Queen of The Outsiders

Scar had brought Nala back to the pride lands, as soon as she finished telling her story. And as he had expected, Sarafina, Nala's mother had snarled and accused him of abducting her, which was absolutely ridiculous, because why would he bring her back?

Mufasa hadn't thanked him and had simply called the lionesses off (Sarabi and her hunting party had come to support Sarafina). But all of this was what Scar had expected. What he hadn't expected was for Nala to growl and plant her self in front of Mufasa, refusing to let him pass until she hear her story. She had even stopped Scar from leaving and had sat herself directly next to him, so their pelts where nearly touching.

"Uncle Scar saved me!" Nala cried, as she ended her tale.

Mufasa simply raised an eyebrow turned to his brother to confirm the she-cubs statement. "Is that true Ta- err Scar?"

A wave of pain and anger washed over Scar, when his brother slipped up with his name. "I suppose." he said curtly and got up to leave.

"Wait! Where are you going?" Nala squeaked and latched onto his tail with her paws.

Scar stared down at her distastefully. She ignored his stare and turned back to Mufasa.
"He saved me so he can sleep with all of us now, right? Instead of sleeping in that drafty old cave!"

Scar snorted, "As much as I'd love to sleep with my dear dear brother and his wonderful family, I feel much more attached to my drafty old cave." he said sarcastically

Nala's ears drooped and then she shrugged, "Okay! See you tomorrow!"

Scar simply flicked his tail in response and left, leaving Nala beaming and the adults suspicious.

Nala bounded across the plains towards Scar's dark and twisted cave. At one time in her life she had associated the cave with fear and danger. But now she just saw it as a place of opportunities and potential fun.
"Uncle Scar!" she bellowed happily, as if he could hear her all the way over there.

The previous day after she had recounted her tale to her mother, aunts and Mufasa, her mother had ordered her not to hang around the dark male. Even though Nala had continuously told her that he had saved her.
In the end, she had left her mother to believe that she had won the argument and had ran off with the excuse that she had gone to watch the monkeys tease the hippos.

"Hi Nala!"

The she cub froze when she heard that voice, that she was so familiar with. She had spent the rest of the other day avoiding Simba and when she had to be near him she had given him the cold shoulder and glared. Neither Simba nor Zazu had told Mufasa about their trip to the elephant graveyards, and even Nala had left it out of her story. She had just told the adults that she had gone on an adventure and wandered too far into hyena territory. She had honestly expected Scar to tell Mufasa what really happened but he had only given her a curious look and said nothing.

Nala gazed at Simba coolly and attempted to walk past him, but he leaped into her path. "Wanna wrestle?" he asked, mock growling

How dare he try to pretend like nothing happened!

Nala gave her best snarl and bowled into her ex-best friend roughly.
"Ow!" Simba cried and tried to push the she cub off of him. But Nala had always been stronger than him and this time she wasn't going to let him up so easily.

"Ow, Nala get off of me!" Simba yelled and kicked at her with his feet feebly.

"What's wrong Simba? I thought you wanted to wrestle!" she yelled back and nipped at his ears as they rolled back and forth over the plains.

Simba continued to kick her and tried to bite her ears as well but she kept moving her head out of his reach but kept a firm hold on him.

"Enough!"

The two cubs sprung apart and Nala looked up to see Scar gliding towards them. His face was a mask of seriousness, so Nala couldn't tell if he was angry or not. Was he going to yell at her for not getting off of Simba when he asked?

But instead of yelling he simply stepped between them and told Simba to 'run along now'.
"But she attacked me!" Simba argued "She kept biting me, when I said stop!"

Scar's gaze darkened and leaned down so he was eye to eye with the golden cub. "In a fight with another lion, you will never have the chance to say 'Get off of me, this is no longer fun.'" he said coldly "Now. Run. Along. Young prince."

With a last hurt and angry look at Nala, the prince ran off in the direction of Rafiki's tree.

Scar sneered at Simba's back, "He's probably going to Rafiki to ask for herbs to cover your bites. He already has an ego the size of the sun and will never let anyone know that a girl beat him in a mock fight."

Nala didn't know what to say, she couldn't figure out whether he was angry at her or not.
"For a cub with no basic fighting skills, your moves were quite forceful, however there were two things that you did wrong. Can you tell me what those were?" he asked, lying down and piercing her with his green eyed stare.

Nala gulped, even though she trusted the lion a lot more, she was still a little intimidated him. Well maybe more than a little.
"Uh...I dunno," she mumbled, and Scar frowned.

"Never start your sentences with 'uh' or anything of the like. Being unsure will mark you as weak. Do you want to appear weak?" he demanded

She shook her head vigorously, "No!"

"Good. Now think long and hard. What aspect of your little confrontation with Simba, was not well thought out?"

Nala stared down at her paws and thought for a few seconds before looking back at Scar. "I fought him, where others could see me?"

Scar grinned, showing two rows of gleaming yellow teeth. "And?"

"I'm not sure,"

Scar nodded, "Exactly, you fought him without knowing how to fight!' his tail twitched in excitement and he beckoned to her with his tail. "Follow me!" he ordered

Two years have passed and Nala, now a strong young teenage lioness was leading a hunting party of lionesses much older than herself. Under the training and watchful eye of Scar, she had become one of the strongest and best hunters in the pride lands. Even the queen of the pride lands had not caught two zebra's on her first hunt.

A harsh whiny broke the air as a young zebra was kicked by one of the older zebras of the herd. The other zebras immediately stepped backwards as the young zebra toppled over from the harsh blow.

"Now!" Nala hissed, and the lionesses surged forward, in perfect formation. They made it seem as though they were going for fallen zebra, but at the last minute they swerved to surround two zebra's who had stepped back a bit too far.
The rest of the heard let out frightened yelps as they scattered in random directions, but Nala didn't pay them any mind. Two large zebra's where enough for the pride, and the gazelle that she had caught by herself and buried under a tree was enough for her and her Uncle Scar and his mate to share.

As she dragged the gazelle to her Uncle's cave a lioness approached her from behind. Nala flicked her ear too acknowledge the lioness then grinned when she realized who it was.

"Zira!" she exclaimed, nuzzling her closest friend

"Nala! I saw you bring down those two zebras, perfect strategy as always!" the pregnant lioness beamed at her and nuzzled her back.

Nala grinned happily, then gave her friend a worried look. "Should you be walking around, when you're so close?" she asked, referring to her friend's current state.

Zira rolled her eyes and bumped her head against Nala's flank, "Don't be silly! I'm perfectly alright! Besides, don't you want to hear the news?"

Nala gave her a curious look, "What news?"

Zira glanced around as they climbed the small rise up to Scar's cave. "Mufasa is going blind! I heard Your mom and Sarabi talking about it!"

Nala flinched at Zira's disrespectful way of referring to Queen Sarabi. She may not have liked the Queen very much these day's but she still had some respect for her. Then the reality of the situation struck her.

"What? No!" she gasped "If Mufasa goes completely blind, Simba will become the king effective immediately!"

"Exactly." A quiet yet smooth voice confirmed from the shadows. Scar emerged from the darkness of his cave to give his adopted daughter and his mate a loving lick. "Simba is too young and too brash to have any authority. And I fear for our situation." he murmured, before biting into the gazelle that Nala had placed before him.

The situation that he referred to happened, a year ago. It all began when Zira wandered into the pride lands, lost and starving. She told Nala, and Scar who had found her collapsed near the watering hole, her story. Half of her pride had been destroyed when an elephant stampede trampled them. The rest had begun to fight and kill each other for the little bit of food that they managed to find so in the end, Zira had fled to join another pride. Nala had taken Zira to Mufasa who had readily welcomed her into the pride, but that was not the problem.

The problem began when Zira began to feel something for Scar. And Scar felt the same way. However Mufasa refused to let them be together, because in a pride, only one lion mated with the lionesses, and that was the king. But Zira refused to mate with Mufasa and continued to see Scar. And eventually Zira became pregnant. Mufasa who was enraged to find that Scar and Zira had broken the law, was about to exile them to the outlands when Nala spoke up for the two.

She had pleaded with Mufasa and in the end he allowed them to stay but exiled Zira and her unborn cubs to Scar's cave. However Queen Sarabi had lessened the ruling so that Zira was allowed stay at pride rock during the day (So she could spend time with Nala) but she had to leave at night. After that everyone was happy, but a little wary of Nala. What heightened the situation was when Nala took to calling Scar 'dad', even though, technically Mufasa was her father. But he had always told her to call him 'Uncle' and treated her as a niece. What made the rest of the pride distrust her even more was Simba. After their fight two years ago, he had attempted to persuade his father to exile Scar even further into the outlands and anyone who supported him.

But his mother and father's authority was much higher than him, so at that time Scar, Nala and Zira were safe. But Simba had the power of influence on his side. After all, if their own prince didn't trust Nala why should the lionesses?

After filling their bellies, the trio decided to take a nap, but where soon woken up to the sound of pain filled roar, coming from pride rock.
Nala shot to her feet and with a hurried promise to return she rushed over to see what had happened. IN the distance she could see the shape of Mufasa crouched over a form right under the protruding edge of pride rock.

"King Mufasa!" she yelled "What happened?"

Mufasa turned to her with with his nearly blind eyes glazed over in pain. "I don't know how it happened...She-she lost her balance--and fell!"

Nala craned her neck to see past Mufasa's huge form and gasped when she saw Sarabi's broken and mangled body on the ground. Her eyes were wide open in shock and her tongue lolled out of her mouth.
"Queen Sarabi!" she shrieked, tears welling up in her eyes.

All of the lionesses came and let out wails of despair when they saw their beloved queen, dead on the ground.
Rain began to fall from the sky and Nala looked up to see a flash of golden, sitting atop pride rock.

It was Simba, and the look on his face did not look quite like sorrow.