Spoils

T'Challa ran to the throne room as fast as he could, heedless of the curious stares from the people he passed by along the way. By the time he reached the throne room, he was panting and breathless, sweat beading on his brow.

The Dora Milaje guarding the doors were two of his old friends, Ayo and Asha. They both looked surprised to see him.

T’Challa paused for a moment before them to let his breathing even out. His robes had become slightly rumpled during his mad dash to the throne room, and he hastily smoothed his hands over the front of his robes, trying to make himself look less dishevelled.

T’Challa inhaled deeply to calm himself, then faced them and drew himself up to his full height.

“I’d like to enter, please,” T’Challa said, with as much calm dignity as he could muster. Dire visions floated through his mind, images of Erik issuing crazy orders to take over the world and killing anyone who vaguely annoyed him.

Ayo and Asha looked at each other.

“The King didn’t say that no one else could enter,” Ayo pointed out.

Asha shrugged.

In unison, they moved the spears back to their sides. Ayo motioned for T’Challa to enter the throne room.

T'Challa was relieved - that had gone smoother than he had expected. But as he reached forward to push the doors open, a thought suddenly struck him. He froze outside the throne room, his palm flat against the heavy vibranium doors.

It suddenly occurred to him that the last time the Elders had seen him, he had been on his hands and knees, getting fucked and claimed by his own cousin before the whole of Wakanda.

T'Challa faltered, a flush of embarrassment flooding his cheeks. How could he even look anyone else in the face again, knowing that they would be undoubtedly be recalling his humiliation at the hands of his cousin?

T’Challa gritted his teeth and fought back the upswell of shame and panic. He had to stop Erik from destroying the world.

Taking a deep breath, he pushed the doors open.

All eyes turned to T'Challa as he entered the throne room.

Erik was sitting sprawled out on the throne, flanked on both sides by two rows of Dora Milaje and looking completely at home. He was surrounded by Council representatives from each of the tribes, all of whom were looking at T’Challa with varying degrees of surprise.

Erik straightened upright in his seat at the sight of T'Challa, a frown beginning to crease his brow.

"T'Challa?" Erik said. "What are you doing here?"

"I was wondering if I could sit in on the meeting," T'Challa said, as innocently as he could manage.

Erik frowned, ignoring T’Challa’s request. "The doctor cleared you so fast? What exactly did she say?"

Oh Bast.

T'Challa swore internally to himself. In his rush to get to the throne room, he had completely forgotten about Erik's earlier instruction to have the doctor clear him before he could leave the room. He grasped for something to say, but just couldn't come up with a plausible excuse or explanation. And he couldn't very well confess in front of the entire council that he hadn't listened to his alpha.

"I… " T'Challa began helplessly, his voice trailing off.  

Erik correctly interpreted T'Challa's stammering as disobedience. A spike of intense displeasure filtered across their mental bond - a red-hot flash of irritation that had T'Challa shivering unconsciously. The look on Erik's face promised dire consequences. It was all he could do not to cower instinctively in the face of his alpha's anger.

A thrill of panic went up T'Challa's spine, making its way right to his heart. There was no way that Erik would just let this go. It wasn't that T'Challa was afraid of punishment per se, but if Erik saw fit to discipline him here, right now, in front of all these people… He didn't think that he could bear the humiliation. Not after the very public way he had been turned and claimed during the Challenge.

He was suddenly acutely aware of all the eyes on him right now. Council Elders who had used to respect him, and those whom he had never managed to truly win over, all staring at him, waiting for Erik to decide what to do with his wayward omega.

T'Challa's throat seized up as he looked pleadingly at Erik, hoping against hope that Erik wouldn't humiliate him too badly. Distantly, he noticed that his hands were trembling. He curled them into fists, nail digging sharply into his palms. But the trembling wouldn't stop.

The dark expression on Erik's face softened just a little.

"I didn't realise you were so eager to help out with the wedding planning," Erik said to T'Challa, with just the lightest bite of sarcasm tinging his voice. He motioned for T'Challa to take the empty seat on his right before turning back to the rest of the council. "Now where were we?"

The intense wave of relief that swept over T'Challa made his knees weak. He made his way over to the empty chair and sat down, his heartbeat still pounding hard.

"Thank you," T’Challa murmured under his breath, his lips barely moving. Too soft to be within the range of normal human hearing, but he knew that Erik, with his senses enhanced by the heart-shaped herb, would be able to hear it.

Erik pointedly ignored him. T’Challa could still sense of Erik’s anger in his mind, but already it was fading to irritation and then mild displeasure in response to T’Challa’s fear and distress.

Unaware of the unspoken mental interaction between Erik and T’Challa, the Council's discussions had shifted back to the wedding preparations again.

Wedding planning.

Of course. T'Challa's wedding to the new King was scheduled for this weekend, and that would have been the first item on the Council's agenda. A royal wedding would usually take months of preparation, but the unusual circumstances of their bonding would have necessitated a shotgun wedding.

Intensely relieved that Erik hadn't been doing anything more sinister than wedding planning,T'Challa took in a couple of shaky breaths, cautiously allowing himself to relax as his heart rate slowly returned to normal.

"The centrepieces," Councillor Enjo of the River Tribe was saying to Erik. "The royal florists usually supply calla lilies for the centrepieces. But I'm pleased to inform you that our white water lilies are in season now. We have thousands of the most beautiful blooms, freshly plucked at dawn from the banks of the Amazon River. We would be honoured to present our water lilies for your consideration for the centrepieces -”

"That's preposterous!" The elderly Councillor Olanda of the Merchant Tribe interrupted, looking outraged. "We've already placed orders for all the centrepieces! The calla lilies are an absolutely irreplaceable symbol of purity and fertility -"

The argument continued on and on in the same vein, with no signs of stopping anytime soon. After ten minutes of this, T’Challa sneaked a glance at Erik. He appeared to be listening intently to the argument, but their mental bond gave T’Challa a sort of window into Erik’s mind - his emotional state, at least - and he could tell that Erik wasn’t paying attention. Boredom interspersed with occasional flashes of irritation filtered through their mental bond. Whether Erik's irritation was due to the ongoing argument between the Councillors, or whether it was because he was still annoyed by T'Challa's disobedience, T'Challa couldn't tell. The bond only allowed him to sense Erik's emotions, not read his thoughts.

T'Challa frowned internally. It would be a complete waste of everyone’s time if the argument continued to drag on. After giving Erik one last glance, T'Challa decided to speak up.

“If I may…” T’Challa began.

Both Councillors Enjo and Olanda turned to look at him.

"I prefer the calla lilies," T'Challa said casually.

The River Tribe was making a blatant power grab for the new King's favour. Of the four tribes who regularly participated in council meetings, the River Tribe representatives were always the ones who were most involved in politicking. When he had come of age as Crown Prince, his father had sat him down and taught him about the history, goals and relationships between all the major players from each tribe. He had explained to T'Challa that the King should be seen to be upright and impartial, not showing too much favour to any particular tribe, and had highlighted to T'Challa that the River Tribe in particular had historically always been eager to curry favour with the new King.

T’Challa knew that Erik couldn’t care less about centrepieces, but if he sided with the River Tribe over this issue to the detriment of the Merchant Tribe, which had a longstanding (and lucrative) arrangement with the Crown for the supply of goods, it had the potential to destabilise the delicate balance of power between the tribes. Whether Erik intended it or not, it would also send a very visible signal to everyone in attendance that the new King could be easily led.

All eyes turned to Erik.

Erik shrugged. "We'll go with the calla lilies."

T'Challa exhaled quietly, relieved and somewhat surprised that Erik had backed him up so readily. The River Tribe's representative appeared displeased, but he knew better than to continue protesting after the King had already made his decision.

As the Council moved on the next item on the agenda, Erik narrowed his eyes at T'Challa. There was an indecipherable expression in his face. Across their mental bond, T’Challa could sense that his anger had mostly cooled, and his mood was quiet and contemplative.

Throughout the rest of the meeting, Erik seemed content to let T'Challa handle the minutiae of the wedding plans. He would make the final decision, but more often than not, he would go along with T'Challa's suggestions.

When the clock finally struck five, drawing the meeting to a close, T'Challa gave Erik a small, tentative smile, which Erik didn't return.

Feeling inexplicably disappointed, T’Challa got up to leave with the rest of the Councillors, but at the last minute, Erik motioned for him to stay behind.

"Not so fast," Erik purred, stalking forward until he was right in front of T'Challa. There was a dark gleam of gold in his eyes, an intense alpha glow that had T’Challa’s heartbeat automatically speeding up. "Did you really think you were off the hook?"

The deep clang of the doors shutting rang out through the throne room, leaving T’Challa alone with Erik.