Elam was on the move again. He was getting use to being on his own but he honestly didn't really care for it. He went from having four mates to no mates. He had left the pride before it disbanded because of angry rogue females. When he went back and tried to find his family they were already all gone. All the white male could hope for was that they were all safe and happy. Elam was trying to get use to the rogue lands, but he found them to be too big and too lonely. Recently he had began to start thinking about joining a pride. It wouldn't be the same as his old one but at least he would feel a sense of belonging and if it was a close knit group maybe he would even get a sense of family.
There was something about the stride of a confident heart that made journeying seem effortless. With a sway in her hips, the grey pelted lioness padded across her migratory route and found herself looking to familiar trees. They were sparse baobobs, with foliage up higher than she could ever aspire getting too, but ones she remembered so fondly.
She turned her head this way and that to study them before spotting a brighter pelt on the other side of the tree. He was still a good ways from her, but that didn't stop Eris from moving closer. Perhaps he would notice her, perhaps he would not. All she could do was to smile in her usual way.
Elam started to contimplate a rest. He had been walking for a long time and the lion was tired. He was tired of walking, he was tired of being alone and he was tired of the stinking rogue lands. As he sat movement flicked in the corner of his eye.
He turned and he was shocked to see a female with the brightest, most colourful mane had had ever seen in his life. He turned his body so it was facing her. He wanted to run right over to her but he didn't want to appear desperate. It had taken him a little while of being in the rogue lands to realize that not everyone was friendly and that even if he was lonely that did not warent a reason to rush up to a perfectly good stranger. At least not to the one he was rushing at.
He looked positively elated to see her, and Eris already thought of him as a fond friend, lost in time. It was as if they had met before. Possibly in a dream, since she didn't remember seeing his face, or in a hallucinogenic daze. "The snow that feasts on the blood mountain gathers on your paw." Her soft blue gaze turned so that she could better see the marking. "Blood and snow, both sorrowful, each deadly. One carries warmth and the other Spring. Which are you?" The way she spoke was as if she had been pulled straight from a dream.
Elam was pleased when the female spoke to him. Although when she began to speak he was immediately confused. She sounded as if she was speaking in riddles. He did his best to listen though, his brow knitted as he did is best to consentrate on what he was saying.
He recognized she was speaking of his mountain, a bit of his grandpa that he carried on is foot. If only she had seen his grandfathers pelt a full scenery stretched over his torso. He contimplated his answer and then finally with a smile said, "Ah you see it is neither, it is firey like a volcanoe. Full of passion and strength." he asnwered hoping that this answered her question in away that she could be satisfied.
"My name is Elam." he told her hoping tha tthis would direct her into a more normal conversation.
His response made Eris' softer smile grow to a full sized grin. He was wittier than the average male she came across, but he had left himself vulnerable. "A passionate volcano that sits so small upon a single paw while ones pelt, so vivid like the snow, turns to hot air and smoke." Tilting her head, her grin only grew. Eris was enjoying this far too much.
She pondered over his name, and thought for a moment about denying her own when she said, "I am called many things, but you may know me as Eris. Tell me, why is the volcano land locked and alone?"
Elam smiled he had managed to get his name but she still spoke in riddles. He smiled, he figured that this conversation and company as weird as it was, it was better than being alone.
He thought about what she said. "The Volcano is landlocked and alone becaue I am without my family. You see my grandfather held a whole mountain range and my daughter a mountain like an iceberg. Saddly I know not where they are and me and my poor volcanoe are lone soliders in the vast lonely rogue lands."
What a wonderful concept. A living mountain with his family touching shores in both the frigid arctic and the warmer seas. She could envision it clearly in her mind, though to describe it would have been an impossible task.
"Lonely?" Eris shook her head and sat down beside him. She gingerly tucked her paws under neath her, keeping up the appearance of a lady when she was little more than a mystic. "At least we've solved one of your problems." Looking up at him, her smile softened once more. Eris neither felt loneliness nor grief, but she understood the importance of it in others. If her company could spare him harm, then she would stay by him.
"Yes we solved it indeed." Elam said pleased that she finally wasn't speaking in riddles any more. She was a captivating lioness and Elam found himself intrigued by the female. He hoped he could persuade him to stay with him for awhile.
"What would you say if I asked you to accompany me for awhile. I am travelling no where specific except for around." he told her. He wasn't sure that she would be whiling to wonder aimlessly with what was practically a stranger, but he was hopeful that she would say yes.
There was no sense of wariness about Eris as she looked about the rogue lands, completely aware of the strange male by her side. She was either truly naive, or perhaps she had seen more than her fair share of evil, to the point where little phased her. Even Eris could not say.
"I wish to see the Ocean. If my company is what you want, then we'll go there together." Since neither truly belonged to anything or anyone a trip to see the vast sea waves was warranted. What better to make you feel insignificant but never ending water?
If only Eris could have predicted the chain of events that would come about thanks to her one, split second decision.