ThunderCats in its entirety © Warner Bros.

Dissonance/Snowfall © WAR-Operative

Summary: Lion-O struggles to find a way to convince Felline not to leave Thundera, conclusion. Sequel to WAR-Operative's "Dissonance/Snowfall."

The entire city turns up for my birthday party.

I stand at the foot of Cat's Lair with my father at moonrise, though the clouds hide even the gas giant from us. We wear gold and blue, glittering in our finery. Tygra, for once, stands far enough back that the pair of them don't dwarf me. I suspect he's flirting with a masked, silent cleric. How he can tell when one of those pale, cloaked figures is a woman has always mystified me. My father passes me a glass of rosy wine, engulfs my shoulder with a battle-scarred paw, and raises his own glass to the gaily bundled-up crowd that fills the frozen courtyard below us. The chattering dies down at once.

His speech, like so many others he's given, is short and to the point. He speaks of love and pride and me being a true son of Thundera, which our people lap up as if it's candyfruit juice. I want to be embarrassed, but a small part of me can't help but be pleased. Father doesn't praise me often. Then the music starts and the party swings into motion beneath the dark, leaden sky.

The braziers are burning full strength, their heat billowing into the night. Tygra soon makes his excuses and detaches himself to chase after the cleric, probably hoping he can finally win a game of trying to make her talk. Father and I eat dinner on the balcony, without tables or chairs so that visiting dignitaries and our own court can pay their respects and wish me many happy returns. I play along, the dutiful prince, until Perrie appears with her daughters.

Everyone else in the room vanishes.

All three women curtsey. Despite current Thunderan fashion, Felline left her hair loose. It tumbles down her back and around her face in curls and kinks of pure starlight. Perrie hugs me, but then my father claims her attention. They speak like old friends, which, in truth, they are. I guess bringing a drugged, traumatized girl home piggyback tends to bring the parents together, too.

"Happy birthday, Your Highness," Lepra and Felline say together.

"Thank you," I say automatically, stung by the fact that Felline didn't use my name. Bypassing Lepra, whose coral-pink lips curve knowingly, I lean toward her sister and say as quietly as I can, "I need to talk to you."

"There isn't anything to talk about," Felline says, her ears easing back.

"Yes, there is." A sidelong glance shows Lepra joining my father and Perrie, leaving us relatively forgotten. I catch Felline's wrist, turning my back as if I can hide her from our families. "Look, I know I messed up. Again. And I'm sorry –"

She fights my hold, but we're in the middle of a brightly-lit room, surroundded by a sizeable crowd, and her resistance is less than vehement. There are more than one pair of curious eyes on us as it is.

Frustrated, I bend closer and hiss, "I'm sorry, all right? But I know what I want now."

"Do you? That's nice," she says, angry like me.

I growl at her. "You're not even going to listen?"

"No, I'm not," she says belligerently. She tosses her head. "Apology accepted. That's all you're getting from me. Now let go."

I do before she decides to make a scene, but there's a hard knot in my chest that's making it hard to breathe. She doesn't look at me as she says, "Enjoy your party."

..::~*~::..

After greeting every guest at least once, I retreat, slipping between a pair of clerics until my back finds the wall. I can hear the upper orchestra tuning up, quite apart from the noise and frolic of the festivities below us, and I know what's coming. Téa searches for me, steel in her eye. In spite of all of my disinterested and unwilling conversation this past week, she hasn't given up. On the other paw, Felline is doing her best to stay as far away from me as possible.

I curse the tenacity of women as a whole. I'm concentrating so ferociously on staying invisible that Tygra sneaks up on me and bumps my shoulder hard enough to spill what's left of my wine.

"What was that for?" I ask angrily, shaking droplets off my paw. At least it hadn't soiled my tunic.

He grins with maddening superiority. "You're skulking over here like a jackal. Why?"

"I'm supposed to ask Téa to open the dancing."

My brother rolls his eyes. "Since when do you ever do what you're supposed to do?"

"Since I don't know how to do what I want to do," I admit, the words burning in my mouth. I hate showing weakness in front of Tygra, who doesn't seem to have any himself.

He usurps my glass and takes the last meager swallow, considering me.

"Are you the one who introduced Leon to Snow?" he asks abruptly.

"Yes," I say, only half listening. I will be glad to send most of these guests home. I'm keeping one eye on a red head, and the other on a white. They're almost dancing as they wander through the room, unaware of each other's existence. My gaze lingers on Felline.

"That's the first time you've ever stepped up on one of these occasions," Tygra says. "Father's pleased. Good for you."

I frown up at him. "I'm not a cub. I pay attention. I know what my obligations are."

Tygra snorts on a skeptical laugh, but I don't say what I'm really thinking. That if Felline can do it, so can I.

It will never end. Now that Leon has succeeded, and Claudia too, in impressing me enough to earn a place at court, more will come. It's inevitable. Yet, there is only one cat I want at my side, and she wants nothing to do with me.

"My baby brother, growing up so fast," Tygra says, bringing me out of my dark thoughts. He heaves an exaggerated sigh that rubs my fur completely wrong. I can see my future spreading out before me, it scares me to death, and he has to be so flippant about it because he's not the one going to be king. "Have you thought of anyone else?"

"Well, you," I say impatiently. "Who else is supposed to keep me in line?"

I have the satisfaction of seeing, for the first time in our lives, Tygra struck dumb.

"I'll take that as a yes," I wearily say, slouching against the wall. I can't summon the energy to gloat about gaining the upper paw, because it's over. I stayed still too long. Téa sees me and makes a beeline straight for us.

She's just about reached us when Tygra comes back to life.

"Go on," he says. "Figure it out. I'll distract her."

"What?" I stare at him, searching for the familiar mocking grin, but it's not there. He looks exasperated again, and maybe a bit affectionate. He's never looked at me like that. Especially not on this day, the anniversary of our mother's death, a death that he blames me for. Now I'm the one speechless.

He thumps his knuckles into my head. "It's your birthday, Lion-O. Don't waste my help. You might not get it again."

With that, he's gone, intercepting a flustered, wide-eyed Téa with a blast of his tiger charm.

It takes me a second to realize that what I'm feeling is gratitude. "Thanks . . . brother," I say, although I know he can't hear me.

While Téa reluctantly accepts Tygra's flamboyant request to dance, I dive into the crowd, bent double as I run. I snag Felline by the paw on the way by and haul her to the stairwell right as the music starts. No one hears her cry of surprise. Then we are through the curtain and stumbling down the spiraling steps together.

"Lion-O!" she gasps in the dark, bumping into me several times. "What on Third Earth do you think you're doing?"

Grimly, I tow her down several more turns until we burst out the bottom into the shadow of the balcony. My breath plumes into the cold winter night when I turn to face her. She's not quick enough to wipe the laughter off her face.

"I want to talk to you," I say hurriedly, "and I can't do it up there. Please, Felline."

She puts her face in her paws. "This is wrong," she says, her voice muffled.

"Why?" I demand, flaring up. "Because of Bastien?"

Not answering, she takes a few steps away from me, her gown swirling around her feet. The night is utterly still here in this part of the royal gardens, separated by the wall and another flight of stairs from the festivities in the courtyard. Felline throws her head back as if to try to catch a glimpse of the party going on above us, but suddenly her eyes widen.

"Snow!" she says in delight.

It's not her father, but sloppy, white flakes dropping from the black sky. She glides onto the lawns, her paws outstretched. Alone, much slower than the tempo of the music drifting down to us, she turns on the spot, her smile radiant. Then, equally slowly, she lowers her arms and stands still. The half-frozen snowflakes dart between us on the breathless air, a veil, a barrier.

"Will you dance with me, Lion-O?" she asks. A bit wistfully.

I don't hesitate. I step into the snowfall.

"I'm not going to marry Bastien," she says before I touch her. "I broke up with him yesterday."

"What? I thought you said there wasn't anything to talk about," I say, raising my eyebrows at her. "That's pretty big news."

"It's none of your business." She laughs quietly, and then sobers. I wonder what she's thinking behind those big, glacier-blue eyes. "It's your turn now. Promise me you aren't going to mess up again."

"I promise," I say, taking her paw in my left and settling my right in the curve of her waist. Instead of beginning the dance, however, I bend down and kiss her.

I don't know what to expect – her to pull away, maybe, or slap me, or yell at me – but she's not. She's kissing me back. She goes up on her toes and weaves her arms around the back of my neck, holding me to her. The world shrinks. All that matters is that she's in my arms, and that her lips are hot on mine. I thread my fingers through her hair, which is as thick and soft as I'd always imagined it would be. I hope she never pins it up after this.

A few seconds or eternities later, one of us comes up for air. I'm not sure which. Her eyes stay closed while the indifferent snow catches in her lashes and melts on my cheeks. It's cold, but I no longer mind.

"I know what I want," I say again, so close that our noses are touching. "I want that to be your last first kiss."

As I wait for my meaning to sink in, I think I'm clever, and am proud of myself. Her dazed eyes open partway. She stares at me in a kind of wonder, and then she does slap me.

"Hey!" I yelp, and we spring apart. She didn't hit me very hard, so even though it stings, I grin at her like a monkey.

"Are you nuts?" she explodes.

No. I'm in love. "I'm dead serious."

"But you're the – and I'm – oh, whiskers!" she swears, and I want to laugh so badly I can feel my eyes watering. She's so cute. "We've been friends forever, but this is different. This is huge. What you're saying – it's not like we're cubs anymore! I'm not a lion. Your father is never going to allow this."

"Are you kidding?" I say heartily, injecting false bravado into my voice. "Your resignation really disappointed him. He's crazy about you."

All the same, I chance a glance up at the balcony and nearly suffer a heart attack when I discover that my father is, in fact, standing at the railing and watching us, Jaga at his side. The light from the party burns in Father's mane, shadows Jaga's aquiline face. I should have known my absence wouldn't go unnoticed; there is no way either one of them would let me out of their sight for long. However, Father merely smiles into his beard and then turns away, giving his permission. I let out an inaudible sigh of relief, trying to project the impression that I expected no less. Felline gapes at the spot where he disappears as if she can't believe her eyes.

I entwine my fingers with hers, needing her close, craving her warmth, her faintly sweet scent. For a whole year, Bastien denied me this. No, that isn't right. My own cowardice did. I'd given her my word, and I'd broken it. Me. I'd so nearly lost her because of my childishness. I want to tell her all this. If she stays, maybe I will. Someday.

Her expression changes. I wonder if she can feel the heat of everything going on inside of me while we gaze at each other. As if in a dream, she kisses me again and it's slower, more passionate than anything I've experienced, and I know it's because of her. My best friend.

"Don't leave me," I whisper against her mouth.

Strange, how we've come to this. All those years ago, it had been Felline begging me to stay, curled against my side like a helpless kitten. Now here I am, holding on to this tiny cat for dear life.

Her fingers tangle in my wet mane. "I'm not going anywhere," she says fiercely. "I promise."

Happiness crashes through me. I don't care who might be looking over the balcony. Laughing, I wrap my arms around her, scoop her up, and waltz with her around the garden, slipping a little in the slushy snow, while she kicks her feet and yells at me to put her down.

Maybe I will. Someday.

A/N: ThunderCats 2011 Omake Gekijō Presents: "Promise Me, conclusion."

Reviewer thanks! Heart of the Demons, KelseyAlicia, The Night Whisperer, and Momochan77. You are the best. You know that, right?

All my love,

Anne