#yesterday was particularly a breaking point for me so I ended up divulging too much information on a public post

[incomplete-ruler]

Posting this meme as courtesy for the personal posts I've made over the past week (most of them are privated/deleted now):

[cartoonfangirl1218]

Winner’s Curse Ch. 11

Yep this is a long one, and I’m sorry since it’s mainly an exposition chapter. But I was trying to set up familial ties and character dynamics and inner conflict so it kinda came out like this...Though I’ll admit it may not be the best, I still enjoy it and I hope you do too. Especially with the obscure references. I hope someone can guess whose children, the new characters that appear at the very end are. 

“Did you get any news last night?” Aziz sighed when he saw Jordan’s pinched frown.

It was early dawn and the small group was waking up to the smell of stale coffee, the garbage cans, and preparing to start the day.

They had been at it for four days now. Jordan, Jay in his goon disguise Calix magicked up for him, and Calix would leave to meet Uma at the castle and look around for any important documents and spy, always coming back around midnight or later when he and Lala were already fast asleep from full day of frustration and confusion.

Their days were like the blind leading the blind since Aziz didn’t know anything or anyone here, and Lala didn’t frequent the urban section of the Isle enough to know who to potential recruit or where anything was.

They did the best they could with mixed results. Asking questions like “Where is the Aladdin-hating club?” or “Do you want to overthrow tyranny?” was met with suspicion. To be fair, most questions Aziz asked were met with suspicion, even what he thought were innocent ones like the bathroom. He still hadn’t got an answer to that last one and he was a bit concerned.

They had tried following particularly bad-tempered and miserable folks to see if they could be goaded into joining a revolution, but it was clear that no matter how unhappy people were, they weren’t willing to fight against the Coven.

Yesterday, they broke through with one small lead. That lots of minor followers like the Forty Thieves and Hun soldiers, and Hook’s crew liked to go to Gaston’s bar, and tended to have loose lips about their bosses’ going-ons after three kegs of beer. Aziz was hoping in their alcohol-fueled state, they would divulge where to find big guns like Clayton or Morgana. Or at least rile them up to join their people’s revolt.

Jay stretched and yawned, and rubbed the dusty window pane that showed the backroom of Jafar’s Junk Shop. The alleyway behind it was their current sleeping place.

Aziz had wanted to ask why they didn’t just sleep inside since it had been confirmed that the Coven members rarely left Maleficent’s castle and that Jafar’s Junk Shop had been closed for weeks. There was no chance of them getting caught but he sensed that would be a sensitive topic.

There was a certain sort of sadness, nostalgia and perhaps even fear that crossed Jay’s face whenever he peered through the windows which was quite often. Usually when he thought no one was looking.

But Aziz was always observing people around him. He just found it fascinating to watch people’s quirks. Those quirks were always so telling of what people, and usually hinted at something going on beneath the surface of those perfect princess smiles or in this case, the suave confidence of a thief.

From what little he knew of Jay’s relationship with his father was that though Jafar had been neglectful, Jay had idolized the man and was still having a hard time breaking away from all the lessons he had been taught and encouraged over the years such as focusing on himself and viewing relationships as a give-and-take rather than a bond of mutual trust and equality.

Perhaps Jay was remembering his childhood sitting in that junk shop with useless shiny baubles, waiting for praise to be turned away to  get something better.

But Aziz’ thoughtful imaginings of the potential inner workings of Jay’s mind soured as he saw Jay take another discreet glance around the group to see if anyone was watching, looked directly past him, and then turned to look through the window again.

Maybe Jay did know Aziz was watching but didn’t care.

It wouldn’t be the first time someone looked right through Aziz. After all, he was apparently a forgettable despite the prestige behind his parentage and what he thought were moderately sizzling good looks.

Very rarely was he featured in Auradon news. Is name was always behind more well-known princes like Chad and Ben or even behind Doug since the media loved the story of the Evil Queen’s daughter falling in love with a dwarf.

It was the same in his own kingdom. He was the third child, third for the throne. Well, second since Zahrat formally relinquished any rights to becoming sultana to Cassima. And he doubted Cassima would ever tire of the job of being Sultana.

It was not like he wanted to be Sultan, but since he was not heir to the throne, people didn’t pay much attention. He wasn’t like the other princes who had royal training for ruling and their marriages and lives planned out.

He was on his own, and his pursuits of parkour, and people-watching and the occasional theft was not that interesting enough to make him stand out.

Unless it was Jay who did it. When Jay did parkour or thievery, people immediately noticed it was he. People easily recognized his swagger and smirk.

Whereas he was a pale imitation of his father, and inferior skill set to Jay to boot.

That’s why Jordan chose him to scour the streets of the Isle without a disguise. In her words, “Aziz you’re great at blending in with a crowd, no one will even notice you. They’ll just think you’re the son of one of the forty thieves or something.”

He blended with the crowd. He looked like any other prince. Like any other thief. Forgettable.

“Day 4 of Castle Reconnaissance has brought no new results. It sucks.” Jordan sighed dramatically, and turned around to pace by the dead-end of the alleyway, tapping at the earchip Carlos had given her. “I’m going to talk Ben and Evie,and see what we should do next if results don’t come quickly.”

“Fine, can you at least give me some baklava before I head out?” Aziz asked which Jordan casually did with a snap of her fingers and a warm piece of baklava appeared in his hands.

“Oh, you’re talking to Ben and Evie. What did the say about Uma?” Jay jumped up to join her and Aziz rolled his eyes.

Jay was still admentally against Jordan’s decision to team up with Uma, and had been hoping the two would agree with him that it was a bad decision and no matter what happened, they wouldn’t help her or Harry or the rest of her crew off the Isle.

However, Ben and Evie both were of the mind to give Uma, and her crew a chance since Ben felt like she had a valid point of how he had broken his pledge to invite other kids off the Isle. Evie believed that every teen on the Isle deserved a chance to grow their potential in Auradon, and that everyone included Uma.

Aziz did agree with Jay that it was probably a bad idea to trust Uma, and an even worse one to promise her a chance to go to Auradon, but he trusted Jordan more. She wasn’t naive, and she undoubtedly was inwardly preparing herself for ways to combat an inevitable betrayal. He also knew that Jordan was still insecure about her role as leader and was probably glad to latch on to Uma who was so put-together and already a respected captain.

“Finally, you’re ready.” Lala got up from where she was polishing her spear, dangerously close to the nose of a still-sleeping Calix.

“Well, you know how it is, I’m a pampered prince. I don’t wake at sunrise like you common hunters.” Aziz faked the haughty air that Chad often used which Lala answered with an eye-roll and mock curtsey.

Surprisingly, he and Lala had settled into a comfortable rapport despite only knowing each other for a week and forced to complete a fruitless, irritating task together.

They worked efficiently together, studying potential targets to follow and ask, and shared the bond of being bored and hangry as they walked through the dusty, surprisingly cold streets. They even shared some jokes over some exceptionally dumb sidekicks getting the boot or wonderings of how one could stoicly walk around with a six arrow embedded into their shoulder like a pincushion. She called him a pampered prince and he jokingly humored her by acting the part.                        

It probably helped that Lala didn’t think much of him to treat him with hostility.

On the second day of their recruiting mission together, she made a joke, and Aziz didn’t stop himself from saying, “The jungle princess is capable of joking?”

Lala shrugged and replied, “Well, you’re not much of a threat to me. I can relax. I mean you’re so quiet and not such a loud-mouth fake like Jay or anything really. You’re like…. hmm like a sidekick. You observe. You’re not going to outshine me or be able to go up against anyone.”

“He was so quiet.” “Not a threat.” Not like Jay who always managed to draw attention. He didn’t come up with witty lines on the spot like his father.

He was like a supporting character. Friendly, smart, capable of surprising people, but not very special.

He tried. Allah knew he tried. He maintained his grades. He was great at conversation with adults, he studied up on foreign affairs and he could charm diplomats with his mom like a pro. He did tourney and he practiced as much as he could, but he didn’t want to get so over muscled as Herkie as to not being able to perform his usual flips through Agrabah’s alleyways. He loved to go to the dances, and going on adventures in the dunes with some street rats during vacation. He did all the things that fellow royals did, his father did, all the heros did.

And the secret thing was that though he had fun, he always felt like an exhausted, nervous wreck after every single event.

He was never able to stop his mind from thinking during the conversation. Thinking of what he was going to say, if what he wanted to say was stupid or lame, what if the other person got offended, what did the person mean. He would think of a bunch of conversational scenarios, ones geared toward topics he knew, and witty remarks he could use, but those never went into effect because it felt awkward to try. He didn’t want to appear like he was trying too hard.

He was only able to relax and stop those racing thoughts with people he had known for years like his family or Ben and Lonnie. But with others..he always ended up listening more than talking.

He was perfectly fine listening to people. He didn’t feel the need to add useless, extraneous remarks just so he could talk. He would talk when he had something meaningful to say. That’s why he and Jordan got along so well because when she felt like it, she could talk for hours and Aziz could listen to it.

When he listened to others talk about a school scandal, he could hear all the different views and biases and piece together what happened, he could analyze their actions and motives, and why they were reacting in a certain way. It was like a psychological puzzle, and standing behind and listening allowed him to glean more information and more pieces to add in. 

For example, everyone saw that Audrey had dyed her hair to match her mother, and assumed it was ‘save face’ after Ben publicly dumped her for Mal, pretending she was over it. Aziz had seen Queen Leah berate Audrey, and surmised that the hair dye was less a reputational pressure but at the influence of familial pressure.  

Jordan said he was an amateur psychoanalyst which amused her because she liked listening to his theories about the motives of their classmates; Yet it annoyed her when the tables turned and he tried to encourage her to talk about her feelings like a normal person. She always shut it down with, “Not now, Sherlock Freud. Analyzing me is off-limits.”

Yet in this world, he was required to contribute to the conversation or else, people would forget he was there. Being the backgrounder he was he already heard other students discuss party invitations and he was left off the list since he was ‘boring” and ‘just there.” On the other hand, he was also invited to parties for the same reason. He was so forgettable that it didn’t matter to people if he was in the room or if he wasn’t.

Rationally, he knew he wasn’t boring. He had great stories to tell, and if anyone asked, he would take them for an adventure of a lifetime in the dunes of Agrabah, and teach them tips to tame wild horses, but that wasn’t how people saw him. People usually went by first impressions, and he wasn’t interesting enough to warrant a deeper look.

Though he tried to change and be outgoing as was expected for a prince- He asked his dad for advice under the guise of flirting tips, he memorized Genie’s standup routines, he forced himself to attend every one of the Tourney teams fundraising events, games, and afterparties- But he was always outshone by the other extroverted people in the room. He could act outgoing, but it was always harder for him. It was never going to be enough compared to those who were naturally outgoing. There was always going to be someone better than him.

“Aziz,” Lala snapped her fingers in front of him, “Stop zoning out, and let’s go to the bar.” “You know where the bar is? Yesterday, you said you knew where the docks were and led us to Facilier’s shop.” Aziz said. “It smelled like sea water.” Lala defended.

“It was bayou water. I’m pretty sure bayou water should smell different than sea water.” Aziz retorted.

“Whatever. I do know where Gaston’s bar is though. I have actually been there before, and you find it by following the crowd.” Lala nodded toward what was indeed a large crowd of shuffling, drunk-looking men and women shoving each other to enter the large front entrance that boasted moose antlers in front.  

Due to their healthier bodies and sober states, Aziz and Lala were easily able to edge through the sluggish crowd and enter the vast bar area with its permanently wet and sticky floor, numerous wooden tables and roaring French-styled fireplace.

Lala didn’t slow down, tugging Aziz’ arm to go to the backroom where another door led them to a junkyard with more tables, and a hastily constructed wrestling ring with a cage.

They sat down at the nearest table, and began their wait, disinterestedly watching the current match between a Hun and the infamous Stanley that was on Gaston’s team. But their primary focus was on the patrons surrounding them, unfortunately none looked like Agrabahian or like a sea monster in cahoots with Morgana. He did spot one young woman who looked like a more sinister version of Cruella if her black and white hair and maniac smirk was anything to go by.

A few minutes went by when their silent observation was interrupted by a voluptuous yet haggard blonde barmaid with a tray of ribs that were half boiled, and what looked like mold surrounding the edges, “You’re Lala, right? Dad sent this. Good. Enjoy. Bye.”

“Oh, thank you.” Lala flusteredly broke off a bone marrow and handed it to him.

“Your dad’s here?” Aziz looked around trying to spot another Atlantean in the crowd just as everyone jumped up to cheer when the Hun body-slammed Stanley against the cage and began beating him with his own hands. “Wait..you know your dad? I thought most Vks--”

“Most Vks don’t know both their parents, it’s true. But my dad stayed around a little longer. Stop looking around like that, you look like a frantic meerkat. He’s not out here. He must have seen me when we were inside or something. I’m kinda easy to spot with the white hair and all.” Lala said, chewing a bit too nonchalantly on a bone.

“I guess he must have liked you enough for him to send-” Aziz began to say but Lala held up a hand.

“Now don’t get your little happy Auradon beliefs up. He doesn’t like me. I remind him too much of my mom. The women who tried to strangle him. If he comes out to greet us which I sincerely doubt he would ever, you’ll see the marks around his neck. He’ll give you an action-packed story of how he fought off Turblat with only his bare hands, but it wasn’t the gorilla. It was mom.”

“Oh okay,” Aziz deflated a bit. He wasn’t as naive as Lala, and Jay and Uma seemed to think he was. He couldn’t imagine villains like Jafar or the Evil Queen would find it in their selfish hearts to love their children, he was just surprised that Lala seemed to have some sort of relationship with her other parent, and what he thought was a good one with free food. “I can imagine that your dad doesn’t love you as I know most parents love their children. But he hates you specifically because you remind him of Queen La? It’s not like you’re the same.” Aziz said before sheepishly adding, “And would I know who he is? Is he a villain? Or is he just a sidekick?” 

“Ha! My mom sleeping with a sidekick? That’ll be the day. My dad’s Muviro. He came from the same tribe as her. Though they didn’t know each other then, and got exiled at different times. And I am like my mom. I look like her. I’m jealous like her.” Lala fiddled with her food.

“You’re not..” Aziz was about to protest, but he trailed off. The Core 4 had proven that they weren’t like their parents, but that didn’t mean they didn’t share the same flaws as their parents, and weren’t capable of acting like them in some moment of anger or weakness. He remembered that Lala wasn’t helping them out of a sense of moral righteousness, she was getting a wish out of this, a wish to have her own kingdom. She wasn’t one of the good guys. 

“What do you mean?” Aziz asked, automatically getting riveted with what he imagined should be an intriguing backstory.

Lala hesitated and Aziz could imagine cat-like hackles rising as she trained her slitted cat eyes at him. She looked like she was about to snap with some comment to put him in his place, but then her eyes softened as she considered his face.

She must have remembered how she didn’t consider him a threat and began to speak.

“Well my mom, and dad..um I guess. I don’t know how to say this. I know they weren’t in love. There is no such thing here. But they stayed together for a while. They had had a child before me, and my dad stayed around till I was 7. My mom usually cheated on my dad, but then she found out he dared to cheat on her too. That was bad, but what really made her snap was that he said he could do better than her. You do not tell my mom there is someone better than her. She still hates Tarzan for choosing Jane, and she considers him to be her perfect mate. And my dad, someone who is just a warrior, not a prince or anything saying he could do better than the Queen of Opar…” Lala trailed off with a pregnant pause.

“Yeah, that is a bad move.” Aziz inhaled with empathetic pain as he imagined the vicious scene.

“After that he left, and…He actually didn’t hate me then. He invited me over here to this “civilized” area away from the “nutcase.” That’s what he calls her.

“But...my mom kept saying that he was choosing the slut over us, and I thought about how he could have children with this woman. Would he think those kids were better than me like that woman was better than my mom? And that wasn’t right. I’m his firstborn daughter. I’m the one he taught how to hunt. I’m the one who knows how to specially hunt eagle feathers.

I got jealous, I stalked him and his girl around and I found out she was a prostitute, but I thought she was cheating on him. I told him and said it showed that even she thought she was better than him. He couldn’t do better than mom and I. He didn’t take that well. He said I was just like my mom. Was I planning to murder ‘the other women’ so I could have his attention too even though I thought I was better than him?” So he stopped inviting me, and..yeah.”

“But what about now? If he hates you,why is he giving you food?” Aziz asked, surprised to find that he had almost finished the ribs, mold and all.

“He said one angry La mad at him is enough, he didn’t want to deal with two. So we sometimes come here and chat. We hunt. Not much now since puberty hit, and I got my white hair and all. It’s too difficult to look at me and not see her.” Lala shrugged again, looking down at the table, clearly trying to pretend the whole matter was cool with her and she didn’t care.

Aziz didn’t know what to say. He wanted to pull her into a hug and comfort her but he knew that wasn’t the way here. She’d probably scratch his eyes out first before admitting emotion.

But still.. It was slightly infuriating to think about. Lala had only been 7 years old. It was natural, she didn’t want to be replaced by some new family. Even if her stalking was unwarranted, the intention was kind of good, what with her concern that her dad was dating another woman who thought she was better than him. Albeit in a badly worded argument.

“So what about this brother you mentioned? What did he think of all this?” Aziz tried to smoothly turn the subject to a less intense topic.

“Oh umm nothing. He died before I was born.” Lala answered.

Aziz cringed, “Sorry. I mean not sorry. I guess you didn’t miss much since you never knew him. It’s just that I have a lot of siblings so when there’s family drama, we usually like to discuss it. Or sometimes fight about it if we disagree,” He saw Lala’s confused face, “Ugh, I’ll stop talking. I’ll stop. Right now.”

“I had a lot of siblings too.” Lala said, “Two sisters, three half sisters, and three half brothers. Plus Musala. That was the one I didn’t know.” Aziz whistled, inwardly contrasting her past tense with his present, “Wow nine’s a lot. I have two older sisters, Zahrat and Cassima, well three if you count Jordan, which we all do. One younger bro, Amal and another sister, Noor. Plus a nephew. That’s Zahrat’s son.”  

Lala had a pinched smile as she listened to him talk, not because she seemed disgusted but more like she was trying to suppress it. Not that she was succeeding too well, “What do you do together?”

“Uh lots of stuff. Mainly formal banquets because we’re royalty and all, but sand dune surfing, parkour. Though that’s just Cassima and I, but we’re getting the little ones into it. Horseback racing. That’s a big one. We have running tally between all of us, and I’m winning but Zahrat is going to beat me if I don’t win another one before her.” Aziz said, surprised by how enthusiastic he sounded as he talked about them, but then he realized how little he got to talk about his home life. In Auradon, everyone was so concerned with school and fashion and latest Vk gossip/rumors no one cares to ask about home life. They just figure they know all they need to know about Agrabah and his family.

“My siblings and I used to have a tally on our hunts too. We had such fun trying to get many prey as we could in one hour. One time I even convinced Ewuare that a speckled baboon was an actual creature, and he was so determined to be the first to..” She paused, caught in the memory before dismissing it, “I know what you’re thinking. But I didn’t actually care about them. Why should I? They succumbed to the jungle, they were weak.”  

Aziz didn’t buy it. If he had his eyes closed he was sure he would have believed her lie. Her matter of factness betrayed no wistful emotion. In fact, she sounded downright annoyed at the fact that weak people existed.

But her look didn’t match her voice. Despite not looking at him, where she looked was telling. She seemed to be staring out to the wrestling ring where the Hun was still beating up Stanley, with a brick this time, but her gaze was unfocused, and her lips were pursed thoughtfully. He wondered when her siblings died-if she had memories of hunting side by side in the jungle, secure in the knowledge that she had one person to trust on this Isle of liars, murderers and thugs. 

Or alternatively, if one of the siblings died just a few months old and she secretly wondered about it growing up. “When did they die?” Aziz ventured to ask, whispering with what he hoped was the appropriate amount of reverence.

Lala visibly tensed and then relaxed, and looked at him with a calm poker face.”When I was three, no two, I think, my mom gave birth to twins. One didn’t get a name because she died within a few hours. The other was Taytu Betuvira, she was my dad’s favorite because mom allowed him name her after himself.” The pinched smile returned but Lala bit it back, “I don’t remember much of her. I think, I thought she was cute. Like a baby cub. But she died a year later from a snake bite.”

“So when I was around four, my mom tried again with Rourke for a stronger child. You know, since dad’s kept dying off. Rourke didn’t stick around. Actually, I don’t think he even knows he had a son. Anyway, that son was Ewuare. He was the best.” Lala shook her head with a fond smile, clearly forgetting her “I didn’t care about them, they're weak” statement.

“But my mom wanted more than one child, so she slept with Clayton too. She got Leopold out of him. Clayton visited the jungle more often than Rourke but only when dad wasn’t around. His visits were more for hunting than for Leopold. Leopold was my mom’s son rather than Clayton’s. Clay was Clayton’s son.

It was nice for a while. Ewuare, Leopold, Clay and I. Clayton even let us use his gun sometimes so we could get used to a different weapon. But then Leopold got mauled by Sabor three years ago. He was only 8.” Lala reflexively clenched her fist and unclenched as she talked, her face growing stony with focused anger when she got to the part about Sabor.

“By then my dad was gone, Mom cheated on Clayton with Gaston and got a girl and boy, Amina and Shaka. They were the biggest babies by far. 8 pounds each. I was around 7 I think, and by then, I was expected to pick up the slack in the hunting department. It was awful. Ewuare was a natural hunter but Leopold kept dragging us down by wandering off. I mean I guess I shouldn’t expect more from a 2 year old, but by the time I was 2, I was a very obedient child. I don’t get why she was so relaxed when training him. I-“

“What happened to Amina and Shaka?” Aziz asked, seeing Lala was getting sidetracked by her mother apparently treating her differently from the twins.

“Oh, yes. They grew up, lasted a year longer than Leopold. But Amina ended up in quicksand, and Shaka tried to help her….” Lala paused again, thinking and composing herself to continue.

“Moving on. By the time I was 10, my mom decided she got the strong, powerful child she desired with Mozonroth. Her name was Sarraounia and she was mom’s favorite because she was starting to show natural magical powers once the barrier came down. She could make little illusions out of smoke. Her favorite was to pretend she was a panther. She was obsessed with panthers.”

“Oh no.” Aziz muttered to himself, half-listening to Lala’s comments about panthers and Sarraounia.

Lala cocked her head to the side like a cat which Aziz had to muse, so many things Lala did reminded him of a cat.

How quick her moods could change from curious look to ready to hiss and attack. Even her movements were catlike, full of grace and fluidity whether she walked on her two feet or as she climbed trees on all fours. The way she arched her back and stretched in  the morning, and whenever she smirked, it didn’t look human. It looked more like a crafty feline smile.

“What no?” Lala asked.

“Mozonroth’s my uncle.” Little known fact around Auradon was that Mozonroth was Aladdin’s half brother. Aladdin’s very evil sorcerer half brother that ruled over the Black Sands and wanted to rule over Agrabah too.

Aziz should have guessed that Mozonroth had a child. If a man like Lefou could have a child, surely Mozonroth was capable of it. Especially with the alleged hotness that he had heard so much about from Aunt Eden.

“Well, I’m pretty sure he has another child somewhere. I don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl though. It’s not Sarraounia. She died this year from fever.” Lala said taking a few deep inhales and exhales.

“My mom didn’t sleep with only one magical Agrabahian man though. She accidentally had a one night stand with Jafar.” Lala paused, clearly waiting for his reaction.

Aziz’s eyebrows shot up to hide behind his bangs, “So that’s how you know Jay.”

“Not that well. I was 13 and Jay was like 15 and even then he was arrogant and annoying. He kept trying to steal my teeth momentos, and pretended he could fight animals. He still keeps insisting that he is just as good a hunter as I am.” Lala huffed with annoyance at the memory.

“Jafar just came over to the cave to make sure my mom wouldn’t give him parental responsibilities of anything. Not that it mattered. My mom got sick with the yellow fever that was going around here, and almost died. I almost died trying to take care of her and getting the yellow fever. The baby came out dead so that was that.”

“Did Jay get to see it?” Aziz asked, starting to wonder if Jay’s pushed friendliness towards Lala was some sort of attempted almost sibling camaraderie.

“It was a she, and no. Jafar didn’t want to have anything to do with her.”

Aziz realized that she mentioned all her siblings’ deaths, but one. It was obvious she skipped over it, and he knew it must have been something terrible if she was glossing over it completely, but his curiosity urged him to know.

He stopped, opened his mouth and then closed it, and opened before finally asking, “What happened to Ewuare?”

Lala looked away, blinking rapidly, “He died four months ago. My jealousy struck again.”

Aziz waited as Lala pulled herself together after that cryptic comment.

“Like I said Ewuare was the best. He was smart, and fast, and such a good hunter. Such a good hunter. He always knew the right time to strike, and he was determined. My mom sometimes...she’d say Ewuare was better than I am in not getting scratched or I was better than him in hand to hand combat. She was trying to make us compete so we’d work harder. And Ewuare didn’t care who was better at what. But I-I got jealous.”

“Just that week, we got ambushed by coyotes and Ewaure got an awful bite on his shoulder, and I was happy. I knew it was going to leave a huge scar and Mom couldn’t hold my scars over me. So when we managed to fight them off, I continued hunting and let him Ewuare walk home alone. I let him because- “He was the magnificent Ewaure,”- he could heal himself.” Lala turned to face the wrestling ring as her nails dug into the splintered wooden table surface as if she was holding onto a liferaft to keep from drowning in emotion.

“..I-I was wrong. He didn’t get a scar. The coyote bit some vital veins and.. and he bled out as he walked….”

Without thinking, Aziz asked “How did you feel?” and Lala slowly  turned to give him a stony stare, her jaw clenched tightly and her eyes filled with unbidden tears.

The tiny voice in his head that sometimes sounded like Jordan berated him, “Not now, Sherlock Freud. Analyzing is off-limits.”

“I mean..um” Aziz stammered, and started talking about the first thing that came to his head, “Uh I get having a little sibling who's obsessed with big dangerous cats. Amal and Noor love our tiger, Rajah. They have these little posters and stuffed tigers all over their rooms. Noor pretended she was a tiger for a whole year and would only communicate in purrs and growls.”

Lala looked down at the table, and looked up, breathing shallowly in a clear attempt to keep grief at bay. At least she looked grateful for the topic change more than annoyed since she eagerly grasped at the opportunity to move on from Ewuare’s death. 

“Sarrounia was just as obsessed with panthers which made it pretty easy to train her. I would tell her all panthers had to know how to climb a tree properly so she would stop ignoring me and listen. And she was very eager to mimic cat sounds.” Lala followed it by a very realistic imitation of a leopard’s rasping yowl that caused Aziz to jolt back and nearby patrons stopped their cheering to stare at her.

Aziz laughed nervously from the sudden surprise, “Can you speak leopard?”

“No. I just sound like one. It scares other animals, and people.” Lala nodded satisfied with herself, and made a point to growl at a hefty looking pirate who was still staring curiously at her. “You’ll have to teach me that sometime. I tried to copy Rajah’s growling but I suck at it. I’m much better at speaking monkey.” Aziz said.

“You speak monkey? You’re a prince that speaks monkey?” Lala looked at him in disbelief, her lips quirking up in her usual feline grin as she tried to wrap her mind around the idea.  

“Yes. Fluently.” Aziz smiled smugly when Lala began to laugh at his talent, continuing to talk with some mock-indignation, “Though some of my classmates did think I was weird when I started to talk to some monkeys that broke out of the Auradon Zoo which is such a double standard. How come princesses can sing to the birds and the racoons without judgement but when I talk to monkeys in their own language..”

Aziz trailed off seeing that Lala was caught up in the hilarity of the fact he spoke fluent Monkey to listen to him. So he allowed himself the chance to observe her without fear of a berating glare. He was surprised to hear how it breathy her laugh was, ending with a snort after each gasp.

As he looked at her another figure caught his eye and made his heart jump into his throat.

He had seen that face many times in Uncle Genie’s magic “flashback shows.” Though the face was a little dirtier and a little bit bigger as if the man had been sampling one too many baklavas these days. 

There was no doubt that it was Abis Mal in the flesh. A helpful clue was the presence of a skeletal thin man that Aziz instinctively knew was Abis’ lazy and constantly annoyed assistant Haroud Hazi Bin.

“There’s Abis Ma!” Aziz hissed, jumping out of his chair to follow the bald bandit and his servant that were heading towards the alleyways.

As the pair left, two slender shadowy figures peeled away from western side of Gaston’s backyard wrestling ring. The dark side where no moonlight illuminated the area giving all manner of people the privacy to drink, to fuck and do what have they.

The two figures sat down where Aziz and Lala had been, licking their dark paws, their eyes glinting with fiendish delight.

“What would we have here, brother? A chance for a family reunion..” The female purred, her sharp teeth glinted brightly in contrast to her night black fur.

“Yes. Mozonroth and Marcellus should have a chance to kill the child of that infuriating Aladdin.” The male smirked, his shendyt fluttering in the night air caught the attention of a pirate’s kid who tried to grab it only to be scratched by the wearer.

“And not only the child of Aladdin, but...any other do gooder who helped him get here. It’s clear he didn’t come on his own.” The girl added, sharpening the claws of her right hand with her left.

The male laughed heartily, “Imagine how they’re going to lacerate him. This is going to be delightful to watch.”

Note on names: Like Ranavalalona, all the names are taken or slightly modified from real life African rulers like Taytu Betul of the Ethiopian Empire, Musa of the Mali Empire, Amina queen of the Zazzau city state, Shaka of the Zulu Kingdom, Ewuare of the Benin empire, and Sarraounia, the sorceress queen of Azna who was heavily associated with panthers. The only exception is Leopold named after King Leopold of Belgium who was a vicious colonizer of Congo and whose bloody hand would probably been respected by villains.