1 - Take

"Be very careful son, it could smell us. It's smart."

The very dark man with bounty beards was very conscious not to lose his balance on the branch of the tree. He almost slipped. He shouldn't. He had been doing that since forever.

The other man whom he had addressed clicked his fingers and whispered. He couldn't get the message probably. The other guy was on another neighboring tree.

The boabab trees were beginning to lose their green tendrils and their maidenhood was going into extinction. Twould take a new summer for new leaves to sprout and the incumbent would have to overstay their welcome.

"What should I do? I'm scared."

The guy responded to the prior call of the dark man. His hands were shivering. He almost shuddered. That was his first time. He had only followed the dark man because he had promised to watch his back. He hoped that he wouldn't regret his decision.

The sharp peg, which looked like a spear, in the hand of the other man dropped. He was too lagging. He looked down firstly and the roar came again.

He was weak to look away. He finally did. He looked at the dark man with bounty beards. The dark man waved him to be calm. He hoped he would.

He wanted to hold his palm to the brown bark of the V-like branch he was standing on. Shame! He lost his balance and down he toppled till he made a thud on the earth.

"Holy mess!"

Like when you say "What the fuck!" The dark man was jumpy then. His heart was racing. Like doing some acrobatics which even the whole of his body wouldn't and couldn't.

He looked down at the fellow who was lying on the damped earth. He sighed in the first place.

He was glad that the long and sharp peg which had fallen in the first place did not pierce the lad, he would had shaved all his beards and go to the rocks to be a cave man. He possibly wouldn't have the courage to tell the folks that he couldn't watch over just a lad.

He saw the lion flexed its limbs towards the lad who was still on the earth. He could see from where he was that the lad was left with no grit in him. He could fumble and lose his life to the lion.

He hadn't been so schooled. There was always a two-weeks training for all the lads before they go into the woods to hunt down all sorts of wild cats.

He hadn't invited the lad in the first place, but the lad had insisted. The intoxication of love blurred his sense of judgement of course.

The lad wanted to impress the daughter of the Weaver of skin for all those who were ripe for modern clothings.

The tradition of the people of Curt was way too remote for your sharpened mind and modernized instinct.

From the age of two to fifteen, all the folks were to wear clothings made from fibres and leaves. Majority of the time, leaves were more preferable because of the stress and odds of making coverings from fibres.

While from the age of eighteen to the eldest in the hood, their clothings were made from the skins of wild cats. That was why the demand for the hunt for wild cats was always high.

Those between the age of sixteen and seventeen were free to put on whatever they wanted. By extension, they were without restrictions. Only that they wouldn't cross the red river of Put.

The lad was sixteen but was always upfront.

The lad at that point was beginning to stand and the lion was charging that time towards him. It got to his front and halted. It roared.

The jaw of the lion was hefty and the lad knew that just a bite from those ferocious teeth would dismember him and his hope of hopping on the train of love would be equal to naught.

He went down on his face again. He didn't mind that he was eating the dust. His nostrils had already been filled with the crumps of twigs and crushed brown leaves.

Then he heard a thud few metres away from him. He heard the lion roared and turned its back to him.

He could sweep the confetti of courage into a whole at that time and looked through the lion to the base of the boabab tree the dark man with bounty beards had been standing on.

The man was stanced with his sharp peg poised. His right leg was at the front and the left was curved at the knee and thrown back.

His chest was forward and his eyes emotionless. Obviously, the lad could say that he had been doing that since like forever.

The lad only wished that he could be like the man. He wished he could stand a raging lion like that and take it down. How graceful would it complement his talent of singing.

By that, he wouldn't only be able to entertain his lover-in-embryo, he would also be able to defend her in the face of opposition and rivalry. Especially from bullies like Arki and Fruk.

The lion was vexed. Its legs were quite heavy but the weight seemed nothing to the rage that was tossing them into the air.

The lad helped himself up to catch the full view of the battle.

Just few throws of its body into the air, the lion was already at the base of the tree where the dark man was.

The man ducked the last throw as the lion hit its head against the bark of the tree.

It didn't wrench. It should. It was determined. Pain meant nothing to it.

The man walked backwardly quickly. He was conscious not to trip. That would be his end.

Fighting with such cat as a lion, you don't make a single mistake, you'd be a goner.

The lion turned towards him. It was all red. Its face was burning with rage. It snarled an charged again.

The man tried as much as possible to duck again, but one of the limbs of the lion ate into his left shoulder but he didn't fall.

He ran as fast as he could towards the boabab tree. He was sure that the lion was still after him. Cats never give up! Lions are proud!

He got to the base of the tree and ran up the bark of the tree in skills, as though he was going to do a backflip.

He was sure that the lion was near before he flipped. Like somersaulted.

He landed on the back of the lion and drove his long, sharp peg into the neck of the angry cat.

The Lion whimpered and fell. That was a KO for the man.

He climbed off the lion and fought his peg free. He turned to the lad,

"Next time, you stay calm and believe in your..."

He saw only the lad's peg there. The lad was nowhere to be found. He rushed away from the lion and went to where the peg was.

"Vie!!!!!!"

He picked the lad's peg and followed the footprints.

He would come back for the cat.

As he walked few metres into the rough path, he felt a thin thorn in his neck. He touched it. Twas the mouth-arrow.

Another came and more. He ducked the few he could, but three were already next of kin to his neck.

He turned to look at the direction where he thought the arrows came from. He saw some manganis gibbering on few other boabab trees.

He saw Vie over the shoulder of one of them.

That was the last scene he could take. The remaining was snatch away from him by gloom.

The Manganis carried him away.