The foxy lioness slept with one eye open. That was how the best dreams found one, when one was still half-awake. The only dreams better were fever dreams, and the dreams that sometimes came from plants. Räven preferred to be able to spring into action when she needed to. She did not often indulge in the strange herbs that grew in her forest.
Her forest … with one waking eye fixed on the trees above, Räv’s dreaming spirit wandered like one of the forest spirits themselves. She felt herself flying as one of them, flitting from branch to branch. And then seeing … something. Probably it was simply her sleeping body catching a sound, her glazed orange eye catching a flicker of movement, but that was not what Räv believed. When she slept she was a spirit, and if she could not make out the approach of an intruder clearly, well then, it was simply because she saw with spirit eyes. Spirits saw things differently.
The lioness went from sleep to wakefulness in an instant. She did not move nor alter her steady breathing. If the intruder had spotted her, it was best to feign sleep for a while yet. There was nothing in front of her half-open eye, so she focused on the signals coming from her ears. Distant birdsong, the wind in the trees … crunch. A heavy foot on the forest floor. How far? Not far, but far enough.
Gunnar was far from the pride and well aware of it. He did like his time alone, but he was steadily growing uncomfortable. He usually wasn’t one to just wander off and leave his pride behind. Gunnar liked sparring with his comrades, boasting, arguing … even spending time with his cubs, as awkward as it sometimes felt, and spending time with … Ferawyn. Ferawyn was a constant source of stress and irritation, but even his company was better than this nothingness.
The blond lion was vaguely aware that some of the others enjoyed excursions into the wilderness on their own, but it felt a bit unnatural to him. Stormborn should be voyaging out with company, to cause trouble. He sighed. Getting some time by himself had seemed like a good idea at the time … but perhaps he shouldn’t have come out quite so far. Although he didn’t like being so far from home, the blond lion was not afraid of whatever might be lurking in the woods, and he wasn’t paying much attention to his surroundings. He cast about, gazing at the ground, looking for a sprig of mint. That would make this trip worthwhile.
Confident now that the stranger wouldn’t spot her, Räv rose to her feet in a fluid motion. Her lithe body – small, for a lioness – was tense, her muscles taught with excitement and readiness. When there was no sound, no sight, no sign of an impending attack, she relaxed slightly. Where was this intruder, then? Bright rabid eyes scanned the forest, her ears flickering as she sought to pick up a sound.
Crunch. Again. Whoever this fellow was – she was sure that such a heavy tread must belong to a male, probably a male lion – he wasn’t stealthy. Either he was stupid, or he was strong enough not to fear the forest. Probably a mix of the two. He sounded heavy. Strong. Maybe he was worth her time. Picking her way carefully through the sparse underbrush, the lioness approached the stranger. She held her body low to the ground, concealing herself as much as possible. She was patient, waiting for the wind to blow as she liked before stepping forward. Räv stalked the stranger as carefully as she would any prey.
Luckily, the wind was blowing in her favor, bringing her his scent and blowing hers away from him. She inhaled deeply. A male lion. She smiled to herself, wickedly sharp teeth flashing. How interesting … and pleasing to know that she had been right in her guess about who the footstep belonged to. Although she moved with the utmost care, it didn’t take long to find her quarry. She watched him through the cover of the underbrush, her bright eyes narrowed. A male lion indeed, large, fierce looking. Hmmm. She smiled.
Gunnar had found his mint, and settled down to relax with it. Having mint with Zsaria had been refreshingly fun, but it was always nice to savor mint by oneself. It always felt … smoother, somehow. More relaxing. He stretched out, enjoying the wash of euphoria from the first few chews. This wasn’t the same quality of the mint they got in the forests right around the stronghold, but it was good. Gunnar chuckled to himself, basking in the delightfully warm and tipsy feeling that had enveloped him from nose to tailtip.
Then there was a sound. Gunnar blinked, his eyes focusing a bit more. It was a sound he couldn’t identify. Almost like a whisper in the wind. Like someone exhaling close by … but there was no one nearby. The lion whipped his head around (a good deal more slowly than he would have sober). Nothing. Not even a glimpse of something. Had someone crept up on him while he was enjoying his mint? Impossible! For one thing, the forest was uninhabited. Gunnar was unaware that his footsteps had taken him beyond the boundaries of the empty forest by the stronghold. This forest was similarly quiet … alike enough to trick him.
When no further sound came, Gunnar began to feel foolish. Perhaps the mint had made him paranoid. It hadn’t happened to him before, but he had heard of it. The lion spat his sprig out, looking at it suspiciously. It looked ordinary enough. Hmmm. The lion carefully took a new sprig and began chewing it with care, alert for any strange taste.
Räv was disappointed that the lion hadn’t reacted with more fire, but amused at his apparent nervousness. Poor fellow. She wondered idly where he had come from. Räv usually remembered strange lions … certainly ones that she had interacted with. This fellow didn’t have the look of anyone she had met. She exhaled again, sidling closer to him. The spritely lioness was beginning to think that it would be just as enjoyable to trick this lion as it would be to seduce him. He wouldn’t be much good to her under the influence of mint, anyways. Such herbs made males far too foolish.
That sound again! Gunnar sprang to his feet, taking only a second to steady himself. He was certain that someone was watching him … someone malicious, or why hadn’t they shown themself? He snarled, glaring around the little clearing. Nothing! He glanced up at the tree tops for a moment. Nothing there either. “Show yourself, before I kill you!” Gunnar roared.
It was an empty threat, of course. How could he kill someone he couldn’t see? The most he could do would be to blunder about drunkenly looking like a fool.
While the foolish male was roaring and posturing, Räv had crept around to the other side of the clearing. She peered at him, her eyes dancing with delight. Yes, he was definitely too drunken to make good sport. She would take her enjoyment from him this way. She reflected briefly that it was too bad she didn’t know the fellow’s name – being called by name from the forest would certainly unsettle him. Oh, well. She would just have to make do.
“Brave warrior,” she whispered, her voice breathy and eerie. “Why do you trespass in my woods?”
A voice! Gunnar whirled around, staggering only slightly. Alarm was ridding his system of the last traces of mint. “I go where I please!” The Stormborn believed fully in their Gods, and Gunnar was starting to feel a bit superstitious. What was this mysterious voice, in this mysterious place? Oh, why hadn’t he brought a friend out here to chew mint with?
Räv was on the move, slinking and circling the male. Keeping him off-balance. “This is not your place,” she breathed, this time from far off to the male’s left. She wanted to laugh as she watched him turn again, but restrained herself. A laugh might give her away as a truly mortal being … and a female. Then his superstitious fear might turn into lust, and she would have to endure his tiresome drunken advances.
This was just getting too weird for Gunnar. He couldn’t get a fix on the voice, and he couldn’t see anything at all through the underbrush. If the voice didn’t belong to a forest spirit, then he was sure it belonged to someone trying to lure him into a trap. An ambush, maybe. Gunnar was a warrior to the bone, but he was no fool. The voice was right; this wasn’t his place. If he were to fight spirits he would fight in a place he knew. Without speaking to the voice again, Gunnar turned and loped out of the clearing in the direction he had come from. Hopefully he wouldn’t be running into a trap.
