It was something that was happening slowly, but it was happening often enough that Brauna was starting to take notice. She wasn't sure what it was about her, but it seemed that others found her easy to confide in. Cubs came with their little secrets to whisper into her ears. Lovers occasionally brought their woes to her. Many touched by grief seemed to find her presence comforting in some way, even when she didn't have much to say. She was beginning to find a portion of her free time from scouting was spent circulating among the pride and stopping to patch up hearts and offer support wherever it was needed.
The latest to approach her, however, wasn't someone she'd have ever would need her kindness. Not that he didn't have his own share of woes; after all, his father had died, though that was some time ago now. Taken from him by the disease. Still, he'd remained chipper and upbeat for the most part, though now that she thought about it, there had seemed to be a shadow scudding behind his cheerful expression of late. Because of his usual bouncy manner, she wasn't at all prepared for what he confided in her when they happened to cross paths.
"Hi there Brauna!" came the usual jovial greeting, and she turned to see the stripey leopard male strolling nonchalantly her direction. "Have you been scouting today?" His question was perfectly friendly and natural, but something odd about his tone or his body language trilled along her senses and told her that he wanted more than just to exchange pleasantries. As a consequence, she angled her path so that their trajectories joined and then gently began to meander towards the less populated areas, where quiet words could remain private.
"Not today," she answered him sweetly, "I've got the day off today. Jabez is out, though, and won't be back for a bit yet. How have you been?" she asked, continuing to slowly pad along beside the almost twitchy male. She had no worries that he was the sort of cad to try and woo her away from Jabez. Sasta was like everyone's little brother, even when he was older than they! He just wasn't the sort to pull that kind of nonsense. She felt as safe with him as she would have with his grandfather.
"I've been... unsettled," he answered slowly, eyes on the path before them, with only his tail twitching to show his usual energy. He wrestled with what to say, how to express what even he couldn't quite nail down, and how much of it to actually tell her. He hadn't actively sought her out, it had just... happened. She was a good listener, and his heart needed someone to open up to about something he felt terribly guilty over.
She gave him a soft smile and gently drew him up towards a rise in the land. It was just a bit of a rocky outcropping, nothing like the cliffs that rose above them in the near distance, but it got them high enough to catch a comfortable breeze and allowed them a modicum of privacy. "Now, tell me what's on your mind," she instructed him, sprawling on the sun-warmed rock and giving him her full attention.
Sasta let himself be directed to the perch, though he did not relax as the leopardess had. Instead he sat, shifting his front paws uneasily and fussing with his tail. He slowly huffed several breaths before he began. "It's been hard, since my dad died," he began quietly. "Not that life has come to a grinding halt of course!" He barked a half-hearted and mostly false laugh, and the shadows grew in his expression. "And it isn't just that, really. I just feel... like I need to leave." He nearly bit his tongue at that, because he hadn't meant to just come right out and say it! He gave her a faintly wild-eyed look to gauge her reaction.
He needn't have worried. Brauna knew what wandering paws felt like, and had been a rogue herself, after all! She chuffed softly at him and batted a paw at his nose affectionately. "You feel bad for wanting to wander, don't you?" At his hangdog expression, that was likely at the heart of his problem. Poor darling! "Ah Sasta, that's not a bad thing! Do not several of the immune lions regularly wander off into the roguelands, for whatever reason stirs them?" He didn't respond much to that, and she nodded a bit. "Perhaps you don't intend just yet to come back here. And perhaps you won't. But stop and think a moment." She waited until he raised his eyes to hers, still looking tortured and miserable. "Would the ones who love you want you this unhappy, staying here?"
Sasta had to stop and consider that question. What would his siblings say? What would his mother say? Why, wasn't she proud of having a son who was so wholly immune to the depredations of the disease? He would miss her terribly, and she him, but he wasn't her only child by any stretch of the imagination. He sucked a deep breath and flexed his claws into the soft fur of his tail, stroking them through without grazing the skin.
Brauna gave him a moment to think before speaking into the silence again. "I know you worry about your mother, and her being here alone and without you, but first, she is never alone. Even beyond her family, which, may I remind you," she added a bit tartly, "is quite extensive and large," earning her a rueful look from the male, "she also has others who love her very much and value the skills and heart she brings to the pride."
"But what if my leaving disappoints her?" he couldn't help asking in a faintly agonized voice. Oh, how it tore at Brauna's heart to hear the sunny Sasta so overwrought! This truly had been eating at him for quite some time now, she realized.
"Why don't you ask her?" she suggested gently, tipping her head to the side engagingly. "Adivyta is not known for her bad temper, after all. If she expresses distress, then you can rethink how you feel and what you want to do. But," she continued after a pause for thought, "I believe she will want you to be happy, and will encourage you in whatever you choose to do."
How was it that this rogue who joined the pride as an adult understood his mother so very well?! She was right, of course. Mother would never naysay his desires, so long as they hurt no one, including himself, and were done with a pure heart. In fact, his pure heart was what she said she loved best about him, wasn't it? He swallowed and nodded slowly. "You are right," he admitted, "I should talk with my mother about this." In a more typically Sasta-ish impulse, he leaned over and rubbed cheeks with the pretty brown leopardess. "Thank you so much, Brauna. You always know just what to say."
She smiled as he leaped off the rock and went trotting back towards the dens again, his tail a little higher in the air than it had been when they met. Yes, he was likely to go haring off on adventures soon, and they would miss him. But she figured it was pretty likely that he'd also come back and would find peace and happiness here again, before all was said and done. Until then, she wished him luck, love, and joy.
