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  Under the Acacias

  ( Chronicles of the Pride Lands - 4 )

  John H. Burkitt

  David A. Morris

  Четвертая книга серии. История Узури, ее супруга и ее друга Рафики.

  UNDER THE ACACIAS

  by John Burkitt and David Morris

  Part Four of Chronicles of the Pride Lands

  FOREWORD BY THE AUTHORS:

  Much of this material was originally slated to appear in “Shadow of the Makei,” and “Spirit Quest,” but it pulled from the focus of the works. It had to wait its turn to be published. Does this mean the material is a series of “outtakes” stitched together? Hardly! In a very real sense, the four parts of Chronicles of the Pride Lands were being worked on at once. Each part matured at a different time. In that sense, The Spirit Quest was not a sequel, nor were Shadow of the Makei or Under the Acacias. These form parts of a whole, and reading them out of order will make a lot less sense to you. It is my fond hope someday to see the four parts ordered chronologically and united into one work.

  In completing this story, we have used the last of the “next project” file, and unlike the others this work did not produce the core of a future story. It is with a sense of fulfillment and closure that we submit the conclusion of the cycle begun with Chronicles of the Pride Lands.

  Will Dave and I collaborate again? Sure! Will the stories be canon with Chronicles? Sure! Will it be Volume 5 of Chronicles? No. Than what will we do? From time to time I taunt David with humorous pitches for stories based on the gopher (“Under the Golden Savanna”), and the wildebeests (“The Little Chewer That Cud”). Don’t spread gossip about these pseudo-fanfics--not even in your dreams!! But Nala--hmm, that could prove an interesting challenge for two male authors trying to avoid stereotypes and clichés....

  This story is lovingly dedicated to the memories of George and Joy Adamson. Gathered to Aiheu, they are indeed “forever free.”

  John Burkitt, Nashville, Tennessee

  February 12, 1997

  Well, here we are again. Pride Rock’s shadow has grown long, burying the promontory in darkness as the sun slips beneath the western horizon. We have many things to do tonight, but first there’s something we’d like to share.

  Somewhere in the midst of writing “The Spirit Quest,” something strange and wonderful happened. This story is mainly about two figures from that work, one brand new, the other a familiar companion from “Chronicles” who came together, forging a relationship that was to ultimately affect not only those around them, but John and I as well.

  The new figure from “The Spirit Quest” is of course Ugas. And the old companion? The lioness Uzuri. Master of the hunt, devoted mother, and stalwart friend, she has touched the lives of nearly everyone around her to some degree...and that includes the authors, as well.

  Let us go now; the lionesses are gathering, and Uzuri is ready.

  The hunt awaits.

  David Morris, Wilmington, North Carolina

  February 12, 1997

  PROLOGUE:

  High on top of Elephant Kopje where the bare rock lay exposed, weathered but defiant, there was a crack. Years of dust storms had patiently filled that crack with small amounts of soil. And in that crack grew a single stalk of Alba whose one red blossom looked up to God with hope for the coming rains. Where the seed came from, only Aiheu knew, but he looked down on it and smiled. “One Who Brings Rain,” Aiheu said, “take care of my garden.”

  “Lord, I see but a single flower,” the cloud answered.

  “But it has the faith of a thousand,” Aiheu said. “Any flower can grow by the river bank, but this one has brought beauty to barrenness.”

  Even in the stoniest ground, the smallest spark of life may bring beauty. And where the beauty is found, Aiheu smiles. This is a story of one such spark--the lioness Uzuri--and the beauty she brought amid the dark days of Taka’s reign.

  CHAPTER: HYENAS IN THE PRIDE LANDS

  Birds still sang in the trees. Clouds still wafted across the sky. A gentle breeze still caressed the grass and stirred it in waves of serene detachment. But for the lionesses of Pride Rock, the old world they thought would last forever had abruptly ended: Mufasa and Simba were gone.

  Sarabi was looking for strength to live from moment to moment. Nala was huddled against her mother, struggling to understand her loss. No longer would Mufasa call her “honey tree” and tell her stories of the great kings of the past. And her friend Simba was gone forever--no more games, no more words, no more anything. In the depths of her grief, she wished she had let Simba win at wrestling just once. Now she would never get another chance.

  “How bad did it hurt?” she asked her mother.

  Sarafina was a huntress and had seen her share of death. Shaking with emotion, she weighed her words carefully and said, “He was so surprised, he didn’t feel much pain. I mean, before he had time to think, they’d have been all over him.” She felt warm tears run down her face. “The poor little angel!” She began to fondle Nala with a paw. “If it had been my little girl, I’d have died! Just died! Don’t you ever go near that place, or I’ll cuff your behind! Do you hear me, Missy??” Sarafina nuzzled her and kissed her.

  “Oh, Momma!” Nala began to sob. “I won’t go there! I promise!” She added in a near whisper, “But can’t we go see him one last time?”

  “No!” Fini kissed her again. “You don’t want to remember him the way he looks now. You really don’t.”

  Before the last warmth had left the old King’s body, a new ruler sat atop Pride Rock and proceeding toward him up the winding trail were the hyenas of Shenzi’s clan. This was the new world, a frightening place of uncertainty, mistrust and grief. Uzuri watched them with bitter anguish as they violated her sanctuary, and she silently cursed Taka for betraying his people. Hyenas had murdered his aunt and uncle, and he was taking them into his home!

  Despite his promise of a “glorious new future,” Taka was merely paying his debt to Shenzi, and he cared little for most of her race. But there was one hyena that he loved above all loves remaining in his tortured heart. Fabana broke from her place in the processional and ran to Taka’s side, fawning on him. He nuzzled her gently, turning her small, scarred face with his large paw and kissing her cheek with his large tongue. “Muti,” he said in broken hyannic, “mo keth ban’ret dubrek!”

  Some of the hyenas looked around, puzzled. “Betra hyannicha?” one of them asked.

  He shook his head. “Just a few phrases I picked up.”

  Shenzi satisfied the longing of a lifetime to see the world from the tip of the promontory, planning for the day when she didn’t have to share it with the lions. All the while, oblivious to her conceited gloating, Taka lovingly stroked Fabana with his paw and gazed into her smiling face.

  “I sit here tonight because of you, Muti. I would have killed myself, and my hopeless spirit would have wandered the night while a stranger ruled the Pride Lands.”

  “If it hadn’t been me, someone else would have stopped you.”

  “You would say that. You always believe that goodness prevails.” He kissed her cheek. “I love you more than words can say.”

  Tears ran down her face, and she sat leaning gently against him. “My dear son.”

  CHAPTER: RECIPE FOR DISASTER

  The first night without Mufasa’s comforting presence was the hardest for Sarabi. She slinked quietly to the spot where she had spent so many blissful nights pressed against his beautiful body. His scent still hung in the air, and closed her eyes, clinging to that one last trace. “Oh gods, help me!” she cried, falling to the ground sobbing.

  That e
vening her own sister had practically thrown herself before Taka, even after he had brought hyenas into the Pride Lands. Hyenas had murdered her parents! After that, she could not bring herself to speak to Elanna. Now her dear friend Rafiki was confined in house arrest. She had no one to turn to for comfort and had to weep alone. Only God stood between her and total isolation.

  There were exactly forty paces to the end of the promontory. On the forty-first she could find an end to suffering. One extra step into the arms of love, and all the things she wished she could say to Mufasa and Simba would come pouring out before them as sweet as fragrance from the nighttime jasmine. But what a blow it would be to those she left behind! Sarafina and Isha would have to drag her battered body to the jackals and watch as her flesh was torn from her by small, sharp teeth. No, after weighing the consequences, she accepted her fate and chose the path of duty. Her life, worth living or not, would go on.

  Elanna had considered her own path of duty. Her heart was pierced with thorns over the anger of her sister and the disapproval of the Pride Sisters. It would have been simple to turn away from Taka and stay in the good graces of her friends. But she had watched Taka’s struggle with depression and frustration wear away at him and take his joys away one by one. His first love had rejected him, and his parents were dead. Now his brother was dead, and he had to turn to the hyenas for comfort. She wanted to love him, to comfort him and give his life meaning once more. And hoping against hope that he would find solace in her love, she had dared to offer herself to him completely and openly.

  Sarabi had asked her to choose between her sister and her lover, to give up happiness and cubs of her own, and share Sarabi’s loneliness forever in return for acceptance by the Pride.

  “It’s not fair!” Elanna prayed fervently. “I love her enough to die for her and right now I should be by her side, but she won’t have me! She loved him once--how can she blame me for needing him so? She doesn’t understand, God. What can I say that will make her listen??”

  Taka stole quietly to her side and nuzzled her. “So sad, my darling?”

  “Hold me,” she said, as tears ran down her cheeks. “Let me feel you near me.”

  Taka kissed away her tears and began to stroke her with his paw. “I’ve never seen you more beautiful than you are right now. Such a kind heart, capable of such compassion.” He looked at her with a tenderness uncommon to him. “If I’d known how you felt before, things might have been very different now.”

  “How?”

  “Does it matter?”

  Taka rested beside her feeling her comforting presence. He closed his eyes and could see Mufasa and Sarabi with little Simba resting in their favorite spot. Next to them, Elanna nursing a small Taka and a small Lannie. Taka loved Mufasa once, as he had loved Sarabi. If only he had stopped striving after a vain dream and seen the potential in Elanna long ago! Under the circumstances, Taka felt his deeds were justified, but still he wondered if there was more he could have done to purge the curse that poisoned Mufasa’s love and alienated Sarabi. The nagging doubt that he was partly to blame for began to eat away at him, and he felt contaminated--dirty in ways that no water could wash clean.

  Oh to have felt clean again! He would have been content with Elanna’s sincere and unblemished love. And there would have been no hyenas in the Pride Lands earning him the undying hatred of the pride. The price he paid to rule was too high, but it was final and there could be no refund. Opening his eyes once more to the sobering truth, he kissed Elanna’s cheek and sighed deeply.

  Uzuri and the other pride sisters were also very upset, but they found solace in the discipline and effort of the hunt. Sarabi’s missing position hurt them like a wound, and Uzuri discretely asked Ajenti to take the left point of the crescent formation. Ajenti took a few steps toward Sarabi’s old spot, but she broke down into tears.

  “I can’t! I just can’t! It’s HER spot!”

  “There now,” Isha said. “You take my spot, Honey Tree. I’ll do the left point tonight.”

  Painfully, Isha stalked to the left point position and took the post with unaccustomed somberness. “Well, let’s do this thing.”

  Meanwhile with unaccustomed jubilation, the hyenas were going to hunt the Pride Lands without the fear of being discovered. Used to the arid conditions of the elephant graveyard, the smell of fresh grass and trees, of blossoms and vines intoxicated their senses. The scents on the wind filled them with promises of good times ahead.

  Not that Ber or the other loyalists got to enjoy any of that. Their ties to the former Roh’mach earned them endless, mind-numbing guard duty. Shenzi suspected that the old ways were too ingrained in them to trust them with anything else.

  Ber watched the night sky and sighed. The distant laughter of his clan brothers stirred a longing in him to be out and about following the trail. “Roh’kash, first I lost my son, and now I’ve lost my true calling! Great Mother, am I to rot out here like a discarded bone with all the marrow stripped away? Show me the way out, Great Mother! There is only death here!”

  Uzuri nodded, and her pride sisters spread out in a pattern of her own design, ready to advance on a herd of gazelles. The moon was kind-- just full enough to see by, but not full enough to betray the lithe lionesses in the tall grass.

  Uzuri’s ears flattened back and her tail twitched. Instantly her pride sisters tensed up, ready for action. They waited for the signal to rush....

  “Now I got you!” shouted a hyena, darting between the lionesses and the gazelles in pursuit of a bolting hare. The gazelles looked around and fled.

  “Damn!” Uzuri yelled.

  The hyena closed on the hare and with a snap, he had snatched the life from the small body. Bearing his trophy proudly, he trotted back across the meadow toward Pride Rock.

  Ber watched Skulk prance by with a dead rabbit. Not far behind him was the hunting party of lionesses, and Ber could tell they were furious.

  “Back early, I see? Did luck go with you?”

  “Yes!” Isha spat. “All of it bad!”

  “Hfff! Did it have to do with that rabbit?”

  Without answering, Isha and the others pushed past him and went to see Taka.

  The King was lying down napping when he got a rude nudge from Uzuri. “Look here, we have a problem.”

  “We do indeed,” Taka said grumpily. “Never do that when I’m asleep!”

  “Those--friends of yours--just spoiled our chances of pulling down a gazelle or two for a lousy rabbit! We can’t have them running wild while we’re hunting! You’re King--do something!”

  “Well I just might, since I AM King. Not that you’d know it from the level respect you show me.”

  “I’m sorry--Sire.”

  “This union will work. I didn’t say there wouldn’t be any problems at first. What we need is more cooperation. Something like a mutual hunt. That’s it--you get together with Pipkah and plan something you can all pull off together.”

  “But sire, our styles are so different!”

  “That’s why I’m putting an expert in charge. You will justify the faith I have in you, hmm?”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “That’s all I ask of anyone. Now run along and let me get some sleep.”

  He closed his eyes and rolled over. Clearly, the subject was closed.

  CHAPTER: WITHOUT A PRAYER

  The next night came in silent splendor. Sarabi looked with misty eyes at the stars as they made their nightly migration across the heavens.

  “Aiheu,” she wailed. “Help us! Call up the ancestral spirits! Send Taka wisdom to turn from the path he has taken! Help him to see the folly of his ways. But until he finds the right path, help us to deal with these hyenas.” She pawed at the sky and added, “I don’t understand any of this. I don’t understand why good people like Simba have to die while Shenzi goes on and on. But you are merciful. I know you are just and good. Don’t forget us in our hour of need! Please don’t forget us!”

  Ber also prayed
. “We are hated here. I want to go home and take my family with me! These lions do not want us, and though their land is good, I cannot sleep safely in the shadow of this rock. Touch our Roh’mach and open her eyes to the truth! Drive out from among us the deceiver and forgive us of our recklessness!”

  “Let the hunt begin,” Taka’s voice boomed with unbridled optimism. “Hunt mistress, we need your blessing!”

  Uzuri went to stand near Taka. The blessing was supposed to be an important milestone, and the new King had given her some prompting on what he wanted her to say. It should not have taken her much thought to do that. He wanted her customary reference to “Aiheu” to be expressed as a more generic “God,” and wanted all references to “Him” or “His” changed to avoid offending the hyenas whose God was the female Roh’kash.

  And yet Uzuri stood before the crowd, lions on her right and hyenas on her left. She looked at the expectant hyenas and felt a shiver run down her spine. Then she glanced over at the lionesses. Their faces were downcast and their ears and tails sagged. Taka’s ideas on a “glorious new era” stuck in her throat. She could say nothing.

  “Come on, Hunt Mistress,” Taka hoarsely whispered.

  The desolation on Yolanda’s face matched the depth of bitterness in Isha’s expression. Uzuri had to drop her glance.

  “Uzuri,” Taka growled, “they’re waiting.”

  The hyenas began to murmur uncomfortably. She had to do something, so she did the only thing she could do. She faced the lionesses squarely and prayed.

  “Have mercy on us, O Lord. For our transgressions, do not punish us. Look with favor upon we who call on you. And on the trail, let us find sustenance for our bodies and comfort for our spirits. Blessed Aiheu, hear our prayer!”