King of the Mountains

by Elizabeth Frost

  Perhaps she didn’t want to hurt him. He understood the guilt of taking a life such as the boy’s, but it was the same as killing a sapling so the rest of the forest could flourish.

  Liam lifted a hand but froze when Morgan said, “Stop.”

  “Stop?” He furrowed his brow. “Why would I stop? This is the one who hurt you. I can smell your blood on his hands.”

  “But he didn’t want to.” She held her hands over his body as though that would prevent Liam from killing the boy. “He deserves to live. He still has a chance.”

  “A chance for what?” She should want revenge on the boys, shouldn’t she? Kill them. He didn’t care. “He’s human. They’re expendable.”

  Morgan met his gaze with large, watery eyes. “No. Not this one. If there’s a chance he can do something right, something that will improve the world, we should let him.”

  “There are a thousand more exactly like him, living in the precise circumstances.” Liam waved his hand and the roots around the boy lifted like snakes, ready to strike. “Losing one will change nothing.”

  “I said stop!” Her voice rang through the room with the promise of power. “Let him live, Liam.”

  He needed to understand the mercy she was willing to give these children. Liam crouched in front of her, ducking his head to stare into her beautiful eyes. “Why? Why this one?”

  She reached out and smoothed a hand over the boy’s forehead. “I looked into his soul and I saw something bright there. Something rare.”

  “What will he do then, oracle?” He knew the word would sting her, but there was some truth to it. She’d seen his future when she touched him. He knew because he’d seen it as well, through her eyes and his magic in her soul.

  Her gaze watched the boy as he slept, but Liam could see Morgan had disappeared. She slipped into the magic of her mind and he felt the answering tug deep in his belly.

  She used his magic to see the future, and he could not be more proud.

  “He’s not a remarkable person. His future is one with a quiet life. A pretty wife who’s very shy, but he helps her out of her shell. A little boy with red hair who becomes a mechanic in this town. Neither leave much, but they’re kind, and they like to watch football together on the television.”

  Liam snorted. “You see? Entirely unremarkable. Take your revenge and his life.”

  She pulled herself from the future. “No,” she said. “The world needs more people with quiet lives. He lives.”

  Liam wanted to argue with her more, but he could see she wouldn’t budge. This boy was worth fighting for, at least in her opinion. And in this moment, he could deny her nothing.

  He sighed. “Fine. Whatever you wish, witch. He lives.”

  Morgan reached out and touched a single finger to the boy’s forehead. She pressed down hard on his third eye and whispered a spell Liam couldn’t hear. He could, however, feel the tug of magic.

  He followed it into the mind of the boy who dreamt of a carnival with an older woman who smiled at him. Somehow, he knew the smile on the woman’s face was rare. The magic dug into the boy’s memory and erased everything from this day. She smoothed the edges of sharp memories where the smiling woman had hit him and coated his mind with softer words.

  Only then did Morgan sigh and release her hold on the boy. She listed to the side, catching herself on a root.

  “Morgan,” Liam reached for her. He helped her stand on shaking knees.

  “I’m fine,” she whispered. “That’s just a lot of magic. A human mind is hard to manipulate, but I managed.”

  His chest puffed with pride. She’d only been able to do all this because of him. She’d taken magic from Liam and used it to do wonderful things. Even if one of those was saving an insignificant human.

  He pulled her to his chest and squeezed her, perhaps a little too hard. He pressed his mouth to her hair and whispered, “Sweet witch of mine, I feared the worst when I followed you through the portal.”

  “How did you know where I was?” She murmured the words against his chest.

  “You’ve got my magic inside you. I can find you anywhere.” And he would follow her to the end of the earth, even if she insisted on fleeing from him. Soon, she would learn she couldn’t run far enough to free herself from his presence.

  Then, to his great surprise, Morgan wrapped her arms around his waist. She let him take her weight and relaxed in his hold. He hadn’t ever thought to be so blessed.

  Her complete trust made his heart swell five times larger than it was. The elemental in him sighed. Green magic glowed from his chest, passing into her and refilling whatever pool of magic she kept in her mind.

  He was only mildly insulted she thought of magic outside his element. Water wasn’t nearly as powerful as earth. His own store of magic was a majestic tree, stretching roots throughout the realms.

  Someday, he would train her to think of her magic the same way. Together, they would weave green magic through this world and strengthen it.

  Together, he trusted they could heal the human realm. Whether the humans remained in it or not.

  The man’s body was still behind them. He could hear the creaking of roots trying to hold the weight in place and not drop him to the floor. Liam couldn’t leave it there. The redheaded boy would awaken to see his friend hung up like some kind of strange voodoo doll.

  Liam flicked his fingers, and the roots moved through the earth. They dragged the man deep into the belly of the ground where he would remain locked in roots forever.

  Now that the body was taken of, he needed to get Morgan out of here. If the redhead woke up, she’d have to wipe his memory again, and that had taken its toll on her. She pressed herself against his chest as though he were the only thing keeping her standing.

  Liam took a step back. Her knees buckled, but she held herself up straight.

  Pressing a hand against his chest, she muttered, “I’m fine.”

  “You’re not fine,” he replied. “Let’s go.”

  Morgan took a step away from him, standing on her own two feet. “I’m not going back to your realm. My place is here. I can’t go back to some made up world.”

  He hadn’t intended on bringing her back to his realm where she was uncomfortable. However, he was curious. “Why not?”

  She gestured around them. “This is where I belong.”

  He looked at the ruined fishing shack. “It’s a little plain.”

  “I don’t mean here here.” She shook her head. “I mean in this realm. This is where I belong. With the humans.”

  “They’ve nearly destroyed this place. If my magic isn’t the end, then they will ruin this place on their own.” He stepped closer and held out his hand. “But if this is where you want to stay, then for now, come with me.”

  She eyed his hand like it were a viper waiting to strike. “There is good in humanity. I know you don’t see it, but they are fighting to keep this realm alive just as others are trying to destroy it. I was wrong. You were wrong. We must find the good ones and believe in them.”

  “Do you really believe that?” The mere idea was fascinating to him. Humans were weak creatures, fragile and so easily manipulated. He’d never thought of them as anything other than pawns in a larger game of life.

  “I do,” she whispered. Her eyes opened wide as if her own words surprised her. “I don’t think I used to believe it. But I have to hope they will spread their kindness throughout this world.”

  “Why do you believe that?”

  “Hope is a dangerous thing,” she replied. “But it’s all that keeps us immortals alive.”

  He supposed she was right. He still had hope for his old home in the faerie realms, even though he knew it existed only in battle and hardship. Perhaps he could spare a little hope for this place as well.

  Even if he still thought humans were nothing more than destructive, insignificant creatures with limited minds.

  “Perhaps the humans will surprise us,” he said, then wiggled his fingers.
“Now, let’s go somewhere safe.”

  “Safe” appeared to be the magic word. She slipped her fingers into his with no hesitation. He let the green magic take over his mind again. And together, they allowed the roots of the earth to rise over their heads and pull them somewhere safe.

  19

  She’d never traveled through the earth like this. Portals were easier for those with magic. This was just roots taking them through the ground to an unknown place.

  Morgan had never even thought magic could do this. But then again, the Mountain King had surprised her so much.

  She thought she hated humans more than he did. And yet, she still repeated the words the strangers had told her when all this started.

  Humans are an important part of how the world runs, we cannot let them all die.

  She hadn’t agreed when the vampire had said the words. She would have been the first to say humans were beyond saving, and anyone who tried to help them was wasting precious energy.

  Now, Morgan thought she might have been wrong. Not because the boys tried to get their revenge. Not because yet another person had died for her.

  But because she’d seen into their minds. She had seen the little redhead boy and the love overflowing from both his parents.

  She’d never felt that kind of love, or even tried to feel it through a human’s mind. Not in all five hundred years of her life. And she was stunned by its power.

  The world needed humans for that reason and that reason alone. Immortals and magical creatures were so stingy with their emotions. Love wasn’t something most immortals believed was even real.

  Humans felt love with their entire being. They gave it freely, and without need for it to be returned. The gift of love was in abundance in their world. They loved their pets, their homes, each other, and all of that was magic only they could give the world.

  So she wanted the boy to live. She wanted that magic to be cast out into the world, even if that meant it only fell onto the soil around his little farmhouse with his quiet wife. The ground where he lived would always show them fair harvest. Their kitchen stove would never break, and their boy wouldn’t fall and break an arm. No spell she ever cast was that powerful in comparison.

  Roots warped around her and opened up to reveal a little room like the one Liam had made for her in his realm. Vine woven walls and a roof made of leaves tangled around three tree trunks. The floors were woven branches that could hold their weight high above the ground.

  They’d be safe here. Safer than she was in her old home, though there was nothing left for her there.

  Morgan sank down onto the bed of leaves and moss in the corner. She sat on its edge, staring down at her hands, and wondering what had changed.

  Why did she feel such mercy now? Why was she capable of these thoughts when her entire life had been focused on ignoring them?

  Liam settled next to the window, his eyes watching the outside world. “What happened? I saw them talking to you about other young men and I felt the remains of their energy in your hedges.”

  Morgan shook her head. “That memory is not for you.”

  He turned his gaze to her, burning anger once again making his eyes glow. “What did they do to you?”

  She met that angered gaze and said, “I don’t want to tell you.”

  “Will you ever?”

  “No.”

  He watched her for a few more moments before giving her a sharp nod. He turned his powerful gaze to the window once more, and the tension drained from her shoulders.

  She couldn’t talk about that night. If she did, then she would have to tell him about the countless other times she’d been abused by men, women, humans. All the times she had been cast aside as a witch.

  She’d tried very hard to not let her history make her into someone she wasn’t. Morgan had forced herself to overcome the anguish and hardship of rejection. She had sifted through memories of hatred and pain.

  Five hundred years was a long time to process being alone. But somehow, all those years didn’t make it any easier.

  The hole in her heart was a hard one to fill. It was even harder to admit it existed.

  “So this is what the human realm looks like now,” he murmured.

  He watched the outside as though it were a puzzle he couldn’t figure out. In all the dramatics, Morgan had forgotten he hadn’t been here for centuries.

  She watched him. His eyes darted in all directions, soaking in whatever details he could. His hands closed on the edge of the window, squeezing until it creaked.

  “Yeah,” she replied. “I’m sure it’s very different from what you remember.”

  “There are so many lights.” Said lights were reflected in his eyes, tiny stars dancing over his features. “How does anyone sleep with so much light everywhere?”

  “We just do.”

  “How do you even see the stars?” He looked up at the sky. “There used to be so many more stars there. Did the humans kill them as well?”

  “No,” she said with a soft laugh. “They’re all there. The lights of the cities just compete with them.”

  He grunted. “It seems a rather bleak way to live. The stars were the prettiest part of the human realm.”

  She hadn’t even thought the brightness of stars in his realm was surprising. She’d stared up at the Milky Way every night and never had a second thought or wondered that she could finally see it.

  Morgan sighed and laid back on the moss bed. “I always stayed in my cabin, so I could see the stars.”

  “Is that a shooting star?” He leaned out of the window and eyed something moving across the horizon. “It’s moving very slow.”

  Her mind stalled out for a second, trying to figure out what he was seeing. She was so tired. Standing up to check the sky seemed like too much.

  Then she realized what he was looking at. “Is there a blinking red light?”

  “Yes,” he muttered. “It’s very strange. When did stars turn red? What have the humans done to this realm?”

  Morgan rolled onto her side and cushioned her head on a hand. She yawned and replied, “That’s not a star, Liam. It’s a plane.”

  “A plane?” He turned to her with a raised brow. “I have a feeling that doesn’t mean something flat.”

  Another yawn forced its way out of her mouth. “No, I’ll explain it in the morning. We might need to take one eventually if the coven is hunting me down.”

  “The coven?” he asked.

  But sleep was already claiming her. She wanted to explain to him there were dangerous things likely searching for her. That she needed him to look out for witches on the horizon.

  She drifted off into sleep with dark worries rampant in her mind.

  Her dreams were strange. She stood before a council of people. Not just her coven, but the strangers who had arrived at her house. They all pointed at her and claimed she hadn’t done the right thing. That she was a failure because she hadn’t killed the king, but also because she wasn’t a good witch.

  Though she begged on her knees for forgiveness, her coven and the strangers still called for her death.

  The rest of the night she spent running. From her past. From her people. From everyone she had once trusted.

  Morgan awoke in a cold sweat. She froze, listening intently for the sound of another person in the woven room. But all she could hear was the sound of crickets.

  She eased up onto her hands and searched for the faerie king who had saved her. When she realized he wasn’t in the room, she leaned down and pressed a hand against the floor.

  “Where is he?” she asked the trees, and they hummed in response.

  “Outside,” they sang. “Out the window.”

  Why, of all places, was the Mountain King sitting outside the window?

  She crawled out of bed and stumbled to the vine made window. The Mountain King sat upon a canopy of leaves, a picture in repose. Branches had created a netting beneath him so he didn’t fall. Leaning back on his hands, he stared
off at the city. His brows were furrowed in thought, his lip between his teeth.

  She wondered what he was thinking. Was the world so different these days he recognized nothing?

  Just cars probably blew his mind. Let alone all the other things that had changed. In a thousand years, humans had created so much. Infinitely so, and likely in terrifying ways.

  Morgan climbed out the window and picked her way across the treetops to join him. He didn’t look at her as she settled down next to him.

  Wrapping her arms around her legs, she put her chin on her knees and watched the city with him. “Is it overwhelming?” she asked.

  “In some ways. These are strange new creations you humans have placed into the world.”

  “I’m not human,” she reminded him. “I watched this place grow and change more in the past five hundred years than in all the centuries put together.”

  “They adapt quickly.” His expression changed to one of immense worry. “And they destroy so much in a short amount of time.”

  There it was again. His inevitable hatred of humanity, something she hadn’t realized was so ingrained in his soul. She knew he was angry about the state of the world. Who wouldn’t be? Green magic had died out so much here that it was almost nonexistent.

  But he couldn’t blame the humans. Though they tried to be better, they would always hurt something with their new machines.

  Still, she believed their capability to love would save them. More than the immortals could.

  “Why do you hate them so much?” she asked. The question was as quiet as the rising sun.

  His sharp inhale made her chest hurt. It was the sound of heartbreak and old pain that rose to the surface before he could stuff it back into the shadows.

  Liam rubbed the back of his neck. “When I was a young fae, I thought it smart to come here. To the realm of the humans with another faerie who I was most interested in pursuing.”

  She smiled. “What kind of faerie was she?”