Today, to Shula, was a special day. She'd been planning it for a while - To pull one of Kosuke's daughters aside to help foster the agility of dancing. It just happened... She'd picked the one that seemed most unsure of herself. The red lioness carefully cleared a shaded area, a familiar outcrop of rock... It seemed like only yesterday she'd met Kosuke, lost in her own world of dancing, like a dream... Violet eyes turned towards the gold cub, a smile on her face. "Are your ready, Haggy?"
The juvenile hesitated, unsure of this whole thing. She was okay with the singing... If nobody was around. The night Kosuke had found her doing so had been a one-time thing. She didn't know he was there. Now, though... She looked up at Shula, red eyes wide. "I.. I think so..." Stepping over to the clearing, Hag looked at it, then sniffed it. It was very faint... But it smelled of Shula and Kosuke. Mostly Shula. "I don't know what to do, though..."
"Just imagine a song..." Shula sat down, smiling as she closed her eyes. She hummed first, then sang a few words. "Dreams.. To dream... In the dark of the night... When the world goes wrong, I can still make it right... I can see, so far in my dreams... I'll follow my dreams... Until they come true..." She did a small part of a dance, then stopped, offerign a smile to Hag. "Like that. You imagine the song, and then just... Let it guide you into a dance..." She motioned with a paw, sweeping it in a gesture across the sand. "Go ahead, try it!"
Enraptured by the song, Hag was surprised by Shula's sudden request. "Um... O-okay..." She closed her eyes, trying to imagine a song, something, anything. After a moment, she saw in her mind a beautiful place, covered in greens and vines, flowers in bloom under a pale crescent moon. With it, came a tune, strange and enrapturing. For a while, she was lost in thought, lost in what she saw, a smile on her face as her body relaxed. After several minutes, she began to unconciously hum the tune.
Shula smiled, leaning over to whisper in the cub's ear. "You've got the tune... Now let it out... Let out the words, Haggy..." She stepped back, wanting to observe. She wondered, though, what was in Hag's mind? The little gold cub's mind was like a chest, locked to the world outside, filled with treasures only she knew about.
"A clouded dream on an earthly night, hangs upon a crescent moon..." Hag slowly rose, taking a step. "A voiceless song in an ageless light, sings at the coming dawn.." She took another step, moving further from Shula. "Birds in flight are calling there, where the heart moves the stones, there that my heart is longing for.. All for, for the love of you.." She stepped sideways, tail swaying behind her, eyes still closed.
Remotely, the red lioness wondered if this was how she looked when Kosuke first found her. It was a bemusing mental image, and yet a sweet one. She found herself humming with the song, again wondering... What was in Hag's mind? What did she see? Shula lay down, stretching to watch.
Rising to her hind paws, Hag took a couple of tentative steps. "A painting hangs on an ivy wall, nestled in the emerald moss..." She swept a paw away from herself, taking another careful step. "The eyes declare a truce of trust, then it draws me far away..." She lowered herself back down, turning around. "Deep in the desert twilight, sand melts in pools of the sky, darkness lays her crimson cloak, lamps will call, call me home..."
Her tail flicked, ears listening. It was a fascinating song, haunting to the ears but sending a deep thrum of emotion to the heart. Shula closed her own eyes, for a moment transported to a far-away land. It seemed disconnected from the here and now, as if listening to a story from an age long gone. The red lioness shivered, lost in the song now.
"And so it's there, my homage's due, clutched by the still of the night..." Hag swept back the other way, taking a few steps to the side. After a moment, she backed up, bowing as she movied. "Now I feel, feel you move, and every breath, breath is full..." She could almost hear some sort of instrument. Where had that word come from, anyway? But she could hear the.. Sounds... Like someone patting a paw on the taught skin of a dead animal stretched on ribs. "So it's there my homage's due, clutched by the still of the night... Even the distance feels so near, all for, for the love of you..."
For a moment, Shula could almost, too, hear the beat that Hag heard. She resisted the urge to rise, wanting Hag to have her own dance, her own moment. Somewhere, a lion roared, but she didn't fully hear it, almost didn't recognize it. It seemed so far away, as if clear across the lands in another world. Her paws twitched, toes feeling the sand shift under them. Oh the urge to dance...
The golden youth shifted again, eyes still closed as she turned back toward Shula. "A clouded dream on an earthly night, hangs upon a crescent moon.." She took a few steps forward, a couple back and to the side. "A voiceless song in an ageless light, sings at the coming dawn... Birds in flight are calling there, where the heart moves the stones.." She could see birds taking flight in her mind, obscuring a crescent moon. "There my heart is longing for, all for, for the love of you..." With the passing of the birds, it all melted away, like sand tumbling down a dune. When she opened her eyes, she was a bit dissapointed that she was still in the desert.
When the singing stopped, Shula opened her eyes, blinking. She saw the sadness in Hag's red eyes, getting up and going over to her. "Aw, Haggy, what's wrong...? That song was beautiful..." And haunting... It'd be with her for a long time, yet. "You did fine!"
"It's not that..." Hag sighed, then started back for the dens. "I liked what I saw in my mind... I think it was one of those dream-visions like Daddy sees..." She looked up at Shula, red eyes filled with mixed emotions. "I'm going somewhere different from the desert when I get older... Not another desert..." It wasn't just her imagination as she sang, but a true vision, she just knew it.
The red lioness sighed, then groomed the cub's head. "I hope you love it there, Haggy... You deserve a nice place to go..." She started up the sand, passing familiar rock formations as she headed with the juvenile back to the dens.
