Title: Lion and Cat
Summary: Things are the same, things are different. Blood remains constant with or without pain. Post-canon, brotherly affection.

Warning: This could be considered a sequel to Bear and Lamb, but it could also stand alone. You don't have to read one to understand the other, though, I assure you. Also, I don't know nearly enough about this particular biblical history, so forgive me if I make this up as I go along.
Dedication: amour de amour de amour who made this grandly affectionate request for more Benjamin and Judah in this section and to Morning-Tide for poking my ego when my last J:KoD fic went up. Apparently I am a narcissist who needs to preen before anything gets done... or do narcissists even acknowledge they're one? Anyway, hope this is liked since it took some five ideas and drafts to publish.

-:-
The past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it, or learn from it.
-The Lion King.

There are birds in Canaan, beasts of large and small sizes, vermin that take advantage when they can and predators all around (eagles with their great wings that could go in and out of the large tents Jacob's family and their families were housed in; sheep to tend to for their meat and fleece with horses, cattle and asses standing tall above them to clear fields and fit them for greens and golds that would keep many fed, milk and cheese to compliment them when the season was good; rats and mice that did not find it difficult to stay out of the way and clean up grains and leavings forgotten by rabbits and shrews that had gotten somewhere before them; foxes, wild dogs and wolves that could grow impossibly large stalking everything and everyone that wandered off on their own) but it could never be said that it was supplied with everything that could staunch someone's curiosity.

Joseph had actually managed to forget that he had only ever seen one cat in his life before coming to Egypt. A starving thing that had been on its last legs (its last life, his father had hummed sadly when Joseph had brought the honey colored, emaciated thing to him and given it some milk from a cow that had just given birth; milk rich with nutrients it didn't feel like giving anyone but it's first born and Rachel, whom it trusted) and died after a night being given food and shelter that he had buried and said a prayer over while his brothers were doing their final chores before bed. He had remembered that the creatures did not exist well in Canaan until his family had come to his home in Egypt and he'd spotted Judah glaring at Joseph's cat after having asked the younger man for access to his bandages.

"It seems that Benjamin is not much liked by your pet, I'm afraid."

And he hadn't been received well, Joseph had seen, once he'd taken Judah to the items he wanted and then followed him to apologize for the assault on his younger (this would never change in that a small, softly rounded feeling that always entered him at that very idea—Rachel had been barren until Joseph and being, admittedly spoiled, he'd never dreamed of having someone younger than him; he would have to get used to that) brother. Benjamin had been just waiting for Judah in the entryway, not wanting to drip red body fluid that would stick and discolor to dark flakes on the palace floor; one hand a tight fist trying to contain the bleeding and the other hand catching the droplets that escaped.

"Open your hand," Judah had instructed in a tone Joseph recalled only when he had whispered a favor for forgiveness with his arms around Joseph a few months earlier and a tone the dream reader was still in awe over (in youth, Judah had stood tall and mighty in stature and voice, which cemented his role as the eldest brother and kept everyone in line, second only to their father; Joseph could easily admit that intimidation made him love, resent and fear the man) each time he addressed Benjamin with the same warmth in every word and thought towards the youngest, "And let's see how deep the damage is."

The fingers uncurled in a relative memory of Joseph's figure when he was Benjamin's age, but the hand was not his twin. This was what pleased Joseph more and more whenever he was around the smaller man. It proved that his father had been equally loving and devoted to Benjamin, but he did not keep him from activities that would have made him an outcast to the older brothers and make them hate him.

Scratches from Joseph's cat ran deep into a palm that was not soft as silk (there was still resentment in that memory of washing courtyards in his early days as a slave—his father chose Joseph's teaching and workload so it was not all his fault that he was like a scribe or a prince in those days before being sold) and blemished with small cracks and blisters—perhaps from washing clothing or sheering the coats from the spring lambs and ewes. Benjamin seemed to like chewing his nails down to the quick, so the blood rolled easily over the tips of each finger when Judah took it gently and wiped at the deep cuts; a hand cradling Benjamin's like a desert lion comparing its size to its infant cub and the other showing more work that either younger brother would experience in their lives dabbing his own tunic sleeve over the inflicted area, cleaning it before even thinking of applying the unused bandages.

Benjamin (eyes and face and figure impossibly like Joseph in all ways but that of which the sun in Egypt had colored him from years of standing in its rays for hours; feminine features from their mother making him soft and submissive to anyone not blind and voice with the hesitance and curious nature of a paintbrush before it colors a canvas with choice that would turn good or ill before another) was still getting used to Joseph; they rarely spoke when alone. But with Judah almost like a safety marker between them, he at least made the effort of becoming verbally closer, "I'm sorry if I left a mess in your dining area. I think I must have frightened the animal or it wouldn't have reacted like that. I think I might have broken one of your vases when it struck me. Sorry."

"You already said that," Judah chided, beginning on the actual bandaging; tight but not uncomfortable, his eyes and hands soft as his voice as he glanced over to Joseph with a light smile meant, Joseph assumed, for both the brothers, "A nervous habit he's had since he was four that he hasn't seemed to grow out of."

"Judah!" Benjamin groaned, all of his embarrassment showing with how he turned the color of certain paints Joseph had used a few years ago to coat the portrait he had started in one of the main halls when his first child had been born.

It was nice to know that Judah could still go into the big brother mode that didn't mind brightening the mood at the expense of one of his younger brothers.

'I still doubt it ever goes both ways, though,' Joseph considered internally, grinning with raised eyebrows at the bright laughter he felt Judah had intended to bring out of him.

Benjamin still blushed, after all, but the tension was simply forgotten.