The soft layer of ground under the shadowy ferns of the forest floor rippled, shifting like a blanket over a restless sleeper. It buckled, billowed, and relaxed again, small cracks showing through the starry patterns of the mosses.
Sunlight beamed quietly. The ferns did not move. A swarm of insects hovered in the heavy air, their soft buzzing a mere accompaniment to the susurration of leaves overhead.
Fingers burst through the soft moss, curling in to grip the earth, showing the taut, root-like lines of bone and tendon. They buckled. Bent. And pulled.
The forest floor rose as a single solid mass, and a sharp inhale of breath broke the relative peace. The figure hauled themselves out to kneel on the ground, blinking at the trees, heaving breath after breath to fill starving lungs with heavy air.
—
It was a quiet day. Half the charge ports out front were broken, as was the front window. The little rest stop on the side of I-38 wasn’t as skeezy as it looked—there were too few people around for any actual crime to occur, for one thing—but most people drove right past anyway.
Not that Rachel minded. She didn’t own the place, so low traffic just meant she was getting paid to read dime novels and swat flies.
Still, she looked up from her current read (Death of the Witch King, which was excellent, even if the witch king hadn’t died yet) when the door sensor made its melodic hum. She was ready to see a tired trucker looking for a cold sandwich, or a small tourist family struggling to keep their kids close.
She wasn’t ready to see. Well. That.
That being a very tall man, tracking dirt over the floor and squinting at the door as if it had personally offended him.
Was he wearing robes?
And…a crown?
“Uh,” she said, catching the man’s attention. “Watcha looking for, mister?”
He blinked at her. At her clothes. At the door, again, because apparently doors were just fascinating these days, and finally back at her.
“Do you…know who I am?” he asked.
Rachel raised her eyebrows.
“Do you know who you are?”
He frowned at her.
“I’m the king.”
Of all the days to be working the till by herself.
“Oh. That’s cool,” she said. “Congrats. Do you want a soda or something? It’s hot out.”
He didn’t look like he had any money, but again, it was hot out. Rachel wasn’t too cheap to not buy someone a cold drink if they looked like they needed it.
The king was looking very confused.
“King Bedelvarr, the third?” he asked, sounding almost hopeful.
“Bedelvarr, cool.” Rachel said, slipping some cash into the till. “Got it. Yeah, we’re gonna get you some water, okay?”
She slid up over the counter and dug a can of water out of the cooler, handing it to Bedelvarr. “Here you go, man. Just drink that.”
Bedelvarr stared at the pop tab. Rachel took it back, snapped it open, and handed it over again. Finally, Bedelvarr took a long drink, and Rachel leaned back against the counter.
The king, to his credit, did have a crown. He took it off, setting it down on the tile floor with a heavy, metallic thunk, and ran a hand through his hair. More dirt rained down on the floor, and Rachel grimaced.
“I’ve been awakened,” King Bedelvarr said. “My kingdom…it’s in peril. Has to be. I was only to be reawakened at its greatest need.”
He looked up at her. “Has there been any peril?”
Rachel shrugged.
“Probably. I mean, when isn’t there, right?”
That was meant to be a joke, but it just got her squinted at some more.
“Has there been an invasion?”
“There’s some kind of non-native bugs that are killing trees, I think? Other than that, no.”
“Is the kingdom at war?”
“I…don’t think so?”
King Bedelvarr frowned again. Pressed his lips together.
“An overwhelming spiritual decline?” he asked, sounding slightly strained, and Rachel raised her eyebrows.
“You know how to fix those?” she asked, and Bedelvarr deflated again.
“I must have a purpose,” he said. “Why was I awakened, if there is nothing for me to do here?”
He sounded so depressed about the whole thing that Rachel felt bad for the guy.
“Well, I mean—there’s the window?” she offered.
Bedelvarr raised his head.
“The what?”
“The window,” she repeated, gesturing to the boarded-up monstrosity. “It’s a two-person job, and the manager here refuses to put more than one person on each shift, which really is straining everyone’s nerves, and—you could help me fix it? It’s been bugging me forever.”
King Bedelvarr (the third) looked at her, then at the window, then at the can of water in his hands.
“I would be happy to assist you, miss. Whatever causes you distress, window or otherwise, I swear, by my honor, to remedy.”
He was still sitting on the floor. After a moment of silence, he took another sip of water.
“Cool,” Rachel said. “So, the replacement pane is in the back—”
—
Bedelvarr became the best employee that the convenience store off of I-38 had ever seen.
The manager threw a bit of a fit when payroll came around, but got grumblingly used to having an additional new hire no one had consulted them about.
If guests were occasionally confused by the tall, imperious man behind the counter referring to the dilapidated rest stop as ‘my kingdom’, well, life was just confusing, wasn’t it? He was such a nice man, otherwise.
—
Thirteen hundred years after the highways and convenience stores had all crumbled to dust, the royal magician and her apprentice relaxed in their boudoir after the strenuous process of laying the kingdom’s greatest monarch to rest.
“That was a very complicated spell. And all to fulfill a prophecy?” the apprentice asked, sighing as they dipped their aching toes into a tub of hot water.
“Of course, to fulfill a prophecy. The King has been foretold to return at our kingdom’s greatest need, so return he must. Of course, ‘greatest need’ is fairly subjective, which is why our spell will catapult him forward some few thousand years into the future, where there’s certain to be a need of some sort. Whatever happens after that is the Fate’s business, really, not ours.”
The elder magician sipped her hot chocolate calmly, relishing its subtle spice, and then frowned at her apprentice, who had gone very suddenly still and wide-eyed.
“What?” she asked, a little snappishly. It had been a long day.
Her apprentice stared.
“Um,” they squeaked.
“What.”
“Future?”
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