"Eshe" means "life"

“By the way, Taka, you probably want to know why I fucked you so well yesterday? Well, I had experience. I fucked your mother.” “WHAAT????”

***

The impala tripped at the most inopportune moment — when Mufasa was almost out of breath and would have started to slow down in a few moments, releasing the failed prey. It flew forward, over its neck, its slender long legs flailing in the air, and let out a guttural cry of fear. Mufasa didn’t even have time to blink — there was a strange click, he saw the herbivore’s neck bend unnaturally, he saw the long slender legs flashing in the air. He exhaled and braked, so as not to crash into it at full speed. The impala was still twitching, limply, resignedly, when he, catching his breath, was already standing and looking at it. So strange. It just tripped. Fell. Broke its neck. Is dying. But it could have flown over that fateful stone and not even noticed it. To live on. At least until tomorrow. It’s almost night. The hunttime is coming to an end. He saw Eshe rushing towards him. She saw everything from afar and probably didn’t understand what happened. “Itself?” she asked, not noticing any blood on the already still carcass. Mufasa nodded, not knowing what to say aloud. Eshe was also silent, catching her breath. “Very strange. Usually they are so sharp-eyed, and jump high. But this one…” “Maybe it was sick with something?” “Yes. Possibly…” Eshe examined the trampled grass and found the fateful stone. She approached it, touched it with her paw. “You should also be careful, Mufasa.” She looked at him more seriously than usual. “A stone like this — and… I don’t even want to say about.” Mufasa smiled at her. “Don’t worry, Eshe. I’m careful.” “You weren’t looking under your paws again. I’m sure. You almost always forget to look under your paws. You only look ahead.” “No, I look under, I see where I’m running. I would have definitely noticed this stone. But…” He gestured with his paw. “She noticed it first.” “You… you do understand what could happen if you… like this?..” Mufasa listened to her with surprise. He didn’t remember Eshe being so persistently worried about him. “Eshe. Really. I’m careful. I’m precise. I see everything. You don’t need to fear for me so.” He took a step towards her, smiling not so obviously, but simply to show her his confidence. “I’m almost an adult. I’m already twenty moons old…” “Exactly!” the lioness almost shouted for some reason and bared her teeth, flicked her tail. “You… you’re already twenty moons old and you just don’t understand what will happen to us, what will happen to me, if something suddenly happens to you! Think about it, Mufasa, please, think! It’s not a game! Please, do understand — it’s not a game!..” “Eshe, please,” said the lion, even more surprised, but feeling that he needed to be even more gentle. “Everything will be fine. I promise you that I will look under my paws. Always. Just… please, don’t… I promise, I promise, Eshe. Please.” He smiled wider, as kindly and delicately as possible, and took another step towards her. Eshe looked at him, and her lips trembled. “Mufasa… I…” She turned her head away and wiped her eyes with her paw. “I’m so worried about you. I’m so worried. I… I imagined what it would be like if you… and…” Mufasa had never seen the lioness like this. The one who replaced his mother, the one who became his closest being in the pride. After his brother… He suddenly remembered how Taka licked him, long ago, in the dry season, lying in a porcupine burrow. And how he himself licked him in response… Why, why did he remember this now?.. “Eshe. I will be careful for you,” he said and stepped close to her. Eshe looked up at him — the male, a former stray, had already grown taller than her, his fresh red mane had already begun to flow down his cheeks, the back of his head and neck. In just a few more moons — and it will be long, beautiful, like Obasi’s, like the other adult lions'. “You… you’ve grown up so fast, my cub,” she said; her eyes glistened with tears. “So fast… my beloved cub.” She nuzzled his withers, feeling his ungrown mane pleasantly tickle the back of her head and ears. Mufasa didn’t pull away — closing his eyes, he leaned towards the lioness. And then he realized that he wanted to hug her with his paw. Like when he found her crying in the roots of a dead tree, and when she said nothing to him about the reasons for her tears. They just hugged. And then she wiped away her tears on his neck and looked into his eyes, as if wanting him to read everything in them himself. But then Mufasa understood nothing. Didn’t recognize the hint. “I love you so much, Mufasa,” Eshe whispered now, freezing under his ungrown mane. She whispered strangely, quietly, deeply. “You are the light of my life. You are my light. My light, my… lion.” Mufasa shuddered, opened his eyes wide and stared blankly at the sparse clouds floating above the horizon. What… what has she said? Why… “Your lion?..” he repeated hoarsely. Instead of an answer, Eshe suddenly, emerging from under his neck, and, ignoring the young male’s bewilderment, thrust her wet tongue into his chin, as if deciding to eat him, greedily ran it all over his young broad muzzle — from bottom to top, from left to right — licked him, frantically, without opening her eyes, possessively stepping on his paw with her own, to emphasize the full seriousness of her feelings and intentions. Mufasa stopped moving and breathing, feeling and seeing the incredible. Could it be… could it be that all this time… Eshe… the one he revered as his mother… “Gods, I so much love you, Mufasa…” the adult lioness rumbled gutturally, tearing her insatiable tongue away from him, and, opening her eyes, looked at him point-blank. Her gaze burned with fire — but only for a few moments. She suddenly saw, realized how shocked her act had made the young lion. “Mufasa… I… No… no… forgive me… oh gods, what I… What have I done, Mufasa…” He saw how quickly the emotions changed on her face, what a terrible fear gripped Obasi’s unfortunate wife. A beautiful adult lioness, mother of his brother. “Forgive me… please…” She moved away from him, then took a couple more steps back, turned her tail to him. “I was so scared for you. I imagined that you had gone, that you had died, and I see your body… Like I saw the body of my… sister-in-law Rani. I loved her. More than life. And I saw how… how she lied in her blood, in… the swampy slush… my beautiful Rani… trampled, mutilated, recently alive… Gods… I couldn’t bear such a sight again — especially with you, Mufasa.” She turned around, glanced at him piercingly. “Because I really do love you. As a lion. As… a male…” She fell silent, twitching her tail, then looked away. “You are my new light, Mufasa. You… I saw how you were growing. I saw a beautiful, sweet cub who matured and grew stronger every day. I saw what you were becoming. I saw what you are endowed with. You are a special lion, Mufasa. Special. Mufasa… it means “king”. You… you are a true king, you must become, must be king — not my… not…” She fell silent and even covered her mouth with her paw in fright. Then she looked at Mufasa again. He listened to her — her young lion, her king. “I am not destined to be king, Eshe,” Mufasa finally ventured to say, as if pleased with the change of topic. “And we both know it. I have no royal blood in me. And my name…” “Your father loved you, since he named you that. And your mother. They knew that you were destined to become a great lion. And you will become one, Mufasa. King Mufasa.” Mufasa looked at her in surprise. “Become? What are you talking about, Eshe?..” Eshe was silent, looking down at her paws. “Nothing, Mufasa,” she finally said. “It’s too early for this talking… or… rather, it’s too late.” “No, Eshe, tell me,” the lion persisted. “You’ve already told me so much, and now we’ll just stop talking and go as if nothing happened? No.” She looked at him again. Her eyes sparkled with admiration. “King…” she said. “Yes… you, you are the king. You are the true king. I would give my life for you, Mufasa. I would… If I were a couple of seasons younger, or you were older… yes, probably even now, but… now nothing can be changed, everything goes as it goes, and it would be criminal to change anything, to tear the past to shreds, to tear apart other lions' souls and destinies…” “I don’t understand, Eshe…” “I want to run away with you from here!” the lioness shouted unexpectedly, so loudly that Mufasa even stepped back from her. “I want to establish a pride with you, Mufasa! I want you to… fuck me, I want to have cubs from you, many cubs, our heirs. I want… I want this so much… gods, gods!!! So… much… want… this…” She could no longer restrain herself — she burst into tears, roared loudly from longing, and bitter tears gushed from her eyes in a torrent. She fell into the grass, right by the dead side of the impala, dropped her head on her paws, flopped her ears, trembled, convulsed in weeping. Mufasa watched this for a very short time — he couldn’t, he approached, lay down next to her, hugged her by the shoulders, pressed himself to the unfortunate lioness — his second mother and… possibly, his first true love? “I love you too, Eshe. I love you very much,” he said in a low voice, and she, as if on purpose, to not drown out his words, calmed down and stopped roaring. “Without you, I have no home. A real home. You are my family. You are my dearest lioness… now… but, most likely, you will remain so forevermore.” She turned around impulsively, glanced at him, squinting from tears and the setting sun shining in her eyes. “Don’t cry, Eshe.” He, also impulsively, not wanting to see tears on her face, reached out to her and gently licked her cheek. “Don’t cry. Let me wipe away your tears.” “My Mufasa… my good cub… my glorious cub…” Eshe said, feeling his warm tongue on her. He washed her, just like she had washed him not so long ago… and already so long ago… “Everything will be fine, Eshe,” he promised her and licked her beautiful face again, touching her whiskers and licorice lips. She squeezed her eyes shut, releasing the remnants of tears under her eyelids, also caught by his tongue. “Thank you… thank you, my dear cub… good… glorious cub…” She snuggled up to him, pressed herself to him, accepting more and more portions of love. “My… king… Mufasa…” The lion slowed down his washing. “Eshe… I…” “You always — always will be my king, Mufasa… My true king.” She looked at him again, and Mufasa suddenly saw strange lights in her eyes, either reflections of the setting sun, or… something else… incomprehensible, but so simple, understandable on a subconscious level and completely unknown. She slowly closed and opened her completely dry eyes, as if inviting him to understand, explore, study these secrets of hers. And he, looking into them and feeling his heart beating stronger and louder, realized that he wanted to accept her invitation — an invitation to the mystery of cognition. He felt that she wanted to get up, she stirred, embraced by him, and he, not wanting to let her go at first, still yielded, allowed it. She, without taking her eyes off him, almost without blinking, with the same fire in them, slowly, cat-like, stretched, rose, but not completely, and, tucking her front paws under her, rested on them, lay back down. Mufasa saw out of the corner of his eye that she did the same with her hind legs, and twirled her long lion’s tail from side to side. He moved away, listening to the strange, alluring spectacle of this seemingly long-familiar, most ancient pose in the world, previously unknown to him, but known to thousands upon thousands of his male ancestors, thousands upon thousands of lions before him — and after. He felt the strange, desirable, beckoning call emanating from her body, her pose, her naked soul. He felt himself raising his labrum, roaring gutturally in response to this call. And… suddenly everything became clear to him, there were no more riddles, no more secrets — only the instinct of his young, lion, male body. He didn’t remember how he went around her, mounted her, leaned on her with all his weight, squeezed her golden torso from the sides, feeling the most ancient instinct flavored with ecstatic youth. Here it is… here it is… now… now… He poked her with his groin, trying to find… what? For what? Why? He didn’t know. Instinct was mute, but demanded, craved, tortured. And Mufasa obeyed him. He could not disobey. Yes, here… something appeared… he felt the evening breeze slightly stirring the nakedness of his newly discovered secret, his short but powerful scepter of fate, masculinity, life itself. What is this… how… where from… I must. I must! He grabbed her neck with his teeth, sharply, relentlessly, powerfully. Pulled her towards himself. Gods… but she… isn’t she in pain?.. “Come on… come on…” he heard her muffled voice. “Mufasa… My… king…” Yes. You’re right, Eshe! Yes! I am your king, Eshe! I AM YOUR KING! The scepter of fate rested against something just as naked, as if their lion souls were now. But her nakedness was yielding, she took him into herself with the very first thrust, and Mufasa, roaring from this sweetest yielding, realized that he didn’t want to get out of there… Eshe hissed in pain. “Y-yes… more… more, Mu… fasa…” Gods, how pleasant… what is this… “More, Mufasa…” Yes… here’s more… “More, plea… se…” Take it, Eshe, receive it. “Y-yes…” Yes — here it is. Here! “Mufasa…” Eshe. Eshe. My Eshe. Mine. MINE! “Don’t… stop…” And I won’t even think about it. I wouldn’t dare. Don’t even wait for it, Eshe, don’t even dream! He sped up, feeling the rise of an incredible, inexorable, logical, sweet, dizzying, deadly in its righteousness sensation. Yes… more… here’s more… What will… what will happen… tell me, Eshe… tell me! It will be… only you and I, Mufasa. Only you and I… Yes, yes, YES, ESHE!.. I am yours, Mufasa. I am yours and only yours… MINE! You are the true king, Mufasa. You are my king… I AM YOUR KING! His paws trembled and could not support his weight. He collapsed on the lioness, buried her under himself, wriggled, trying to reach with himself to her very essence, to the very depths of her noble female soul that had opened up to him. Eshe hissed and roared gutturally, feeling his spiky essence inside her, painful, wounding, erupting with its first love, beautiful and amazing, because it was the first, the beginning of the entire fate and life of her lion, her grown cub, her king, her male, whom she had waited for all her life, waited longingly and heavily, but as it turned out — not in vain. She endured her female pain, which at another time would have torn her from her place, enraged her, made her strike the one who caused it, who tormented her noble, unfortunate essence. She endured it, because this pain, tormenting her body, was now healing her soul. Eshe smiled and roared at her pain. At her fate. At her life. At her lion. The moments flowed. Love flowed. Eshe felt it flowing through her fur. Gods… gods… it’s him… It’s all — HIM… He took a deep breath, finally stopping collapsing on her, tried to rise, but his paws poorly obeyed his commands. She turned her head to him, touched his ungrown mane with her whiskers. “Are… are you okay, Mufasa?” He didn’t answer, sighed heavily again and tried to get up again. Eshe felt his young male scepter, sorting through her essence with its thorns, slipping out, easily, painfully for her, and she knew how incomprehensibly pleasant it was — for him. The pain that males give is inexorable, true, unshakable. Humane. Sincere. And the pain from him is more humane and sincere a hundred times. “Are you unwell?” She got up when he finally got off her and stepped away. She saw his paws trembling, as if in a fever. “It’s strange… I’ve never felt anything like this,” the young male finally said and looked at her, trying to smile. “It will pass. Don’t worry, Mufasa.” She got up, and although everything itched and ached in her rear, longing for the soothing moisture of a tongue, the lioness still hurried to press herself against her lion, to calm him. “Everything will pass, Mufasa. Everything will pass.” He, hesitating a little, accepted her caress, snuggled up to his lioness, laid his head on her withers. He breathed deeply, looked at the sun touching the horizon, watching it float in the trembling evening air. “Eshe…” he uttered. “That was… that thing?” The lioness smiled at his words. “Yes, Mufasa.” “But… but you… but we…” She licked him on the neck. “Don’t be afraid, Mufasa, don’t be afraid of anything…” “But what if… if there will be cubs…” Eshe laughed, unable to restrain herself. “No, there will be no cubs. It’s not the right season. And you would have to do it ten times — what you just did. Although… maybe I’m wrong, and eight times would be enough for you.” She suddenly playfully nudged him with her muzzle, like a peer. “So don’t worry, Mufasa. Don’t worry.” He was silent. “It happened… But… I didn’t think at all…” “It’s okay, sweet.” “I didn’t think of you in that way, Eshe. I never thought!..” “I know, I know.” “But what about Obasi? What about… Taka… He is your son, and I…” He didn’t finish, stumbled, hung his head. Then he looked at the lioness again, with anxiety, surprise and fear. “If Obasi finds out…” “Obasi won’t find out. Never.” The lioness frowned, remembering her lawful spouse. “And let’s not talk about him. The least I want right now is for you to blame yourself, Mufasa. It was me — and only me. I wanted this. And you… you just read everything right, you saw it in my eyes. You felt your strength, you felt yourself a lion. And… it happened. By itself… It’s our nature, our essence, Mufasa. Our truth.” She fell silent. The lion was also silent, not knowing what to answer, and felt her breath on his neck and chest. The breath of the noblest, most generous female in the world. The one he considered his mother. And who became more than a mother to him. From now on and for ever. Who is to blame for this? And is it necessary?.. He suddenly realized that is not. He moved away from Eshe — to look into her eyes again. Into the eyes of the noblest lioness in the world. And then he saw tears in them. “Are… are you crying, Eshe?” the lion said in surprise and quietly. She smiled at him, dropping tears into the grass. “Yes, Mufasa. Yes…” “But… why…” “Because nothing will ever be the same, Mufasa. Nothing.” She wiped her eyes with her paw, was silent. “And even what was just now — won’t last long. I know it.” “But…” “Don’t interrupt me. Please,” she suddenly said sternly. “Our life is not what we want, Mufasa. It is not. And I… I know, I just know that everything will change soon. I don’t feel it, but I know it with my mind — like the fact that the sun will rise again tomorrow. And I… I want you to promise me, Mufasa. Promise me one thing.” “What thing, Eshe?..” “Don’t betray those who love you.” She looked at him intently, still stern, but with a barely perceptible cordiality. “Those whom you feel, whom you know that they love you. Never betray them. Be faithful to them in return, even if you cannot feel reciprocal love for them. Just believe in their devotion. Believe in their feelings. Believe in them. Love… can change destinies. Can change lifes. It can make rivers flow backwards, it can change that elusive moment when good turns into evil. Don’t miss it, Mufasa, don’t miss this moment. Don’t miss… And be loved, my lion. Be loved. And love for yourself. I do beg you.” Mufasa, struck to the core, fascinated, stunned by her speech, didn’t know what to answer. He just looked at her, looked, almost without blinking. “I won’t always be around, Mufasa.” She touched his chest with her paw. “But when I’m gone, not around — for a while or until the end of eternity — please, remember what I just told you. Remember me through these words. Let them live here. Let me live in them, in the very depths of your heart.” “I promise you, Eshe. I promise,” the lion suddenly answered her and, feeling a surge of emotions, again snuggled up to, embraced his lioness, his mother, his first love. “They will be in my heart. They… are already in it now. And — for ever.” They froze in each other’s legs. They were silent. They moved away again and looked at each other. They smiled. “Let’s go home, Mufasa,” Eshe said and gently nudged her adopted son’s cheek with her nose. “It’s getting late.” “What… about the impala?” Eshe turned her gaze to the lifeless herbivore carcass, which had become a witness, and indeed the cause of everything that had happened to them now. “We shouldn’t waste the poor creature,” she said. “Let me take it, so that Obasi doesn’t smell your scent on it.” “But you… you have…” “Oh heavens… yes.” Eshe shuddered. Exactly. How could she forget such a thing… She sat down and, beautifully stretching out her hind leg, began to tidy up her tormented vulva. Mufasa silently watched her toilet. “What, do you like the view?” she suddenly said playfully after she had thoroughly licked both of her semicircles, barely noticeable among her golden fur this season. “You wouldn’t be watching if you didn’t like it, my young lion.” Mufasa swallowed and lowered his gaze. He liked it. “You say there won’t be cubs, Eshe?..” he inquired, looking at her again. Eshe burst out laughing, ringing and high-pitched, like a young lioness girl. She understood his adult hint. *** “Are you meaning… then you just fucked my mother again? And she wasn’t against it at all?..” “I’m saying that then I fucked her three more times.” “W-what?..” “And then we did it every day, at sunrise, sometimes after sunset. When we went hunting, or returned. Or instead. Or together. Sometimes I fucked her right on the corpse of a zebra or wildebeest. Sometimes on a termite mound, so that these little creatures would move and crawl under her belly. She liked it. Madly.” “Gods…” “And sometimes, when the wind was blowing in the other direction, we did it, looking at Obasi, at your daddy — in his direct line of sight. We saw him, watched him sleep — a pot-bellied lazybones and parasite. She would cover her mouth with her paw so as not to roar, and more often I would do it. Or I would just grab her scruff in my teeth and pull her towards me, choke her until she lost consciousness. How she enjoyed it, if only you knew, Taka. If only you knew…” “Gods… I can’t believe it… And all this time I didn’t even… suspect… How did you… How did you manage it? We… You went hunting with her, dad kept me in the pride with him and the uncles at this time. But… All the rest of the time we were together with you. How did I… Why did I never notice her scent on you? Well, maybe I noticed it a couple of times… But…” “We knew how to hide. Sometimes we did it, looking at you.” “Oh, come on. Seriously?” “Yes, Taka. You were lying in the grass, and I don’t know what you were doing there, but we saw you and fucked. We fucked so, so hard.” “Come on… You know, I don’t believe you, Mufasa.” “We fucked and watched you. She saw you at the moment when she came. You, Taka.” “Okay, okay, enough, brother. I’m tired. I see that you’re just mocking me. And nothing happened between you, you’re making it all up. Well… maybe it happened that first time, maybe there were a couple more, but the rest you just made up and decided to see my reaction. Right? Admi…” “Yes, you saw through me, Taka. Saw through me.” “W… What? You… you’re just admitting it? Unexpectedly…” “So what?” “Well… I thought you would deny it, make up more, make up your fables.” “Well, what’s the point? Even a king needs to admit that in some things he’s not so good.” “Heh, sounds like a good conclusion, brother.” “Yes. If even you managed to see through me — it means that I’m really a bad actor.” “So… what else does “even you managed” mean?!…” “Oh, and Sarabi decides you have cute balls.” “S-Sarabi?” “Yes. When you picked them up to her. By the way, explain me, why did you do it? Why was all this bullshit with the duck needed, if in reality you loved me?” “I-I’m not ready to talk about that yet. Maybe sometime later, brother…” “She, just in case, agrees to a threesome.” “WHAAT????”