A knock echoed through Sebbi's chambers, rattling him free of his thoughts.

"Your Highness?" A high-pitched, annoyed squeak, accompanied by the impatient staccato of boots against the floor, came from the other side of the door.

Sebbi's ears twitched. "What?"

"Your lack of cordiality when conversing with a most trusted advisor, is truly unrivaled, ben' nessren."

"Come in," he said, sourly, turning around. He ran a hand over his fur, pulling it upward so it no longer hung in front of his eyes, trying ever so slightly to look the part of king.

Reven, an old stick-to-traditions, cat-man, hobbled into the room, in a glossy black robe, trimmed with golden crescent moons. His tortoise-shell fur was trimmed close to his face which better showed off the Aelurian's squat and always grumpy expression.

A pair of glasses perched on Reven's muzzle, magnifying his analytical green eyes. A quiet fury glimmered in his gaze, like a soft boil, or a current underneath a lake's surface, seen by only the most observant eye.

The cat-man took a pointed finger, adjusting his glasses so they balanced perfectly on his nose. "Your highness," he supplied a perfunctory bow demanded of an interaction with royal blood, "you cannot leave until you settle this matter with the Houses."

Sebbi turned away, ignoring the mountain of scrolls bulging in Reven's arms, and the various wax seals of those bloodlines calling for the death of the Cloudians. "It can wait."

Reven sighed, depositing the scrolls across the bed. "You say that every time."

"Because it's the truth."

He stood straighter then, his size nothing compared to Sebbi's, even though the Aelurian king was currently slouching. He'd been educated about Aelurian height differences- it had to do with their bloods and the different moons they were born under.

Crescent Moonborns, like Sebbi, were descendants of the Yaujar – an ancient god-like creature of strength and cunning. Reven was born with diluted half-Hewn blood, a bloodline already thought by many to be the weakest among the Moonborns.

Considered inferior among his own, Hewn Moon House had disowned him. The runt of a litter was never meant to survive.

Despite Reven's stature, slim shoulders, and bobtail, the cat-man proved fierce in all his assessments. Nothing went unnoticed under his eye.

When Sebbi had first met Reven, he'd thought nothing of the smaller, seemingly frail Aelurian who cowered whenever Sebbi spoke. But after so many years on the receiving end of Reven's wisdom and lectures, Sebbi knew there was nothing inferior about his advisor.

If anything, the diversity of his blood gave Reven a strength other Aelurians lacked.

Reven shook his head, his glasses dipping to the right side of his face. "It's because you are a foolish leader who refuses to grapple with the seriousness of the situation," he said, jabbing a finger at the scrolls. "These are all from the leaders of Moonborn Houses who call on you to solve this issue with the Cloudians."

"There is no issue," Sebbi spat. "The Cloudians don't have a home, so they can use ours. It's big enough."

Reven cocked his head, anger making his whiskers spasm. "Incorrect, Your Highness," he smoothed the front of his robes, dragging his hands along the fabric so hard, Sebbi thought he might tear it, "the Cloudians destroyed their own home, so fears that they'll destroy ours aren't unfounded and shouldn't be so easily dismissed. Some would argue and some do," he said, referencing the scrolls with a nod, "that the destruction of their realm signifies the Cloudians have run their course."

Sebbi growled. "We exterminate them then? Is that what those scrolls really are? Orders you want me to sign giving the Houses permission to march their armies and destroy a race they deem inferior?"

"Not inferior. Obsolete," Reven corrected. "The strong survive, that is the way of the world. That is the way of this world, ben' nessren, and if you wish to rule it much longer, you need to understand that."

Sebbi folded his arms across his chest and scowled. "I'm not," he pressed the words between his teeth, his voice a menacing whisper, "dealing with this now."

Reven shook his head. "Very well, My King. Enjoy your jaunt into Exul." The cat-man eyed the clothes strewn over Sebbi's bed, his upper lip curling in disgust. "I'm sure your enemies would love to discover their king has been visiting the hemma world disguised as one." Reven's face grew serious. "More propaganda to add to what's already floating around the capital." Sebbi gaped. The advisor narrowed his eyes, fingers tightening around a silk shirtsleeve. "Blood, Harvest and Swift Houses are doing everything they can to undermine your rule." He whirled on Sebbi, fangs bared. "Their subterfuge is not something you can bat away, nor can it be dismantled with a swipe of your claws. They claim you're a Cloudian sympathizer. That you turn a blind eye to those villages on the outskirts of Aelurus where our people, your people, starve. That you ignore the stress the Cloudians are putting on our world, a world mind you, whose magick is dying."

Reven took a breath, huffed and continued. "That you, an outsider, whether with the blood of the true heir or not, refuse to understand the Aelurian way of things. That a hemma submissive, domesticated in a lesser realm, with all the obedience and singlemindedness of a canine can not rule without leading our kingdom to its destruc—"

"Enough!" Sebbi bellowed. Reven froze, the wispy, grey fur tufts in his ears quivering as a breeze blew through the open patio doors. It did nothing to disperse the tension looming over either cat-man. "That's enough." Sebbi's heart hammered in his chest, the rush of blood in his ears the only sound he could focus on.

Sometimes Reven's words were too much, too harsh, too honest. An Aelurian didn't always need claws to cut down his enemies; words, when wielded with brutal, undeniable truths, worked equally well.

Reven bowed, placing a hand over his heart. When next he looked at Sebbi, the fury in his gaze had fled. "I only tell you this, Your Highness, so you will entertain the idea of compromise." Sebbi knew this. Still, it was a hard potion to swallow. "I know you do not wish to annihilate the threat. I know you seek another way, that you desire, for yourself and all Aelurians to rise above their instincts. Their bloodshed," Reven said. "But we are creatures ruled by those instincts, by impulse, by the need to survive. A warring people forced into an era of peace, do you not see the problem? Have you not felt it in yourself? The conflict? You are trying to be someone you are not, by denying those parts of you that make you Aelurian. Assassinations. Poisonings. Exterminations. Yes, they're ugly machinations, but they are a part of us. Do you know how much blood has been shed for that throne you so frivolously dismiss? This, ben' nessren, is who we," he stared directly at Sebbi, gaze unwavering, "who you are."

Sebbi flinched, his grip tightening around the potion still in his hand. He heard the burst of seams as the hide split. Immediately, its stench overpowered the room. Reven coughed.

His focus elsewhere, Sebbi pounced on the opportunity to end this conversation. Taking the bottle to his lips, he held his breath and swallowed. The potion moved down his throat like lava, slow-moving and molten, searing his mouth.

Reven finally stopped coughing. Looking at his king, hunched over and softly glowing the eerie shade of magick, he shook his head. "I see you've had enough. Very well." He turned. "I will arrange for Archmage Menna to open the portal—"

Something was wrong. Sebbi's vision blurred. The cat-man yelped as he tried to orient himself in a room that had begun to come apart. Piece by piece, his bed and furnishings started disappearing. Thread by thread, his bedsheets unraveled. Even Reven had started to crumble. Sebbi blinked. This wasn't real. It couldn't be.

"My King?" Reven's voice came to him, dream-like, far away and airy.

Sebbi coughed as he pitched forward. He hit the floor hard, as the room continued to undo itself. He wretched, spewing blood and bile over the tunic he had clenched in his hand.

Someone screamed.

"B-b-bl—" Sebbi reached for the fabric, for the freshly made stains. Was this him? His blood? He meant to form words, but they only gurgled on his lips before dying. What was happening?

"My King!"

Someone's calling for me?

Sebbi's head throbbed as unformed thoughts swirled in his mind. Things around him lost their shape, melting into swaths of color.

Then something in his stomach unfurled.

He screamed and clutched his belly. Something writhed inside him, its claws scraping at his insides, causing another agonized yell to blossom over his tongue. Rocking on the ground, he had to get whatever it was out. Gasping for breath, Sebbi dug his claws into his stomach.

Get it out. Out. Make it stop.

"My King, no!" Something warm yanked Sebbi's hands away. "Menna's on her way. Please, ben' nessren, hold on."

Sebbi relaxed, his hands falling limply to his sides. The beast in his belly abated.

"That's it, your Highness," someone said. "That's it."

Sebbi's breathing slowed as he closed his eyes and welcomed the darkness. The pounding of footsteps found his ears, people talking. Sebbi wandered the darkness, the sounds growing fainter and fainter, until the darkness finally fell away. Abby sat beneath Sir Simon, all smiles as she petted a sleeping Lucy nestled on her lap. 

Sebbi, himself, perched on a tree branch, pawing at a passing horned beetle carrying bark on its head pinchers. He heard the sounds of the Fragilli in the distance - the mews of the gulls, the slurping of its waters against the shores of the surrounding beaches. He heard the noise of Laos, all the raucous, obnoxious braying of a city that thrived on chaos.

Sebbi felt at home, all his pain forgotten, his troubled heart soothed by the familiar as a current of unconsciousness pulled him deeper. A fourth, and perhaps, the most important lesson of his reign, left unlearned: Aelurus had teeth.