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 Posted: Sun May 27, 2018 10:46 am
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When Kimondo finally returned from the Tianxia, it turned out that she had missed quite a bit in the Mwezi'Johari. Naturally, there were no easy answers for any of it. After a rocky attempt at diplomacy in the West House, she was hardly confident in her skills to manage things at home but at least here she the authority. Based on the task before her this night, she would decide if that helped or hurt later.
It was no surprise to hear that there were unhappy pride members amongst them. She would have been more suspicious not to hear of any. What was a surprise, though, was that it wasn't anybody who had stood out during Shangyue's reign or the rebellion. Another item to evaluate later. Threatened though her worldview and confidence in her reign was, she wouldn't let it show.
Cruithne was her cousin, one of many she barely knew. They were primarily separated by age but also the way the branches on the family tree diverged. But it wasn't Cruithne she was looking to talk to tonight. It was another cousin, one from both sides, who had a more familiar appearance and kept his dissenting opinions, if any, to himself better than his friend. Kimondo was waiting near the center of the pride for Kumbha to arrive, pacing and trying to get her mind focused on only the task at hand and not the dozen other things demanding action. |
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Posted: Sun May 27, 2018 11:09 am
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He would have been naive to assume that this wasn't going to happen sooner or later. Cruithne had steadily lost his tact, and the worse he got, the less subtle he became. Though neither Kumbha or Qoba had exhibited any genuine dissent or bad behaviour, by mere association they had drawn attention to themselves. The pale male was fortunate that it was he who had been summoned, and not the striped male who had every chance of expiring on the spot if it happened to him.
...As the first, Kumhba could at the very least gain some sort of read on Kimondo's demeanour, and by extension, advise his friend on whether or not he needed to be concerned.
Regardless, it was unwise of him to keep the current monarch waiting and it was with this in mind that he found himself moving towards the inner most regions of the pride. To her credit it seemed that Kimondo had kept the purpose of their meeting quiet for the time being, something that was of benefit to everyone. The less people knew, the less they could gossip, and the less gossip there was... well, the less she might have to tidy up afterwards.
"Your Highness," True to form, he didn't take long to make his presence known. He'd long since schooled his expression into something reasonably neutral, and this was what she would be greeted with when she acknowledged him. "I believe you requested my presence?"
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Posted: Mon May 28, 2018 5:29 am
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Straight to the point, he'd give her credit where it was due on that one. Small took would have dragged this out unnecessarily and to be entirely honest, he wasn't overly interested in discussing the weather this afternoon. Still, the topic of conversation was one he could have done without. As it stood the aforementioned topic was now unavoidable though and he might as well provide her with some clarity on it.
"I am a friend of his," Kumbha replied with a simple confirmation and shook his head. He was at least relieved to discover that Cruithne might have been loud enough to be overheard, but he hadn't been standing on a podium to preach to the masses. Whether or not it got to that remained to be seen, but it was highly likely at that stage that the pale lion would tackle his wayward cousin to the ground and drag him off by his ear.
"As for what he's saying I imagine he has some way to go before he's standing on any hill tops denouncing the crown," He added. His lips pursed as he regarded the monarch for a time, it was true that he had little trust in her, he wasn't quite as paranoid as Qoba... However his time around Cruithne had left some residual suspicion in his own mind. She was nobility and she would do what suited her and her high ranking friends, anything beneath her was likely to be expendable if it changed the status quo.
...Especially if it required them to do some work for once.
"Quite frankly he doesn't quite know what he wants at the moment," He explained, shoulders rolling in a light shrug. "But he's certainly not happy, for all the assumptions that the world is right again, it seems living outside of our home has given him clarity that we...did not necessarily have," he murmured.
"However if you are worried about rebellion I am fairly confident he will behave himself. He's unhappy and he may be running his mouth, but he isn't stupid."
Well, he wasn't stupid yet and Kumbha sincerely hoped it would stay that way!
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Posted: Mon May 28, 2018 6:12 am
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"Eesh..." Kumbha winced as she asked what Cruithne's concerns were. If he knew he was going to be asked that he might have thought about it more so that he could split the valid points from the nonsense. When his cousin started to rant, he really started to rant, and some of what he said was largely incoherent and not entirely relevant to the Mwezi!
"I'll will stick to the basics if you don't mind," Kumbha elected to play it safe. Cruithne had said certain things more than once, and if these had been important enough to repeat, then Kumbha would assume they were a key concern.
"Based on his own remarks you have done nothing but revert every valid change made by Shangyue. You have put the slaves back in their box and placed the nobility back on their pedestal. Shangyue was likely to succeed because he took advantage of the lack of freedoms provided to those who have been enslaved, he gave them the chance to improve their standing." He shrugged.
"He seems particularly fixated on our desire to enslave those who wait to see if the divine blesses an outsider too. They go to sleep free one day, and the next we clap them in chains without so much as a warning. Everything they once knew is wrenched from them because we have decided as much," He paused briefly and sighed; it was in his best interests not to remark upon Cruithne's blasphemy at this time... That was something that lion genuinely had to work through on his own.
"In his view we are worse than some of those prides he has met on the outside, they might have slaves, but it seems those slaves can work their way towards freedom."
Another pause follows.
"And quite frankly I would say that he believes you are a spectacular politician, but ultimately no better than any other leader we've had. You restored the status quo, something of benefit to those in the highest echelons, but of little value to anyone else," he explained.
He was satisfied in his own way, he was middle class and left very much to his own devices, but he'd also never been terribly interested in politics anyway. Without Cruithne to rant about them he probably wouldn't have noticed, or if he'd noticed, he was blind to them as they didn't have an impact on his own life.
"For the most part I suspect his views are generic, nothing new and most likely heard before," he murmured. "They just came from a different mouthpiece in the past," he concluded.
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Posted: Mon May 28, 2018 9:22 am
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Kimondo was expecting a reaction like that to her question but it had to be asked. This was still second-hand information and it was coming from a source who would want to protect his friend, but it would be better than the gossip she'd heard a few times removed from the source and biased towards making him sound crazy. When Kumbha actually began to speak, though, she was surprised by the amount of honesty that seemed to come through.
If this was a polished, deceptive version of things then things were more dire than she first thought. That would be a question for later, though, and now she would give her cousin the benefit of the doubt and assume he was indeed being honest with her.
... Ultimately no better than any other leader we've had ...
That stung. The only other leader Kimondo had known was Shangyue, though she had met Selene and fantasized about what it must have been like when Alcmene was in charge. When Unyezi was in charge. She wanted to argue with him, defend herself and the things she had done so far, but this wasn't a debate. Hard as it was to hear, this was how someone in the pride saw things and she couldn't fix with words.
"I see," she said finally, pausing for a moment before asking her next question, "What do you think, Kumbha? I wanted a better source for what Cruithne thinks but being the loudest doesn't make his opinion the most valuable. You're already here, do you have anything to say that you think I should hear?"
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Posted: Tue May 29, 2018 1:24 am
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"Me?" For a brief moment, Kumbha appeared to be alarmed. If there was ever an opportunity to throw someone under the metaphorical bus it was going to be now and he wasn't quite ready for it. He might have questioned Qoba's paranoia on occasions but there could be some truth to it, related or not, he could have found himself on a trip outside if he answered the wrong way. Well, that was how it would have been if she resorted to the extreme, he would at least give her some credit and see where she took him...If it back fired then more fool him.
"There's some truth to his words," he said simply and cleared his throat. "You haven't done anything remarkable here, you really did just give back what the high born wanted," he murmured. "You put the slaves back in their box and gave them the tiniest voice, and it's not really a voice they can use either," he pursed his lips.
"Then you disappear for quite some time and return with...well I'm not sure, politics generally isn't my thing," he admitted. It was with a roll of his shoulders that he lifted a paw and motioned away from him towards the borders where a fair number of his kind lurked. "You've done nothing for the rest of us," he pointed out. "Not really anyway, not from what I can see," he murmured.
"There's probably plenty who disagree, they preferred the status quo for whatever reason, maybe it was just easier..." Kumbha couldn't speak for the masses, he could only speak for himself, and as a consequence he wouldn't go so far as to say that everyone felt as he did. "But from where I'm stood, you just put things back to the way they were before Shangyue took over, you didn't...learn anything."
...Not that he really knew what could be learned beyond Cruithne's rants, but the status quo hadn't worked for a reason before, that was the entire reason Shangyue had succeeded and had a following.
"If I'm to be entirely honest with you, I don't think throwing a slave out with your lacklustre blessing is really enough to say we've changed," he confessed, a grim line fixing on to his lips. "And that is what it is when you are tearing them from their families because it is the only option they have, other than to kneel and accept indefinite enslavement," he pointed out. "They either pick their families and slavery, or they're cast out... I'm just not sure it works."
"I'm the last person who can give solid advice on this, but I will admit that yeah, you've really just catered to the high born who do nothing constructive as is," he tilted his head to the side. "But being constructive, and doing work is the low born's job right?" He raised a brow. "That's how it works according to our own Divinity, is it not?"
"They were always going to side with the one that would restore the status quo and ensure they never had to lift a paw," he pointed out, his brow lifting just a touch. "Beyond that I don't really think there's much more I can change," he admitted. Even now he was treading a dangerous line, go too far and he could come across as blasphemous, but for now he did still have his faith even if his take on it might be questionable.
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Posted: Sat Jun 02, 2018 11:10 am
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It was a feat that Kimondo kept a neutral expression as Kumbha worked his way through his shock, fear and then finally his feelings on the subject at hand. Though it wavered slightly as she received his criticisms and told herself not to take it personally or defend herself, she kept her mouth shut and listened.
That was what she needed to do. That was what she ought to have been doing sooner if this was the kind of feeling that some had. She saw flaws in his rhetoric, had examples of evidence in her favor.. but she also had questions. She had concerns. What she didn't have was ideas.
Unfortunately for the Queen, Kumbha was not obligated to have an answer to his complaints. None of the pride was responsible for having an answer except for her. And that realization was scary. And when Kumbha brought up the divine order of the pride and how that affected 'the way things are' .. it was the closest Kimondo came to cracking under the pressure. Never had she ever expressed her doubts in the Great Lion but she had them, it had been a personal hurdle in accepting her place to begin with.
"Thank you for your honesty, Kumbha," she said finally, her voice almost giving away her frantic mental state but evening out as she continued, "I appreciate that you were willing to come speak to me, I don't have any answers to these issues now but I promise I have taken them to heart. We share so much family but we've had such different experiences.."
She paused thoughtfully, sighing.
"As for Cruithne, you don't need to worry about him," Kimondo added, compelled by his bleak opinion of her and the other nobles, "If what you say is true, he's not a threat to the stability of the pride and no direct intervention is needed. He chose the wrong audience but he has still been heard."
((Had a busy, sleepy week and knew this would take some serious thought to reply to! Sorry for the delay!!))
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Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2018 5:26 am
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"With all due respect, I'm not stupid," Khumba shook his head. "If I'd refused to see you it would have ignited far more gossip than it was worth, and with gossip comes toxicity," he pursed his lips. He was generally a more pleasant sort but he was in the presence of some who could, quite honestly, ruin his life. She didn't seem to have the desire to do that, but he'd also seen how slimey others could be.
...Everyone had, for the most part, adapted and done as they were told under Shangyue. Those who had benefited from his rein, regardless of rank, hadn't even made an effort to address his more controversial actions. He might not be able to play the politician himself but he could at the very least recognise that there were those who could and he had no doubt that most of those who sat around and did nothing all day could be quite practised at it.
It would have been accurate to assume that while Cruithne hadn't inspired him to become a revolutionary, he had certainly placed a valid series of points in front of the paler lion. Over the course of his distant cousin's company he had finally begun to see that the nobles did nothing and it was by the 'grace of god' that they sat on their backsides and did nothing.
...He was anti-noble as it stood, if only by the manner in which they were chosen and their failure to contribute to society. Perhaps if it had been merit based rather than divine right, he might have been more receptive. Alas, given that was unlikely to ever happen, he would simply remain resentful and largely unimpressed by those above him.
"So long as Cruithne doesn't get hurt that's all I can ask; he might not like you or your reign, but he's not going to harm you," he cleared his throats. "That aside I'm assuming that I have permission to take my leave," he added.
Evidently he was a touch less sentimental than Kimondo was when it came to family connections and to him, her words were just that... words. Their family connection was irrelevant when he was related to a rather large chunk of the pride, she could have said that to anyone.
That being said if Kimondo proved her value then he would quickly become one of her greatest champions, he was prepared to give her a chance, she was entitled and deserving of that at the very least!
Ecavi crying Sorry I forgot to tag this one in my rounds!
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