A/N: As the first chapter turned out to be quite popular, I have decided to continue where we left off and make this a full story! You can expect about 6 emotional and fast-paced chapters in total, with a (hopefully) satisfying climax in the end.

Tirthika is the Buddhist concept known as the 'Outer Path': Basically, it refers to someone trying to take the easy way out to escape the cycle of pain known as Samsara, and contrasts with the correct 'Inner Path'.

"Good morning, Sire!"

Scar swiped blindly at the source of the blaring sound, only to have it fly away and out of arm's reach, which he found terribly unsporting. He supposed he could have gotten up and chased after it, but Zira had become decidedly more receptive to his advances ever since Simba had abdicated the throne to him, and, well… he never did have his brother's prodigious stamina.

"I would never have become king if I knew it involved getting up in the morning," he groaned into his rocky pillow.

"Oh, chin up, Sire! It's another bright new day under your glorious reign," Zazu said with ear-splitting cheer. Scar was fairly certain that from the hornbill's perspective, being able to wake Scar up each morning was the only consoling factor regarding his brother's death, and the damnable bird was going to milk it for all it was worth. "Now with your blessing Sire, it is high time for the morning report."

Scar drowsily gathered his limbs underneath him, only to yelp in pain when he promptly placed his paw in the skeletal remains of his evening feast. "Go on then, man, out with it! What new and exciting crisis afflicts us this time?"

"Well, since you asked, Sire, you'll be aggrieved to learn that the great Aminifu has passed away."

Scar winced as he pulled a bone fragment from his sensitive forepaw. "Who?"

"Aminifu. One of your late brother's oldest friends? Revered leader of the elephant tribe?"

"Oh, the one that smelled like week-old dung. What about him?"

Scar was rewarded with an irate glare from Zazu. "The elephants are expecting the king to come and pay his respects. You are to offer your condolences in the native Elephantese, as per ancient custom."

Scar groaned theatrically, cradling his wounded paw across his chest. "Oh Zazu, have some compassion for your poor old liege. You cannot expect me to travel all the way to the edge of the Pridelands for every trifling inconvenience that afflicts the kingdom. I have a bad back, you know."

Zazu was standing there with both wings on his flanks, wearing the least-impressed expression Scar had seen on him so far. "…I'll go beg the queen mother to go in your place."

"No!" Scar shot up, all thoughts of sleep and injury forgotten. Having the Pridelanders get used to following Sarabi's lead was the absolute last thing he needed right now. "No, ah, I mean… what if Simba were to go instead? Think about it: In my attendance the elephants would no doubt find an excuse to take offense at the slightest slip of the tongue and harbour a grudge against me forever. Simba however could come right out and say he smelled of excrement, and they would all think it was adorable."

Zazu seemed to mull this over. "It would be good for the young prince to get acquainted with the finer touches of ruling a kingdom… and I could take the opportunity to introduce him to a different culture and a new language. Good thinking, Sire! We'll make a king out of you yet."

"Yes, very good," said Scar, plonking back down onto his cool stone bed. "Now, if that was all…"

"There are also some rumours that you murdered your brother."

Scar jumped up. "What?"

"Oh, it's just idle gossip, Sire – the kind you always get with a sudden transition of power. I doubt anyone really believes it." He gave a feathery shrug. "Although, it certainly doesn't help that you disrupted the established social order with your hare-brained popularity-boosting scheme of making everybody king for a day." He hopped over to the cave's exit and took the time to stretch and bask in the morning sun. "Beautiful day, isn't it, Sire? Really makes you want to take wing and soar through the open sky."

Scar limped after him, cursing his poor luck with every step. "What do you mean, hare-brained scheme? I'm offering them immortality! They should be chanting my name in reverence from here to the Outlands."

"Yes, well, if you had thought to consult your royal advisor before declaring your intentions from on top of Pride Rock, I might have reminded you that most animals don't harbour ambitions of eternal splendour and grandeur. What they want is a safe and stable existence that does not contradict their understanding of the natural order, with a clearly defined social hierarchy that leaves them safe in the knowledge that no matter how low on the ladder they are, there is always a hyena or a zebra somewhere below to kick down. You see, it somewhat detracts from the promise of a perfect afterlife if it turns out you have to share it with the boorish neighbour who insulted your mother."

Scar cursed under his breath. Somehow he had taken his own perspective for granted to such an extent that he had actually expected people to be grateful to him, but in retrospect that was pure wishful thinking. "Fine, I'll retract the statement. Tell them that I merely meant that the extraordinary boon of divine status shall be offered as a reward for the king's most loyal and able servants."

"Very good sire," Zazu said, looking unbearably smug – which was quite impressive considering the lack of lips to smirk with. "I'll just arrange the preparations for my own coronation then, shall I? King Zazu does have a nice ring to it, if I do say so myself. It's preferable to King Trash, in any case."

This time Scar did pounce at him, but his target promptly flew up and left him biting dust.

"Speaking of wasteful things," Zazu continued, flying circles around Scar's head as if to symbolise his growing headache, "there is also the matter of the burgeoning drought. It hasn't rained a day since you became king, which hasn't exactly done much to endear your subjects to you."

Scar swiped at the interminable pest without much hope of success. "How is a lack of rain my fault?"

"Well Sire, they're saying that you upset the Circle of Life with your talk of radical change, causing us to lose favour with the great Kings of the Past, and that this drought is their divine punishment."

Scar stared at him, gobsmacked. "They really believe that our past kings would respond to a petty disagreement with regards to my executive style by cursing the entire kingdom which they, which they themselves… used to rule…"

"Sire?"

"It's nothing," Scar said. He wouldn't, would he? No, that's wishful thinking again; of course he bloody well would. "Has there been any sight of Rafiki yet? We need his spiritual guidance, now more than ever." The damnable monkey had a habit of disappearing into the wilderness at unpredictable intervals, which turned out to be both a blessing and a curse in this instance. "Also, my coronation will not be seen as official by all without his ritual ceremony." Every second of delay weakens my authority…

"No, sire. Do you wish for me to send out a search party?"

"No, I'll find someone to take care of it." Scar waved him off, and finally the bird left Scar alone to ponder his problems. He gazed up at the sky, which was indeed free of any clouds, but the sunny weather no longer seemed so benevolent in nature. The humid air almost seemed to press down on him, willing him to fail.

Brother, even in death you seek to spite me. From hell's heart, you stab at me…

Scar made his way down the hill and to the next cave, ignoring the pain that flared up his paw with each step. It was becoming increasingly obvious that he was in need of a second-in-command, and for the sake of his plans and his continued existence he would suffer whatever discomfort was needed.

He had realized a long time ago that there was no such thing as a sole ruler: He could recruit a whole army of Hyenas if he promised them enough meat, but it would do nothing to prevent the lionesses from subtly undermining his efforts, nor would it stop his subjects from failing to receive urgent messages.

It was not that Scar did not trust Zazu, exactly – serving was all the featherbrain knew. Zazu had actually begged Mufasa to be allowed to serve him back when they were still children: The thought of betraying his rightful king would quite literally never enter his mind.

Still, for this particular role, he required someone with a bit more… venom.

"Who's there? Get off our turf!"

The voice that had spoken belonged to a mangy cub which had been squatting near the cave's entrance, chewing on a root until Scar's arrival. "Where's your mother, lad? I need to talk to her."

"The name's Nuka," the cub growled. It was truly a pitiful sight, scraggly and unwashed as it was. Probably had flees, too. "And I don't hafta do anything you say – you're not my real dad!"

"Nor will I ever be confused for such," Scar said, peering inside the cave. "Zira? Are you in there?"

"My liege! What a pleasant surprise." The lioness had appeared behind him, and instantly dropped the leg of zebra she had been carrying home to perform a curtsy. Like him, she preferred to keep her privacy intact by living away from the rest of the Pride, which was just one of many things they had in common.

"Zira, I told you, I'm only your liege at night. Call me Scar."

"Of course Scar, anything for you," she purred, brushing up close against him. She turned and growled at her kid. "Nuka, what are you standing around for? Go make yourself useful and take this leg inside."

"Of course, mother! Right away, mother." The boy practically pounced after the hump of meat, as if expecting it to run away if given the chance. Scar stared after it, nonplussed.

"Now tell me Scar, what can I do for you?" She was still rubbing against him as they walked towards the cave, using enough force and vigour as to nearly tip him over. Her affections had been pleasant enough at first, but he was starting to find her enthusiasm vaguely unsettling.

"I do have a task for you, in fact – one that I would only ever assign to someone I trust completely." He ignored the grin she beamed at him. "Tell me, do you remember the royal mjuzi, Rafiki?"

"That old monkey? Why, is he in your way? Do you need me to pounce on him?"

"No. Well, not yet, anyway. He is in my way because he is said to converse with the spirits of the past, which you might realize could prove… problematic, in my case." He was relieved to see she had the sense not to react to this declaration. "If he were to return to the Pridelands, it could spell disaster. On the other hand, I require him to answer some urgent questions regarding the spirit world."

She gave him an empty look. "Why? If he's dead, then it doesn't matter anymore, does it?"

He sighed. "Zira, you're a clever young lioness full of untapped potential, but you still have a ways to go when it comes to subtlety." As they entered the cave the light dimmed and the air grew damp and cool. The two of them hunkered down opposite each other, Zira's red eyes gleaming in the dark and boring deep into his own. "Think about it from my perspective: My poor older brother dies, and immediately after a drought strikes the kingdom. Moreover, I might have crowned myself king and call you queen, but there is no guarantee that this offers either of us eternal life. And even if we truly are immortal now, we still don't know if the afterlife is desirable at all. There are simply too many unknown variables."

There was a thoughtful frown on her vulpine face, which was encouraging to see. "So what? You don't need him for that. Scar, you're captain of the Lion Guard – wielder of the Elder Roar! They say you could call down lighting from the sky and bathe your enemies in fire, back when you were at the height of your power. Surely no mere monkey could possess a stronger connection to the spirit world than you."

Scar's response was interrupted when Nuka entered the cave, startling them both by revealing that he was still tugging the leg of meat along with him. He dragged it between them, looked expectantly at his mother for a second, then shot a reproachful glare at Scar and sauntered away.

Scar tore off a chunk of meat and chewed carefully as he sought his next words. "Zira, I lost my connection to the spirit world a long time ago, when I… experimented, in their usage." Scar had always thought that was terribly unfair: How was he to knowthat their power was not to be used in anger? As far as he was concerned, that was what eldritch weapons of mass destruction were for. "Steeped in wisdom and lore I may be, but there is no advantage to being attuned to the spirit world when said spirits will not even give you the time of day."

She frowned, clearly unhappy with the answer, and gulped down a chunk of meat. "Then what do you want me to do?"

"I want you to travel through the desert and head to the oasis, and find Rafiki. The royal mjuzi has an inexplicable dislike of me, so don't let out that I sent you – in fact, better to make no mention of me at all. Tell him that prince Simba has been having strange dreams ever since the death of his father, and he is in need of spiritual assistance. That should be enough to lure the old monkey back to the Pridelands."

Zira's red eyes lit up. "And then we pounce on him, take his bakora staff, and use it to reawaken your divine powers and subdue the entire world under your glorious reign! Brilliant, Scar."

"Ah, no." He put back down the piece of Zebra he had intended to devour. "First of all, Zira, when discussing our evil plans we use our inside voice." She grinned sheepishly. "Secondly, I just finished explaining to you that I have no power of my own – I'm hardly going to single-handedly tame a dozen capricious god-kings to my will with a pointy stick and a bit of pluck. Finally, if you attack Rafiki and take his staff, that's hardly going to make him inclined to answer my questions, now is it?"

"I could make him be inclined," she grumbled.

"Yes, well, just because it is possible to achieve your goals with violence doesn't mean you should." He worked his way through the last of his zebra – Zira had long ago finished hers, having offered him the larger part and lacking a propensity for chewing. There was something decidedly unnerving about the way she watched him eat. "No, far better to let him believe he's performing his regal duty as spiritual advisor to the Prince. Accompany him to Flatrock Ridge – that's the ridge with the big flat rock on it," he explained, seeing her expression. "After coming all this way, he will be reluctant to just turn around when it is revealed that Prince Simba is feeling poorly and cannot meet him there in person."

She cocked her head uncertainly. "And that's when I pounce on him?"

"No! There is to be no pouncing, torture, bloodshed, or for that matter any kind of wanton violence whatsoever. You will trick him into coming here, he will answer my questions, and then that's it!"

She bit her lip. "So… you want me to go look for someone you don't want to be found, so you can ask him questions you don't want answered, and then let him go in order to prevent him from escaping?"

"Yes, precisely."

Her mouth split into a grin, baring teeth which gleamed even in the dim light of the cave. "Oh Scar, you know what I love about you? Your mind is so delightfully twisted."

Scar walked the last leg of his journey up the entryway to Pride Rock, his injured paw aching with each consecutive step. The first stars were already showing in the evening sky, as his daily activities had taken longer than expected – Zira's insatiable pouncing not least among them.

At last he entered the royal den, where all the other lionesses were getting huddled up for sleep. His brother had slept right in the middle of them on his stone dais, and for the sake of seeming less like an outsider he probably should have continued that tradition – but Scar had never been able to sleep unless he was alone. He did not understand how Mufasa could stand being surrounded and watched by others at all times; never mind how he had even managed with his wife.

Said wife was now rising to meet him, though there was no warmth to be found in her welcome. "Scar."

"That's king Scar now, unless you have some truly miraculous news to tell me with regards to my brother." Sarabi was impossible to read, that was the problem. Was her cool demeanour intended to broadcast defiance, or was she merely assuming the proper pose for a widow in mourning?

"Mufasa was king too," she said with half-lidded eyes. All the other lionesses were staring at him now, and not in a friendly way. "Yet I never called him Sire."

He bit back a sharp comment with regards to her being free to call him whatever she liked if she performed the same services for him as she had for Mufasa. "I suppose I could make an exception to royal tradition for the sake of my brother's queen," he said instead.

Her expression stayed perfectly fixed for a second, but then she gave the slightest nod. A gesture intended to display power over me? "The draught is getting worse," she said eventually. "All across the Pridelands the vegetation withers and dies. Scar, there is talk among the herds of moving on."

"I'm working on it," he growled back. She had to know that there was nothing he could realistically do about it, which meant that she was trying to subvert his authority after all – challenging him in front of the others. The lionesses were grouped together now, as impenetrable as a formation of elephants.

Frustrated, he turned and marched towards the exit – coming here had clearly been a mistake.

"Scar… he asked for you. He said he still cannot sleep."

Scar paused. "Why don't you take care of it? You're his mother."

"He asked for you, Scar."

He hesitated, looking back at the circle of lionesses. Slowly their formation parted, revealing a single cub lying alone on the stone dais in the centre. He walked down their middle, ignoring the looks they were giving him. They retreated to a respectful distance at least, as he approached the crown prince.

"You still have those nightmares, huh?"

The boy nodded mutely, and Scar felt another stab in his chest. For a moment he imagined it was Mufasa's own ghost driving the talon in, and he could not help but wonder if his brother would damn him harder for having the gall to act like a parent to Simba, or for failing to do so.

The lad looked up at him, unblinking brown eyes showing signs of insufficient sleep. "Could you tell me a story, uncle Scar?"

He sat down next to the boy. He was no good at these things, but nightmares, at least, he understood. "I could tell you about the Lion Guard of old, if you like." He had always loved hearing those stories himself, as a cub. "I could tell you about the great battles that took place during Ahadi's age, or perhaps the time when we rescued your maternal grandfather from a tree. That one's always good for a laugh."

Simba sat up, some of the weariness retreating from his eyes. "I wanna hear about you, uncle Scar. Is it true what aunt Zira said, that you could call lightning from the sky and bathe your enemies in fire?"

"She told you about that, did she?" He frowned, trying to decide how he felt about that. "Listen, Simba. I don't think Zira is a good influence on you right now."

"Why not? She's your friend, isn't she?"

"Yes she is," he said, uneasily. "But just because someone is a friend that doesn't make them a good person – and just because someone isn't a good person, that doesn't mean they can't be your friend. Some people find it easy to be liked by everyone, but others… sometimes people are just born with a lot of anger and frustration in them, but that doesn't mean they don't deserve to be loved."

Simba tilted his head. "Uncle Scar, are you talking about yourself?"

"No, I'm talking about your mother. She's a terrible person, but we all love her anyway."

Simba giggled. "It's true! She can be really mean sometimes, like how she makes me go to bed even though I can't sleep."

"I had that too sometimes," Scar said sagely. "You know what I always did? I'd just sneak away at night and occupy myself with something else, like studying ancient mural paintings in the caverns below – I'd still fall unconscious eventually, but at least I had done something productive in the meantime."

"Uncle Scar, you're so weird!" The boy laughed again. "Didn't your mum and dad get mad at you for doing stuff like that?"

"Oh yes," he said morosely. "But then, they were always mad at me, especially Ahadi. Sometimes I think he had made up his mind to hate me from the moment I was born." He clenched his paw, his own claws digging into his skin and causing his injury to flare again. "He named me Taka, which means Waste in the old tongue. Who does that? What kind of parent names one son king and the other trash?"

"He probably didn't know that though," said Simba. "I guess they just thought it sounded cool."

"They should have checked! But no, being King is all about getting people to respect you for being strong and powerful, not about learning the meaning of some words in a dusty old language nobody speaks anymore." He flexed his aching paw, trying to retract his claws and failing. "That's how I lost my powers, back then. I turned them against my brother during a fight, and the spirits never answered me again after that. He was allowed to use his strength against me, but I was not allowed to use my own."

Simba's ears drooped. "I guess you really hated him, huh?"

"No! I mean, I thought I did, but…" He gestured helplessly as he sought to explain something he did not understand himself. "Maybe I couldn't help but hate him a little, even though it mostly wasn't his fault, but that doesn't mean he deserved to die. Nobody – nobody deserves that."

"I'm sorry," Simba whispered.

"Don't say that," Scar growled. "Don't ever say that to me. You have nothing to apologize for, do you understand?" Why do I do this? Why do I talk to someone who causes me this much pain?

He got up and turned towards the exit. Coming here was a mistake.

Simba said nothing, but merely placed his head back down onto the stone dais in the centre of the royal den. There was no way the boy was going to fall asleep now, after he had said all of that.

He sighed deeply, and lay down next to the boy, placing one paw over the cub's fragile body and doing his best to ignore the lionesses' stares as he resigned himself to yet another restless night.