It was dusk when the king returned. His pale fur stood out clearly against the dark earth; it wasn't long before the gathering lionesses began to greet him.

"My king! You've returned!"

"How was it?"

"Did you have fun?"

"It's good to have you back!"

Maliki said nothing. He barely heard his subjects' greetings. His head hung low, staring perpetually at the rocky ground, and his tail drooped. It didn't take long for the lionesses to nervously halt their chatter, and they looked upon their king with concern in their eyes.

"Uh…Y-Your Majesty?" prodded one lioness. "Are you all right?"

"DOES IT LOOK LIKE I'M ALL RIGHT?!" Maliki roared, snapping his head up.

He caught his breath the next second, but the damage was done. The lionesses flinched as one, their faces fearful, and soon started to trickle away timidly. Maliki's head began to sag again; he hadn't meant to snap. He was just…irritated.

"Ardhi."

One brownish-furred lioness turned around. "Eh?"

"Come." Maliki began to walk towards a lone tree near the edge of the cliff, the lioness following nervously. He wasn't really sure why he had called her name. But he needed to talk to somebody. Needed to release some of his worries with his most trusted friend.

He sat down beneath the tree, and Ardhi followed suit. Neither spoke for several moments. At long last Maliki took a deep breath and began to speak.

"Ardhi," he sighed, "I hope you don't mind me dragging you over here like this. I…"

"Oh, don't apologize, Maliki. I'm honored you wish to speak with me."

Maliki chuckled weakly. "I'm glad you think that way. I just…just think I should talk to somebody, and you're the best option."

"Me?" Ardhi asked, confused. "But I…what about your queen? Sarafina?"

"That is precisely what I wanted to speak about," Maliki growled as he glared off into the distance. But after a moment, he sighed heavily, his features softened again, and he turned back to the lioness. "Sorry, Ardhi, I-I'm not trying to be so blunt. I'm just…not in the best mood."

"Shh. There is no need to apologize to me; we all get worked up occasionally."

Maliki dropped his gaze from Ardhi's eyes and moaned in confusion and inner pain.

"Maliki." Ardhi draped her paw over Maliki's paw. "Look at me."

The lion obediently looked up, back into the lionesses' face. Her face was soft, her yellowish eyes gentle.

"Look, I've been your friend longer than anyone else in the pride. I met you at the border long before you built up the nerve to challenge Kongwe for the throne. I'd already known you for a month by the time you fell in love with Sarafina." She lowered her head briefly, as if summoning her next words, and then looked back up at him. "I'm here for you, my friend. I'm willing to do anything, put up with anything, as long as it makes you feel better."

Maliki smiled weakly. He'd forgotten just how much he could count on Ardhi to help him out when he was having trouble. He usually turned to Sarafina for emotional support. But this time, obviously, that was out of the question.

"So," Ardhi began, "judging from your reaction earlier, am I correct in guessing that this has something to do with Sarafina?"

"To put it simply, yes," Maliki grunted, his gloomy mood returning.

"Well, what happened? I mean, you two went off together a couple of days ago, and now you come back to the pride alone. What gives?"

Maliki opened his mouth to speak, but choked on his words. Even with his best friend, he wasn't entirely ready to speak about his outing. He took a couple of breaths and tried again. "Sarafina…she was…reluctant. It's like she used to enjoy it more. I mean, yeah, I know her instincts clamor for it and she can't help but feel pleasure and all, but…ugh." His head dropped. "Each time we took a break, she sounded more and more pessimistic. Uh…"

Arhi's face remained neutral. "Could you give some specifics, what she actually said?"

"I don't remember all of it, but later on, after her mood got worse, she started muttering about me not being devoted to her exclusively enough or something. And then—and this was really weird—she started talking about Uru. She said I liked Uru more than her, or something dumb like that." He snorted. "As if! She was twice my age!"

"Ah, yes," Arhi mused quietly. "The classic female condition: jealousy."

Maliki didn't hear her. "I don't think I've ever seen her so unhappy. It…it's almost as if…but no…th-that can't be it."

Ardhi stroked Maliki's paw ever so gently. "Yes?"

"I'm worried that…that she doesn't love me anymore. It's like…our connection is dying. I-I don't understand."

"Maliki…" Ardhi began. "I don't want to, you know, make you mad or anything, but I have to ask you to do something for me."

The king turned to his friend in confusion. "Do something?"

"Yeah. Take a second and think back…and tell me honestly. How long ago did you and Sarafina meet?"

"Why, six months," Maliki said easily, surprised at the question. "When I claimed this land."

"And how long did it take before your first copulation?"

"Uh…" Maliki halted nervously. "Let's see, I remember noticing her not long after defeating the old king. She caught my eye, being so…attractive…oh…" He trailed off, afraid to admit his memories, but he steeled himself and continued. "She…wasn't just attractive. She was in heat, dammit. I went with her that very night because she was in heat. My first time ever. She seemed to be very enthusiastic."

"I see," Ardhi muttered. "So the two of you had a very…immediate physical connection."

Maliki blushed. "Yes."

"How about the emotional connection?"

"Well, we liked to confide in each other and empathize with each other, so…"

"All the time?"

Maliki held his breath for a moment. His pained expression betrayed him. After a moment he exhaled loudly. "No."

"So your emotional connection was never very strong. I see."

"Hey, it was," Maliki protested defensively.

Ardhi gave him the one-eyebrow-raised look.

"Okay, okay, we don't have the most compatible personalities. But we try. Okay?" He turned away in a huff. "What would you understand about it? You've never been in love."

"I…" Ardhi began, but stopped herself. No. Not now…

"Call me an idiot if you want," Maliki continued, still growling angrily, still turned away from her. "Go ahead. I probably am one. But I love Sarafina, I always have, and I always will. I don't care that we have some issues. She was my first love and she will be my last. It's the least I can do in this world."

Ardhi hesitated before continuing. Though Maliki didn't know it, he had cut deep. She spoke as gently as she could manage, trying to sound sincere. "I…I'm sorry, Maliki. I didn't know it meant that much to you."

There was a pause before Ardhi heard Maliki sigh and saw his posture go limp. "No…I'm the one who should be sorry. I should listen to you. You're right…Sarafina and I are just too different." He swiveled his head back around to look at Ardhi. "But I can't just leave her, just like that. I…I have to think. And I can't just walk up to her and say, 'Hey honey, guess what, you aren't my honey anymore!' I have to stay with her for a while longer. At least three or four months, you know. Er, I mean…"

Ardhi froze. "Oh, don't tell me…"

Maliki cringed. "I…I think I got her pregnant this time."

"Oh…well, then. That's a different story."

"Wha-what do you mean?"

"Fine." Ardhi turned her nose up. "You be there for her just because she's got your cub growing inside her. Be there when our kingdom receives its new heir. Stay with her until the end of time for the sake of being nice, for the sake of being the most faithful being alive. Go ahead. I clearly can't stop you." She pushed herself to her feet and stalked off along the ridge, flicking her tail in anger behind her.

Maliki was, by now, completely confused. Where had that come from? Since when did Ardhi get so touchy about him and his sexual life? Now he wasn't even sure why he'd started this conversation in the first place. It was insane of him to think that a mere friend could be trusted with such confidential revelations. What had he been thinking? He stood, thoroughly irritated at Ardhi, at females, and at life, and stomped off in the other direction.

Ardhi didn't slow down until she was a good twenty yards away from Maliki. She wasn't entirely sure why she had gotten so terse back there. She didn't want to get mad at her best friend. She never liked seeing him hurt or in a bad mood.

But…

She struck the ground angrily with her paw. How could he be so blind? Why couldn't he see what he had done? He had gone off with the first and prettiest girl that he'd seen and then pledged to never let anybody else have a chance. It was ridiculous. If he'd met a nice girl and worked slowly towards mutual understanding first, then maybe she could forgive his choice. But had he done that? No. He was just being silly, trying to make himself feel better.

But what was she thinking, wanting to muck around with his life like this? He was her best friend. She shouldn't interfere with his choices. She liked to think that she was willing to let him go and do whatever he pleased. She mostly did let him. However, it wasn't exactly willingly that she did so. It was reluctantly. She let him go because she cared too much about him to want to make a mess of things for him. He was more or less happy now. She didn't want to run the risk of making things worse. That was really the only reason she stayed out of things. Well, that and her cowardice.

And yet, as she stood there, staring at her paws, she could see her vision start to swim, feel a quivering presence before her eyes. Her face was tight, pained. She could never tell him, since she feared getting his life more tangled. She squeezed her eyes shut, pushing the tears down her cheeks; they ran down her fur a ways before dripping to the ground. After a moment she opened her eyes again and turned to look wistfully back at the tree where they had just been, but she could no longer see Maliki's pale coat gleaming beneath it in the low evening light.

Maliki, she thought as she felt new tears replacing the ones she had just shed, why couldn't it have been me?

Sarafina walked slowly along the northern border of her pride's lands, gazing north. The kingdom just north of them…She hadn't known much about them before all of this started. They had seemed like nice enough people, trying to protect her pride from the dog attack. Well, more specifically, protect Maliki. They'd just cared about him, not the rest of her pride. Her family.

She'd started growling. Curse you, Maliki! Everything their kingdom had had to go through recently was connected to him. He'd shown up six months ago, a hotheaded and scrawny young adult all on his own, and somehow managed to overthrow the established king. Poor Kongwe! He had been growing old; he didn't deserve to die so violently! Every lioness, without exception, had cherished the wise elder lion. And then BAM, oh look, here comes a fresh little twerp who thinks he's ready to take on the world.

She'd known something was up when mere hours after the humiliating the battle, the youngster had chased after her. How dare he? Granted, she couldn't have been older than him by more than a few weeks herself, and she was in heat, but still. It just wasn't done! Why had she gone along with him so willingly? Because she had been young and foolish, that's why. He was the first young (and attractive) male she'd seen since her cousins had been sent away months before. She'd been stupid, stupid and needy.

And that…that Uru! When Sarafina had first found the stranger mourning, she'd been worried for her and run to her husband for help. But then the two of them had started hitting it off like old friends. Very suspicious. Well, there went Sarafina's sympathy for that woman. Selfish twit.

The queen was growling louder now. Curse Maliki. Curse this kingdom. Curse it all! As long as she stayed here, she'd be bound to that trouble magnet that was His Majesty. Maybe she could escape to the kingdom to the north, make some new friends. That Mufasa guy had seemed like a nice fellow, at least.

Sarafina sat down heavily in the grass, looking longingly out towards the northern horizon. She couldn't leave. She wasn't brave enough, dammit. She would stay here forever because she lacked the determination to simply stand up and take a few more steps northward. She let her head fall. It was hopeless.

She looked at her belly. Something felt strange about it; something was different. Sure, it was flat now, but she could feel it, and she could tell—she knew—that in a few months, that belly would be round and bloated with Maliki's cubs. She sprawled on the ground and dropped her head on her paws, exhaling sharply. She hated her life right now.