Rafiki’s thoughts went back to a different time and place before old age had set in and when all things were fresh and new. He remembered picking up Ajenti and holding her, and asking his new wife, “Isn’t she beautiful, Asumini?”

Asumini had smiled. “Our child will also be beautiful, like its father.”

Dearest Asumini! It was on their wedding day, the beginning of a brief dream of happiness and fatherhood. He kissed Saieti again and closed his eyes, listening to her small heartbeat. Poor Asumini, poor Penda, gone! Spirits in the Kingdom of Aiheu separated from him by every breath he drew, every beat of his own heart.

He clung to the cub, sighed deeply, and remembered. Then he looked in her eyes and kissed her again. “I see the beauty of Aiheu in your smile and the way your eyes shine. I feel the warmth of Aiheu in your soft fur. Never turn from your Uncle Rafiki, my dear. I love you, Saieti.”

“I love you too.”

Sh’aari nuzzled him and smiled, giving him a long, slow lick up the cheek. “Oh, look what I did to your beard!” She quickly began grooming his right side back into some semblance of his left.

Rafiki’s eyes half closed and he felt very much at peace. The realization came streaming through that his happiness had always been there--it had only taken many different forms. “Thank you, Aiheu,” he prayed silently. “You always take care of me. Now if I only had a home of my own....”

At that moment Amara came in. “I hear you need a place to live,” she said. “You can have my old place. I’m staying with my husband now.”

He looked up and sighed gratefully. “That was fast.”

Amara led the crowd down to her small cave in the side of the kopje. It was not much to look at, but it had made her the envy of all the other lionesses.

“Here it is!” she said with obvious pride. “Your new home!”

Rafiki looked inside. It was damp and wet, though Marrie was clearly making a great sacrifice for him.

“You ought to know when it rains, water comes through this crack in the ceiling.”

“I can fill the crack,” he said, thinking aloud. “It will require some work from time to time, and maybe a little straw on the floor will make it a little dryer and warmer. Makaka has lung trouble, so I’ll let him take this side when he sleeps over.” Idly running his fingers through Makaka’s hair, he told Amara, “He’ll usually sleep with you girls if that’s all right. Uzuri is his mother, you know.”

“We’d be delighted!” Amara said, nuzzling Makaka until he had to giggle. “He’s so sweet!”

“We’d have to raise a bed here to keep out the water.”

“I’m sorry we don’t have anything better.”

Rafiki put his arms around Amara’s neck. “Oh gods, It’s the most wonderful present I’ve ever received! Thank you, dear Marrie!”

Still, it was not exactly Busara’s cave....

Old Busara! How long ago those happy days seemed! Once Rafiki thought he would be chief of the mandrill village where he lived. Then Busara brought him to a state of enlightenment, a favor he would buy with his own blood when the priest of the old ways found out. The fever to be a shaman consumed him and transformed him, and finally sent him to his third home. That was supposed to be his final haven, a place to spend the rest of his days in loving service with his wife and children and the people of Ahadi.

Fate was not so kind. With no wife to comfort him, no children to raise, he had lost the home itself with all its memories. Makaka and Uzuri were his only ties to his old life. At his advanced age, he was starting over.

CHAPTER: NIGHT COMES

As the sun began to set, the lionesses gathered for their hunt. Adhama came and nuzzled Uzuri. “Time to gather up,” she said cheerfully. “I’ve looked so forward to the honor of hunting with you, Zuri.”

“I’m flattered,” Uzuri said. “But I’m unfamiliar with the area. Tonight, let me sit with the children.”

“Zuri, don’t be timid! We don’t expect you to bring down a buffalo by yourself! Just tag along and learn the land tonight.”

“Maybe tomorrow,” Uzuri said. “Good hunting, sister.”

Adhama nodded, and before she left she added, “Don’t get used to it. I look forward to seeing you in action out there.”

“I won’t.” Uzuri smiled and pulled a sleepy cub a bit closer.

Adhama nodded and paced away silently, vanishing into the dark. From another clump of brush, Makaka emerged, humming a tune to himself as he meandered over. He sighed and slipped his arms around Uzuri’s neck, hugging her close.

She smiled and kissed him with her warm tongue. “Busy day?”

“Busy week!” He slid down, resting his head on her side. “We walked everywhere! Rafiki found this really cool place to set up in. It’s kind of damp, though.” He yawned hugely. “We had to cut brush and fill cracks. The dampness hurts his joints, you know.” His voice dropped off to a buzz as he slowly nodded off.

Uzuri continued to groom him absently, turning this over in her mind. After all the times Rafiki had rubbed her stuff joint without complaint! She had no idea his joints hurt!

Eventually the warmth of Makaka and the cubs sank into her and she drowsed lightly, head still erect and ears alert for any disturbance. Before too long she detected the familiar tread of Rafiki as he eased through the grass towards her; his distinctive gait barely registering before she relaxed again.

Very quietly, Rafiki bent down next to her face and ever so softly planted a kiss on her cheek. He whispered, “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you, girl. If this doesn’t prove it, I don’t know what will.”

One of her eyes opened to look at him.

“Oh, I didn’t mean to wake you!”

“That’s all right.” She patted with her paw and winked. She didn’t have to ask twice--he settled next to her. “You look tense. Relax.” She took a paw and controlling her great strength with finesse, began to rub his back and shoulders. “You need to relax. This day has worn you out.” When she heard the grunt of relief, she knew she’d found the source of his pain and she concentrated on loosening him up. What her paws lacked in dexterity, they made up for in gentle persistence. And only when Uzuri was content with the results did she let him up. “If you feel tense again, you come see me.”

“I will,” he said, kissing her brow. “Thank you.”

She managed to stay awake until the hunting party came back. She had an important job to do, but she was restless and wondered what she was missing on the trail. She also wondered how her own Pride Sisters were faring, and if they caught anything. She glanced back in the direction of Pride Rock and sighed.

When the lionesses returned victorious, she woke the cubs and shared her first meal with her new family. Not knowing many of them well, she heard snatches of gossip and idle chatter that sounded only distantly familiar. As a result, she said very little.

That night as she finally settled to sleep, time and time again in her dreams she re-enacted the parting from her Pride Sisters.

“I give you the most precious possession I have. I gave a lot of thought to what I would say when I left you. In the end there is nothing I can say, and so I leave you with silence. But I can never forget the time we spent together on the trail....”

That was the crux of her problem. She could never forget the time they spent together on the trail. Would she ever be that happy again? And did she have the right to subject Rafiki and Makaka to this?