-1I fell into a hole and can’t get out…

It’s too deep…

Nobody can save me now…

Clouds, brown and dust-laden, swirled in the calm air. They swirled, despite there being no wind. It was surreal, large balls of cloud, rolling, rolling…

The air was sharp, crisp bitter cold, and frost formed on the clouds’ moisture. It was a freezing air.

The ruddy brown earth was covered in frost, grass and small, stunted trees were covered as well. They sparkled in the light of a sun that could not find its way through the clouds, but made them glow as it shone through them as light traveled through freezing water droplets.

The freezing clouds hung low to the ground, like a fog of icy death, and the surrounding land was hidden from view. All that existed was the icy ground and the sky that had frozen it.

The clouds lifted slightly as the sun’s rays tried its best to break through. The sun wanted to see what was hiding beneath the frozen blanket, its warmth trying to fight it away. Something horrific lay beneath the cloud bank, but what was it?

There was the smell of blood, and it was strong.

Where there was no ice, where the warmth of cooling blood had prevented the ground from giving way to the shadow of death that had come from the sky, there lay bodies… many bodies. Lifeless and gored, nearly a dozen lions, enough to make up a small pride, lay silently in a land where the vultures had already left, were beginning to rot slowly in the cold. Most were lionesses, the huntresses of a lion pride. There was only one fully adult male, his head violently ripped from his soft body. The few other males were just adolescents, manes barely grown in at all.

There were dead cubs here as well.

A mother lioness lay over the destroyed bodies of a few small cubs, seeming to mourn them in death as they would in life, bodies cold.

Blood striped the ground like the hide of a zebra, and paw tracks crisscrossed in soil that was once moist. Evidence of struggles, fights, and defeat was strewn out across the small battlefield. It was apparent there was nothing this small pride could’ve done to protect themselves from their attackers.

The attackers had long since moved on to new lands, to terrorize other small prides like this one, leaving a shadow of cold in their wake. Nothing the lions knew would ever live here again. This land would become dead, ridden with the smell of death.

Movement in the clouds, different from the usual rolling…

From a sunlit side of the slowly leaving clouds, a shape began to appear. It was the shape of a lion, coming out of the clouds. He was somewhat small in size, but was nearly an adult, mane not fully grown in.

As he stepped down to the earth below, his form changed slowly from clouds into the form of a solid lion, made of real flesh and fur. His mane kept the cloudy white color of the thundercloud, and his fur was yellow, the color of the stars and life giving sun. His eyes were a dark brown, and his nose was as black as the darkest reaches of the night sky. From his front paws rose the colors of the fire trails left behind from shooting stars, and on his back, a white circle, the symbol of the lion goddess of life and earth, Turkana.

This strange lion, bearing the colors of the sky, but the symbol of the earth, walked slowly on light paws towards the dead lions. His face was pure, but far from innocent, and bore the expressions of sadness, confusion… and betrayal. In his mouth, he carried a beaded feather of a white raven, a creature of life spirit, a companion of Turkana. The beads were colored of the four elements of the sky. Blue was at the top, a symbol of life giving rain. Black followed, representing darkness and the deepest of night, and of death. Then there was red, the fires of the sky that made the stars and sun burn on into eternity. And white, the color of the air, the wind, and the clouds.

Then there was the fifth bead…

The strange lion dared not to touch it, for it burned with the vengeful spirits of the dead pride that lay here, on the ground before him. They called for a cub. They wanted a cub to avenge their deaths, once it was to become older.

The strange lion sensed warmth among the cold bodies. There was life, buried, somewhere…

Coming close to the female with the dead cubs, he sensed warmth. There was light here, a burning energy. Was it possible a cub was still alive?

Pushing the dead lioness gently away from the cubs she was protecting, the strange lion found a cub, bloodied from the bodies of his dead siblings, but still breathing with an inner warmth still contained. The strange lion purred, happy to have found a cub that was strong enough to live on, even though he was weak and near-death.

The strange lion closed his eyes, and nuzzled the young cub as if he was giving his own life energy to bring the cub to open his eyes.

Do not be afraid, young cub. I may be a stranger, but I am here to help you.

The cub coughed up a few spats of blood as life began to return to him. His fur began to change from a pale tawny color to a much brighter yellow, enough to match the strange lion’s own coat. Around one of his front legs, a white stripe wrapped around, a spiral. The strange lion saw that, somewhat concerned. The spiral was the sky symbol, a sign of death…

Sky…

The small cub was coming back to life as his fur continued to change with the presence of life-giving magic. Above his left eye, the color shifted to a pure white, and above his right eye, it became a pitch black.

No more dawdling. We need to get away from here, little cub…

The strange lion attached the beaded feather to the cub’s mane, and the bead that contained the vengeful spirits changed to a solid green. He then picked the cub up by the scruff of his neck, and began to walk slowly away from the scene of death, not wanting the cub to open his eyes while they were still there.

The ground crunched as he walked on it. It was prickly, cold… the feelings of mortality…

The cub stirred in his sleep, but only weakly. The strange lion knew they needed to seek shelter with a new pride quickly. They would need food, and they wouldn’t be able to find it on their own.

Hurrying the pace, running in a southerly direction, the strange lion could sense the presence of the creatures that had destroyed this pride. There were many of them, and they were watching.

Why am I just now sensing this?

He felt the coldness of being chased…

He ran, breathing as hard as he could through his black nose alone, carrying the cub in his jaws. The wind picked up, and his small mane became ruffled, and the sky became darkly clouded. A boom of thunder rolled in the distance, and rain began to stab at his eyes.

All he could hear was the wind, and all he could see were the shadows…

He was running down hill, chased. Slipping and sliding over the loose rocks, he felt panic, but he wouldn’t give in. This could be the end…

The rain was heavy and blinded the lion, vision cut off from the curtains of heavily falling water. The loose gravel beneath his paws was wet, making his strong legs unsteady.

Finally, he lost his footing, crashing onto the jagged slope, dropping the cub. The cub made a soft squeak as he hit the hard, sharp rocks. The strange lion looked up from where he had fallen, in terrible pain. The cub was several strides away, facing in the other direction, not moving. Groaning, the lion tried to stand up and walk towards the cub. He felt the bones in his front leg strain and complain, and rocks lodged in an open wound stabbed into his flesh.

Stay there, little cub. I’m coming for you.

Limping, he heard the cries of the monsters all around him. They were hiding in the rain, laughing. They had thought they won this fight. The strange lion would never give into their desires.

He gently lifted the small cub into his jaws once more, and limped on. Running wouldn’t help them now. All he could do was pray Turkana would help them, despite all that had happened…

The strange lion took a step, and the rocks below gave way. He slipped, keeping hold of the cub, then fell over the edge of a sharp cliff into the ravine of a rain-swollen river.