Chapter 30 Kendra #2
The lion shifters roar and the sound fills the clearing and rolls out into the forest and vibrates through the ground beneath my bare feet.
I step forward and accept, and the word that comes out of my mouth is “yes,” simple and certain, and Kojo and Zaki drop to one knee again. I walk to them and smooth my palm over both their heads, sliding across Zaki’s hair first and then Kojo, the Matriarch’s blessing.
Meekah leans toward me with a grin I already regret. “May your mating be fruitful,” he says, his tail lifting with amusement, “and may it be quieter than it has been, because my pride can hear you from across the territory.”
I want the ground to open up and swallow me whole.
My face burns and I can’t look at anyone and Amaya walks up and grabs Meekah’s arm and pulls him back.
“That is enough,” she says, and Meekah’s tail droops and his face falls into a pout.
A ripple of laughter moves through the crowd and I press both hands to my face.
“You must speak now.” Zaki is beside me. “We have practiced this.”
I look at the crowd waiting in the firelight, lion shifters and their mates, cubs peeking from behind their parents’ legs, the fire cracking and sending sparks into the dark sky.
I had a speech, Zaki and I rehearsed it for a week, formal words about tradition and honor and the Bouda way.
But standing here in this garment with these beads in my hair and the fire on my skin and the man I love watching me from three feet away, the rehearsed words feel like someone else’s clothes.
“I had it all planned out,” I say, and the clearing is quiet enough that my voice reaches every corner of the circle.
“But now that I’m officially queen, I think I need to change my speech.
” Zaki frowns and opens her mouth but I hold my hand up and she closes it.
I take a breath and speak from my heart.
“I’m human. I don’t carry the sovereign frequency.
I can’t cackle. I can’t shift. Two months ago I didn’t know any of this existed.
” I look at Kojo. “But I found a man who had been waiting a thousand years for someone to love, and he chose me. Not for strength or royalty or teeth. He chose me because I showed up. And stayed.”
I turn to Zaki. “And I found a sister who was infuriating from the moment I met her. A woman with more courage in her bare feet than most people carry in their entire lives. She lost everything and still stands every morning like the world owes her nothing. She has never once told me she loves me but she shows it in every meal she puts in front of me, every door she stands beside, every time her ridge goes flat when she’s near me and she thinks I don’t notice.
” My voice cracks and I let it. “I notice, Zaki. I’ve always noticed. ”
Zaki’s eyes are wet and her ridge is trembling and she doesn’t wipe her face.
“The Bouda were hunted and lost everything. The Matriarch was murdered on her own altar. A brother and a sister crossed an ocean and refused to let the bloodline die.” I straighten my shoulders.
“I can’t cackle. I can’t shift. But I carry the future of this clan in my heart, and I will protect it with everything I have — not out of obligation.
Out of choice. The same way he chose me. ”
The silence that follows is so complete I can hear the fire breathing. Then I turn to Kojo and the next words I speak are the ones that matter most. “I name you First Guard of the Bouda clan.”
Zaki’s hands fly to her mouth and the sound she makes is somewhere between a cackle and a scream, tears running down her face unchecked. Kojo drops to his knees, head bowed, ridge flat, shoulders shaking once before he steadies himself.
“Thank you, my queen.” His voice is rough and cracked and it is the most beautiful sound I have ever heard from him.
I smooth my hand over his head. “Rise, sister-son.”
He rises to his full height and his ridge extends slowly, blade by blade, and he turns to the crowd, firelight catching the tears on his cheeks, and he speaks.
“I am not Kojo.” His words comes out certain. “I am Alemayehu. First Guard of the Bouda clan. And I have come home.”
I start crying and I don't care who sees it. The lion shifters chant his name — Alemayehu, Alemayehu — and Zaki is crying beside me. The fire is burning. The stars are out. This is the beginning of everything.
Amaya finds me after the chanting fades, her arm sliding through mine, her face warm and kind.
“I cooked human food,” she says, steering me away from the fire where the lion shifters are already tearing into fresh elk. “You don’t have to join them for that part.”
“Thank Mother Fate,” I whisper.
I look back once. Zaki and Alemayehu are standing together at the fire, ridges extended. They catch me looking and I wave them off.
“Go eat,” I call, and they nod, watching me until Amaya pulls me around the corner and into the warm light of her home.
This is a new beginning for the Bouda. And it’s a new beginning for me.