Once upon a time, in the African Tribe known as Lacewood, there was a girl named after her beauty, Ashaki. Her skin black as night, lips red as blood and her teeth as white as snow. Ashaki had turned out to be the most successful hunter and gatherer in all of Lacewood, surpassing her mother. This angered Ashaki’s mother, as she was no longer the most sought after women of the tribe, and her daughter was becoming independent, meaning she didn’t need her. If only Ashaki could see her mother’s growing distaste towards her, because only then would Ashaki have had the opportunity to be able to save herself.
Every single day since Ashaki was able to fend for herself (and she became quite well at it), her mother would grow more and more jealous that she was becoming the talk of the tribe. She would walk down to the river every day, looking down at the water clear enough to be a mirror, asking “Why is my daughter now receiving the attention that only I deserve?” She would never get a response back from the river, but she knew what she must do to come out on top as the alpha female of Lacewood. Ashaki was to be killed, and it had to be by the hands of her own mother.
Ashaki woke for the day, climbed out of her hut and began her typical routine, she was to go into the forest and find her food that she would eat for the day. Something was different for Ashaki this day, as she found and apple, which she had only seen when she made a trade with some travelers that passed through when she was younger. Placed perfectly on the ground, Ashaki was puzzled, but decided it must have just fallen out of the bag of a traveler. However, the apple was hers now, and being eager to have found the ripe apple, she took a bite of it. Upon swallowing the first bite, Ashaki knew this was not an apple that she should have eaten. The forest around her began to spin, Ashaki lost her breath, and upon falling to the ground, saw her mother running off into the distance, laughing at what had happened to her.
Upon falling to the forest ground, Ashaki was unresponsive. The animals that watched the exchange between Ashaki and her mother were beyond stunned that a mother was capable at hurting her own child. Seven lion cubs decided to keep watch of Ashaki, laying her on a bed of flowers. Every day and every night they had their eyes on her, waiting for a miracle to bring her back. Come night time on the thirtieth day, the alpha male of the tribe was wondering in the forest and found Ashaki. He was stunned, as he thought maybe she had run away from Lacewood, like her mother told everyone. Having had a crush on Ashaki his entire childhood, he laid his bow and arrow down on her chest a symbol of mourning. This touch must have had electricity, as if it were true love, waking her up from the state the apple put her in.
Ashaki woke up, telling the alpha male what her mother had done to her, and the two knew that here had to be some sort of punishment put in place. The seven cubs brought Ashaki’s mother to the forest, and it was there that the alpha male of Lacewood ordered the mother to be banished from the tribe, never to return again. Ashaki agreed with this punishment, and once her mother left for good, she got married to the alpha male and continued the rest of her life peacefully in Lacewood.

THE END