The Lorilla and the Wolf-shrike

The rain is over, and so is the reign. The old king is dead. 

For three years, he maintained control over this lush territory between the forest hills and the sprawling swamps. He kept his harem safe from rivals, and sired many offspring. He was in his prime, powerful and sleek, arm muscles rippling through shimmering blue plumage. There could be no more fit example of a lorilla, one of the largest ornkeys, and one which had become too large to live in the trees and so now made its home along the ground where woods meets grassland, foraging for leaves, fruits, and insects in the open, and retiring into the shaded glades to avoid prying eyes. Few dared challenge his rule here, and even fewer survived to tell the tale. The old king was a skilled fighter, pummeling all comers. His dominion seemed absolute.

But today it all came toppling down. A young upstart had been lingering at the edge of the swamp for the past two weeks, encroaching on his land. That was bad enough, and he would rush down to the water's edge whenever he picked up the scent of his enemy, who would quickly retreat. A coward, the old king was assured. And so though the interloper would return almost daily, the old king so easily drove him off that he grew cocky, so confident in his ability to chase off his foe that he soon put only a minimum of effort into it. A teenager would be pushing the boundaries, but would pose no real threat to him. Or so he would believe.

But the old king did not know that his rival was not a solitary invader. He was recruited from within the king's own social group. The three females in his harem had grown dissatisfied with their leader, who vainly spent all of his time picking fights with other males and yet precious little time defending their young from the predators of forest and field. For a long, long while they had put up with the male's unacceptable behavior, for they had chicks of their own to protect, and a new male would kill any which were not his. But now, the last of their young had been taken by predators - the male did not even seem to notice. With nothing to stop them, they were now staging a coupe, a plot to depose their negligent king. They gave the illusion of being complacent wives, their stares seemingly vacant. But in lorilla society, it is the females - who outnumber the males in every troop - who really call the shots when push comes to shove. Masters of manipulation, today they would make their move.

And so today, they executed their unhelpful mate. 

They took him out into the meadow during a torrential rain. He didn't like that, for the rain made it hard to keep sight of them, while the water would temporarily wash away any scents into the earth, and the overwhelming noise of raindrops against the vegetation muffled his hearing. He could not let them simply wander off unaccompanied, so despite barks of protest, he went after them to herd them back to the shelter of the woods. But he struggled to find them, because inexplicably, they had seemed to split up. This confused the old king, for this was not something they had ever done before. He could only try and follow one fading scent trail at once, and finally lost all trace of each one of his females. In frustration, he beat his fists into the ground, and roared.

The heavy rain still disguised the noises around him, but he did not know that he had been watched the entire time from behind. Nor did he know that the females, too, had circled back around after entering the swamp, to wash away their trails, and then returned to the forest, where the interloper was waiting. They had been meeting with him for some time now, always when the old king was asleep, which he did a lot now in his older age. To them, he was no interloper, but the new king. All he did to do now, to make official his title, was to get rid of the old one. And now, as the sun peered out from stormy clouds and the rain threatened to fade away, was his only chance.

The new king erupted from the forest and barreled down the hill, catching the old king by surprise with a blow to the back of the head, his entire body weight behind it. The fight, if it could be called that at all, was short and decisive. The old king's skull was cracked, and he crumpled into the wet grass in a fit of seizures as the new leader stepped down onto his neck to cut off his airway. Almost instantly, scavengers caught wind of the drama. Wolf-shrikes, aggressive meat-eating descendants of shrieker-descended seabirds, were opportunists that responded nearly immediately to the scent of blood. With an uncommonly powerful sense of smell, they converged to swarm the dying and the dead, advertising a meal-to-be with a shrill, broadcasted shriek that would soon draw in all others of their kind for up to half a mile. Soon, they would feast.

The old king, it was true, was strong and steady. But the new king was smart and calculating. The females crowded around him, watching the drama unfold with little outward expression. They seemed detached - by design. The female lorillas might have seemed to live their lives under the thumb of the dominant males which controlled their lives. And the females, for their part, never openly disobeyed their leaders. But these were no demure, timid broodmares. And though for now, this new male seemed promising, and they would next appear to swoon over him and make him feel good about his win, their favors were conditional.

As long as he performed all his duties to their liking, hopefully he would never have to find out what they were truly capable of, as his predecessor had.

But if he didn't...

May long live the queens.