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The Savannah

Prologue

“No!” cried Beige, holding her baby closer to her, and backing away from the approaching leopard. But the leopard wasn’t going for Beige, but for the dark skinned baby. The leopard was far from hungry—she had feasted on a gazelle little more than two hours ago. The baby’s destiny was with the big cats of the Kenyan savanna, not with the humans, and she had been chosen to rescue the baby and bring her to her true home. “Please,” gasped Beige, “let me keep her,” The leopard gently growled, as if reminding Beige of something.

“Leave the girl with me,” the leopard hissed tenderly, “I will take care of her.” Beige, who had always been quite a strange human, understood the cat, but wouldn’t give in. She shook her head silently, and turned around, clasping the young toddler close and walked in the opposite direction. The leopard was not going to give up so easily. She had remembered those days when she herself was striving to figure out where she had truly belonged. There was only one more tactic to use in retrieving the baby, and that was to attack.

The leopard pounced, with her claws sheathed. She only needed the infant, and intended to give her mother no more than a bruise. She grabbed the tiny girl by her shirt and held her gently with her teeth. Then, without turning back to her mother, the leopard trotted back to the nearest tree and gingerly scaled it, careful not to hurt the baby. Beige turned away, knowing that her fight was lost. But before she could go too far, the leopard had come back to her (she had left the girl in the tree) and, as if comforting, rubbed against the humans legs. Beige looked down, her eyes clouded with regret and grief.

“Fear not, Beige, your baby will thrive and be honored by all cats.” the leopard mewed. Beige nodded, knelt down and touched her nose to the leopard’s fur, then ran away as fast as her simple two legs could take her, until she was a mere dot in the distance, running straight into the horizon.

The leopard sniffed silently, then padded back to the tree where the baby awaited.

Chapter One

“Tanya, I’m going to see the lions! Brightfur is having kits!” called Amber, the human, to Tanya. Tanya was a leopard that had taken care of Amber since her mother had died in a stampede of buffalo. Tanya nodded, and Amber set off. She climbed nimbly down the tree and ran, much faster than the normal human, to the lions’ den. Normally, lions and leopards were enemies, but all of the cats were used to Amber, and accepted her as their own.

Amber arrived at the lions’ den. All of the lions and lionesses were crowded around Brightfur, which could only mean that she’d had her kits already.

“Hello, Amber!” A young lion cub bounded up to her.

“Oh, hello, Flame.” Amber stroked the tom’s soft, flaming yellow head. He would be leaving his own pride in a few months to establish a pride of his own. Amber would miss the young lion. “Did Brightfur have a she-cat or a tom?” she asked, suddenly remembering why she had come. She pushed through the crowd and found her way to Brightfur. She was thoroughly surprised when she saw three kits by Brightfur’s side. They were all tiny, mewling kits, two of them toms who appeared to be perfectly healthy, the other, a tiny female, who was shivering and sneezing. Brightfur was licking her vigorously, and Amber knew that without proper care, the kit would die soon. Suddenly, Brightfur looked up at Amber. She seemed weak and tired, but healthy.

“Greetings, dear Amber,” she rasped. Amber put her arms around her, glad that she was safe, and nothing had happened to her when she was bearing her kits. Then her gaze fell back to the small kit. “Will you help me take care of her?” she asked, looking back up to Amber.

“Of course!” cried Amber, then picked up the tawny, temporarily spotted cub. “What will you name them?”

Murmurs of agreement spread about her as the cats wondered openly what Brightfur would name them. She nodded reluctantly.

“This tom here,” she picked him up and placed him next to his sister, “is Sand, after the yellow sand of the dry parts of the savannah.” She nodded to his brother, who was a silky golden color. “This one will be Rain, after the downpours that come each year. As for his sister,” There was a deep pause. “She will be called Savannah, after the place that we cats call home. Perhaps this will keep her alive longer.”

Chapter 2

It had been many months since Brightfur had given her kits, and now, with Savannah to look after, Amber was spending more and more of her time with the lions.

“Amber please don’t go to the loins today—I’m feeling lonely.” Pleaded Tanya one morning as Amber was awakening.

Amber, being kind hearted and half asleep agreed. “Sure, I’ll stay with you today.”

The two spent the day bickering gently and talking about random things and dreaming. Amber recalled a time when she had been strolling in the savannah after a wild fire that had swept through the plains. She had come across a burnt to death gazelle and, being very hungry indeed, decided to eat it. To her surprise, she found the flakey meal quite delicious and brought it back to Amber and Tanya’s favorite tree so that Tanya could taste some of it. Tanya had reluctantly bit into it after much persuasion on Amber’s part, only to spit it out in utter disgust.

“How can you like such a tasteless thing?” she had hissed. “What’s meat without the blood?”

Amber had narrowed her eyes, hissing back that she had never liked the taste of blood anyway. However, she could hardly ever enjoy burn meat except for after wildfires, for Amber didn’t know how to make this bright, hot flame—brighter than the pelts of the brightest cat and hotter than the fur of any sick one. To the cats, fire was something to avoid and be constantly looking out for, not one to go chasing and bringing back.

It was the beginning of the great- rains of the savannah, and sometimes, the savannah would flood. The rains had begun, and Amber and Tanya climbed up their favorite tree and Amber crept close against Tanya’s beige dappled fur, trying to seek warmth from the cold rains. Amber’s eyes closed and she felt herself slipping away to the land of sleeping leopards…

“What’s that?” Amber awoke with a start. It was Tanya. “I smell lion!” she declared. Amber tasted the air as she had seen Tanya do. Her sense of smell had never been as keen as the cats’. She caught a whiff of lion, but it took her all of her focus to smell it.

“Tanya! Amber! Please,” it was Flame, and panting.

“What do you want?” Tanya spat contemptuously.

“Help! Rain is missing! We can’t find him anywhere!” Flame wailed. Tanya was of no help.

“Not my problem, she mewed, and rested her head back on the tree branch. But Amber was already down the tree.

“Come on! Let’s see what I can do for Rain.” And they ran like the wind to the lion pride.

Water was still pouring out of the sky as a hungry hyena scavenged for his food.

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to be continued....