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Huruma turned back to the avian just in time to see her flying away, but she was already well out of reach and had a lengthy head start. The rustling in the grass was a clear indication that the hare was on the run now too. She growled inwardly, cursing herself for falling for such a trick. And now she would have to find something else to eat, most likely something much less fresh than either of them would have been. It was a depressing thought, but she almost felt it was what she earned after this little incident.

Stupid bird. Stupid hare. It was a unique encounter, an uninvolved individual barging in and disturbing the hunt- but it wasn't strange to miss your chance, especially hunting alone. She couldn't let it get to her, nobody was relying on her, nobody would really know about it and she would find something else to eat.

She stopped growling, but continued to glare and watch the pair go off. Once they were too hard to keep watching, she looked around her. She was a distance from where she started off and hoped it would prove beneficial. Her nose to the air momentarily, she headed off in the direction Mnyama had been going with high hopes of getting her meal eventually.

Mnyama followed as quick as her springy paws would take her, tumbling to a stop at the trunk of the tree, nearly going head first into a root. She was glad to have narrowly missed becoming lunch, knowing she could never share the story with her mother, and almost as glad to have avoided further damage by head-on collision with a tree. She poked out of the grass and looked back to see they were no longer being harassed, and then she looked up and stared at the funny little bird that had saved her life. She waited for the bird to turn her attention down, and she smiled gratefully.

"Thank you!" she called back.

"I don't need to be careful, usually," she explained, glad to be on the same level as the bird now. It was much easier on conversation when you didn't have to stare up the trunk of a tree. She didn't want to be defensive, she was grateful! But it was hard when you were being scolded, especially for someone like Mnyama, "I live in the lion pride back that way, I'm not normally anywhere this strange."

She hopped a step closer to the bird, nodding politely and introducing herself, "I'm Mnyama, by the way."

"I was born there," she said as an explanation, and then laughed awkwardly at the question of why she would leave if she considered it safe, rubbing her ear as she considered how she might answer. It was hard to explain, especially to a stranger. "I'm just out looking around, I was curious, I guess you could say. Plenty of lions in a pride but not all that many hares, not outside my own family anyway."

It was a good answer, not entirely untrue. She was looking for other hares! Then she reminded herself, on the idea of being most familiar with lions and other creatures living closer to the pride.

"What was that yellow thing that tried to eat me, anyway?" she asked, looking back to where the confrontation took place.

With that comment from Kiongozi, Mnyama decided to leave out that her whole reason for being away from home involved her best friend- and that best friend was a lioness. Though she couldn't completely hide her amusement at the direction of the conversation. She tucked away the tidbit of information about what exactly had attacked her and instead focused back on the conversation about lions.

"They're not so bad," she said with a small shrug, "I don't suppose you know where I could find more hares, though?"

Mnyama didn't even realize how much she was asking of the avian, to her it was just a simple question not a request for an escort to anywhere in particular. But it never even crossed her mind to turn down such an offer, she did want to get back home before too long! And Kiongozi was correct, she did have a much better perspective while hunting.

"I would appreciate the help!" she said, rocking on her feet in anticipation. Perhaps this would not take so long.