Time pushed on again, and in a matter of days, the rains had completely finished and the trees and grasses were back to normal. It seemed we could live just as we had before, provided that there were no problems with either the River Pride or the lionesses who seemed to hold things against me.

Nothing seemed to have happened regarding the River Pride since I had met the rogue, despite the fact that I had been over there a number of times in my border patrol. Whilst things we fine on that front, it was not so within my own pride. Many of the older lionesses seemed to stick together in small groups, keeping their distance from me wherever they could. Despite Sarabi and Sarafina's continued efforts to bring them round, it seemed they were fighting a losing battle, so I let them off it until I could find the reasons why they were behaving like they were.

All Sarabi and Sarafina had established was that they were not keen on me as King when I was so young and inexperienced. Whilst I theorised that they may have had a point at first, I felt they were ignoring all the good that I had done for the lands since id got here. For their part, they argued that anyone bar Scar could have led them on to greater things. I felt most aggrieved my this, and Sarabi reacted angrily on my behalf to their insensitive nature.

But no matter how hard I tried, it seemed there was no bringing them round. And weeks later, I noticed some of the younger lionesses disappearing for days at a time, and avoiding my gaze. When I got sick of this, I put the question to my mother.

"Oh, Simba," she said, smiling. "The rains have gone and its the mating season. Of course they'll be disappearing for days. They're looking for rogue mates in the outlands.

"But why are they avoiding me?" I asked, genuinely not knowing.

"Because you haven't given them your blessing to do so," she patiently explained. "They're bound to keep it quiet if you haven't yet told them they're allowed to go. One of the King's most important jobs is to tell them they can look for a mate as soon as the rains have finished."

I understood, and later that afternoon, called a meeting for all members of the pride where I sheepishly apologised and gave my blessing for them to go and return later. I stated that they must not enter the Riverlands, however, because I was worried about what might happen to them from their King, from what I had heard, and indeed what I had seen.

Later, in the cool evening air, I was walking down to the water hole for a drink, feeling rather thirsty. I was also feeling odd in some other way though I couldn't quite put my paw on what it was. Down at the waterhole, I again met Nala, staring at her reflection in the water.

I walked over to her. She seemed neither upset nor jubilant, but somehow rather lonely. I wondered if she was upset because I had forbidden any lionesses to visit the Riverlands, where she had come from. I asked her this, and she said that it wasn't. But she remained staring at her reflection in the water, and mine next to her.

I also took to staring at our reflections in the water, looking at my dark red mane, and across at Nala's magnificent green eyes. In her reflection, she looked even more beautiful than she did normally. The feeling I'd felt on the way to the waterhole suddenly intensified, and I felt the urgent need to sit closer to my Queen.

I nuzzled my head against her, and she pushed her head onto my chest, letting it rest there for a few seconds. Suddenly, I understood what I was feeling, and what she was feeling too. Purring madly, we stood together for a good few minutes, before she headed for some undergrowth, and beckoned for me to follow...

It seemed we were not the only ones to return to Pride Rock contented that night. We spent the night at the top of Pride Rock again, looking out across the land whilst the sun slowly set over them, giving them a brilliant red glow. Today of all days, I realised just how pretty they were, more than I had ever appreciated before. Sitting together on one side, we talked deep into the night about anything and everything, culminating in our discussion about being parents.

"Of course, I've had all this practice from looking after you," she purred, looking at me happily.

I purred back, and replied, "Well, at any rate, I'll have the experience. I can tell the child stories, teach him my mistakes, and make his late cubhood and growing up all the more useful and better than mine."

"You're assuming the cub will be male, Simba," she reminded me, "what if it's a girl?"

"Then I'll know I'll be just as happy because she'll be as beautiful as you."

She licked my face, just as she always did when feeling at her most loving, and we settled down, blissful and peaceful and as full of hope as ever we had been for our future.

So it was that next morning we awoke still with smiles on our faces, the sun almost fully risen and warming our backs upon the cold stone of Pride Rock. With each new day, we were brought ever closer to the next generation, and I thought wistfully of mine and Nala's days as cubs, carefree and innocent, whilst our parents looked on, proud and happy. And it would be roles reversed. Even the slightly frosty reception I received from a minority of the older lionesses when I descended from the top of the rock couldn't ruin my mood, and I happily set off with Zazu half an hour later on border patrol, eager to hear anything he had to say that might be of interest.

I learned that he had been keeping minor tabs upon the various places the lionesses had visited in order to find mates. "Oh, most of them have been pretty lucky sire. They all seem perfectly happy. There'll be some happy faces when the cubs are delivered, I can tell you."

I was pleased for them, because I myself knew the feeling. I encouraged Zazu to continue with the morning report as I skirted the Northern border of the Pridelands and looked at the elephant graveyard with an amused interest. "Well, sire, the herds are grazing as ever. Antelope giddy as usual, cheetahs racing across the savannah. Oh yes," he remarked, "the Pridelands are returning to just as they ever were. And if I may say so, Sire, that's thanks in no small part to you."

"I'm glad you think so, Zazu, but flattery will get you nowhere!" I laughed, winking.

"On the contrary, it has got me everywhere! Oh, your father was a tough nut to crack, but I got round him in the end."

I laughed, surprised at this analogy of my father as I'd never heard him before. Mufasa, difficult? No! It couldn't be!

"Oh yes, he was as cynical to my usefulness as you were as a cub my boy. But, I talked him round in the end."

"Zazu, you could talk anyone round." Zazu missed my sarcasm, to my amusement.

As we neared the end our patrol, it occurred to me that I was happy. Happier than I'd ever been in my life, in fact. As a cub, I was carefree, innocent and lived life to the full, but at that age, you lack the appreciation of what you have. Rafiki once told me a proverb that had been passed down for generations in his kind. "You never appreciate a gift until it's gone." And if life is not a gift, what is? No matter what we are dealt, who we are born as, life is still a gift. And when it's gone, people bask in your memory. Just look what it had done for my father – he was the Lion King, but not a great King in his time, he was too young. And yet with memory, his life and the small time we spent with him on earth was nothing if not a gift.

But why am I explaining this? I need to establish the gift of peace. In many long years, the pride had never known it. Always there had been times where they resented the hyenas or had fought with the River Pride. None remained save myself from my time in the jungle who could remember the blissful tolerance of everything that peace gives. It is said that it is at your 'coming of age' that your innocent cub-like nature begins to realise that peace didn't exist, and your memories of it are poor. Yet now, here we were, on the brink of something great, and to think, I was at the helm!

Could it last though? Could it ever. I wasn't born Simba for nothing. My role as King and trying to keep peace was clearly never going to be easy, and so it proved. The tension that I had felt bubbling under the last few months in my lionesses seemed to have come to the surface one day during a meeting I had called for the whole pride. I had suggested, quite reasonably, I felt, that certain duties for which I had been fully responsible in my reign should be shared and spread evenly throughout the pride. I appreciated the lionesses job as hunters, but knew I couldn't keep up a full border patrol on my lonesome along with all my other duties. But was that fair? Apparently not…