eyes, some hint of the past? But in an instant it was gone and he found himself wondering if he had really seen anything at all.

Shaking it off, Juhudi nodded and made his way to a group of stones, his eyes searching them for any trace of markings. The land was dusty here which made markings harder to see, and it was a bit difficult for him to distinguish between the natural colroings of the rocks and actual marks.

"This looks kinda like a snake...or maybe it's a river."

Coughing a bit on the dusty, Juhudi leaned over for a closer look at the markings, his eyes tracing the shapes, trying to make sense of them. It seemed odd for so many rocks to bear the same markings, he couldn't tell if they really were markings or if their eyes were just picking out random shapes.

"Are you sure? Maybe it's just the natural color of these rocks."

He wasn't trying to be skeptical, he just couldn't be certain. These had always just look liked regular rocks to him, he'd never noticed any markings or drawings on them before.

He lifted one paw, setting it on the closest rock, he brushed away some of the dusty, tracing the lines with a talon, trying to make sense of what was there.

"Maybe they picked these rocks because they were already colored like that."

A light laugh escaped the red-headed lion, a smile crossing his maw.

"I never said they weren't markings, but sometimes nature makes things even more unusual than any creature could."

Juhudi reared up, his front paws falling on one of the rocks. Putting his full weight on the stone, his paws curled around the surface and he stepped backward, rolling the rock over. There was one way to find out if the markings were natural or not right? ...unless they marked the bottom too.

"Well, if the same marks are on the bottom then they're probably natural, right?"

Leaning toward the rock for a better look, blue eyes searched the rock, tracing the dark lines that marred it's surface. The dark bands were not identical to the ones on the top surface, none of them appearing as a snake or river, but they seem to be the same color and cosistency.

"Hmmmm...well they could be natural, it's hard to tell."