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 Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2007 2:09 pm
 ((Kivuli's a juve, but my hard drive died when she grew so I couldn't save her image :B))
Kivuli'Mwale poked her black nose out from under the rock ledge that formed a roof for the makeshift den her mother had dug a couple of months earlier. Motomilia was out hunting for the pride, and she had no idea where her sister had gone off to.
Normally she would be perfectly happy to stay in her den and sleep curled into a red-and-black ball; every time she stepped onto the sands outside the scorching heat threatened to burn her paw-pads and more than once she'd received painful sunburns around her eyes and muzzle. The shaded sand in the den was surprisingly cool and comforting. Today, though, her blue eyes refused to remain closed, and she found herself staring outside rather than sleeping, and glancing down at the huge imprint her mother's body left in the sand reminded her just how bored Kivuli really was. Besides, she was thirsty.
She finally made up her mind and stepped outside the den, lifting her paw and placing it in another spot on the sand that happened to be just as hot as the first. She'd get used to it, she reasoned, as she sidestepped the den and made her way in an odd, slightly prancing step in a random direction. The only place she knew was the heart of the pridelands, she realized; her mother had taken her to the oasis a few times but she'd simply followed, never really paying attention to where they were going on the way there.
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Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2007 2:40 pm
 In stark contrast, the blood red cub did not seem bothered by the heat of the desert or it's scorching sands, or maybe he simply did not care enough to notice. He walked calmly, ears upright, his keen eyes holding a chilling gaze.
It was not boredom that had motivated the young cub to stray from his mother's den, nor was it curiosity, it was knowledge. And the more he learned, the stronger he would become, each detail he glimpsed, each sound he heard stored in his memory for the time when he would need them. Not that escaping his siblings for a short time wasn't a bonus.
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Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2007 10:11 pm
The bright red cub was easy to spot against the tawny beige of the sands cut through occasionally by the dark sienna cliffs. Given that the black-and-red tuxedoed female had been sheltered most of her life and hadn't actually met another of the pride's younglings, she figured it was high time she do so now.
The other cub had his back to her, and she approached at a trot. As she got closer though, her ears flattened and her pace slowed, she hadn't a clue as to what to say.
"Hello," she finally called, her voice ringing out much clearer than she had expected, a stark contrast to how nervous she was feeling.
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Posted: Mon Mar 26, 2007 1:21 pm
He paused in his steps for only a brief moment, one dark ear flicking, swiveling toward the voice that had called to him, his gaze turned just enough to glimpse the darker cub from the corner of his eye. But if she was nervous because she feared his reaction, then she had no reason to be so. For unlike others of the blood, Ashi was icey, cold, emotionless as the frozen tundra. To the other cub, he was simply, indifferent.
"Hello."
He tone was flat, unemotional, barren. It wasn't that he begrudged the other's presence, or that he was set on being alone, after all by meeting others, young or old, there was more to be learned, more knowledge to be stored away. He simply was incapable of feeling.
"Aren't you a little young to be out alone?"
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Posted: Mon Mar 26, 2007 7:04 pm
It was a second before she answered; his "hello" alone was enough to silence whatever thoughts she might've had in answer to his toneless question.
She had heard her mother often use this same voice, void of any emotion -- she had also heard her use a variety of other emotions, but even as young as she was, she was smart enough to recognize that some, if not all, of those emotions had been faked.
She flicked her tail once, and again. Perhaps this was what was expected of her if she wanted to be a true Firekin -- one of the Motoujamii. She remembered he'd asked her a question, and when she answered she was pleased to find she'd strained most of the offense out of her voice.
"No younger than you."
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Posted: Mon Mar 26, 2007 11:07 pm
"Maybe."
His tail flicked, as if dismissing her answer with nothing but a simple gesture. She may have been older, but she looked a lot more lost than he did too. Perhaps her mother hadn't taught her yet as his had taught him, or perhaps her memory was not as sharp nor her senses as keen. Either way, Shin knew where he was, and he couldn't help the faintest hints of a smug smirk that crossed his maw as his red eyes shifted to glance over his shoulder once more.
"So why -are- you out here alone?"
Maybe there was something here he could learn, after all information often lay in the most unlikely of places.
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Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:22 pm
Kivuli shrugged in answer, approaching to sit next to him -- not too close, but at a respectful distance. The other cub seemed much more sure of himself, if perhaps distant, and she oddly respected it, and unconsciously found herself sitting up straighter and forcefully wiping whatever expression she had off her face. "Because I want to be," was her reply a few seconds later, trying to give off the impression that she was just as free and powerful as he.
"Why are you?" she asked after a second, an ear flicking as she twisted her head around to look at him. She might have succeeded in controlling her body language and expression, but her blue eyes couldn't hide her interest.
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Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2007 10:17 pm
The young cub stood calmly, stretching his body one leg at a time, paws spreading within the sand beneath as if feeling the very earth on which they trod, taking information from the desert itself. His head turned, red eyes drifting over the barren landscape, studying each detail and distant dune.
"I am studying."
He seemed oddly proud of that fact, or at least confident. There was no hesitation in his voice, a firm statement that almost returned the question of 'what else would I be doing?'. He neglected to mention that he had also left the den to escape his sisters and spend some time walking the lands alone. After all he wasn't bothered by the juvenile's presence, why should he be?
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Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 1:35 pm
"Studying what?" came the next question, almost the same second the young male's answer to her previous one had left his jaws. She was just beginning to learn to control her curiosity; Mother usually cuffed her when annoyed by her too many questions. But this wasn't Mother. This was just another cub -- like her. Surely he wouldn't bothered.
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Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 4:22 pm
He shot a glance at the female, perhaps wondering why she should care so much what he was doing or why. He certainly wouldn't have cared enough to ask had he stumbled on another such as himself.
"The land."
Paws trod forward again, not bothering to look back to see if she had followed, tail flicking with each calculated step, red eyes searching the flat terrain ahead for whatever secrets it had to share. He didn't care if the other cub chose to follow him or not, it simply wasn't important.
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Posted: Tue Aug 21, 2007 12:56 pm
"Ah." There didn't seem much to say to that, so for a while she was quiet, looking out over the land and trying to see what he saw. All Kivuli saw, though, was the same sand-swept pridelands she'd seen every day since her birth. She was bored in less than a minute, and was up again and following as soon as she saw him move.
"What's your name?" She piped up again, unable to keep quiet for much longer.
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Posted: Wed Aug 22, 2007 2:10 pm
In the silence he explored the land before him. To him, the land was far from a flat, featureless desert. It was a land of contours and lines, a land that bore its own face. And though the stranger to the firekin lands may not see it, Ashi knew that every part of the desert had it's own complexity that set it apart from every other piece of the deceptive terrain.
"Hiashi'ikusa."
He did not turn to the other cub as he spoke, his gaze instead focused on the earth beneath his paws. Paused in his steps, the young cub sniffed at the air before lowering his maw to sniff at the earth. The desert held many secrets, so much more must be held beneath the sands. Pawing at the earth, he pushed the sands to form a small indentation, as if he could find those secrets under but a single layer of that earth. What mysteries lay beneath?
"Is there a particular reason you're following me?"
There was no sound of annoyance or irritation in his tone, no accusation. It was a question, no more or less.
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Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2007 8:24 pm
She shrugged and voiced a "No" once she realized his eyes weren't on her. "Just watching."
Mother had said once that she should sit and just watch and listen to people more often, she might learn something. And admittedly, the actions of the younger cub interested her. She shut up for once, not knowing what he was doing with the sand beneath his paws nor thinking to ask. The way she viewed the world around her was simple, it was a flat, featureless desert. She was often bored by it.
It was a few minutes later that she realized that he'd given her his name, and she still hadn't given hers.
"I'm Kivuli'Mwale."
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Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2007 11:11 pm
He shot her a glance from the corner of his eye, as if to say he didn't care what she did so long as she was silent. Much like with his own sister, Ashi was tolerant so long as she didn't interfere. If she did, then his talons would persuade her otherwise.
His attention returned to the earth once more, he scooped a pawful of sand, watching as the sparkling grains as they slipped from his grasp to the land once more. It may have seemed a pointless task to some, but as a true warrior and future assassin, the young cub was already aware of the necessity of an awareness of his surroundings, of a need to read the earth and thus move silently through it.
A satisfied smirk crossed his maw as small black talons sank into the sands, drawing their secrets to the surface. By the time he reached adolescence this young cub would come to understand every corner of this desert, would come to read it and find his way even in the deepest darkness, and he would move through the shadows like death itself.
But for now he was a cub, and there was much still to learn.
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