Isamu needed more pelts. Even with permission to leave Umsindisi for a short while, he would easily freeze again if he couldn't wrap his feet up in whatever pelts they could find. So the servant set out to dig around for whatever she could find. If she could just wrap one of his feet, the lioness would be happy. Isamu and Upala took good care of her, and she wanted to return the favor.
Instead of looking to hunt, Zhaleh decided to snoop around and see if she could find any somewhat-fresh kills that still had some pelt left on it. She was very mindful of avoiding the forest; though she was a lioness, she didn't want her connection to the colony to risk the relationship. So the edge of the plains it was, keeping herself close to where Isamu and Upala were resting.
Nose to the ground, it didn't take her too long to find the first kill. It was hard to tell what it was....there wasn't much left. It was too cold for flies to swarm it, but even still its origins were a mystery to her. She picked at the fur, cursing when tiny strips would rip apart instead of peeling off in one nice piece. "This is nearly useless," she mumbled as she continued to work, doing her best to adapt her work as the carcass began to let go of its fur. (1)
"Well, that'll wrap a paw up, I guess." She knew that they would be happy with anything she brought them, but she wanted to try again. She continued to move through the grasses, dismissing even smaller bits of fur that clung to carcasses. Hares that had nearly nothing left to them, or ground rodents that were too small to even wrap a toe up. Frustrated, she started to turn back when she noticed an extremely emaciated jackal wandering around. It was barely alive, and Zhaleh cursed at the creature. She didn't have any plans on hunting anything while out there, but there was no reason to just...let it continue to starve to death. So she chased after it, and the poor creature couldn't move fast enough. It was soon hanging in her mouth, and the lioness did her best to not puncture the fur too much as she carried it off (2). This was much more of what she was trying to look for, though it seemed like there were no canine furs to be found out here today.
She set the dead jackal down, staring at it. "How...am I going to do this?" There wasn't much there to eat, so it seemed useless to try. She settled herself down, working to craftily gut the creature before skinning it. As she had never been trained in this process, it wasn't as smooth and perfect as she had envisioned it being...and it was kind of gross. She was able to get most of the fur off in one piece, and carried it (and her pathetic scrap from earlier) away from the carcass, hoping that the vultures would swarm to it and not her precious fur. She tossed it up in a high branch, aiming to let it sit skin-up to dry out and stop smelling. At least she knew that much. "A pity the sun isn't more intense today," she sighed. It would take a few days for it to fully cure at this rate, but any fur was better than nothing.
She would take it with her. For now, she was going to try one last time. Well, after a small nap. She rested under the tree, confident that no one would steal something from a sleeping lion. Zhlaeh never slept deeply, for she had been a slave her entire life, and needs had to be met at any hour of the day. Isamu and Upala never asked her for anything more than help with Isamu's merchant business, but it was a habit that the minty lioness would never be able to drop.
So she dozed for a couple hours, keeping the scrappy-looking fur between her forepaws, and the slowly drying fur hanging above her. A shift in the wind awoke her. She shook off the echos of sleepiness and returned to her business, pleased to see that the fresher pelt was already half-cured. It would probably only take another day for it to be fully usable, and Zhaleh couldn't have been more excited about that.
With the jackal fur on her back, skin up, and the somewhat-usable scrap between her shoulders, she was making good time in returning to Isamu and Upala. It was then that she spotted a hare. A good looking hare, too. It didn't seem to notice her, and the lioness couldn't let this opportunity pass up. If she could return with enough furs to completely wrap one of Isamu's legs...or both of his forepaws...she was going to have to take it.
Without another sound, she sprinted towards the hare, feeling the other two furs fly off of her back as she did so. The sound they made when they hit the grasses could be heard at the same point in time she took the hare down. They would be a bit dirty now, but still usable. (3) With the dead hare hanging out of her mouth, she trotted back to her furs, carefully balancing them on her back once more. So much for trying to find furs instead of 'making' them with hunting.
At least she would return with a decent fur and two smaller bits, three pieces more than what they had right now. If it turned out that they didn't need them, they could just turn them to the community if anyone else needed them. At the very least, the little scrappy ones could help pad an existing fur pile, or soften up the ground of a den. Everything could be useful if put in the right perspective.
And she had a snack! Zhaleh was quite pleased with herself, and she knew that Upala was going to be thrilled to see anything new added to their pile.
(1,022 words)
