Though she had a hesitant moment in doing it, Embamba had left Issy's side for a short while to attempt and seek out her children. She wanted to explain some things to them, the least of which her two week absence, in private before they had a chance to stumble across what she'd done. Ata might already know, she realized, because of their run in with Odjit the day before... but she'd hoped that she might be able to break the news easily before. There was that still present fear that her children were going to turn on her for this... and the fact that Embamba knew she couldn't blame them if they did. She'd never been the kind of mother she should have, had she?
The lioness sighed. There was no point in getting caught up in should-haves; they only clouded things. Right now.... The first thing she did was check the communal cave. Failing in finding any of the litter there, she turned and began to systematically check what she thought their favorite hang outs and hideaways were.
Ah... peace. She hadn't been getting too much. She was now looking after 6 cubs! Today they were all off, playing, whatever it was they were doing, and Barazahi was grooming her grey bang fur, playing around at a small pool with a curl at the tip of her bangs. She'd never tried the look, and was coming to like it. Her mind wasn't on any cubs, not even on Mbura, her own sons or daughter would have him well looked after. Her mind was pretty empty at the moment, really... Except for one thing. Her mother. Barazahi hadn't visited her dear mother in so long... she felt like the world's worst cub. With that idea in her head, she gave her bang one last drop of water with a curl before rising to her paws and getting up. She padded back towards the backdrop of the Mteo lands, that great cliff face. She hadn't gotten used to seeing it there yet.
Dropping her reddish eyes to the horizon again, they came across the figure she'd been looking for, and she was surprised! That was extremely convenient, and Barazahi picked up the pace towards her mother so she wouldn't have to walk much more of the way. "Mother! How good to see you!" her voice was a yell at first due to the distance, but quieting appropriately as she got closer. She stopped short of a mother-cub embrace, however. "Mom... I'm so sorry I haven't been out to see you... The cubs and everything," She did hate making excuses, but they had some truth to them. She turned her earthy red eyes to Embamba, hoping for quick forgiveness. She did want to give her mom a hug, she felt it was due.
Embamba was somewhat surprised that Baharazi found her, rather than the other way about. She smiled, though, and tried to put her nervousness aside as she bumped foreheads with her daughter in a feline greeting. The apolgoy struck her silent, though.
It took a few moments for Embamba to figure out what to say, and then she gave a mixed sigh and chuckle. "It.. probably isn't you that should be apologizing, my love... and please, you don't have to explain to me. I know how cubs can be, after all."
The lioness looked up at the area they were in. She spotted a tree not to far off and nodded towards it before making her way over. Once there, the lioness sprawled down into the shadow to rest her weary paws. "i've not.. been about, actually, even if you'd had reason to look."
"Oh?" Barazhi questioned, confused. Raza didn't have to be sorry? She offered a genuine smile at not having to explain about the cubs. She was glad to be with her mother after so long... Sometimes the adult still felt like a cub. She always had felt like Embamba and she had had a good relationship, it was a shame that they hadn't seen each other as often as they had when they travelled.
Barazahi agreed to moving to the shade. As she padded along, she checked on that curl of hers- yes, still in place! She so liked the way it looked in her reflection, maybe her mother would notice?
However, when Embamba spoke again, Raza knew there were more important matters to discuss than curls. "Where have you been?" she asked with a smile and a tilt of the head, a slightly puzzled look on her face. She'd been out of the greater family loop- she hoped whatever news wouldn't shake her too much, though she prepared to deal with it. Raza was starting to inherit the mask that had always marked her face- she was starting to learn to appear calm no matter what. For her mate and her cubs' sake. Even... perhaps more often, for her own sake.
Had Embamba known that her daughter was doing exactly what she'd done, she might have warned her. Instead, she leaned forward to bump their heads again. She eyed that curl, but said nothing of it for now.. it was all she could do to get herself to tell her daughter this news. "I... well, I went into the rogue lands for a time.." She waited to see who Barazhi would react to something so heinous from the zealot her mother had been before continuing the confession of... well, heresy.
Raza's reaction would have been surprising to many traditional pride members. She simply nodded, as if it was nothing to worry about. She had been raised there, after all. Though the blue lioness knew that it was dangerous out there in the roguelands, in myriad ways, Barazahi felt as if it was a second home. Though she often hid it, she felt no need to fear or shun roguelanders either.
However, this spurred a question. "Does anyone else know? Some lions here get very upset at that, I'm sure you know." She looked her mother in the eye, whatever this was seemed to bug her greatly.
Of course she knew--she agreed with them.. or had. It was still something that was uneasy with her, even though she hadn't intentionally wandered out as far as she had. But... so many things had changed upon meeting Issy, upon doing something as foolish as falling in love so, so quickly. How could she help it thought?
"No, not.. not yet. But they will, there is no way for them not to find out." She sighed, hesitating again, then faced her daughter in the most straight forward manner she could manage, "Razi I.. this is so hard for me to tell you, please understand that but... your father and i... well.. there's been..." Embamba's ears flattened and she found herself grasping for words. It had been easier to finish things with Ndege than it was to explain it to his children.
In that moment, the instinctual feeling kicked in. She could finish her mother's sentence in that moment, mom and dad weren't together anymore. It was the instinct that one gets when being told a loved one had passed on, the pieces of the puzzle were impossible to not put together.
She looked away, tears starting to come to her eyes but she held them back. She wouldn't let a tear fall in front of anyone except Angusho anymore. She'd have to pass the news on to him. She only looked away for a moment before she looked in her mother's eyes again. She restrained the tears more, pushing so much as the water in her eyes away. "You and dad aren't together anymore, are you?" She offered, though she knew it was the truth. Something deep in her being didn't want to believe it, either. She pushed that little part of her away to let her mother explain, there had to be a good reason.
Silently, Embamba shook her head. She reached out a paw to touch her daughter's, praying that the girl wouldn't take it away. "We're not," She confirmed when she found her voice, and found it thick with a tearful guilt and fear she'd never expressed before around her children. Embamba tried to hide it but her mask wouldn't come so easily as it had before... she wasn't sure she wanted it to. "I... its.... you should probably know now, I am the one who broke it off."
Raza crept closer to her mother as if she couldn't cling to anyone else. Raza hadn't been near as close to her dad as her mom... Nonetheless, she didn't want it to be true... what had she done? She feared that perhaps something that she'd done had sparked a fight between them... That could have escalated.
She scooted closer, but didn't make any additional contact yet. "May I know what happened?" She asked without looking up from the ground. She'd hoped that this meeting might have gone better... Her ears were folded back, her grey-tipped tail twitched lightly against the ground. Would Embamba abandon her? She resembled Ndege more than Ata did... Would Embamba want nothing more to do with her? Was there any way to keep her parents together? No, the latter wasn't something she could choose. Raza would not attempt to dictate her parent's personal lives.
"I... I thought everything here was supposed to be... perfect." She whispered, almost inaudibly.
"I.. I thought so too, Raza." Embamba sighed. She looked up at the leaves of the trees as they danced above, then back down at her daughter. Suddenly the girl looked so small again...
"the truth is... its been hard between your father and I for.. for quite some time. Our relationship was built upon his putting me on a pedestal.. and my consistently overlooking half the things he... well, he never did, that he needed to do."
She tried to explain this in as neat a fashion as she could, but there were certain things she knew it was best not to say. Like the fact that she wasn't sure how much she'd ever really loved him. "It was easier to ignore the differences when we were outside the pride. He was constantly away from us on patrol.. and the only times we really had to talk were at the evening meal. Even then, we didn't talk much--we were too tired. ...
"I don't want you thinking this is your father's fault or mine.. it was.. both of our fault, really. We just.. we didn't work. And then I woke up one day and realized that the man i'd spent so many long seasons with didn't know the first thing about me... "
"I'm sorry," Raza said, laying her head on her mother's paws. She didn't know if she was apologizing for her existence, or for her mother's situation. She didn't know where to turn, perhaps to Angu... but were they built to last? Her eyes closed to keep the tears in. The blue lioness was silent beyond the sound of her breathing. She was truly at a loss of words... This seemed so random, so out of the blue.
"I suppose it was inevitable, then," she said without moving her head from the warmth of her mother's paws. "I'd compare Angu and I with you two, and I always noticed something different. I always blamed it on the fact that our relationship was younger than yours, and the differences were just due to time... I suppose it was something more." She said emotionlessly, staring out into the grasses... And beyond that, the roguelands.
"What do I do, mother?" she asked quietly.
Embamba tucked her head over her daughter's neck and held her as close as she could. It was good to feel her there, and to know that she wanted to be there. So very good. "Oh dear, no... no.." She crooned gently, "Don't compair your relationship to ours.. There are many differences you don't see... and my relationship with Ndege was never at all like yours with Angu. You two will be fine."
Emabma nuzzled the soft blue fur, then groomed it back into place. "You... decide how you feel about this," She said softly. "you take your time and think about it, and you can ask me anything you like... just know that I still love you, and that I did love your father, and that ... that the past we all share was not a lie. Its merely that.. things change, and situations are viewed differently.. and... sometimes its better for things to end."
"You have no idea how much that means... to me." Barazahi said before finally losing it. She cried in her mother's arms, she may as well have been a little cub with a cut on her paw. She didn't care, though, not at this point. She didn't even give a damn about the curl, which was a very odd thing for the lioness. It felt comforting to know that she was still wanted by her mother, still loved. It felt comforting for her mother to say that she and Angusho would be alright... It felt comforting to know that the past was not a lie.
But the whole affair was difficult for her to bear. Not so much, anymore, with her mother's reassurance of what had troubled her. "What are you going to do?" She asked as strongly as she could as her sobs began to wane. She had to know that her mother would be alright. As odd as it was, she really didn't care about how her father fared that much... He had always been gone anyway, always fretting. More often than not, the male got on her nerves too, though she'd never ever vocalize her opinion. However, she had to know her mother would be alright. She'd be upset for a few more days, but overall at peace if she knew that her mother would be alright.
Embamba held her daughter as she cried and whispered reassurances the same way she had when the girl was young. It was almost like being back in those days for a moment. When Baharazhi seemed to calm down some, Embamba licked the girl's face clean and then recurled that little bit of fluff upon her head.
"I... will be okay." Her cheeks grew hot at that. Should she lie? Or should she tell the truth fast... put it all in the open at once and just have it be done? It might be too much. "While I was out there.. I thought a lot and learned a lot.. ... and I met someone who is a very dear friend to me, now. Someone..." She shook her head, "oh how silly it sounds to say it out loud! But... someone who understands me so well.. even in such short a time.."
Her mother had noticed the little curl. She smiled, though not a full smile. A smile nonetheless. "Little curl looks good, doesn't it?" She asked, pulling her head off her mother's paws.
With regards to Embamba's new friend... "That's good," She didn't push the matter much more than that. Well... a little more couldn't hurt much worse than the rest of the day? "Can I meet this certain someone?" She asked, trying her hardest to get her mind off the matter. "I know I'm not supposed to say it, but I've met a number of nice outsiders... They always have interesting views." In all honesty, it was just the thing she needed to get her mind off of this whole affair. That was what she needed most, to get her mind off of things.
"you can.." She nodded, "He's going to try and join the pride.." Embamba admitted, feelings strange admitting Issy's gender to the girl. To her it seemed as if it were all rather obvious, no matter how much a part of her hoped that it wasn't... "well.. since i knew it already, i suppose it doesn't matter if you say it to me," embamba chuckled, smiling almost as easily as she had been the past week with Issy.
For the first time since the heavy conversation had started, Barazahi perked up a bit. She didn't know if what she was about to say would fit or not, but quite honestly, she didn't really care. She felt it would lighten the mood. "Ah... a boyfriend," She said teasingly, rising to her paws. "Let's head back, if you're ready for it," Barazahi said, tail flicking behind her. Could she have been over it already? Or was it just the mask that she'd been hiding behind of late? Who knew? Not even she could tell the truth. Right now, she just knew that she did not like this tree anymore. She'd remember its placement.
"I have a little secret for you too," She hinted, though hers was a much more positive note, she felt. She also had the feeling that now was as good of time as any to tell Embamba of Mbura. "I adopted a rogue cub. He was alone, abandoned by his parents at our borders. He wanted to repent for the darkness that rested in every rogue! I've yet to tell Warithi... He's just been with my cubs. Perhaps you would like to meet him sometime?" She offered.
"A rogue cub?" Embamba's ears perked. She got up and nuzzled her daughter, somehow feeling that reassurances were still in order.. and not quite certain how to go about doing that. She tried not to act too embarrassed by the boyfriend talk, especially as it seemed like a front.
The elder lioness got to her feet and trotted along by her for a moment, then stopped. She looked at Barazahi apologetically then sighed, "Actually, dear one, as much as i would love to, I need to find your brother and sister.. and then Warithi. May I come later?"
"oh what am i saying," Embamba shook her head and laughed, "i'll be at the den tonight, I'll see them then..." She frowned, "how on earth has Warithi not seen the cub? We all den together."
Barazahi smiled at her mother. "We're good at hiding the boy, what can I say?" She said with a smile. Before she let her mother depart, though... She padded up to her and nuzzled her. As odd as it seemed, she was thankful for the truth. And the support. "I love you, mom. No matter what." She pulled away. "I'll see you later tonight, then!" With that, she padded off, cheeriness fading a bit, though some still managed to stay with her. Things didn't always go as planned, but they always worked out.
Embamba sighed as she the girl ran off. That was... both harder and easier than she'd imagined it to be, somehow. But her job wasn't over yet--she still had two children and a cousin to explain herself to... and the cousin was going to be infinitely more in depth, she knew. Turning, embamba forced her strength back into her feet to carry her to daughter number two.
