Bury me in The Ocean (Erik Killmonger/Black Panther au)

2

Anila rose from her seat, swallowing last the lump in her throat. "Are we done here, your highness?" She asked curtly, "or do you wish to insult me further?"

"I do not wish anything, princess, only unity," T'Challa said in his defence, but by the expression the princess wore, she was far from believing him. They had desired different things, he — an alliance with the ability to surpass their past, and she — everything she had lost, had that even been possible.

"And by that you want us to bend the knee to you,"

T'Challa frowned, "does that matter? I am your king nonetheless,"

"You killed our king," she said, with exaggerated enunciation between each word.

"I killed a tyrant," T'Challa stood, but the princess shook her head, as a sad laugh played from her lips. "I saved Wakanda from his rule, I saved the rest of the world from his dysfunction, I even saved you from what Okoye has told me."

Her head turned like a whip, gaping in cold shock with a look of anger and distress in her eyes, an anger and distress so easily read from her voice. "You didn't save me from anything, T'Challa." He swallowed hard at the harshness of his name, maybe he rather than preferred it when she mocked him with a title than utter his name.

"Whatever Okoye has told you, please believe that I loved and worshipped my husband," she closed the space between them, staring into his eyes feverishly. "When every noblewoman across the continent vied from his hand, he was mine after one night." Her finger pressed against his chest, scoldingly hot as if the sun lived beneath her skin. It made T'Challa melt.

"And when I married him, it was the greatest day of my life, I was going to be queen of the country that birthed me, and a queen to a man that wouldn't hesitate to rip the tongue through the teeth of a man who disrespected him." Not even T'Challa himself could not deny that, Erik — N'Jadaka — was pitiless to any man that stood against him, and he had even been that man twice. 

"Then that night he crawled on top of me, glorious and strong, he reminded me of that and since then he never forgot to."

T'Challa felt relieved when Okoye appeared in the clearing aside the princess' guards silently watching. The princess turned her head regarding the woman evenly, before returning her gaze toward him as it she had forgotten to say one last thing.

"You were once dead to the world, T'Challa, and it was better that way," she said softly, but her softness was nothing more than a sharp blade to his throat. "Even deep down I know you believe that too, it would've saved you lowering your pride to beg for an alliance, no?"

A servant had come to lead her to her room after she dismissed her guards, who against their better judgment hesitantly agreed. She followed the small slight woman, with a name she had not caught through long hallways and winding staircases till she came to a grand set of doors, beautiful craved — just for her. The doors slid open smoothly, and her sister standing aside the balcony, turned her head over her shoulder to regard her.

"What did that sorry excuse for a king say?" Farah asked as her sister crawled through tirelessly, she stretched out across the bed cat like. "Anila."

"He wants us to bend the knee to him,"

"Moran would never agree to such a thing!"

"Don't you think I know that?" She spat, seemingly harsher than intended. Her older sister frowned at that, fluidly crossing the room.

"Save your growl for King T'Challa," she uttered, "I am not the one you want to be raising your voice at,"

"Farah..."

She shook her head nonetheless, turning back toward the window slowly. "What else did he want?"

"He wants to unify our tribe with the others, bring us back into the fold, he's sure that they'd forgive the Asharni despite what we've done, as though we have done anything worth forgiveness," she relayed.

"T'Challa is more wishful than I thought," Farah said in return, "thinking that we would instantly bow to him after all he's done, he's sent our progress back years, if he even cares about that. Moran will not agree to anything he says, he'd rather have another war, even if it ultimately destroys him. Do what Erik should've done."

If what she had said were true, if their brother proceeded in bringing war against their own country, they'd all die for it. And for people like them, there'd be no expenses for burials, no marble cut to their likenesses, no one to remember their names in praises, no wreaths. Just lost in history. Dead. Just like Erik, just like N'Jadaka.

Anila felt her sister's eyes again, studying her cautiously. Farah appeared in the corners of her eyes, the edges of her gown gleaming brightly.

"What did he say about Erik?" She asked.

"He—"

"And do not bother lying to me, a discussion as tedious as the one you had will always have Erik's name mentioned."

She wasn't interested in rehearsing her words, and she knew her sister knew she wasn't remotely interested in doing so. Yet, Farah wanted to know, after his death anything about Erik made her vulnerable, and once even a mention of his name weakened her to the point beyond return.

"T'Challa believes he saved me from him," her words came out lowly, as if she had not said them. "From what Okoye had told him, he did me a great justice in killing him."

"He does not know anything," her sister said bravely. She lifted her head by her chin, nodding curtly at her. "He knows only what he thinks and what he's been told, and none of that the truth,"

"But..."

"T'Challa only said that to sadden you, and you ought not to let it," her sister moved toward the door. "He wants you to grieve him even further than you already have, and you're done grieving, yes?"

"Yes."

Anila was tired of grieving. She'd grieved for the loss of her husband, the loss of her children suffered, the loss of her crown and for the loss of her power. Residing within these walls of a castle built for her, memories and dreams that scarred each wall, it seemed like a punishment. She thought that maybe she could return, shake T'Challa the way he had shaken her when Erik died. But, still he stood as strong as the mountains that surrounded them — once Farah had gone, she stepped out from the balcony, down to where water ran over every rock and stone into a stream — and she, withering and wavering as an endless running river.

She knelt down against the water, watching at her reflection with a slight frown before dipping her finger into its current to hold the eddy of its power in her hand. Queen of Wakanda, she said to herself mockingly. If Erik were still alive he'd surely be disappointed to see his wife like this, which queen cringed her head? He'd question, or when swimming, which queen drowned in its depths? She was as much a Wakandan as any of them, and more importantly an Asharni, they were always known to endure and prevail, she ought to do the same.