The Legend of Lapis

Lapis pulled Monia's body to his once more, buried his face in her neck and impaled her as deep as he possibly could with a final spearing. He emptied his white, hot seed deep into her, and she screamed out as her own body shuddered in climax from the sensation.

After an eternity of breaths, one by one slowing their hearts to resting pace, they sunk down to the floor, shared a long look, and finally parted. Lapis' shaft was coated with the evidence of a line crossed, a hunter's caution thrown aside, and Monia wrapped a hand around its slippery surface.

"What more can I do for you, my guest?" she asked.

He replied with a smile that said as clear as words what he wanted.

When they finally emerged from the hut, soaked in sweat and laughter, the sun was setting, and the tiger had returned from her hunt with a deer that the villagers were busy cutting slabs of meat from. Parts were already roasting over an open fire in the clearing. The lion and her cubs were feasting happily on entrails and fat from the animal's belly.

"See how it works out?" Monia said. "She's back, her children are safe and everybody gets fed. You live a strange way, you people of the plains. You hunt and eat another hunter. Why? Their meat is tough, and they are of better use as friends than foes."

"But that is why we're strong. We kill the strong and eat them."

"I don't think that is why. You are strong because you hunt. It doesn't matter if you're hunting a lion or a deer. The lions are strong, but what do they hunt? Not other lions."

He thought about that. "Maybe you're right. Or maybe not. I have no head to ponder that with right now, because my belly is making too much noise. And besides, what I think about that doesn't matter tonight. There are no lions for me to hunt on your grounds."

"But there's fresh meat and fruit to feast on, blue eyes," Monia said and lead him to the fire, where men, women and children had gathered. "You are still my guest. Today, tomorrow and for as long as you care to stay. And I think that what you want more than anything is to remedy that hunger, is it not?"

He nodded in agreement and they sat down on the ground in the warm light. The fire sparkled and crackled, and the fat from the meat sizzled as it dripped onto the glowing trunks. He was no longer a stranger to the villagers, and part from the odd, curious look from the children, nobody made a big affair of his presence. He was the whisperer's guest, and it seemed like that was all the explanation they needed. Someone raised his voice in a song, and children were running round the outer edge of the lit circle, chasing one another and squealing with laughter. It was a scene so close to where he came from, several days away, that Lapis for a moment forgot just where he was. Only the smell from the meat was different. Sweeter, less earthy.

The sated sensation of being spent, and smelling his own body on the woman next to him in that homely setting, that was new too. It was the privilege of the settled. To consummate each other's bodies to the fullest, to breed as it pleased them and sit down by the fire to feast on what the hunters brought home. He wouldn't leave tomorrow. He knew that already. Maybe he had already fathered a child in the pale beauty's belly. But that is another story, to be told somewhere else. I leave them as I leave you there, by the fire, in a short while.

No, he'd stay because she had looked into his mind and made walls crumble. And the things he had seen with his newfound horizons were too wondrous to leave behind. Maybe he'd never scour the plains with spear in hand again. That didn't matter. This was a whole new hunt, one that could last a lifetime.

"Does she have a name?" he asked suddenly.

This time it was Monia's turn to be perplexed. She looked at him with her big, cobalt blue eyes into his almost identical.

"What? Who?"

"The lion."

"She's a lion," Monia said. "They don't have names."

"But she's more than a lion, isn't she? She's your companion, a part of the village, a friend. What kind of a friend is nameless?"

Monia stared at him with a fascinated look. The flames from the fireplace danced in her eyes, and a small smile spread into a wide, happy one.

"I have a name for her. I have kept it under my breath, because I feared I had lost my mind. Because who would name an animal? But you showed me that it's not crazy after all. I call her Tesla. It was my mother's name, but I give it to her now."

"It's a good name," Lapis said and put an arm around her shoulder.

Minutes later, the tender meat was cooked, cut and served with sweet fruit and spicy roots. And for a while, all thoughts of lions, mountains, scouts, pale skin, blue eyes, sapling spears and seed in a womb were shoved aside. One urge at the time. That was more than enough.

And so I come to an end, to stay here for a while, to be forgotten soon. But I'm a story, and I will hide and listen. One day you will recall, rediscover me in my true form, and see me for what I really am. No words, no names, no places and things. But until then, I hope I amused you for the time being. That is also a worthy purpose.

Forget me now, remember me later.