was, in a word, lost.

“You crazy or somethin’?” shouted Mtundu as he straggled up, sides heaving as he too fought for breath. “You peed on Elizabeth for cryin’ out loud!! She kills animals for less’n that!”

“Hush!” Nengwalamwe stared about, nonplussed at the sight of the odd scrub vegetation all around. The ground around them was flat, cracked and dusty; small zephyrs of air swirling sand about his paws and settling in-between his toes.

“What for? We lost the bums anyways, lucky us. They’ll be layin’ for us when we get back…”

“Who is this Mary anyway?”

“Oh her; she was the dog you wasted.”

“I’ve never killed any dog.”

“Nengwe - come on. That dog in the hollow - don’t go all innocent on me. Even I know lion claw and teeth marks when I se’em.”

“Lion’s teeth you say? Who’s? They weren’t mine.”

“One of the lionesses then eh? Shaha? She hates the dogs.”

“No chance - she was too weak. Anyway, she and they seem to have some… arrangement or something. Maybe it was one of Yali’s pride?”

Now it was the baboon’s turn to be puzzled.

“Who’s? No, Fuzzbutt, if it weren’t Shaha it had to be Falana. Who else can it have been?”

Nengwalamwe grew tired of guessing.

“We’ll never find out now anyway so what’s the point?”

“You’re right there Fuzzbutt. The dogs’ll be after you when we get back no matter who did it. Kinda takes the shine of going back dun’it.”

“They’d be after you too if we went back. And anyway, just how do we do that?!” Nengwalamwe glared at him, motioning wildly with a forepaw and showering the baboon with a dusting of sand. “Where are we, Baldarse?”

Mtundu looked around, and then back at the lion. “How should I know? You were leadin’, Fuzzbutt!”

“Don’t tell me I get all the blame for this? I was running awa… well yeah, here.”

“Naw, I was talkin’ to the lizard over there. Not you, you musclehead, despite the fact you peed on Lizzie, and you led us off on this wild romp, and you…”

Nengwalamwe snarled and shoved his face into Mtundu’s, nose butted to nose. The monkey suddenly become very aware of the lion’s size and power.

“Erm… never mind.” Mtundu grinned queasily and pushed a stray hair of Nengwe’s mane out of his eyes, patting it back in place gently. “What’s your plan, huh?”

Nengwalamwe’s mood subsided somewhat, his rage slipping away, revealing the worry beneath. “Plan? I don’t know… first things first. Let’s find some water.” Without waiting for a reply, he turned and paced off slowly out onto the shimmering flats, looking about uneasily like an ancient sailor who has taken his ship too close to the edge of the world.

 

***

 

Some hours later, lion and ape strode slowly alongside each other. They followed a lugga then the meandering trail of the river as it snaked its way from the distant mountains, their snowy peaks glimmering red in the twilight. The river cut a clean deep furrow into the paw burning, pad scraping flatlands. Nengwalamwe moved slowly, pausing now and again to scramble down into the river gully to soothe his sore paws in the rustling water for a moment before moving on. The gully was too rough to follow for any distance, and he would have to scrape, slide and scrabble back up to the flats the way he had come. He stood by the water, craning his neck out from the dry mud, hardened into churned ridges and deep furrows. He closed his eyes for a moment in relief as the cool water rushed over his paws, soaking the tawny fur.

“You okay Fuzzbutt?”

“Yeah… just sore, is all.” Nengwalamwe lifted a paw in cursory examination and winced; the tough pads were lined and cracked, the hard skin scraped away in places revealing raw flesh beneath. The desert hardpan had not been kind to him during his flight. A sudden wind had kicked up a brief but violent sandstorm, forcing him to huddle down with his back to it. Mtundu had sheltered in the turbulent lee of his body.

Peering down at his reflection, Nengwalamwe observed glumly the destruction of his years of painstaking grooming; his mane was tousled and caked with dust, his eyes reddened and his nose and lips chapped and wind-burned. He was bedraggled, and he fancied not even the most desperate lioness would give him a second look.

Sighing, he made his way out a few paces into the shallows, closing his eyes and letting the cool stream of water soothe his paws. The burning sensation faded a little and he relaxed, his mind roving back again over the day’s events, worrying through the actions he’d taken like a dog harrying an old bone. Falana.… He grimaced. If there had been any chance of his botching that up any more, he wasn’t aware of it. He knew that ever since he’d met that lioness he’d played the fool, and he looked back on each occasion with increasing depression. It was becoming obvious that she wanted nothing to do with him, and considering his attitude; he couldn’t blame her.

‘She’s not Llasani, you idiot,’ he thought to himself viciously. ‘You can’t stride up to her, shake your mane about, and have her fall over in ecstasy.’

He froze, suddenly repelled at himself. Stars above, was that all he saw? A rump with a head attached? Had that been his intention all along… to impress her just enough to allow him to spend a few moments atop her? Had it really? He looked down at his reflection, his face screwing up in a horrible mask. “You sorry bastard,” he said to himself, “you’ve become your father after all.”

His reflection rippled gently in answer, glittering in the late sun. It reminded him of standing by the cave on the rock; the world beyond as impenetrable and unknown as what lay under the water. So calm, always there, never changing, always the same, mocking him, telling him how small he was, how weak he was… Then it exploded in a shattering spray of water and sand. Dark gleaming jaws snapped upward, water streaming away in sparkling glittering lines as something huge lifted up and seized a mouthful of his mane. Nengwalamwe uttered a choked scream and lurched backward and upwards, lifted clean off the ground by the devastating impact and then he was snapped back down, held fast in a unrelenting grip. He was twisting through the air, rolling over as easily as Nengwalamwe flicked his tail.

From behind him, a cry arose as the baboon looked on in utter helplessness, “NENGWE!”

Nengwalamwe looked down his muzzle in panic at the huge form that held him fast. The animal’s jaws were out of sight, but he felt them crushing his throat just as surely as he could feel the loathsome hide, rough and leathery, wetly matting the fur under his chin. Lifting his gaze, he met hi captor’s eyes, the dark unfocussed orbs alien and uncaring, swallowing his gaze and holding him horridly still. Then the eyes rolled back as the crocodile surged backwards, pulling Nengwalamwe into the now thick mud brown water.

The lion uttered a choked sob and pulled desperately, his hind legs splaying apart and scrabbling in the loose sand, his claws leaving long furrows as he was dragged inexorably forward. The water parted around his head; then closed above him, cloaking him in the brown murk of the reptilian underworld. His forepaws flailed desperately, sending up huge showers of water as he splashed helplessly about, seeking any kind of purchase and finding nothing but loose rocks and smooth, silky mud. His throat tried to release a low pitched whining sound as he whipped from side to side, rocking himself desperately, trying to gain some leverage - any leverage. By the stars that he would never see again, this thing was going to drag him in. Drag him in and eat him and there would be nothing left behind to show that Nengwalamwe had ever existed….

 

***

 

Mtundu rushed into the water, grabbed Nengwalamwe’s tail, gripped him painfully and tugging backwards futilely. “Oh jeez, this ain’t doin’ nuffin’. You dumb fuzzball, PULL DAMN YOU!”

The soupy water boiled and foamed angrily as the crocodile’s tail, fully as long as a lion, broke surface, thrashing against a massive midstream boulder. The crocodile could go no further into the water, which was barely deep enough to cover the crocodile’s back. It pulled away sideways, struggling to gain depth. In its fight to slip into deeper water, it neglected its prey. Mtundu watched and heaved. Nengwalamwe’s aching hind paws suddenly found some purchase on the rocks of the riverbed, and he yanked back jerkily. His mane broke surface sending showers of silver droplets over his back as he lurched wildly, trying to snatch his life back from the crocodile’s jaws.

He felt the pressure lessen and he tugged with renewed lung-burning hope, contorting insanely as he began to pull free. The crocodile gave a sudden lurch as it sensed its prey escaping. With a low grunt, it whipped its long snout to one side and rolled; twisting Nengwalamwe further off balance and sending him face first into the water once more, dragging him upstream. The world tilted sideways, and suddenly his vision filled with silver bubbles and muddy clouds of silt stirred up from the bottom. With a startled gasp he gulped

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