NOVEL NEXT Chapter 69: Annoying Weakness
'Elder Leo, we need to rest. Please can we stop?' Leo growled audibly at the request but it wasn't any more than his own eyes, ears, and nose were telling him. The group of elven mages were not at all used to travelling across the savannah and it showed. Even his brother had been surprised at how out of breath they had got when he'd been in control. It felt like they weren't even halfway home and they had already stopped three times, once for several hours to actually sleep which was needed, to be fair, and once when they stopped at the basin to collect the rest of the carcasses – now everyone with a storage space had at least a couple of carcasses in it.
They'd also collected the rest of the beasts which had surrendered to them, though Leo thought his brother had been a bit too patient with one of the other leaders who had demanded why, if they weren't pets of the two-legs, they now had several of them as part of their party. Leo would have personally taught that insubordinate female what strength really meant, but his brother had been more diplomatic. In the end, the female had accepted it when she'd realised that the elves followed the lion's commands, not the other way around. But at this rate, it would take three days to make it back rather than the two days that Dominic had estimated it would take.
And that was after they had wasted more time with that stupid 'Seat' thing even when they'd decided that they could get the rest of the Pride outfitted with their promised armour once the elves had moved the Great Mother and whatever other trees they would be bringing with them into the Pride's territory. Not needing to wait for that definitely saved time, but Leo reckoned that almost all the benefit was lost with the other delays. Why the elves put so much importance into a carved wooden chair, he didn't know. It wasn't even all that pretty, though Leo did have to admit that it suited the rough-hewn room in which it had been placed.
The worst bit was that they'd had to go back on themselves since, of course, the 'Seat' was in the exact place where they'd just been. Or, rather, not the exact place, but in the massive tree in the centre of the elven forest. At least it hadn't been all the way at the top. Instead, they'd had to take a passage down to a dark little room right down in the roots of the tree. Leo would admit that he hadn't noticed the passage the first time – hadn't even noticed it until the female leader elf had opened the door.
Sitting on the seat itself had been an ordeal – it had been a bit too small for the large lion and his brother had struggled to find a position where he would be arguably 'sitting' without falling off. Leo had suggested that Dominic give up on the idea, but the leader elf had been adamant that it was absolutely necessary for him to sit on the wooden chair and Dominic had conceded to her. The only thing that made the indignity even vaguely worthwhile was that he now had a throne to accompany his position as an undisputed king of the savannah, even by his brother's human standards.
After sitting on the seat for a short time, messages had appeared up in front of Dominic's eyes. Seeing that they were all about boring matters relating to the elven forest, Leo had retreated to their mental space to relax a bit – there was nothing even vaguely interesting like gaining Prey Points or extra fertility bonuses or anything like that. Instead, it was all about space, numbers of trees, numbers of residents…administrative stuff that apparently interested his brother but Leo, not at all.
His brother had been unjustly annoyed at his gentle reminders of their oncoming deadline and had snapped at Leo more than once before finally being willing to leave that dark, wooden room. He'd tried to explain himself by saying that he was just learning how to help the elves transplant their forest, but Leo didn't believe that. How long could that take, after all? It wasn't like they were going to be the ones controlling the spell!
At least the group of elven mages who were supposed to be the ones actually doing the spell were ready by the time they had joined the rest of the Pride on the outskirts of the forest. They had been a group of fifteen, accompanied by ten hunters, only one of whom Leo had recognised. Finally, they were able to leave.
His brother had maintained control of their body for a while, but then, after their second rest, had apparently decided that he wanted to relax a bit and had shoved the responsibility over to Leo. Which led him to this situation where he had to deal with the annoying weakness of humanoids.
The elf speaking to him flinched a little at the display of his ire, but she didn't back down. Leo respected her for that.
'Fine,' he huffed, sending a message through the Pride chat to signal that they would be taking another rest. 'But we will stop only long enough for everyone to recover their stamina, and then we must continue. We must take advantage of the time before the sun becomes too hot. We will sleep then.'
The elf touched her shoulder and dipped her head.
'Yes, liege lord,' she murmured, then stumbled away to join her fellow mages who had collapsed upon the ground as soon as the halt was called.
Leo looked around to check on everyone else. All two hundred or more of them, when counting those who they'd brought with them from the basin. Truth be told, it made Leo a little nervous to have so many different beasts around him, especially when he wasn't entirely sure of their loyalty. But his brother was determined to give them a chance, arguing that they would be grateful for having numbers to fight against the dungeon overflow. Well, perhaps, but if these 'allies' turned on them before the dungeon beasts could ever reach them, that would be an irrelevant point.
Ultimately, Leo was willing to see how the allies behaved. And so far, he didn't have much cause to complain, and most of his complaints were more about his brother's reactions rather than the allies themselves. The allied leaders traveled with their respective groups, which allowed for easy communication since they had been permitted to join the Pride even if their followers had not. That came in useful when calling for a halt, or when warning about potential threats. So far, though, there hadn't been any attacks, only sightings of beasts that quickly avoided them. Leo wasn't surprised at that – with their numbers, it would be suicidal for all but the most confident ambusher. Only one who thought that it could grab one of them and get away with its prize would even try and apparently none of those they had spotted so far had been that confident.
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From the start, Dominic had made sure that their most vulnerable were kept in the centre of the group, a decision which Leo approved of, even if he wouldn't have necessarily suggested that the allies follow the same sort of pattern as his brother did – if they were careless enough to lose some of their members to opportunistic predators, they deserved it.
From what he could see, none of the Pride nor their allies looked perturbed at the announcement, though several of his females looked more than a little irritated. Leo observed their lashing tails and how their ears were pressed against their skulls and decided not to go near them and risk getting a pawful of claws to the muzzle.
One of the females, however, approached him. It was the one his brother liked to call 'Sekhmet', the strongest of his females – and strangest.
'Why are we stopping again? We are taking far too long to return home! We want to get back to our territory!'
'It's not my fault! These elves are too weak to keep up!' Leo retorted angrily in response to the faint snarl in her chest.
'Then can we not just go ahead and leave them to catch up?'
'Dominic doesn't want to do that,' Leo replied with a growl directed more at his brother than the female before him. He'd already made the suggestion. Several times even. But his brother was determined not to split the group, using the argument of 'safety in numbers' in his explanation. And, unfortunately without any other reason to suggest splitting it than just impatience with the weakness of these elves, Leo was unable to argue with him there. Well, unable to argue effectively with him. And yes, he was in control of their shared body, but he knew that he'd never hear the end of it if he forced the matter and then something happened.
It was a great pity those damn plant-eaters hadn't been willing to carry the elves. Dominic had asked both the ullas and the buffalos after their first unnecessary stop, but the fighting was still too recent and their wariness towards both elves and lions was still too strong to allow the elves to ride on their vulnerable backs.
Dominic had chosen not to push the issue, deciding that it wasn't worth antagonising the headstrong beasts. Leo thought that that had been a mistake, but his suggestion of killing the one who had refused to help to set an example to the rest was rejected with barely any thought.
'Oh. Well, if Dominic wishes us to travel at the elves' speed, then that is what we will do,' Sekhmet responded, changing her tune in a way that annoyed Leo even further. Why was she always on his brother's side? She was the only female so far who allowed only Dominic exclusively to mate with her.
Leo huffed in annoyance but he was immediately distracted from his irritation when a different female sidled up to him, her scent musky and heavy with heat. She was one of the females from the new pride, Leo was pleased to note. Perhaps they were closer to integrating with his pride than he'd been fearing.
Mounting her after a few cursory licks, he basked in the pleasurable, yet brief experience. Dodging the expected reactionary attack when he disengaged, Leo found that he was feeling a lot more relaxed afterwards. He felt even better when that one female was followed by four more, two from his original Pride and two from the new additions. Perhaps there were some benefits to stopping more frequently, he decided.
The improvement to his mood was enough that when his little brother flopped onto the ground not far from him, Leo just yawned rather than snarling at him or threatening to attack as he probably would have done if it had happened prior to the mating.
The other male really did have an impressive mane, Leo thought begrudgingly. Only the fact that three of his little brother's females had clearly sought out Leo himself for mating allowed him to admit that.
'Why did you not concentrate on improving your mane and size?' the other male asked Leo, his thoughts clearly running along the same lines.
Leo didn't want to admit that it had been mostly Dominic's influence which had stopped him from doing just that and was briefly tempted to activate Rage and show his little brother just how big he could swell when he put his mind to it. But he only needed to think about how much material it would give Dominic to throw at him if he did such a thing in the middle of his Pride just for the sake of showing off to make him decide that it wasn't worth it. And he wouldn't want to risk putting his females at risk, either – losing control the way Dominic had wouldn't be a good look.
'Size isn't everything,' he remarked instead. 'And an impressive mane is important, but the females also appreciate a successful fighter.'
'I realise that,' the other lion replied glumly. 'Far more females in heat approached you than approached me.' He huffed dolefully. 'And I cannot even complain when you won against me so easily. Do you have any advice?'
Leo found himself warming to the other lion – clearly he wasn't so bad if he was willing to recognise Leo as the bigger brother and come and ask for advice. And he was a good enough fighter that, as long as he pulled his weight, Leo would be willing to have him around. He'd even be willing to share the females with him – as long as the females didn't start preferring him.
'You are too slow,' Leo told the lion, pushing himself more upright and primly crossing his paws. 'You rely too much on your size to win. Concentrate more on your flexibility and speed.' Then he paused, thinking about some things Dominic had said. 'Or you could concentrate on your defence, on making it impossible for enemies to bite through your skin, or cause them to damage themselves as they do so.' He breathed out a gust of air. 'Ultimately, you need to focus on excelling in one or two areas, but also shoring up your weaknesses everywhere else as much as possible.'
'I understand, brother, and thank you for your guidance,' the other lion responded gratefully. 'It is a very new world we find ourselves in, is it not? And we must be adaptable to the changes. I thought I had been, but recent events have proven differently.'
About to reply, Leo was distracted by a message popping up before his eyes.
His lips lifted slightly off his teeth as he recognised some of the words. He reached out to the being whose mental presence he had become so used to feeling.
'Brother? Dominic? We have a problem.'