A Lion's Heart (7 page)

“You attack very fiercely,” Lormar said, “but you clearly lack true hunting skills. You must have been driven from your pride before the females could fully teach you, am I right?”

Tamarind gave one, small nod, but he said with conviction, “I can do it.”

Lormar snorted. “And how well were you hunting before the werecheetahs enslaved you?”

Tamarind turned away and looked very angry and embarrassed.

“Tamarind,” Shakra was afraid now, afraid that Tamarind was about to make a very bad decision. “I know this place bothers you, but out there... You don't know anything about hunting in a forest or what dangers live there. We've found something that you can eat. It's warm and comfortable here. I can keep you safe-”

“Can you?” Tamarind hissed and glared at him, silver eyes almost glowing with temper. “And what difference is there in this than in being in the cage of a werecheetah?”

“Here, you're promised a chance to return home, under escort, and alive,” Shakra argued. “Out there, I can't help you.”

Tamarind was suddenly very close, all warmth, soft, purring breath, and Savannah scent. His eyes bored into Shakra's and he said distinctly, “I am going. Will you stop me?”

Was it a threat? Shakra heard one, but Tamarind's body language said something else. It was pleading, wanting him to give in without a fight. Shakra let out a long breath and closed his eyes. Then he opened them again and they were harder. He ordered Lormar briskly, “Accompany us out of the city after nightfall. I doubt that we can keep everyone from knowing that Tamarind is leaving, but we will try to keep it from happening. Tell no one, not even Shang.”

Lormar nodded. Kyrill looked distressed.

“Tamarind! You can't mean to go?” Kyrill reached out and touched Tamarind's arm boldly. “I don't understand why you would risk yourself when Shakra is offering you protection until we leave here for my home.”

“Being free is more important than being safe,” Tamarind replied, and then he went to a window and looked out, waiting for nightfall.

Chapter Seven

Shakra crouched beside Tamarind, staring around them nervously and ears cocked for any sound. Lormar was crouched low behind them, a sword held ready, and Tamarind was looking confused already, ears down, and tail twitching.

“We can go back,” Shakra almost begged. “You don't have to do this.”

“I'll... get used to it,” Tamarind replied, but his assurance wasn't wholly steady. “I feel better already, being out of that place.”

“We'll meet here, tomorrow, at midday,” Shakra promised. “I'll bring food.”

Tamarind snarled. “I can hunt!”

Shakra's hackles rose, but he willed them down in the next instant. He wasn't going to part in anger. “I know you can,” he decided to agree. “But it may be a few days before you learn how to hunt here.”

“Nothing is his equal, here,” Lormar grumbled. “Leave him and let's go back. I feel danger in the air. I'm certain we were followed. The sooner he goes into the ferns and the darkness, the better.”

Shakra felt hesitant, but determined. He could barely make out Tamarind in the dappled moonlight. It made it harder to say, “I feel that we've become friends. I don't want you to suffer... to go hungry.”

“Friends?” Tamarind sounded surprised and then thoughtful as he replied, “Yes, I think... All right. I'll be here... midday.”

Shakra was relieved, but it took very little away from his anxiousness for Tamarind's safety.

“I'll have fresh meat,” Shakra promised.

“Warm?” Tamarind asked.

“Warm,” Shakra promised, though he didn't know how he was going to accomplish that. He would have given Tamarind the moon, just then, for his promise to meet with him.

“I need a lot of meat,” Tamarind worried. “You'll bring enough?”

“What happened to,
I can hunt
?” Lormar wondered under his breath.

Tamarind growled, “If he is determined to meet, he might as well bring what I need!”

“Of course,” Lormar snorted sarcastically.

Tamarind crouched as if he were about to spring. Lormar gripped his sword tightly and backed up a few, wary paces.

“That's enough!” Shakra ordered sharply. He stepped between Lormar and Tamarind and inadvertently brushed against Tamarind's soft, warm fur. That touch caused a rush of heat to flood Shakra's body.

“You... smell,” Tamarind said suddenly.

Lormar snickered. Shakra glared and blushed.

“What... What is that?” Tamarind wondered.

“Love,” Lormar laughed and Shakra felt like murder.

“I don't understand. It smells like...” Tamarind trailed off and Shakra heard an audible swallow. Tamarind was suddenly moving off into the woods. “I have to go. I need to find a den.”

He was gone into the night then, like a shadow, without a leaf crunching under his paws. Shakra stood, ears cocked, trying to catch a sound or a scent on the wind blowing back to him. He smelled it then... like... warm milk... spices... heat... sizzling vanilla...

Lormar smelled it too. “It seems that your werelion isn't a cub any longer either.”

Shakra wanted to follow Tamarind, follow that incredible scent that was sending every hormone in his body into overdrive. The hard tug on his ruff made him snarl and whirl on Lormar. Lormar backed up a pace, but his expression was stern.

“We must go, prince,” Lormar urged.

Shakra made a sound of frustration, but he followed Lormar obediently. After a few paces, though, it came to him that here was the one person who could answer his questions. It seemed appropriate too, to be in the shadows while he asked them.

“Lormar?”

“Prince Shakra?”

“You and Kyrill...”

“Yes?”

“You... mate.”

“Yes, we mate.”

“Why... why with each other and not... with females?”

There was a long pause and then Lormar replied, sounding puzzled himself, “I don't know. I have always been attracted to males.”

Shakra swallowed hard, feeling hot with embarrassment. “So... you and Kyrill...”

“Yes?”

“Mate.”

There was a small chuckle. “Yes.”

Shakra steeled himself. “How?”

Another silence. “Do you know anything about mating, even in the normal way?”

“With... females.”

Lormar sounded curious, “Have you tried...?”

“No.”

“Then how...?”

“Talk.”

“Ah...”

“It's somewhat the same,” Lormar explained, “But more difficult and in... another place.”

Shakra choked. He'd suspected but... “Does it... hurt?”

“It can, if you're a fool and don't go slowly and if you don't have a care for your mate,” Lormar replied. “I can explain... if you like?”

Lormar sounded uncomfortable. Shakra felt that he was going to burst into flames. “Yes... I think I need to know.”

Lormar sounded thoughtful now, cautious, “Of course, anything I tell you does pertain to werewolves and werefoxes. I've never... I don't know anyone who's been with a werelion.”

Shakra ducked his head and his ears drooped. “I've seen... I've seen that they are the same as we are.”

“Have you?” Lormar snorted, but then he became serious again. “A werewolf might bite, might claw, but a werelion... if you hurt or offend him, he could easily kill you.”

“I know,” Shakra replied. “That's why I need to know... in case... not that I think... he's probably not interested-”

“Oh, I think he is, prince,” Lormar interjected.

“How...” Shakra struggled. “How do you know who is...mated?”

“There isn't a rule, Prince,” Lormar explained. “Some like to be mated and some like to mate. Some like both. There is a way, though, to see whether someone is predisposed to... being mated.”

“How?” Shakra demanded anxiously.

“You hold the neck, at the back. It doesn't have to be hard. If a werewolf is... submissive, he'll lift his tail for you,” Lormar explained. “I'm not certain this works with werelions, but...”

“Does Kyrill... lift his tail for you?” Shakra wondered.

“That's personal,” Lormar growled.

Shakra moved away from that question quickly, not wanting to anger Lormar and lose his chance to have his questions answered. “Could you tell me... how... how I do it?”

Lormar explained then, and Shakra felt waves of heat assail his body until...

Shakra grunted and crouched, ears down.

Lormar stopped and looked back at him. “My Prince?”

Shakra remained crouching and hid his face in his hands.

“Think of Kol, bathing, with Tikena,” Lormar suggested, guessing his problem.

Shakra tried to imagine it, but it was hard.

“I could help you,” Lormar suggested. “I don't stray, but you are a prince. Kyrill wouldn't have to know.”

The thought of Lormar mating him did more than a face full of cold water. Shakra snarled and raised his short ruff. His painful excitement went away and he stood up.

“Never,” Shakra snapped.

“I'm not that bad,” Lormar chuckled.

Shakra snarled and stormed past him toward the keep. After a moment, and a chuckle, Lormar followed.

**************

Tamarind nosed through the ferns, hating the heavy smell of earth, plants, and the pungent smell of strange animals. The darkness was his friend. His eyes caught the moonlight and flashed with a rainbow of light as he stepped softly and tried to keep low.

He marked a few trees discretely, so that he would remember his way back, and hoped someone else wouldn't use that scent to trap him again. Nervously, Tamarind moved far downwind before he began his search for a place to sleep. On the Savannah, they built small huts, but Tamarind had rarely slept in them. He preferred a smooth rock high up above the tall grasses, the clear, starry sky, and the moon sailing overhead.

The ground grew rocky and sloped sharply upward. Tamarind picked his way carefully and then found a small opening half hidden by ferns and the roots of trees. Tamarind squeezed in, hating the chill of the rock, the cold ground, and the lack of space. He didn't want to be out in the open, though, not when his senses were so confused.

Tamarind curled up into a ball, tucking inward so that he was protected by the thick fur on his legs. He stared out at the darkness and listened to the sound of tree branches rubbing together in a breeze. Leaves rustled and animals made small noises. Crickets made an endless symphony punctuated by croaking frogs. That told Tamarind where there was water and food. He would eat frogs if that was all he could manage to kill.

Grimacing at having to fall that low, Tamarind's thoughts wandered toward home and what must be happening there. It pained him when he thought of Kiva. The werelion had been as close as a brother to Tamarind. It hadn't surprised him when he had declined to challenge Katze for his sake. The white leader of their pride was a huge werelion and skilled at fighting. Challenging him would have meant death. It did hurt that Kiva hadn't followed him into the Savannah. Male werelions often paired when they were cast out from their prides, and it wasn't unusual for such friends to share the leadership of a pride. If there were many females, it would take more than one male to satisfy them and to keep other males from trying to claim them. Such partnerships were almost necessary.

Katze had broken that tradition though. He hadn't driven out all males, just Tamarind. Kiva, and other males who had pledged their allegiance, he had kept close and, it seemed, he was using them to take over all the prides. Katze was determined to take them to war. It was unheard of, strange to contemplate. Werelions belonged on the Savanna. They weren't meant for forests.

Tamarind thought of his foster mother and the pain in his heart grew. She had broken tradition to adopt him. If she had tried to stop Katze from sending him away, Tamarind hadn't seen it. He closed his eyes and tried to think of her soft, warm fur and her comforting voice. In the cold of a small hole in the rocks of a strange forest, it was impossible to breathe life into that memory. It was much easier, far easier, to remember the warmth of a certain werewolf.

Tamarind felt an uncomfortable heat again, the same heat that had come over him when he had caught Shakra's new scent. Something about the prince drew him, but Tamarind didn't understand what that something might be. The prince was arrogant, rude, and commanding... yet, he had shown Tamarind kindness. Tamarind didn't want to warm to him or be grateful. He was still hurting from his capture by the werecheetahs and he had seen enough of the political and social intrigue of the Keep to have a bad taste in his mouth. Allowing any kind of... friendship... to develop, between himself and a prince of such a place... Common sense told him that it could only end badly. Better to be alone and hope that the hyper werefox would keep his promise to take him home.

Yet... Tamarind sighed. Werelions fought for leadership so they could mate with females. Tamarind had never felt the urge, had never wanted to challenge Katze or leave to find his own pride. He had been comfortable among the females and being friends with Kiva. Kiva had joked that he was still a cub, and to give it time, but even Kiva had begun to wonder about his friend when he himself had followed the scent of a female and dallied in secret, while Tamarind had felt complete indifference.

The strong feelings that Shakra's scent had ignited... was that what he was supposed to feel for females? Tamarind chewed on the end of his tail, ears down, as he thought about it. What had he wanted to do when he had smelled Shakra's scent? Tamarind blushed hotly and tucked his head down, curling up tighter. He had wanted to... dally... Tamarind was honest with himself. He had seen Katze mate. He knew how it was done. Somehow, he didn't think it was something that two males were supposed to do, though. His imagination painted options, painted a detailed picture of Shakra and himself doing something like...

Tamarind groaned and hid his face completely. The need between his legs was suddenly very intense. It wasn't pain, but it was something that begged the same respite. He felt... this had to be wrong, what he felt. It had to be something to be ashamed of. He was
wanting
a werewolf, a male werewolf; a bad tempered prince of a foreign land who was about to go to war with the prides.

It had to be wrong. This new place was confusing him. If he just ignored it, until he returned to the prides, he would become normal and he would want females like he was supposed to. He would meet up with Kiva and he would convince the werelion to go with him and form their own pride.

In the dark, and in a strange place, it was hard to convince himself of those things. Tamarind's thoughts wandered back to Shakra as if Shakra had become his mental lodestone. Why had Shakra suddenly become more appealing than his best friend? At that moment, it was Shakra he'd rather be with, Tamarind realized; Shakra whom he wished would follow him, not Kiva.

Tamarind bit into his tail, punishing himself. He needed sleep. He needed to be sharp and ready to hunt and defend himself. Worrying about something he was sure would never come to pass, was a dangerous waste of time. Even if his body had lost its senses and wanted a werewolf, Prince Shakra didn't have any interest in him like that.