Chapter 11:Crown Of The Cursed King

Alabaster

So as it turned out Alley’s suspicion about triggering some ancient magic atop the altar had been correct, and the moment he touched the stack of cards he wished he had followed that instinct.

The teal haze that saturated the room seemed to rush towards him from all directions, leaving nothing but darkness in its wake. If he could have the boy would have dropped the cards, he tried but his body refused to obey. The greenish light flowed into the deck, which began to not only glow but transform. Their backs changing from blank brown to an ethereal gray. The image of a goblet seemingly made of a crowned skull appeared. ‘Custom card backs.’ He pondered in awe. You didn’t see that every day. There were craftsmen out there who could customize a deck in this sort of manner for you, but it was a slow, costly process that added nothing to a Deck’s effectiveness. Most people couldn’t afford this kind of addition, and wouldn’t spend the money on it even if they could.

Once the images on the back of the cards completed themselves the cards vanished completely, but Alley did not regain the ability to move. The chains held by the gargoyles on the other hand did gain that capacity, filling with that same teal glow and snaking towards the boy with oddly organic movements. He redoubled his efforts to escape the invisible bondage, but it was useless. The younger Roe child couldn’t even manage a sound when the chains flowed not just around his feet but into them!

While the chains seemed to lose their corporality passing through leather boots and flesh without leaving a mark, the invasive feeling of the metal links passing into him, and up his legs would have been enough to make him wretch if he could.

A second set of the animated links leaped up, driving into his hands the same way the first two had his feet. He saw and felt another pair drive into his chest and back simultaneously. The first pair of chains finished disappearing just as the final pair wound their way up his body, his neck, before plunging into his eyes.

They brought with them a flood of visions, stealing Alley’s sight and searing his brain.

First were flashes of war. Alley could see the formations of men and beasts clashing, taste the smoke and blood in the air, and even feel the vibrations as thousands of beings of all shapes and sizes collided in vicious combat.

One side seemed to gain an edge until the dead men and monsters on one side began to rise again.

A figure he couldn’t quite make out strode between the lines of reviving men. Somehow he knew the figure was a player wielding a Deck of stupendous power. Suddenly the vision changed and Alley was no longer witnessing a battle. Where he had been almost choking on the hot smoke now the air was cold, crisp, and rushing past him. He was witnessing the very castle his body stood in, but it was…falling? The massive structure of dark stone plummeted from a sky so clear and blue it made the land beneath it seem barren.

Next, he felt the spray of sea air and witnessed two figures fighting a challenge on the beach. Like before he couldn’t quite make out their features, but the sense of power that radiated from them was almost overwhelming. If Alley hadn’t been in some sort of ethereal limbo his knees would have buckled just from their presence. When one played a card the sense of threat that washed over him made him want to flee, to hurl himself to the ground in obeisance. By merely manifesting their decks these two changed the world. With each play or draw mountains rose, and seas drained, empires collapsed, only to be replaced by their destroyers. Jungles and woods burned to the ground, only to rise again stronger.

These weren’t men his instincts screamed. The two figures battling on the beach were nothing short of gods.

The nature of the vision changed. Alley was once more on the altar, but the skeletal figures about him cavorted and celebrated, manically going from whispered prayer to rapturous cheers and applause, back to prayer, before finally rushing him from all sides. Alley opened his mouth to scream but what poured out was an endless darkness that consumed the skeletons, before turning to devour the boy himself.

When Alley came to he found himself collapsed on the altar in a pool of dried bile spread out from his mouth. His head throbbed, and he felt like he hadn’t slept in days. With a groan, Alley sat up. He was quietly relieved to see the skeletons were all exactly where he had left them, faces down unmoving. He couldn’t say the same for the cards, the gargoyle statues, or the chains. All had vanished.

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Wiping his mouth Alley felt his eyes go wide in shock. Replacing his clothes a strangely archaic tunic of dark silk, topped by a ragged black cloak of far rougher material had appeared. That would have been bizarre enough on its own to surprise him, but the realization that he’d brought his broken left arm to his face without pain was if anything more stunning.

His injuries were gone, just gone. Outside the ache in his head, there wasn’t even pain or stiffness. It was like he had never been hurt at all.

While that certainly seemed like a good thing, given what he had seen and was surrounded by Alley couldn’t help but feel something sinister was at work. In every story, he had ever heard of hidden castles, and long-dormant magics almost always led to some danger or another. Even when they initially seemed like a boon.

Still, he really had no one to blame but himself for this latest development. He had been the one who walked onto an obviously magical altar to secure a mysterious stack of ancient cards. In hindsight, his meager attempts to check the thing were woefully inadequate. That thought was as obviously true as it was frustrating. It never felt good when something went wrong and you only had yourself to blame.

“What the fuck is going on with my life?!” He yelled out into the darkness. Which oddly was not dark at all. When the teal haze had fled it had left behind the darkness of an unlit cave. Now while the world appeared to Alley in strange gray tones the cathedral around him was perfectly visible.

While his clothes were different he noted with relief that his hook and non-freakishly alive chain were on the altar next to him. The Roe boy took a minute to collect the pair of items and return them to where they belonged. The hook at his belt, the chain wrapped around his abdomen.

It was getting harder and harder to stay calm and think logically, but Alley did his best.

He was fairly certain he had just bonded with a new deck. Without time and experimentation, there really wasn't a way to prove it, but the suspicion felt true.

If he knew the names of the cards or the deck he could find out with ease. Manifesting a card or accessing the tiny reality one stored their library, collection, and linked items in required knowing names. There were other ways, of course, certain spells and magical items could trigger an unknown dealer. As best he could tell there weren't any such items down here. Well… there might be, Alley had yet to explore most of the castle.

If he was honest with himself it was a tempting proposition. While Alley was rattled by the magical invasion he had experienced, he felt fine, better than when he had come in here. It made him hunger to find out what other secrets the place held, but as the old saying went.

‘Once outplayed, twice watchful.’ He would be stupid not to take this opportunity to leave. Healed as the boy had become climbing back up the way he fell shouldn’t be all that dangerous. Exhausting and slow, but likely no more deadly than scaling the mountains above his home.

He would be foolish to keep delving into the castle. It had probably been here for a thousand years, it wasn’t going anywhere. Alley had ample opportunity to come back with supplies, equipment, and help. Darius would lose his mind at the chance to explore something like this.

‘It isn’t like anyone else is going to find it and loot the place.’ He thought with a grim smile. There wasn’t anyone left in Valeton to find the place.

Running a hand through his hair, Alley resolved to at least inspect the chasm again, and leave if he could. After which he would absolutely be coming back once he was ready. What else was he going to do? That thought stopped him in his tracks. There had been so much going on he hadn’t even considered his future. What was he going to do at all? For a second he felt panic rise before his mind began to unspool the problem. Despite all the shock, the pain, the mystical visions of apocalyptic power. Alabaster Roe was more than anything else a being of logic. Whether he wanted to or not his brain knew he had to keep going, keep waking up, feeding himself, and living his life regardless of tragedy. Join up with the Knots family he supposed, they would absolutely take him in if he turned up on their doorstep. But what then?

“Find and kill Soren Creed.” He said aloud with a sardonic laugh. Hadn’t he just been thinking of himself as logical? He may as well claim he was going to write his name across the sun. One didn’t kill a walking god, he had learned that the hard way. During their challenge, Alley hadn’t even been able to launch an attack let alone put a dent in the other boy’s overwhelming life essence.

No, he had to focus on what was in front of him. He was not trapped exactly, but still stranded in an ancient magical castle deep under the ground, magical chains had entered his body, and very well might still be there. These were the things he should be putting his mind towards. Not fantasies of gaining enough power to take his revenge.

So Alley made his way past the huge skeletal knight, the praying bodies, and the empty plinths. He was almost out of the cathedral room when a voice like whiskey-soaked gravel murmured past his ear.

“Crown Of The Cursed King.”