Seneca shifts with the seasons. As the days get longer, they promise the return of summer, which can be the most difficult of seasons when one lives in a desert. He is awake late into the evenings, and by the time the sun threatens to bake them alive, he will be almost entirely nocturnal. This particular spring night finds the sovereign prowling the darkness, skirting the territory with a routine border patrol. It isn't often that he stops during his route, finding it a waste of time and resources; if anyone needs to bother him, they are capable of walking whilst they do it. Today, however, he does find himself momentarily distracted by a patch of territory in the pridelands that has been quite obviously cultivated with care. Green shoots have begun to spring up in neat rows, and he meanders closer if for no reason other than curiosity. This garden is nowhere near Iofiel's den and is unlikely to be his, and Seneca has begun to accumulate a small group of medics within the Oasis, so he can do little else than guess at who has created it. @Hazel

image by koafox, code by koi

The best time to water a garden when you live in the desert is at night; the sun won’t sap away any irrigation before the plants have had their fill. This is Hazel’s task for the night, growing her small garden with half-coconut shells of water. It’s a tedious task, and takes hours, but it will be worth it to have herbs and plants growing within the Oasis.

She’s returning from her third pass when there’s an unsettling sight in her garden - the king, nosing around. A frown pulls the lioness’s brows together. Her coconut is dipped over a thirsty plant, and then dumped on the ground so she can speak.

"What are you doing?" There’s more than a little huff in her tone, it’s accusatory and irritated. Lately, the only way she sounds when Seneca is around.

Ah. He supposes he should have suspected it would be Hazel's garden, secluded away where he would be unlikely to find or frequent it. Seneca watches her approach with an impassive gaze, though he is mildly amused by the somewhat petulant look upon her face. It's only after tending to her plants that she fully acknowledges him, with no sort of the sass or humor she'd boasted the first time they met; fair enough, he supposes, considering how sourly she'd left their last interaction. "Oh, just wondering which one of these you'll use to kill me in my sleep," he muses with a slight quirk of his brow; it's a dry humor, and quite possibly rooted in truth if the dissatisfied look on Hazel's face is anything to go by. He could leave her be -- he supposes she would prefer that, but Seneca is not so easily deterred by dour demeanors.

image by koafox, code by koi

It’s almost a shame to see how well his face has healed since she’d worked on it; normally, a patient of Hazel’s was looked after until there is nothing but scar tissue. Seneca had not been given that privilege, and the druid had left him to heal without her help. What scars remain do nothing but make him look rugged, and she hates him for that, too.

She snorts at his answer, but her gaze does drift over the plant by his right front paw. High enough dosage of that, and you never wake up. Fortunately for the king, she is not the type of lioness to poison, or kill. Not that she’s going to tell him that. A little bit of fear is healthy for a man - especially one like him.

"Oh, it won’t be in your sleep." She speaks so sweetly her mouth feels full of cotton. "That’s far too peaceful."

Unfortunately for Hazel, fear is not something that easily instilled in a Miroslav, Seneca least of all. The pointed drift of her gaze to the plant nearest him does nothing to deter the sovereign, who has little concern about the spotted medic being able to take him down in any manner, let alone with her herbs. In the past few weeks of her cold shoulder, and especially now, Seneca has become aware that Hazel is the sort to keep a grudge. While it is something of an irritant, he is used to being labeled villain; it's easy to assume the worst. "And if you did manage it..." he hums airily, a thoughtful tone to his consideration, "what do you suppose would happen to the Oasis?" Without him, where does she think the pride's men, women, and children will wind up? Seneca knows only too well what happens when a king falls -- the kingdom tumbles into bedlam.

image by koafox, code by koi

If she managed it. Hazel has no doubt that, if she really wanted Seneca dead, he would die. Maybe not by claw, or her fangs, but certainly he would perish. She knows enough of herbs and plants to poison him. But that is not who she is - not who she wants to be. Murder is barbaric, the type of thing the Miroslav king would default to. And she will never be like him.

The question he poses to her is a surprise. If Seneca is disturbed by her joke comment it doesn’t show. "Someone else would take the throne." Hazel answers simply, outwardly unphased by the idea. But inwardly, she had considered it before - in her anger before, she’d considered moving to dispose him from his power, but the thought had occurred to her that someone worse that the sexist jerk might come to power, and it would be her fault.

Seneca is the lesser of two potential evils, much as she hates to admit that.

"Are you done with the inquisition, your majesty?" Fur along her neck ruffles, agitation rather clear in her movements.

In the literal sense, she's correct; the territory itself would live to see another day, would fall to another king -- but whether its inhabitants would be better off for it is an uncertainty. Seneca is not the kindest nor gentlest of men, but he is a dutiful one. Hazel might know that if she'd bothered to partake in any of the pride's group gatherings, but she seems too interested in nursing the wounds of their last encounter instead. "Yes, someone else would take it," he muses, his calculating gaze never wavering from the features of her face. "Someone who may not have your best interest in mind." Your being the collective -- the pride he protects and provides for. Despite his gruff nature, Seneca is (usually) a fair leader, and will not hesitate to protect the lions under his rule from harm. Even petulant and argumentative ones like Hazel. His lips quiver in a half smirk with her bitter question -- right on cue, proving the point of his internal monologue. "If I'm not?" he returns with a quirk of his brow, somewhat entertained by her desire to so hastily dismiss him. If nothing else, it gives Seneca a greater desire to loiter -- simply because she doesn't want him to.

image by koafox, code by koi

He doesn’t have to read her thoughts out loud, but he’s nothing if not thorough in his ability to irritate. Hazel’s lip curls under that too-sharp gaze, her own flashing hotly as she shifts and wraps a tail around her ankle. Does Seneca have the pride’s best interest in mind? She almost, almost let’s her question slip free, but manages to keep it behind her clenched teeth. Hazel knows the answer is no; men like Seneca protect only what they want, what’s useful to them, and power. Once something is not of use, it's discarded. His subjects would be no different.

Still. Lesser of two evils.

"Then you keep me from my work that much longer." The druid answers sharply, but not heatedly. It’s his choice to keep a pride’s medic distracted when she’s busy with her garden, and she’s happy to point out he is being rather stupid bothering her. "What do you want, sire?" As always, she manages to make the title sound like an insult.

A dry smirk quirks the edges of his lips at her commentary -- amusingly enough, it's a familiar feeling for Seneca, who often grows rather perturbed when he is pulled from his duties, especially without reason. Odd, now, how he is the one doing the distracting. Granted, he suspects that Hazel's annoyance is more about who is bothering her, rather than the fact that she's being bothered. He finds her disdain a curious and intriguing thing -- a testament to her stubborn nature. "Do I have to want something to check on the members of my pride?" he queries with a little quirk of his brow. Whether or not Hazel likes him doesn't particularly matter to the sovereign, but the well-being of the lions living beneath his rule is important to Seneca, whether she wants to consider that possibility or not. "You don't come when the pride gathers to hunt, so you've left me with little choice but to track you down." She's secluded herself, from him in particular, allowing her distaste to fester and causing something of a thorn in Seneca's side.

image by koafox, code by koi

"Men like you always want something." The words slip free from between her teeth, fast and furious and lacking all of the faux-friendliness she usually uses with the king, and all of the sharp, bitter edge she holds back. Ears flatten into the thick ruff of her fur, and in the second before she catches herself Hazel looks just as angry and hurt as she feels and holds back.

Seneca says something about hunting, and in that split second the druid pulls herself back together. Frayed as she might feel, allowing the king to see just how perturbed he makes her is unthinkable. "Is this your roundabout way or ordering me to attend hunts?" She inquires, still lacking a jovial tone but at least she doesn’t sound ready to snarl at him more. Expression blank, almost empty, Hazel looks at Seneca like a dutiful pride member with no opinions whatsoever.