Escape Under the Forever Sky (15 page)

I was exhausted and my circumstances hadn't changed, but at least my belly was full. I climbed down carefully and retrieved my walking stick from the ground under the acacia, where I'd left it. I was ready to face whatever the day would bring.

Moses was deserted. I rinsed my wound and the bandage and was relieved to see there were still no
signs of infection. I even broke a small twig and used the frayed end to brush my teeth the way I'd seen some African kids do it. A long drink topped off my fig breakfast, and after a giant stretch I was off, limping after Moses wherever he chose to go.

It was still early, so the sun wasn't too strong. I figured this was probably going to be the nicest part of the day and I should enjoy it as much as possible. As I walked, I sang song after song in my head, curious to see how long I could go before I ran out of new ones.

There were no signs of you-know-who, and I was feeling pretty good, all things considered. A beautiful red and orange kingfisher caught my eye, but I didn't stop to admire it. I needed to get to wherever I was going as fast as I could. Up ahead I could see Moses flowing out of the trees and into a clearing. I noted that he was getting bigger and wondered whether he would turn into a watering hole. Sure enough, just beyond the tree line I could see what looked like a small pond. Stepping out from the trees, I was just about to drop to my knees, grateful for a drink of water that didn't have mud visibly swirling around in it, when out of the corner
of my eye I saw something twitch. I froze. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and goose bumps popped up all over my arms.

There, twenty feet straight ahead and on the same side of the water as me, stood three grown lions. A male and two females. I had interrupted them while they were drinking. Water dripped from their chins, along with some blood from a recent kill.

For an eternity nothing moved. We just stared at each other. Gradually, I became aware of a whimpering sound, and I wondered if the animal they had just eaten might still be alive nearby. Then I realized the whimpering sound was me.

The lion raised his massive head and looked straight into my eyes and through me. His black mane was short, and I could see spots on his nose—he was young. One of the females sat down and began cleaning her face with a paw, just like a house cat only much, much bigger. The other one went back to drinking. All that separated us was a few feet of grass, like a corridor that ran between the pond on my left side and the trees on my right. Beyond them the stream continued into an open field.

“Anbasa,”
I whispered.

They ignored me, totally indifferent to my presence. But I couldn't take my eyes off them. The bushy tufts at the ends of their tales, their pale swollen bellies marked by faint spots, their big, round paws, claws retracted for now but there nonetheless, inches long and lethal. The weird thing was, I didn't feel afraid. I felt
electrified
.

Suddenly there was a loud rustling from the trees, and I whipped my head around to see what was coming. I heard their voices before I saw them: Markos, Dawit, and Helena. The dogs must have followed my scent. It couldn't have been too hard, especially with a fresh cut on my foot.

Markos, Dawit, and Helena jerked to a stop as soon as they saw the lions, their expressions ranging from shock to terror. The dogs strained against their leashes back toward the trees, desperate to get away from the predators. We stood in a triangle, with me at one corner, the lions straight ahead, and Markos, Helena, and Dawit to my right, near the trees. One lioness flicked her tail, a sign of annoyance. I wanted to tell her,
It's their fault I'm here—blame them, not me!!

Markos was the first to recover. “You stupid, stupid
girl.” His quiet voice seethed with anger. “Look at what you have done.”

Dawit held up his hand. “Enough, Markos,” he murmured. “Lucy. Back up very slowly and make your way to us. It will be okay. Move very slowly, and do not show the lions your back.”

But I had no intention of moving. I had made my choice two nights ago when I decided to escape.

“Lucy,” urged Helena, “you can't stay here. The lions will kill you. Please—”

“And do you know how they will kill you?” Markos interrupted. “First, they will tear out your throat. Next, they will rip open your stomach with their claws. If you are lucky, you will be dead before that happens.”

His words wiped out any doubt I might have felt. “And what about you, Markos?” I said, keeping my voice low but strong and even. “How will you kill me? Do tell me, please. I want to make an informed choice.”

That did it. Markos started toward me, but before he took two steps, the lion stood up.

The lion stood up
.

The lion walked slowly, deliberately, directly toward me, and the lionesses followed him. The king of the jungle and his two queens were ten feet away. Nine. Eight. Five.

None.

Three gigantic beasts surrounded me, their heads almost level with mine. I couldn't move, couldn't breathe. Silent tears poured down my cheeks. It was like my body was experiencing what was happening while my brain was observing everything from a distance. Mesmerized, I watched the lions' rib cages expand and contract with each heavy breath. The male leaned forward.

I'm going to die
.

But with one long stride he turned to face the other humans. Helena and Dawit staggered back, wide-eyed and openmouthed. Markos wasn't intimidated so easily. Of course not. He was the one with the gun, which he was gripping so hard I could see the tendons in his hands.

The standoff was broken by a low, rumbling growl from one of the lionesses. Then the lion tossed his head and stretched his mouth into a wide grimace,
bearing every one of his two-inch-long teeth. Markos flinched. He had about ten seconds to get of there, and he knew it.

“You had your chance, Lucy,” he called as he backed away. “Move,” he ordered the others.

Helena's shoulders were shaking with quiet sobs as they fell back into the trees. Dawit was the last to go. Just before he disappeared, he said, “I am sorry, Lucy.”
Yeah, thanks for nothing
.

My head swam as the enormity of it hit me: I was safe from my kidnappers—but surrounded by wild lions.

I let out a small moan, and with it went all of my courage. My shaky legs couldn't support me anymore. I sank down into the grass and hid my face in my hands, too scared to see what would happen next.

To my utter amazement, what happened next turned out to be—nothing. With the big humans gone, the lions went back to ignoring me and ambled over to a particularly shady tree and lay down.
Now what?
I was trapped. I couldn't go back, I couldn't follow Markos, Dawit, and Helena into the trees, and the lions blocked Moses's path ahead of me. How much
time did I have left until they got hungry again? I sat where I was in the increasingly hot sun and sneaked glances at them out of the corner of my eye while they dozed.

I fantasized about living among the lions out in the wild. They would hunt, and I would build a fire and roast the leftovers for myself. During the day we'd sleep together in one big cozy heap, and at night we'd go exploring. Sometimes the lion would even let me ride on his back. I would be Lady Lucy of the Lions, and the stories about me would live on forever as legends of bravery and adventure.

One of the lionesses was still awake, studying me as I studied her. I stared into her amber eyes, so calm and unknowable, and wondered what she saw in me. We stayed like that for a long time, communing. Like Yousef and his hyenas.

You must not be afraid. Show them respect
.

You must not be afraid
.

What did I have to lose?

S
LOWLY, WITHOUT BREAKING
eye contact with the lioness, I got to my feet. I took two deep breaths, drew back my shoulders, and set my face in what I hoped was a peaceful, confident, but unchallenging expression.

I took a step forward. The lioness raised her head but stayed where she was. The other two kept sleeping.
So far, so good. Just take it one step at a time
. And I did. Step by step, I approached the lions, talking softly to them the whole time.

“Okay, friendly lions, I'm just going to walk by you now so I can keep going on that path over there. No problem, I'm just walking nice and slow; you can
stay right where you are; I won't bother you. That's right, here I am, getting closer now, but it's okay; you just keep resting, and I'll keep walking.”

I was just a few feet in front of them now, and they were all awake, watching me. I scanned their bodies, looking for any signs of anger or annoyance, a tense muscle, a yawn, a flick of a tail. But no, they just looked back at me the same way I was looking at them. Politely.

“Here we go, lions, I'm walking past you now, past you and then away, that's right.”

I stared straight ahead as I walked, hands at my sides with the palms out so the lions could see them. To get around the lions, I had to pass within inches of the male, and when I did, I felt something graze my fingers. My heart leaped to my throat. Terrified, I looked down.

The lion was sniffing me.

“Oh!” I exclaimed softly, my whole body tingling. I resisted the overpowering urge to yank my hand away and stayed perfectly still while he made his way from my hand to my wrist. I inhaled his warm, doggy smell, and then slowly and gently I extended my fingers and
touched his bristly fur. It reminded me of a German shepherd.

“Nice to meet you too,” I whispered. It really felt that way. He just seemed to be—I don't know,
exploring
. Imagine that—a lion exploring me!

But I had to keep moving. “Thank you for saving my life,” I whispered.

After I had walked about thirty feet, I risked looking back. But they were invisible, hidden by the tall grass that separated us. I could almost believe the whole thing had never happened except that my body still hummed with excitement and relief. It was a false sense of security, though. I knew that even after leaving me to be eaten alive by wild animals, Markos, Dawit, and Helena wouldn't give up without seeing my chewed up bones with their own eyes.

My buzzing nerves were completely at odds with the peacefulness of my new surroundings: an open field of dry grass dotted with scrub bushes, bunches of acacias, and here and there a massive ficus tree. The aqua sky stretched forever without any sign that a single human being had ever been under it—no rooftops or smoke or airplanes whizzing by. During
the rainy season all of this was probably lush and flowery, but now, dried out by the relentless sun, it was mostly brown.

Which meant if I didn't do something soon, I was going to be fried. With my green eyes and beyond-pale freckled skin, I'm the last person who should have been spending extended periods of time outside in equatorial Africa. And unfortunately, I seemed to have forgotten my sunscreen.

Somehow I had to cover my skin. But what could I use? I looked around, and inspiration struck. Once again Moses came to my rescue. I scooped up handfuls of mud from his banks and smeared it over every exposed inch of my body and then some—face, neck, arms, legs, stomach, back, ears, eyelids, even up into my hairline. The cool mud felt so good I didn't even care what I looked like. My first thought was of one of those gnome pencils we used to collect in second grade, the ones that you rub back and forth between your hands to make the fluorescent hair stand out. I patted my head gingerly. My hair was stiff with days of sweat and filth and now a generous application of mud.

A flash of movement out in the field caught my eye and I snapped to attention. I spotted two—no, three—no,
more
antelope. A small herd ambled across the grassland and stopped to graze about twenty yards from me. They weren't very big, about five feet high. Some were chocolate brown and others were more yellowish—according to gender, I hypothesized. I looked carefully at their horns: They curved out, then forward, and then backward. And then it dawned on me—they weren't just any old antelope; they were hartebeest.
Swayne's
hartebeest! If I had had two good feet, I would have done a little dance, but as it was I did a finger boogie instead, shaking my shoulders and jabbing my index fingers at the sky. I knew where I was!
Wahoo!

I love you, Swayne's hartebeest! I want to marry you! I want to be you! Has there ever been a more perfect, more beautiful, more brilliant antelope than a Swayne's hartebeest? How kind of you to be practically extinct and living only in four tiny regions of Ethiopia! And how much of a genius am I to have spent ten thousand million hours rereading
Haines's Guide to African Mammals,
fifth edition, so that I could, in a flash of truly astonishing mental acuity, recognize you? Lions plus Swayne's hartebeest plus ficus trees plus
sycamore figs plus savanna and woodland equal
O
ROMO
R
EGION NEAR
L
AKE
C
HAMO
!