Disclaimer: I do not own The Lion King or any of its characters. They belong to Disney

Kovu walked out of the den with hesitating steps. He’d look back to the entrance every few moments has his paws carried him to one of the high stones that would lead him down into the grass. His eyes were filled with a worry he couldn’t express. He stared out into the lands, his head hung low.

“Okay, I have to tell her today,” Kovu said softly. “Oh, where do I start?” He didn’t want to tell her the truth but he couldn’t keep it hidden. “Kiara, Zira had a plot and I was part of it but I don’t want to be.” He shook his head. “Because… it’s because I love you,” he whispered and lowered his head, his worry increasing. “She’ll never believe me…” He turned back to the entrance of the den and started walking to it. “But I gotta try…”

When he entered the cave, Kiara came to him, a smile on her face. “Kiara,” he started, a little louder than he intended. “I need to talk to you.”

“Kiara…”

The two lions turned to see Simba, his face stern.

“I don’t want you talking with him,” he said, speaking with the authority. But then, his face turned to a smile and he came nearer, the morning light shining on his face. “I want to talk with him.”

Kiara’s face, which held worry turned to relief but Kovu was shocked and slightly terrified. Two days ago the King had been ready to rip out his throat for saving the princess’s life and tried to attack him as he came near the den.

Simba winked at his daughter and with the brown lion at his side, they walked out of the cave and down the steps.

While Simba showed him the Pridelands, Kovu kept his head down, his mind reeling. It was just him and Simba, out in the open… No one was around. Kovu figured he could surprise the King and attack. He wanted to, so badly.

His blood boiled. He had been so close to getting Simba until Kiara ruined it. He spent the whole day with her, teaching her how to hunt and she in turn, taught him how to have fun. That same night, they watched the stars, making forms of animals in the sky. They had grown close, shared an embrace and Kovu wanted to tell her his reason for being in the Pridelands but faltered at the last minute. She wanted to know what troubled him but a mandrill, someone Kiara called ‘a friend of the family’ had taken them to a place where their feelings were revealed.

Kovu realized in that moment that he could love, even if it meant loving the daughter of the lion he was supposed to slay. Now he wondered if it was all worth it. The fact that Simba wanted to talk to him indicated that maybe this lion wasn’t as bad as his mother said.

As they walked, Simba filled him in on Pridelands history. He told the young lion of his father, the great King Mufasa, and how his life had been brutally cut short and how he himself was banished.

The words of the King deeply surprised Kovu but he was unable to speak. Then, to Kovu’s amaze, Simba told him of Scar’s reign. Of how the lion he called uncle had killed his father to take the throne and near tried to kill him by sending his hyena companions to chase him out of the Pridelands.

Simba spoke every detail of Scar and his rule, at least the details his mother and mate relayed to him.

Kovu walked in silence, his mind absorbing the information. He wasn’t sure which side to believe. The Pridelanders never spoke of Scar or his rule but his mother did and often. Both she and the lionesses had a different take on Scar and what he was like. Zira told her children stories but Nuka, who lived during those times and old enough to remember, never stayed to listen. Kovu always wondered why the subject bothered his brother so but he knew better than to ask.

The words of the Lion King had Kovu thinking. Was Scar really the bad ruler Simba made him out to be? Or was he, in fact, a king who only wanted what was best for his pride and the hyenas he had allowed into the lands? And what was it about his birth that Scar would make him the heir? Wasn’t his brother Nuka, the true son of Scar?

His thoughts were interrupted as Simba spoke again. The further they walked into the lands the ground under their paws that was beautiful and healthy became hard, cold, dusty and a sickening gray brown color. The trees around them started to die. The leaves fell from the branches until there were no leaves to be seen on any of the trees as the trees looked dead and deprived of life.

Kovu, with a still lowered head, looked around the lands, seeing the damage caused by the fire his brother and sister had been sent out to start. He shivered but to his luck, Simba didn’t notice but he did stare at the ground and on the lands.

“Scar couldn’t let go of his hate,” the king spoke, occasionally looking down at his young companion. “And in the end it destroyed him.”

But Kovu knew that this statement wasn’t true. It was the hyenas who destroyed Scar. They had torn him apart after Simba threw him from the highest point of Pride Rock. And it was his mother who fought the beasts to avenge the blood they spilt and nearly lost her right ear. His brother, only a cub, cried at his slain father’s side while his infant sister was taken care of by the lionesses loyal to Scar.

“Nuka was only a cub then,” the brown lion thought. His mind spoke the words but his mouth would say different. After all, he wanted to get on the king’s good side, especially now. “If you hadn’t thrown Scar, my brother might still have his father! You are the murderer not Scar!” his mind screamed.

Kovu shook his head and still stared at the ground. At last, he found his voice. “I’ve… never heard the story of Scar that way.” He looked up at Simba when the gold lion stopped in place. “He truly was a killer…” But there was another side, his mother’s. Kovu knew that Simba did not live in the Pridelands during Scar’s reign that he only returned to take from Scar what Scar stole from Simba and his father.

Simba looked from him and to the lands. The smell of ash still lingered and it was a sad sight to look upon. Sorrow played in his eyes. “Fire is a killer,” he said.

Kovu turned to him with a questioning stare.

Simba continued. “Sometimes what’s left behind and grow better than the generation before.”

Kovu watched as the king stretched out a paw, placing it on the earth then moving the dirt to reveal a small green plant that would ensure new life to the burned lands when the rains came. The two lions lowered their heads to it.

“If given the chance,” Simba concluded with a small smile.

Suddenly, both lifted their heads as if hearing strange yet soft laughter. The air around them turned cold and it sent shivers down both their spines. A dusty mist settled around and on all sides of them slowly approached lionesses. Kovu gasped, knowing who they were. Simba was surprised and wondered silently if there was a way for him and Kovu to escape.

From the front of them appeared three to four lionesses and a young lion. The lioness in front grinned evilly as she slowly stepped from the mist. “Why Simba…”

The King narrowed his eyes dangerously getting into a crouching stance. Kovu just looked terrified. Right before his eyes stood his mother, sister and brother. The lionesses circling them were his pride mates.

“Zira…” Simba spoke, growling.

“What are you doing out here…” Zira paused as she continued to step forward, her son and daughter on either side. “… And so... alone…?” She chuckled.

Simba faced the lionesses and growled while Kovu silently wondered what to do.

Zira stood in an upright but proud position. She faced her son, the pride shining through her crimson red eyes. Nuka, for the first time in his life, smiled at his brother, knowing he had both failed and succeeded. If he got a piece of Simba beforehand, maybe he would at last, please his mother.

“Well done, Kovu. Just… like we always planned,” Zira spoke, smiling.

Simba’s eyes widened in shock and he turned to Kovu, his eyes once willing for chance turned to pure hatred. “You…!”

Kovu’s ears perked and he turned his head to the king. “No! I didn’t have anything to do with this!” he said in insistence, wanting Simba to believe him but the timing… was it possible his mother found out that he didn’t kill Simba when he had the chance and formed a plan of her own?

Zira stepped forward. “Attack!” she commanded.

Nuka sprang forward, claws out and teeth ready to bite but Simba hit him with a paw. When Nuka sprawled to the ground, dust covering his coat, the lionesses ran to their own attack.

“No!” Kovu cried.

Simba swung his paw at a lioness to his left until one in front bit into his mane. A few more jumped onto his back clawing and biting. Simba groaned in pain and tried to throw them off but the lionesses kept coming, biting his sides and