Deposed Queen Astera

Donated for Wish on a Star program by Mungu (#19637). Big thanks to her, please give this cub a nice home :)
~39236

A bitter young queen to the evil Dahati. Married young they hated each other from the moment they met. When Astera found that she was in heat she ran far away from the pride through a desert and into a jungle not wanting to bear his child. There she met the kind young King Kivulli and they shared a romantic night together, a night of young love and for Astera a middle finger to Dahati. Unfortunately a war on water broke out in the early morning and Kivulli left Astera to save his pride and the young cubs in it. He would return later to ask her to stay but she left misunderstanding his intentions and thinking that he'd left her after a one night stand. In anger and hate she left to jungle to return to Dahati's lands. Heartbroken she soon discovered that she was with cubs, and soon delivered them on the borders of the recently burned down lands. She named her daughter Vitani out of hate for Kivulli and her son Muuaji since she would preen him to kill his own father. The remains of the pride and a transformed Dahati (now calling himself Damu Kondo) found her and the cubs. Damu Kondo would have had the cubs killed, but hearing their names the new monster laughed and said he would personally train them and with a newly rebuilt pride they would tear down Kivulli's pride and create a monstrous empire. Astera is now a proud and faithful queen at Damu Kondo's side training a new league of lions to take poor Kivulli's down. If only Astera had known that Kivulli had wanted to marry her, if only she'd stayed...if only...

Much time had passed in the shadow lands the Queen calls home, but strangely her and her pride do not age like the lions outside of the pride. Sure they do still feel the passage of time but it seems to be greatly slowed for them. Before she knew it Kivulli had passed on to the stars and the third generation after him was now king. Astera mourned not only the lost but her own mortality as she realized that whatever darkness had taken over her pride had also transformed them all beyond normal lions.

The now much older Astera has been deposed by the new king and queen. What brats! Barely out of adolescence and they dare to over throw them like this! They say they are being kind by allowing not only the now deposed king and queen to stay but also not chasing out their heir and son from the pride, but Astera knows they are just doing this to win favor with the pride. Her true king Damu Kondo refuses to do anything about it and now just lazes around in his elderly state just accepting that this is the way thing are. Pissed Astera now brings in young lionesses to the pride in hopes to overthrow them. Only time will tell if her plot will be successful.