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 Posted: Wed Sep 22, 2010 7:30 pm
Tybolt had had far more time to think these several weeks than he was truly accustomed to. He was, unbelievably, the recipient of so many cold shoulders and waving tails. The lionesses were taking sides against him.
He'd shrugged it off at first. Of course they would eventually come to see matters his way. He was the alpha male, his decisions he made were made in that great leadership position. He wielded more power over them than they could imagine. If he wanted, he could zap them into oblivion. If good sense and reason didn't win the to his side, fear certainly would.
Yet when he'd lost patience for good sense and tried to push fear, calm, gentle, timid Dawinah had laughed in his face. He'd never seen her as strong, was always certain of being able to pull her to his side in one way or another. She'd not only not seen reason, but had dared him to go ahead and hit her.
For all his anger, for all his bluffing, he couldn't and wouldn't. Not even when he heard that the cubs were born and he was still not permitted to come anyways closer to the mother's den.
He'd had a lot of time to think, and a lot of time to have to consider past his normal shows of grandeur and leadership. The lionesses were right, he would not harm them. He was their brother, cousin, and protector.
Most unbelievably of all, the first of the lionesses he missed was not those blood relatives of his. He wondered most about the mother, how she fared, what she was doing, how she would continue. How would she raise those cubs? What if something came her way? Both proud possession, paternal protection, and further perhaps caused those concerns to be irritants. And after awhile, his anger turned from self-righteous indignation to something far more humbling, into a concern for the others.
The lionesses of his family saw the change in his gait as he walked forward, and did nothing to neither stop him or come near. Egyptia, who had been the most constant to remain close and help, turned to walk where she remained in earshot, remained within leaping distance, but not specifically near. Dawinah remained out of sight entirely.
Tail down, head lower than he knew it could come, Tybolt approached Twitch and her cubs, a small meal in his mouth as a peace offering. He set it down near to her.
"I wanted to know if you had need of something." Words without the arrogant power of before.
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Posted: Thu Sep 23, 2010 12:26 am
 The lioness let out a long drown out sigh, though it was not directed to her company. No, it was clearly directed to life itself. Any fight or fire she once had seemed to be long gone, the fem herself seemed more like an empty shell. Her head was almost glued to her front paws as she seemed to struggle just open her eyes to look upon her guest. What look she could muster was simply a lonely, broken one.
Her daughter had long since left, possibly even before the cubs were born. Bored. In fact it was clear the mother would have been a lot worst off if it wasn't for the fact she had been looked after. She often would refuse food after not eating for days and had little to no will to get up for water or even move at all. A broken fae. That's all she was.
She never did anwser Tybolt back, gazing off into nothingness for a bit before closing her eyes once again. The only thing that seemed to be alive was the two cubs nested in her scarf, a wing was slightly draped over them.
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Posted: Thu Sep 23, 2010 1:10 am
Tybolt stared at the lioness in front of him. At first, he assumed that maybe he was getting slighted. Maybe his relatives' silence was scorn and not acceptance. Perhaps... But that wasn't it. Concern very shortly replaced irritation, he brought his head down to sniff at her, tail beginning to move slightly in rare uncertainty. Dawinah knew healing herbs. Whether it was true or not, Tybolt had blind confidence that any ailment of the body could swiftly be remedied by his cousin. What made this lioness so listless, in such magnificent care as hers?
He stood there for a very long time, unmoving except for his tail. Finally, he pawed the ground unconsciously before sitting down. Whatever conclusion he came to about her condition, manliness still refused to let that be said. It was easier to approach a different angle.
"You're angry with me." Hadn't the others refused speaking to him for their anger? "You have a right to be. You..." He paused, tail swishing its uncertainty. You wasn't right, it wasn't personal, but what else was right for use? "I mean, a lioness like yourself, and your cubs..." Hadn't that been drilled into him? Egyptia had nearly had his head over exactly whose cubs these were, though pride straightened his back at the words, a glint of rebellion. He tossed a look back his sister with a slight huff of air. "...our cubs. You are all...I suppose I should have...because you're more than worthy of it."
What was that? That just angered him, and again anger at himself and not with anything else. His tail hit first his back end then the ground with two self-reproaching thwacks. But he wasn't just going to outright say that he should have asked what she'd wanted, that the choice was hers to begin with. No, if he said that, she might make the wrong choices. Others did that sort of thing, made wrong choices. Made choices that would get themselves hurt. Worse, made choices that excluded him. That Tybolt couldn't imagine, to be excluded. Hadn't these weeks been painful enough?
He couldn't say those words, so he twisted them around a new way. "They're magnificent. What names have you given them? What do--how do you--" He frowned. A dangerous question, twist it a little, don't ask out right. "--plan on presenting the world to them? And what should I do?" The last words came out unbidden, more cautious than he would have liked them to be asked, but well enough said. He wouldn't be excluded! Would he?
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Posted: Thu Sep 23, 2010 11:15 pm
The lioness shook her head slightly. Mad? No, she wasn't mad. She listened quietly as the male continued, Names? Had she even named them? "No names...Just take them..." The female curled into a fetal position, her back was to the male. "Just let me rot in peace." She sputtered out, clearly beginning to weep silently. The sudden movement of her mother's body caused the young fem to awaken from her nap. She listen quietly for a moment before stretching out in a yawn, kicking her brother to wake him up as well. "Momma's crying again, get up." Paying no attention to the strange male, the kitten grabbed onto one of her mother's flakes and started to tug on it, still half asleep, acting as if it was second natuer to the young one. "Come....On...Momma...Snap....Outta....It." The youngling growled between pulls.
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Posted: Thu Sep 23, 2010 11:31 pm
What? Tybolt's eyes went wide, his whole body tensed. What had she said? That wasn't right. Weeks ago, during the time they'd had their fall out, Tybolt might have tossed his head, proclaimed the weakness of the lioness, and done exactly what she suggested. Weeks ago though, he'd not had time to consider.
"That's just not acceptable." Now he finally crouched down, nearly lying down in front of her. "Do you hear your cub? She calls for you. I can't take the honor of knowing her mother from her." The male hissed his protest, one that ended in a querying mewl. "Momma-y!" He inched himself forward around to his mother's face, then started to crawl on top of her nose to lick at the tears. "Please be happy."
Tybolt watched, without any idea of how to respond to the lioness or the cubs. What would he do with babies? What was he going to do with someone without a will? It had never occurred to him that one who had once been so right could turn so wrong/i] like this.
"No. We will help you to be strong again. We won't abandon you." If sometimes the strong were weak, then perhaps it was the job of those still strong to help bear that burden.
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Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 4:01 am
As broken as she was the fem could not ignore her motherly duties, slowly curling a paw around her son and licking him back softly. The tears stopped though this had all but drained her. She slowly slipped of into a dreamless sleep.
Well at least her mother wasn't crying, but the tears would be back. They were always back. The cub sat semi-content for a moment before turning her attention to the strange male that was in the den, her brow was raised. "Who are you and why are you making momma cry?" She huffed accusingly. Any stranger that made her momma cry was no good in her books.
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Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 3:19 pm
Tybolt couldn't help but to smile at the girl as she made her demands. "I---"
"Yeah!" Maybe he was slow on the uptake, perhaps from squeegling his was around to face the strange lion while wrapped up-like on his mother, but now the boy fell back down close to his sister, "No cry, not here, bad!" He huffed, wanting to say too much without the patience to bother with full sentences.
"I am here to help." Tybolt answered, finding it easy with the circumstances to hide his amusements. "I am your father, and will try to help your mother get better so she doesn't cry."
The baby boy frowned, fur still fluffed up, and looked to his sister for the proper reaction to that. On one hand, that sounded great! On the other hand, he didn't seem to be doing so good at it.
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