Teseka: 'Suffer, be tortured' (Swahili)

Age: Mohatu's generation
Pride Affiliation: Northlands

Father: Unknown
Mother: Unknown
Siblings: Ingine
Other Relations: Shani (niece)

Mate: None
Cubs: None

Likes: Healing, religious studies
Dislikes: His illness

Personality: Teseka is mostly cheerful, despite his illness. He likes seclusion and is dedicated to learning and knowledge. 

Bio:

Teseka is born shortly after Ingine, but his mother knows that something is wrong with him. The poor mite is dreadfully skinny, he can barely move for he is so weak, and his eyes are glazed over with white. His mother decides to take him to see Mchungaji, the High Priest of the Pride. It is there that the High Priest declares him diseased and cursed, doomed to die a slow and painful death. Teseka's mother is forced to give him to a lioness willing to care for him. A kindly lioness, aged and withered, volunteers.

The lioness' name is Shiya, and she is good to Teseka. It is she who names him as well, giving him a name that fits his condition.

Teseka grows quickly, spending time with his foster mother, learning every day. He is soon adept at healing and can identify each and every healing herb or plant. His true passion, though, lies in religious studies.

The young cub devotes most of his time learning about Bophelo, Lehu and all of the other lion deities. These are not Northerner deities, he knows, but this does not stop his fascination.

When he is an adolescent and his mane is growing, lions begin to visit him for healing. Teseka is impressed and dumfounded; don't they know of his illness? But he treats them and soon, word spread, and Teseka becomes the Monk in the Dark, an idol to those in need of healing. It is soon after Teseka recieves this title that Shiya dies. 

Teseka sees it all as his fault; he is cursed, he has the illness, it was he who killed her. But as he examines her, she shows none of the symptoms found in Teseka, and this reassures him a little.

The Monk in the Dark continues to heal and aid the lions of the Empire, until one day, while he is out gathering herbs  by the border, he stumbles across a lioness and her young cub. He carries the lioness on his back, despite his weakness, and carries the cub in his jaws. He takes them to the cave, and proceeds to preform a healing ritual on the lioness.

When she wakes, she reveals herself as his sister Ingine. Now Teseka remembers! She visited him once when he was younger, and Shiya tried to hide him most of the time. But before Teseka can question her, she is gone. This upsets Teseka; he was finally looking forward to some company.

Teseka lives out the rest of his days as the Monk in the Dark, healing the lions of the Empire that crossed his path. When he is old and greying, Ingine returns to him to live with him, much to his joy. He finally dies when age, not the illness, claims him, and he can be at one with the Stars.

Relation to TLK: Brother of Mohatu's mate

Bases: Wolfgirl50