Chapter Three- The Cub
#2 of Torn
**Torn
Summary** : A chance encounter will stay with them for the rest of their lives
© Maelandra
4th October, 2009
All Rights Reserved.
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Chapter Three- The Cub
Blood, so much blood... She was covered in it- her own blood. Yet she was smiling, saying it was alright, that she wanted to die. Even though he held her, it was just her shell as her eyes turned darker and lost their light of life. Howling into the air, Markus screamed out in pain, eyes flooding with tears. The leopard sat up in bed with a start, bringing his paws up to his face. He hadn't dreamt about his sister's murder for so long but the wound in his heart opened up again and the pain of the loss poured through his again. Would he ever be able to grow strong enough? He didn't want to be weighted down with the pain of her death even though he loved her so much. He didn't want to worry about what was dead and gone, yet he was stuck.
Markus swore and lay back, wishing he could forget.
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Nedira groaned in pain, doubling over with her hands on her sides. Why did it hurt so much? Maybe her mother would know the answer. Finding her outside their modest hut, she told her mother and the older woman's eyes gleamed brightly; the woman was actually smiling! Did she like the idea that she was in pain? How could she just smile? Then her mother explained when she saw her daughter's hurt look. "You have finally grown to the level of womanhood. It means you can finally have a baby like your sister, my little Dira."
The young girl made a face. "I don't want to have a baby, Mama."
The woman just laughed quietly. "You will, one day." Then the girl's mother led her to the waste ground and showed Nedira what to do with the scraps of fabric they had on hand just for the purpose of the female cycle. The girl, now fourteen-years old thought that the idea of bleeding once a moon cycle was disgusting but when her mother told her there was nothing she could do about it, she just frowned. Why did she have to be a girl? Her mother continued to laugh at her when she handed her daughter the basket of dirty laundry and told her to go wash them in the river.
Grumbling the fourteen-year-old did as she was told. But something waited for her at the river. Stopping dead in her tracks when she saw the leopard there, her breath caught in her throat and her heart skipped a beat. The female leopard looked up wearily and said quietly, "I won't hurt you, human. At this point, I can't. I'm dying." Suddenly the sound of a baby crying touched the girl's ears. The mother leopard looked down and readjusted what she held in her arms- a bundled up baby.
"Are you alight?" Nedira asked quietly. "What do you mean you are dying?" The leopard showed the girl her sides and the blood oozing out of the grievous wounds she had there; her clothes were stained black with the amount of blood the leopard had lost. Nedira gasped, dropping the basket of dirty laundry but knew there was nothing to be done for the poor mother.
The leopard sniffed and looked at the human girl, calculating. "You are in your heat cycle," she whispered quietly. "You can be a mother... Would you take care of my son?" Nedira stared at the leopard and saw the desperation in the golden eyes and slowly moved forward to take the bundle; the cub was only about seven, eight months old. "His name is Ian. His father didn't want him and my family is ashamed of me so I set out on my own only to be gutted by a wild boar." Looking back up at Nedira, the leopard asked, "You do promise to take care of my child- my precious little Ian?" The girl promised and the leopard pushed herself into the river and floated away. Looking down at the leopard cub, Nedira stroked his cheek and smiled. He was so adorable. She would keep him as her own; she had promised.
Laying the baby down by her knees, Nedira set to work on the laundry and talked to the baby. He smiled and gurgled happily enough until he yawned and slept. Folding up the clean, wet laundry, Nedira put the cub on the top of the pile and carried her load back home to find her mother. The fourteen-year-old hesitated on the path, thinking about her mother. How would her mother react? She hadn't thought about that... Well, it was too late to go back on her promise and she would keep the baby, no matter what, her mother be damned.
"Mother!" she called out as she went into the backyard and started to hang the laundry to dry, the bundle by the basket, still sleeping away. A moment later, the elder woman appeared and came to help. "Mother," Nedira licked her lips, "I found a baby." Her mother looked down at the bundle when the girl pointed and went over to it, gasping when she saw it was a leopard cub.
"We must get rid of it!" her mother cried, backing away from the bundle as if it were evil. The cub woke at the noise and began to cry.
"No," Nedira said, scooping up the bundle and holding the cub tightly to her breast, shushing him and getting him to relax easily. "I won't let you kill Ian. I promised his mother I would take care of him, and you know how I feel about promises!" Her mother stared at her in horror. "Please, Mother. Help me. Support my decision. You said that I have finally joined the ranks of women, so as a woman, I made the decision to take care of Ian. Please, Mother." Nothing was said between the two for a long time as they stared each other down. The baby gurgled again and Nedira's mother looked at the cub's face. Her eyes softened a fraction and the teen almost smiled, knowing she was about to win this argument but knew also, not to gloat.
"Fine. I will help you, Dira, but he is your responsibility," her mother finally said. "You will feed him, bathe him, change his rags, make sure he doesn't get ill and if he does, you will make sure he gets better. I will only help you from the sidelines." Nedira smiled.
"Thank you, Mother." Smiling down at the cub, she kissed her son's forehead. "I love you, my son."