The purple lioness nuzzled her niece's face until it was quite squished into the ground. The blue lioness kept calling for her to get off of her, no, really, you have got to get off, Ebumnyami, but she could not be bothered to. No force on this earth could have torn Xan from Ebumnyami again. She examined the blue and white lioness thoroughly, scrutinizing her every inch for scrapes or bruises or bumps or a single missing hair from her sweet albeit a little empty head. Her eyebrows were furrowed and her icy blue eyes stared deeply into Xan's own pair in muted gold.
"Have they hurt you in any way?"
----
Xan finally was let up from her aunt's very, some may say overly affectionate embrace and shook the dusty dirt from her still sleek coat. She blushed faintly and cast her eyes at the ground.
"Well... The lioness who brought me here, Adelheid, she has been a little preoccupied but I really like her, she is quite nice. I think she might be pregnant though. Well, because she told me she tried to get pregnant by this fellow in the rogue lands, but, anyway-
"So I met this boy, okay? And stop- don't interrupt me- let me finish!! He's really, really sweet Ebumnyami, you would really like him." Her soft eyes and sing song tone were practiced to soothe or butter up her pink and purple aunt.
"His name is Dhikkara, we're both Thralls but I'm not sure what that means but I've never been in a pride before, so, I guess I'll figure it out. But he's really been helpful while Adelheid is gone and I dunno, I think I might really like him. Or, well," she rolled her eyes, shrugged her pink-marked shoulders and blew a puff of air through her forelock, "he's really cute."
"What!? I know that look!!" She pouted at her tutting aunt.
----
Ebumnyami's eyes could have rolled into the back of her head. This one was just like Velum. If only she had taken on her grandmother Orco's sensibilities. Or followed Ebumnyami's own sparkling example. But for the time being she was just flooded with relief to see that her niece was safe and unharmed. She would have to talk her out of falling in love with the first boy she saw, especially in a pride where they could not be sure that anyone was able to be trusted. Though, if she was being honest- well, not to Xan but to herself, she did kind of think that Phlegyas was handsome too, in a very rugged and world-weary way. But Ebumnyami was pretty good at suppressing any feelings or desires of her own because she was always too busy babysitting Xan to worry about herself.
"Well, we will just have to worry about that later. Right now, I'm just happy that you're alive."
----
Xun could have rolled her eyes too, but did not want to diminish the vibe that Ebumnyami was putting out. She stopped herself from asking her aunt why she had thought that she had been dead, but if she got Ebumnyami started, she knew that she would not be able to get her aunt to shut up.
Instead, she just smiled
the end.
total word counts:
Ebumnyami: 509
Xan: 507