This body was strange, but it responded as if it was always hers.  She was always meant to be this way – to fight with teeth and claws.  It was a graceful dance between predator and scavenger though in this case predator had become rescuer.
 
She didn’t know what she was rescuing, had no idea of the implications of her actions, she just knew that she must act.  She whirled, she struck, she pounced – she ravished in the things that this body was capable of that she could never dream of accomplishing in he equine form.  Snarls flowed freely from her throat coming as natural as any words ever have. 
 
The dance doesn’t last long.  Two fled, and the egg was dropped. Only one remained. Blue eyes narrowed, Tsavo growled her distaste before swiping at the face of the creature now that the egg was out of harms way. The hyena fled – ever a coward – to join its brethren in shame.  The lioness stood protectively over the abandoned egg, panting.  The fight had been exhausting, yet she never felt more alive than she did at this moment. 
 
Was this the attraction of this Helovia?  This magic?  This physical expression of her inner potential? 
 
Before her musings could take her any further, she remembered the egg.  She sat (another strange sensation) next to the abandoned egg, wondering what to do with the thing next.  Gently, she turned it over, examining to see if the hyenas had managed to damage it at all.  She breathed a small sigh of relief when she could not make out any imperfections in the shell.  Relief was short lived, however, when the egg gave a jolt and a great fracture split the whole face of the egg nearly in two.
 
No, she gasped, thinking that she’d freed the egg for nothing.  But then it rocked again, unaided this time. 
 
Oh, she breathed, realizing that it wasn’t broken it was hatching.  After only a few moments a paw emerged from the smooth shell, quickly followed by a second.  When the hatchling righted itself there was, scattered among bits of broken eggshell and wearing one particularly large piece of eggshell as a sort of hat, a tiny lion.  A lioness.
 
Like her. 
 
Tsavo gently brushed off the errant piece of shell and was surprised to find that when she made contact with the little thing, pleasure blossomed in her own stomach.  And it wasn’t the only thing.  With a little squeak, the newborn lion made its way unsteadily to its feet and looked expectantly up at Tsavo – the little one’s big yellow eyes meeting Tsavo’s blue ones.
 
“Well then.  Lets get you fed.” she said to the little one, soothingly.