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Smart, Fierce, Loyal, Blunt like a Stone, Harsh but Secretly Soft Hearted
Aiana had just finished telling a story, the cubs, the young lionesses through to even the old enraptured by her smooth tones. Smooth and unending, like the colours of her pelt, marked with the reminder that the leader would have to leave them.
Aiana - the wonderful soul who lingered with the Pride, even as her soul was drawn to the starry kingdom above, it's tether weakening inside her strengthened, honed body. Her shell, her vessel. She would make a wonderful Queen there, too. Imagine all the Pride's ancestors, and former leaders, meeting her again up there, Kinnara sighed a little, and even though she was young, wondered about her mother up there, identical in looks. but with an endless void of calmness about her. Kinnara herself tending to be a hotter-burning personality, a passionate one. Over the clearing, Elren sighed silently, wondering where she would go when she died. To the stars, or someplace else? She'd always been quiet, disconnected from the pride, yet somehow still involved. She didn't watch the cubs with a motherly pride like the other lionesses did, but more of a kind of spark, a hope for their future. A willingness to secure that for them. Perhaps she'd go toa place she'd long since left, with her blood kin, but maybe... maybe she'd stay up there with the rest of the pride, despite her distant ancestry. Though she didn't show it, the idea of being with her accepting pride even in the after was a warm thought. Aiana had secured that for her.
Aiana - none of the pride knew the mysterious secret of her strangely long life, or the white mark that now sliced her face in two. One side, her almost glowing pelt shimmered, and on the other, blank, fresh white stretched like an endless desert plain of burning white sand.
She was powerful, this leader, this lioness with a coat of darkness dripped into with colours of sunset. Perhaps she would not just be a Queen, but perhaps something more, as well. Maybe something more. Maybe even a Goddess.
After all, she had been the one to lead them through the demons rise for power, the path of the shamans, the hunger, the near-apocalypse. She had communed with the very god of death himself and even come back from it, not once, but twice.
Once where her mortal lifespan ended, and she fought to live another for her pride, twice where that fragile tether slipped during the aftermath of the great battle, the creation of a powerful vessel, and into the dark of death only to be led back by Anubis, as thanks. She had lived long, Aiana. even though she had been avoided death twice now, and been re-established in her own body and even another vessel's, the lioness who seemingly ran from death would probably be happy to see the her friend the god of death once more, and gladly walk through the gates to whichever realm she was meant for.
The idea of some form of higher power to be gained didn't seem so outrageously unlikely to most of the pride. The thought that they lived and breathed and ate and slept with possibly an almost divine being wasn't as shocking as it might have been. Whether she was a God or not, Aiana was Aiana, and they loved her for it.
~~
"RUN!" Zarya roared from the edge of the clearing. Already, Mipha tired. She ran and ran and ran, pushed and pushed, but it was never enough. She burst through the grasses, around trees and bushes and rocks, pain screaming along her exhausted muscles. Her paws skidded over the line, where her mother waited.
"Good," her mother said, scrutinising her daughter's panting form, "but not good enough. Train harder."
Misha slumped at the words, but before she could rest, her mother's command came again. "Up. Eight brisk laps around the hill, then join me." She padded away.
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