King of the Mountains

by Elizabeth Frost

  He blew out a long, measured breath. “The elemental is far stronger than any faerie. Stronger than a witch or the most powerful of any magical creature. It is not one of us. But it must live within one of us.”

  She had guessed as much. The elemental seemed to have a mind of its own. “Why does it want to take the throne?”

  “Because it hates what the humans have done. It desires to see nothing but trees and green things growing. We both agreed the world was a better place when there were no humans, only fae, all those years ago.”

  “You can’t stop progress,” she argued. “Humans weren’t meant to stay in the Dark Ages.”

  “And the earth was not meant to howl,” he retorted. “What is more important to you, Morgan? The planet you walk upon or the humans who infest it?”

  She squeezed the glass in her hands so hard it creaked. “There is so much good here. I refuse to believe you’ve blinded yourself to progress.”

  “You keep saying those words, but all I’ve seen thus far is pain and torment.” He looked at her in the reflection, meeting her gaze with emerald eyes. “We could turn the world right, you know. Then we could go back to our realm, the place I built. It could be your home too.”

  She didn’t want to live in a made up world, she wanted to live in a real one. With real people and real problems.

  How could she ever take him up on that offer? Destroy the world she was in, just to trade it for one she could change at whim. Morgan wasn’t a goddess. She was a hedge witch.

  She shook her head and took another sip of her whiskey. “No, Liam. I want to live in this world with all its flaws. I just wish you could see the beauty of it.”

  The counter creaked under his grip. She feared he might snap through the marble before he let out a long, hissing breath. “The throne would destroy mortal men, but would that be so bad? It calls to me even now, begging me to help heal all the harm that has been wrought. Who am I to deny the earth?”

  “There is always another way,” she whispered. “A thousand ways to right the same wrong. Why would you assume the only way to fix this problem is the path of death?”

  “Then give me another way to fix this, Morgan. Give me another option that provides some kind of hope. Any kind of hope.”

  She wished she could. Morgan could only see two choices, however. Death or allowing the humans to continue in this realm and figure all this out for themselves.

  Magical creatures were stronger than their human counterparts. She knew how frustrating it was to contain that power and hide from the world. But perhaps it was the best option for all magical creatures. Remain hidden. Not kill teenaged boys who made mistakes and bury them in the hedgerows.

  She lifted the glass and took another sip of her whiskey. “I will not turn myself into a god, and neither should you.”

  “If I do nothing, the elemental will devour me whole,” he murmured.

  His words rang true in her head, but wasn’t it already happening? She could see the elemental every time she looked at him. Just being in the human realm had awakened the demon. It was only a matter of time before something happened.

  She couldn’t stop him or his power. She could only provide momentary distractions with her own body, but eventually he’d get bored with that too.

  And therein lay the real problem. Morgan realized with shocking clarity that she was terrified he would leave her. Just uproot himself from her life as if he hadn’t changed everything.

  She’d let him in too much. He now lived some place deep in her soul and the lack of control made her stomach roll in fear. A cold sweat broke out over her body at the mere thought of losing her authority. Of losing herself in another person.

  Hands shaking, she held the whiskey glass against her belly to still the nervous twitches. “The elemental is already eating you alive,” she whispered. “Even I can see that. You cannot become a god, Liam.” Even if that meant accepting his death.

  The unsaid words hung between them.

  He shoved away from the counter. She watched in the glass windows as he strode toward the door of the penthouse. Without glancing over his shoulder, he spat, “If that’s how you feel, then I will return to my court. My rightful place awaits, after all.”

  And with that, the elevator dinged. He stepped into it, and the doors closed behind him.

  Morgan’s throat tightened. She tried to tell herself this was for the better. He’d go back to his own realm, and she would stay here. Where she belonged.

  Alone.

  23

  He made his way out of the strange building. Hot air blasted his face like a punch to the nose. He could almost feel the bones shattering.

  How did they live in this place? How did any human survive day by day when the world was trying to kill them?

  He stumbled down the street toward the one place where he knew he’d feel at home. The trees called to him. They whispered of a place where all the green things grew in the city. A place where they might be cut and forced to grow as the humans wanted. At least they were alive and well.

  Liam needed to be somewhere green. He needed to feel grass under his feet, not concrete. He needed to smell pollen in the air and hear leaves dancing in the wind. Anything to remind him this world was still alive.

  What did she mean she needed to be somewhere real? Her words ghosted through his mind, punishing and cruel. The world he’d created was more real than this one. He’d given life to so many creatures and plants. How was that any less real than this place?

  He stared up at the concrete buildings stretching up into the sky and hatred burned in his chest. This place was the one thing he needed to fight. All wars would end if he could just destroy this realm.

  Then his people could come into power once again. The faeries would take over, as they had long, long ago. They would bring this realm back to its former glory without humanity ruining everything.

  A loud, blaring honk shattered his vision of the future. Something yellow barreled down the road toward him. At the last second, Liam hopped back onto the sidewalk as the metal being blasted by him.

  This place was dangerous. Not just for him, but for everyone else. His life had almost been taken, and he had only stopped for a second.

  The world didn’t have knights and soldiers now. It had regular people being careless.

  He could have died in a split second when he’d not looked where he was going. He, the Mountain King, the King of the Spring Court, could have been brought to his knees by a simple metal box.

  Liam had never been so angry. Energy crackled at his fingertips, green magic that could throw roots around the car and destroy it.

  The elemental didn’t speak in his mind. It just poured more power into his palms. He could lose control. He could release the power and make the humans pay for what they had done to the realm which had once been a faerie playground.

  Liam didn’t know when he released his control on the magic. He didn’t know if it was even a conscious decision. All he knew was one moment, the yellow beast charged away from him. The next, an ancient root from deep within the earth shot up and wrapped around the car.

  Gnarled and knotted, it cried out in happiness at the freedom he’d given it. Though the root might have been severed, it had waited for a long time to grow again. Now, power gave it life.

  It coiled around the yellow car and squeezed. A man screamed within the metal interior, but it was far too late for him. The root crushed until it had severed the car in half.

  People on the street screamed and ran. They bolted away from magic.

  A woman ran by him shouting, “Terrorists!”

  As if that was what it was. How could humans not understand sometimes it was merely the earth coming to punish them? They deserved punishment for all they’d done. Did they not see?

  Power strengthened him. He strode through the crowds of screaming people. They blasted by him, carrying bags full of plastics and disease riddled pollutants. They didn’t care their water bottl
es were choking the planet. How could they?

  All they cared about was getting from point A to point B.

  He strode in the opposite direction. His shoulder caught a man who whirled but didn’t apologize for striking him.

  Not even politeness had remained in this world. The Dark Ages had been bad enough. Humans were disgusting back then, but this? This he couldn’t suffer through any longer.

  If Morgan wouldn’t help him, then he would release the elemental. The being deep inside him heard and rose to the surface of his skin.

  Power beyond faerie magic, beyond even a god, boiled inside him. He could feel every earthen thing all around him. Roots, leaves, trunks and stems. All of it, all a source of power he could draw upon.

  And the being inside him. The one that wanted to unleash the earth’s retribution upon the world.

  Had his counterparts felt this? Did they understand the meaning of genuine power as it was so close to his fingertips?

  All he had to do was let go. Just a little. Just enough so that the pots on windowsills above him burst and the plants stretched their roots. They grew fast, stretching up the buildings and spreading great clouds of seeds.

  Soon, those seeds would plant themselves into the walls of the building. They would find whatever crack they could, grow through it, and shatter concrete. They would prove the earth was much stronger than anything humans made.

  He walked confidently into the park with all the trees crying out his name. The grass reached out for him, curling around his shoes and pulling them from his feet. Trees reached down and rained leaves to tangle in his hair. Branches fell with them, twisting in long locks until a crown graced his head once more.

  He felt more like himself than he had in a long time. Moss dripped from the surrounding bark, pooling into a mantle that stretched from his shoulders and slid along the ground.

  The park came alive. All the trees burst into a shower of petals, flowering for a second time this year. But they didn’t mind. They wanted to show the king what they could do.

  Power spilled from his hands and into the earth in sparkling green waves. Not once in his life had he felt like this. He’d felt power before, certainly. How could he not? He was the Mountain King.

  But this time was different. The power wasn’t his, so he didn’t get tired. The elemental allowed him to draw from roots. This would have taken years to drain if he’d done it himself.

  The ground rolled under his feet, drawing him closer to the heart of the park. An ancient tree waited for him there. He could feel it anticipating the meeting of the king.

  Through his toes, he could feel the power the ancient tree held within its roots. There was something deep inside, a secret hidden for many years.

  “What do you want to show me?” he asked, his voice ringing through the park. “What mysteries have you kept?”

  The elemental unfurled long wings of power. Glimmering green light outlined behind him, just slight enough for him to catch out of the corner of his eye.

  A faint part of him feared what was happening. He was changing, turning into something that wasn’t Liam. Something that wasn’t even the Mountain King. And though he didn’t know what he was turning into, he somehow couldn’t process any fear.

  Pollen floated all around him. The dancing dust motes were so beautiful they looked like chips of gold. He strode over a hill, and then he was there. At the center of the park.

  The tree had been growing for many years. Its roots were nearly at the heart of the earth by now. Perhaps that was why the humans had never cut it. Or perhaps because the leaves of this tree were sharp as knives. It would protect itself should such force be necessary.

  “Mountain King,” it said. The voice was the whisper of wind through leaves, yet filled with the power of an avalanche. It rolled through him with a power he recognized as his own.

  Slowly, he took a knee before the ancient being. The others whispered the Mountain King bowed to the venerable. He knew the old ways. He honored the trees.

  “Ancient. Luck was with me today, for it brought me to you.”

  The tree hummed out a long, pleased breath. “Welcome to the forest, Mountain King. I have waited many millennia for you.”

  Millennia? The part of him who was still Liam balked at the words. Why had it been waiting that long? He wasn’t even that old. He should never have come here.

  Someone had wanted him to remain Liam, and he’d chosen that path. For her. For the woman with inky hair fanned out across his pillow with petals in the black strands.

  Power swelled over his head. It crashed down upon the memories and wiped them clean once again. It was just him and the power.

  The tree shivered. Green magic poured out of his fingertips and into the ground, sinking deep into the dirt and flowing out to the ancient being. It heaved one last content sigh before the magic overwhelmed it.

  A great crack like lightning split the tree in half. It curved, warped, and twisted around itself until the sounds finally ceased. All was quiet then, as if the entire park held its breath.

  The ancient tree had become a throne.

  Impressively large and wonderfully beautiful, the throne had been created for him. Great vines curved into a halo of leaves around the top, raining down the back and cushioning the seat. Flowers bloomed along the twig arms and spilled down the side. It was an impressive throne for a green king who would make the world anew.

  But did he want to?

  Clarity spread through his mind. He shook off the control of the elemental and stared at the throne as himself.

  He knelt in the green grass with blades tangled around his fingers in loving hugs. These plants needed him. The earth itself desired nothing more than freedom from the horrible things that had been done to it.

  He was the only one who could save them. He was the only one with enough power to free them from the jagged pain of humankind.

  Like a tooth, he could pull humanity out of the earth’s mouth and free it from the torment. All he had to do was accept his place as the Earthen King. Not just the Mountain King, but a creature who had been created to rule.

  Liam wasn’t so sure he wanted this. A long time ago, he would have desired nothing more than to come into power. But then he’d created his own realm, and he had learned so much about his own people.

  What would happen to the mud faeries if he left? The flower fae, even Arcane, who had stayed to look over that realm?

  A voice echoed in his head, deep and grumbling from the heart of the earth itself. “You can keep all those things. But first you must take the throne and protect what is yours.” The elemental. Who else could it possibly be?

  “And the woman?” he asked. “Where will she be?”

  The elemental grumbled. “Witches are humans.”

  “They are magical beings just as we are. I will not cause her death.” He couldn’t bear the thought, knowing he could have protected her. Saved her. Done something more than just wiped out all the people she loved and respected.

  “Then the witches will live. They will be the last, and I shall allow only their children with magical abilities to live. It is the one concession I will make, Mountain King.”

  If that was what it took, then he would take his rightful place. Liam stared at the throne, at the future awaiting him.

  “Will I still be me?” he asked, his voice quiet.

  “No. You will be so much more.”

  24

  Morgan paced through the penthouse apartment, her footsteps pounding. She should never have let him leave. He needed her now more than ever. He’d made that very clear. And for some strange reason, her stomach ached now that he was gone.

  Not a stomach ache as though she was ill. But like she missed something.

  Crazy. That was a crazy thought.

  She turned around and paced in the other direction, toward the sunken living room with its stale white furniture.

  She wasn’t attached to a faerie king. And yet, she was. Damn it.
The more she thought about him, the more she remembered the details of things she didn’t want to lose. The way his dimples appeared when he smiled. How his hair tangled around her fingers when she played with it.

  The green magic he always used around her. Not because she desired power or because he was showing off, but because he wanted her to be comfortable. No matter what the cost.

  He was a kind man to the core. That was her problem.

  The Mountain King was supposed to be like every other faerie she’d ever met. He was supposed to be selfish and rude. All faeries liked to have sex and then throw aside their new partner when something new came along.

  Morgan had seen it happen to people close to her. She’d warned witches before, not to get involved with a faerie. The stories always ended sadly.

  She couldn’t get involved with him.

  But she had.

  She was already so deeply involved she missed him when he wasn’t there. Her heart actually hurt at the thought of a life without him, and how was she supposed to move forward? She wasn’t in control of her own life anymore, and it was all his fault.

  “I should hate him,” she muttered. “I should hate everything he changed and all the bits of him I love so much.”

  She stopped in her pacing and stood frozen in the middle of the living room. Love? She didn’t love him. She couldn’t.

  Faeries weren’t capable of love. Immortals weren’t capable of the emotion either. She’d had five hundred years to fall in love, and she’d never done it.

  Morgan had thought she was in love many times. But every single person always disappointed her, and she left. That’s what she was supposed to do. Protect herself, her heart, and her life at all costs.

  This one was different. And she’d let him walk out the door in a huff.

  “Damn it,” she muttered. She needed to go back to the realm he’d created and get him back. Or at least apologize. Or maybe try to explain why she felt the way she did.

  Her life hadn’t been easy. It was full of rejection and the thought of him looking at her as though he didn’t feel the same way… tears burned her eyes.