Taming the Rogue King

Who are You?

Liam

***

A three year old Liam played in the snow, making snow angels. Even at this age, he did not need layers and layers of clothing like a human child to protect him from the cold. His skin was enough.

He was faster than all the pups around him who were playing snowball fights. A boy his age threw a snowball at a slightly older girl that caught the side of her head making her totter and fall.

The girl got up and without any hesitation whatsoever punched the tiny toddler who had hurled the projectile at her. He tipped over backwards and within minutes the kids had taken sides.

A real fight began as they pulled each other’s hair, kicked and punched. Liam stopped making snow angels as the fight erupted around him. Some of the kids had started crying.

He looked at the wailing kids in front of him and shook his head.

“SHTOP!” His tiny voice carried through the ruckus. Little Liam tottered on his tiny feet towards the squabbling pre schoolers. His non-wavering command, even in baby talk, made all the children around him stop fighting. “Mommy says, NO fight!” He continued to address the kids, who were still gawking at him.

He turned to his mother who watched from a distance. With no features on her face, it should have looked creepy, but instead, he felt a strange calm as he turned to look at her.

He had no idea how he knew she was smiling. He waved at her, proud to have stopped a fight.

The weather suddenly changed around him and he saw his mother disappear into thin air. As the sky turned dark, an unusual sadness overpowered his gleeful heart.

He felt a stinging sensation all over his body and he lifted his hand to check what was happening. Something was changing, transforming. He could feel the strange metamorphosis somewhere within his depths.

He rotated his wrist, slowly turning his hand, front and back. His heartbeats raced as he tried to understand the change that was taking place. He wasn’t in the body of a three year old anymore. His hand was bigger. Instead of snow under his feet, there was a steady stream of clear water.

His feet were bigger. He heard someone's painful shriek and woke up, sweating.

“MOM?” Fifteen year old Liam was awake. Sweating profusely, his heart pounding against his chest, he looked around his room. It took him a while to get his bearings right. He was on his bed inside his own bedroom.

He had seen this dream numerous times but never managed to see his mother’s face or find out the reason behind her painful shriek.

He had to check on his mother, Miriam. Every time, a sense of foreboding prevailed after he woke up from a dream. He felt an innate urge to seek his mother. He got up and got dressed.

Miriam’s place was 20 minutes away, towards the deeper end of the forest. He often wondered why she had chosen to separate his living quarters from her home so early in his life.

Since he had been twelve he had his own quarters on one of the hills, sitting just outside the territories of the Blood Moon Clan.

Their area was called no man’s land, and no werewolf could stake any claim on it. This reserved land was mostly used by the werewolves to say goodbyes to their dead, every solstice. For the rest of the year, rogues lived here, taking advantage of its remoteness as well as its neutral status. The woop-woop, they used to call such parts which had very little human civilisation.

He was one such rogue living here with his witch mother.

His mother’s quarters were away from the cliffs. Even when he had met with an accident and lost his memories, his mother did not really care to stay with him and help him recuperate.

He did not mind, though. He assigned his mother’s behaviour to his father’s death.

He did not remember what his father looked like. His mother had no photo of his dad. She was so traumatised that she couldn’t even speak about his father without going through a full-blown panic attack.

Liam had learnt very early in life to never ask about his dad. He didn’t even know the name of his father.

He did not remember the accident, only remembered a lot of pain, especially in his head and blinding green light.

His mother had told him how he and his father were attacked by werewolves of the Blood Moon clan. They were angry that his father had found a witch as her mate. Liam’s birth had outraged them further.

They had time and again tried to attack Liam and his parents, but Miriam had managed to save them until that fateful day. Liam hated the blood thirsty clan.

The mutts had killed his father and left him to die on the banks of the river.

He walked towards his mother’s chambers. She had enchanted a cave on one of the hills to look like a palace. His mother loved grandeur.

He reached the main gate. Huge wooden doors were guarded by four hybrids and a bunch of enchantments.

Two guards were stationed at the gate, and the other two patrolled around the cave. In addition to the outer guards, there were a few well-hidden hybrids guarding the corridor that led to Miriam’s courtroom.

For an outsider, the corridor appeared to be empty. Its dark grey walls and unnatural silence were deliberately designed to instil fear in people approaching the red door of Miriam’s courtroom.

It was his idea to give his mother the best possible guard. Hybrids were known to be vicious and ruthless. They possessed the speed of vampires and the sharp senses of the werewolves.

They could also mind link, and the best part was that they could be commanded by Liam. It was always difficult to form alliances with vampires because of their fiercely independent nature. But the hybrids adhered to the werewolf law.

For a rogue king, this was a win-win situation.

He knocked at his mother’s bedroom door which was opposite her courtroom. It was the last door on the left and appeared inconspicuous. Only he and Miriam’s servants knew that it was her bedroom.

He heard someone giggling at the other end, followed by a deep grunting voice of a male.

Fuck! She is with someone! As usual! I shouldn't have come here! He bunched his fingers into a fist in anger.

Biting the inside of his cheek, he stopped himself from growling and breaking the door open.

Why did his mother have to be so slutty? She never had time for her son. He was just an unwanted hurdle for her string of lovers. He craved for a father figure but found none in his mother's s****l partners.

His thoughts tortured him and he rushed out of the witch’s chambers before he ended up creating a scene. He hated her cheap flings. Why was he deprived of a father?

He ran into the forest, not knowing where his feet carried him. Deeper into the woods he continued to run, while Ben, his beta, shouted out his name. Ben had followed him and was trying to keep up.

Liam did not want to stop. He wanted freedom from this pain. He wanted to wipe out the Blood Moon Clan, who had caused his dad’s death.

They were the reason his mother was w*****g herself! He had lost count of the number of men he had seen his mother with.

He wanted to kill himself for surviving the attack. If only it was him instead of his father! He hated himself for being alive while his dad was gone.

His tormented wolf took over as he tore through his clothes and turned into his large snow-white wolf. His paws smashed against the dry forest floor as he continued to run. Ben couldn’t keep up. Ben hadn’t had his first shift yet.

As Liam’s wolf ran towards the Blood Moon Clan’s territory, he banged against an invisible barrier and fell back. The sudden impact brought his agitated mind back to the present faster than anything else could have.

What the f**k was that? He cautiously moved towards the Blood Moon Clan border and felt the thick invisible barrier again. He tried pushing against it with all his might, but it did not budge.

His wolf was strong! Yet the barrier did not move. He summoned extra strength by visualising himself, slicing through the barrier, but that did not help either.

The air around him moved. The light from the early dawn produced an eerie glow around him and he heard someone in his head, ‘Your power won’t help you, young one. Not until you learn to use it!’ The woman cackled.

'WHO ARE YOU?' He screamed inside his head in his wolf form. The woman's high-pitched laughter continued to pierce through his head.

*****