“No! Please don’t! Don’t hurt her! I’m begging you!” she ceaselessly cried, desperate, hopeless, broken. Whilst Shenya had previously stared at her in contempt, awe and fear at her enemy, now she just couldn’t help but feel sorry for her.

*

Shenya stared up, much as everyone else was doing, at Shetani. She stared up at the helpless cub, still in between the Graymane’s bloody yaws.

So this is the sight of victory?

Everyone had become silent, until suddenly, the cub on the Rock burst out in tears again, leading to another stream of pleas from the now obviously broken Nala. Staring up, Shenya felt her stomach turning. Cubs had never crossed her mind… and seeing their fate foreshadowed, she couldn’t help but considerer it awfully wrong.

Upon Nala’s new pleas, a single hyena suddenly broke out into laughter, whilst another one started shouting encouragements towards Shetani telling her to... drop the cub? To Shenya's shock, it wasn't long before the entire clan joined in cheers, seemingly celebrating their victory at the expense of one unsuspecting little cub, whilst the hyena's around her started hailing both Shenya and victory with appaling satisfaction. The surviving lions started in shock. And so did Shenya. But it wasn’t just the cub, it were her clanmates: trusted friends, bright younglings and even caring mothers, all of them cheering at the sight of one defenseless, innocent, harmless young lion being subjected to such a grim fate. She looked at the cub again.

They're thieves, murderers, savages, heartless brutes…

She then looked at the still cheering clan, cheering at the impending doom of a harmless little being guilty of nothing but being born.

…savages, heartless brutes.

“No! stop this! For Spirits’ sake, Shetani, put it down!” Shenya suddenly found herself shouting. But her plea was lost in the ever swelling laughing, cheering, shouting and hailing. It took her another attempt to draw attention. As one, the whole clan turned to her in disbelief and ignorance, the by now ecstatic Banzaï most of all. ‘What had gotten into her all of a sudden?’ they collectively seemed to ask themselves, ‘Why doesn’t she shout 'Hail to victory!' for all to hear?’

“Put it down, now!”

More stares of disbelief, most of all from Shetani, who eventually, but reluctantly, ordered her subordinate with the cub to back away from the edge of the Rock a bit. The clan kept staring, now confused. No cheers nor hails were to be heard. But the silence wasn't absolute, though: in the wake of the awkward atmosphere following her command, Shenya began hearing some noise to her left. In the aftermath of the fight, a small circle had formed there, consisting of silently whispering hyenas and one, badly hurt lioness (though she still sat upright, staring into the circle as well). Shenya couldn’t really see what was going on in the circle, so she moved closer to take a peek, and so did most others, even the now slightly calmed down Nala.

Within the circle lay one hyena, seemingly just one of the many corpses now scattered at the base of Priderock, and one lioness. The hyena, however, was still breathing, albeit not regular nor easy. At first, Shenya thought that to be because of the young lioness, whose paws were firmly pressed to the hyena’s neck. But just before she was about to order the lioness to back of immediately, she noticed a gulp of blood welling up through the lioness' paws. Then, she realized what the lioness was doing; she was trying to ease the hyena’s bleeding, as its artery seemed to have been slashed. In spite of the ever increasing mumbling rising up from the crowd around her, the young lioness just kept staring forward, a single tear regularly dripping down onto the blood stained ground, desperately trying to postpone the inevitable fate awaiting the wounded hyena. As Shenya moved closer, she suddenly recognized the casualty: Kim, the messenger. She seemed to be trying to say something, but even as Shenya mover her ear right next to Kim, she couldn’t understand her. Did she want them to help her, to prolong her life by mere minutes at best? Or to end her suffering?

Unable to further look at but one of the countless tragedy's to have taken place that dawn, Shenya did all she could; she put her paw on the lioness’, gently pushing hers aside, allowing Kim’s blood to flow freely, letting the mangled hyena pass into eternal slumber, just one of the many lives to have been lost that day. The lioness resisted a bit at first, but after one or two comforting words from Shenya, she gave in, and collapsed in tears. But lion nor hyena stepped up to provide any comfort, everyone just stared, locked in a dreadful, tormenting silence. For a moment, Shenya looked at the young lioness who, it seemed, had been desperately attempting to save Kim’s life for reasons unclear to her.

…murderers…

She looked at up the by now famous lion cub again, still under a Graymane’s control, seemingly only just saved from a certain and undeserved demise.

…savages, heartless brutes.

She looked around her, around the battlefield at Priderock’s base, now covered in lion and hyena bodies alike, in death side by side. She didn’t have the hearth to count them.

What have I done?

Breaking the law

I bet he’ll try to cross us over again, I’m sure of it… Once you turn into a traitor, there’s no way back. Uh, I can’t believe Vitani let him off just like that, and that she’s following him again too! She’s putting herself (not to mention me as well) in harm’s way trusting him like that.

“How much longer?” Vitani yawned, slacking behind Kiruhu fatigued.

“Almost there, probably less than an hour, then we’ll reach the crossing,” the cheetah reassured, although Vincent was less than convinced, which he immediately made clear:

“You’re sure the ‘crossing’ isn’t just one of your obscure metaphors for getting us killed in one or another gruesome manner?” he sneered.

“Come on Vincent, give him a break already. He got us out of the mountains, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, and he almost killed us halfway through…”

Kiruhu tried to ignore Vincent’s never ceasing nasty remarks to the best of his abilities, or at least refrain from responding to them: Vincent had a point, after all. Kiruhu was, all in all, very lucky to still be alive after what he had done; he knew that by all accounts, he should have already been dead, no use complaining there. So the party just journeyed on under the setting sun, bickering every now and then over whether forgivingness and atonement were the path to follow, never reaching a conclusion. At a given point they neared a large, run-down baobab, hardly noticing it. Nothing peculiar, although Vitani did at one time spot from the corner of her eyes a green hornbill flying by, but she didn’t pay any real attention to it.

“Can you hear the river too?”

“Nope…”

“No? Oh… Just thought I heard something…”

“Well I didn’t…”

“And where are you going?”

All three predators startled at the sound of the unknown voice which seemed to be coming out of nowhere. Vitani cautiously looked around, until she spotted the baobab.

“No way… Not out here…” she sighed, looking at the tree.

“What’s happening?” Vincent wondered, a bit nervous. But Vitani ignored him and casually headed towards the tree. Her companions followed, cautious but curious as well.

“Rafiki? You pothead baboon, is that you?”

Suddenly, an upside-down face appeared out of the leafs, much to Vincent and Kiruhu’s surprise; they sprung back in shock. The ape – or whatever it was that had appeared – broke out in laughter.

The mandrill, however, burst out in laughter again before Vitani could continue.

“ Ha ha, ‘looks peculiar’! That’s one way of putting it – but I’d go easy on the looking!” he exclaimed as he fluently swung out of the tree, landing just in front of Vitani. He then looked straight at Vitani, who then saw something was out of place: the mandrill’s eyes seemed covered in a transparent, white fog.

“What the… You okay?”

“Oh, I’m okay. At least I’m not seeingly blind,” the mandrill added a bit mysterious, “And I’ve got a spare pair of eyes with me as well!”

“He’s not just as blind as a bat, but totally bonkers too…” Vincent whispered. Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, the mandrill struck out with a large decorated stick he’d