It's been oddly peaceful in Fillory this past month, which in itself was suspicious. Peace in this realm never lasted long. Still, with the Beast gone, the majority of neglected responsibilities came crashing down squarely onto Eliot's shoulders.
Court work first.
Eliot, now officially High King, found himself buried under scrolls, decrees, and the desperate pleas of Fillorian nobles who suddenly remembered what politics were. He made do, of course, by crowning the rest of the High Kings in a ceremony so dramatic that Kai had to admit, it was far better than watching it on his laptop back on Earth.
Then came the matter of food.
Agriculture, the most basic necessity of survival, had always eluded the people of Fillory. Magic made things easy until it didn't. With the Wellspring was almost drained and is magic stretched thin, crops withered like spoiled fruit. Eliot, with a patience born only of someone already three glasses of wine deep, introduced them to what he called the Holy Grail of Farming: manure. Real, honest-to-god fertilizer. Suddenly, compost piles were treasures, and cow dung had more value than rubies.
With time and Eliot's uncharacteristically practical lecture on "why dirt needs help when magic isn't doing the job," vegetables began to rise again. Carrots, potatoes, even squash miracles by Fillorian standards.
The next issue was less appetizing.
The Regicide that almost took their lives. 'Oops'. It was avoided of course but barely. Martin, had cursed the thrones themselves. Anyone who sat on them will be driven by paranoia. Kai had nearly forgotten about that little booby trap while building the Ascendant, but when he finally remembered, he siphoned off the curse before Fillory's new golden age turned into a revolving door of royal funerals.
'Can you imagine,' Kai thought to himself, 'Eliot choking to death mid-toast. Awkward.'
And then there was Ember.
The god had seen fit to relieve himself directly into the Wellspring, leaving behind a divine turd of catastrophic proportions. The stench was legendary enough to make a satyr gag and worse, it warped the Wellspring's delicate balance. Oddly enough, the disturbance was felt more on Earth than in Fillory: hedge witches' spells faltered according to Marina, enchanted wards started to invert and minor glamours backfired spectacularly. All because a god couldn't find a better toilet.
Meanwhile, Eliot tried to cheat the fine print of his reign. He'd attempted to create a golem-double to sit on the throne while he escaped the tedium. Theoretically clever until the split consciousness nearly drove him insane, and Fen couldn't keep her hands to herself around the duplicate, shaking his head. 'Most men dream of a woman who can't get enough of sex. They usually regret it once they realize how exhausting that actually is'. He chuckled, muttering under his breath, "Not me, though."
The morning light spilled across Kai's bed, where Alicia's naked body curled to his left, Julia sprawled to his right. A thin blanket tangled over them as Kai slid out silently, naked and padded to the bathroom. His lovers remained asleep.
Another looming matter was the trickster god. Raynard the Fox, loosed upon the world once again by his mother, no less. Poor parenting at its finest. "Your child kills, rapes, and burns everything in sight related to you to spite you and so the best decision is to set him free? Five stars on the mothering chart," Kai muttered dryly.
The five remaining hybrids had been hunting Raynard, but his trail slithered all over creation. In the meantime, hedges were dying. Whole group of them brutal split open. The killings were sloppy, yes, but terrifying enough that Marina nearly had a breakdown, convinced she was next on the trickster god's list.
It was one thing after another. And then another. Kai sighed, stretching his shoulders when he felt someone behind him and saw Alicia. Still naked with her perfect figure and breasts on display, lazily brushing her hair as she greeted him, "Good morning."
He glanced at her through the mirror. She arched a brow, catching the look on his face. "You've got that look. What's wrong?"
Kai turned to face her. "Problem with my stolen god statue," he said, voice edged with irritation. "The damn thing's running loose, killing again, the hedges are being picked off by him, Marina's on the verge of a meltdown. And if that wasn't enough, magic itself is faltering.
Earth's witches are feeling the backlash from Ember's little toilet stunt in the Wellspring."
Alicia tilted her head, smirking faintly as she dragged the brush through her hair then moved closer and laid the brush down. "You look a bit stressed, why don't I help you relax a bit hmmm."
Kai raised an eyebrow maintaining eye contact with her as she grabbed his cock and bent down till she was face to face with his rod.
"Mmmn, look who's excited already" she teased as she went straight to work.
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