In a dark, muddy hut amidst the rank of rotting food, a Kaunlutha female shivered in her bed. Kiyamanuva wore a wrapping of cloth around her. Two nights ago, she came down with iceblood, a disease that took many of her kind. The frosted fog sat still and stiff where it last landed after taking hamlets to the grave. It emitted a fume when breathed in, those near would fall ill.

It was the law of the land to report the disease to the Humans, an alien race that came to the planet hundreds of years ago. Kaunlutha lost in the great wars many years ago, and Humans put them into enclosure saying it would preserve their species. Under the control, all Kaunlutha had to report friends and relatives with the disease for them to be taken away. 

But the bipedal lion queen, pregnant with the last hope of the Kaunlutha, hid her disease, painting her cheeks to hide the paleness, wearing a thick fur cloak to camouflage her fur loss. Tufts of golden fur came off onto her bed each morning. It was her eldest that cleaned and hid it.

"Rathana," she called now to her daughter standing by the entrance. The spears at Rathana's hip clanked when she approached. Her long brown hair was like a mane and like her mother, but unlike her mother, she hardly had any magick. Even at the ripe age of twelve, she did not develop. It was a sign. Kaunlutha magick was dying.

"You call me bid?" Rathana bowed her head. A daughter, but a warrior loyal to her queen.

"Get Oolid. It is time."

Rathana's furred face puffed up, losing a soldier's control. "Must we, Mama?" Anger sizzled in her voice. "He's a Human!" Kiyamanuva stretched her arm and caressed her daughter's coarse cheek fur with her paw.

"I trust Oolid. Please."

Her body spasmed as pain shot through her from her abdomen. The baby was coming now. Rathana gave a growl of obedience and rushed out of the hut. When the door opened Kiyamanuva saw the gathered crowd waiting for the arrival of the heir.

Twisting her body, she tried to refused the pain, but it came again and again without control. She cried out. Her husband came. The mane fanned out around a dark brown face as he leaned forward, his black eyes stared intently into hers. Black and brown fur layered with shimmering gold. Wisps of gold rose from his back. He gritted his teeth and held a giant black paw over her body.

"It's alright, Oga," Kiyamanuva's voice was faint, "She is alright."

"She? How know it?"

"Can feel her." Kiyamanuva guided Ogalutha's paw to rest on her stomach where the baby squirmed and kicked. "She's warm."

Ogalutha's bared his fangs and his jaw trembled. "She-she has—!" He fell to his knees. 

Kiyamanuva smiled weakly. The child was warm with magick.

The door burst open and Oolid stumbled into the hut. Dark hair, pale skin, wearing a gray shirt and black pants, he didn't even bother to change for the special arrival. Humans never understood their customs. In his hand was a black bag. Rathana nudged him forward with the dull end of her spear.

"Birth her," she said and put her paw on his head. He only came to her throat. Humans were no threat to them as long as they didn't come in packs. "Do any funny thing," she snarled, "I will snap your head off."

The Human nodded his head, eyes wide in fear. So much smaller than Kaunlutha, he dragged over the chair that Ogalutha was sitting on and knelt on it to reach Kiyamanuva's stomach. Out came his gadgets and shiny silver tools.

After a few moments, he turned to father and daughter and nodded his head. "It is ready."

He put on gloves. Kiyamanuva rolled on her side.

"Push."

The lion queen yowled once, twice, and the baby was almost there. Oolid shouted for blankets and water. The stench of blood filled the room. Sweat soaked Kiyamanuva's fur. She clenched her teeth, letting fangs dig into her lip. Ogalutha called her name over and over.

"I see her!" Oolid called. Two females brought in blankets. One came with water. Blood dripped on the ground. "Come on, dear queen," Oolid grabbed the baby, "come on."

Kiyamanuva's breathing came rapid. Her nostrils flared. Then heat filled her from the inside, hot and scalding. She choked on a scream. Thoughts white, mind numb, and she couldn't hear anything.

Something is wrong, she thought. She wanted to tell Oolid, but she couldn't speak. Then in a split second, a vision rushed into her mind.

In the vision, she was standing alone, covered in blood. Around her, black, ashen land. All trees had fallen, and all huts were burnt in the fire. The sun hidden behind the moon gave an eerie pale glow. From the horizon, a giant white cloud of frost crawling toward them, freezing everything in its path. A child stood in middle of a circle of Kaunlutha bodies, some struggling to get up and escape the oncoming doom. 

Kiyamanuva knew the child was hers. In one paw, the child held a green gem. The other, a small sun. The child's orange mane rose as she growled. Orange sparks flew. Kiyamanuva instinctively knew what will happen, but she couldn't move. The child smashed the sun into the gem, shattering both. Frost clouds rushed at them.

"There's no point," the child said.

The vision faded to darkness. It was the same one she had months ago around the time she became pregnant. A warning from the sun. She wasn't about to have a baby with magick, but a baby also with powers that would bring doom onto them. Kiyamanuva knew she should not have ignored the sun. But it was a much-wanted pregnancy after so many miscarriages. She couldn't get rid of the child.

A shock of pain snatched her back to wakefulness and she snapped her eyes open, letting out a mighty yowl.

I knew, but I love her.

Tears streamed down her face as sunlight warmed her face. No sounds. No screams. So quiet and peaceful.

Kiyamanuva felt the tiny body struggling to free itself.

Then, from far away, she heard voices.

"Kiya, au-luda (my love), stay with me."

Oh, Oga, I'm not going anywhere.

"Mama, Mama-a!"

Rathana, be strong. Look after your sister.

"Push."

So, let it be. Let her come. Let me believe she will be good. Fate is not in stone.

She let out a final, mighty yowl of love and joy. The sunlight shaped into an ancient Kaunlutha queen in old tribal wear with a headpiece made of golden vines and flowers. The female caressed Kiyamanuva's cheek and wrapped her into a warm hug. Kiyamanuva cried in her mother's arms.

Her mother whispered to her. "Fate decides the path, but they will carve their own."

Kiyamanuva closed her eyes, content and at peace.

* * *

"Kiya?" Ogalutha whispered and fell to his knees. Small golden sparkles of her magick lifted, returning to the air, and her physical body crumble into ashes. When he touched them, they were cold.

"It had her, iceblood," he said to no one in particular.

He turned again to Oolid. The cub wrapped in bloodied blankets did not stir, but she was not dead. Her eyes were closed and her breath was easy.

"Make her cry," he demanded.

"She's fine," Oolid shook his head as if in disbelief, "she's breathing."

"Give her to me."

Oolid hesitated, then handed the cub to her father. Ogalutha peered into the child's face. A thin outline of a mane was already forming. A mix of deep orange and golden yellow like her grandfather, long-ago deceased. She even shared the button nose with the black tip and the lion's tail with the brown tuft of fur at the end.

Ogalutha took the child outside for all to see. The sun gently touched its light upon the clearing where tall cluda trees stood like stiff, green sentinels. Ripe orange fruit rolled about their vine roots. A straight path stretched from the hut to the center of Tumattamaku jungle where the sun shrine awaited the naming ceremony as soon the child was born. But instead of waiting there, all Kaunlutha had filled the path and fanned out around the hut.

Chatter died when Ogalutha unwrapped the blanket and revealed the new heir. All manes swished and tails shivered. Those who could kneel, dug their knees into the ground.

"Kiyamanuva joined the ancestors among the stars," Ogalutha bellowed, "but left behind a valuable treasure. Our legacy and magick live on."

A moment of silence and stillness as everyone stood. They unsheathed their claws and raised a paw into the air in respect to their dead queen. As the sun climbed to the sky, their fur shimmered golden and bronze. Their manes rippled as if wanting to soak up the sun even though very few had any magick left. When the sun reached the hut and covered Ogalutha and his child, a miracle occurred.

The child opened her eyes and let out a piercing cry that burst up into the sky. The crowd murmured and some ducked as the wind tore through them and the jungle. It went beyond the enclosure.

Far from the jungle where trees died and the land was wrought in frost, a glass ball lay beneath layers and layers of thick ice and snow. When the glass shuddered from the soundwaves, a single gray eye blinked open and an ice beast rose from a two-hundred-year slumber. Shouts of alarm echoed throughout the underground ice caves, making ice vibrate and small icicles shatter.

"The beast has awoken!"

"Get his lordship."

"Soon, we will ride."

But such calls were hidden beneath the frozen lands. Ogalutha and the Kaunlutha would forever be unaware of the commotion in the north where a monster seeped in legend lay waiting to destroy the sun child they so adored. A dark tale it was which only elders claimed in moments of feverish talk as real. No one believed them. 

And now, Ogalutha was beaming at his daughter and her mighty roar.

"You special, very special," he said, wiggling his finger at her as she tried to swat at it.

"What will you name her, Papa?" Rathana came up to her father and peered into the blanket at her sister.

"What Kiya had wanted," he answered.

"With her name?"

Ogalutha looked ahead and the crowd parted as he made way for the sun shrine. "With her name," he said, "her love, and the sun." In his arms, the child's mane was rippling on its own, filled with unruly magick she would one day learn to control, use, and save them all.

But that day didn't come. Ogalutha lost all hope as the frost curse took more and more Kaunlutha, and the death toll increased. Distraught and defeated, he would desperately cling to hope only when he looked into his daughter's eyes and felt the warmth of her magick.

"One day, she leads. Maybe then."

Maybe then, he would think, the Kaunlutha would be saved.