Okay…Swishy thought as he snow-angeled on the beach sands, massaging his senses with the coarse noises. His gourd was gorged with worries. My life is too much, too adventurous...He raised his head and morphed his soul-blues into the curvaceous telescope lenses. Swishy would see it all—and accept it all.
First things first: the postcard had come to life. Real life, tactile and auditory life. The sands and breeze and sea were convincing. He picked up seashells and absent-mindedly juggled them in his hands. The boy spied a line of sand crabs skittering alongside him. Hi friends, he waved, to which the bite-sized crustaceans offered their own greeting—a snip-snip of their claws—before side-shuffling away.
The atmosphere cramped around Swishy once more. In spite of the place's beauty, he couldn’t disregard its undercurrent of darkness. Charcoal-colored fog seeped through every inch of all-encompassing nature—the sands and ocean and trees and outlying hills. The curses were humid. They clung and stuck. They behave as sweat, as a grimy second skin. Swishy experimentally wiped a hand across his gourd and inspected it—a streak of black gunk stained his fingers.
With an ecosystem firmly established, Swishy spotted the trail of Ruby's presence receding beyond the beach, the forests, and the sky. The Last Straw resided on the same sky-piercer tree that’d summoned itself from the Swish-heart. Ruby's home was lodged into the treetops which tore through the heavens, wearing a ring of shadow-scarred clouds. So far, so high—a while yet before Swishy made it there.
But the shocking part came when his gaze drifted down the length of the ancient bark towards its roots—which were dislodged from the ground. The roots were curled and twisted and enormous. These tendrils equaled the tree trunk's size, leading to the structure's true root system: serpentine curses which wrapped around the roots. The black tentacles ensnared the wooden foundation and suspended the entire tree skyward. The way the kraken-like shadows lifted the tree reminded him of parents raising their babies overhead—an easy support, a natural one.
The ambient curses flowed around Swishy now that Queen Ruby had left. The High Chasm...isn't it lovely? That's our goal...to live there.
"Then go. What’s stopping you?" He shooed the nuisances away.
It'll absorb us.
"Even better."
Fine, you'll see...
The curses disappeared then.
"Don't let the door hit you on the way to abyss!"
But when Swishy returned his gaze to the tree, he saw the curses were right. The High Chasm married its veins to the depths with shadowy connections. The darkness pulsed, gulping and drinking curses. The tree siphoned whatever of heart and soul were accessible to its tentacles.
The architecture was clear to Swishy, and terrifying too: MIDNIGHT. The collected curses from outside of the city were being drawn in through the roots.
The below-surface current thrummed with the suction of the city’s strange, bodiless visitors. The boy was thunderstruck with the horrific knowledge, the edges of his soul abuzz with fear.
Make things right, make things right…I'll grow something nicer. Less...mean.
His retracted his wide-lens view of life into a beady-eyed concentration. His soul effortlessly solved the realm's altar arithmetic: The collected MIDNIGHT lapped at the realm's barrier like a spiritual tsunami. They were in a bubble, swallowed in an ocean of Ruby’s brewed magic. Swishy thought of it like his Straw Hut maneuver, drawing the wheat into himself.
Ruby, malignantly talented, could do the same with darkness. She summoned the curses with MIDNIGHT, an influx of Straw City immigrants which paid their initial toll costs for entry—themselves. Their power, their feelings, their traces of soul and heart fueled the new Stormcellar.
The shadows Ruby had collected functioned as a continually replenishing mana reserve for her witchery.
And she’d started with a POSTCARD.
(...)
Swishy worried about the birds.
He couldn't forget the POSTCARD bursting into a brilliant magical flare—right as the black birds were to emerge beyond the card’s threshold.
Swishy tensed. His weaves tightened as he searched for evidence of the flock. He couldn't find them but knew they were there. If there were sand crabs, then there were shadowclaws, too. Alive was alive, the winds and shadows, the crabs and the birds—everything in this accursed place was alive.
Myself included, hehe…
“Okay birdy, where are you…I don’t hear wings, I don’t hear anything…” Swishy sheepishly progressed as the darkness simmered.
Swishy left the shore and proceeded towards the woodsy area framing the beach. Green grass and willows, birdsong and buzzing beehives—Swishy quite liked the scenery of the dense thicket. He imagined that he’d been transported to the forestry of the Altruistic Altar games. A fairy tale landscape before the grim shadows of woodland beasts came to snatch him.
As he flounced along, he spun his rake like a martial arts master. He walked and twirled, thought and twirled. A scheme, a scheme, he knew he could use a scheme—or what Trey had called direction.
The boy hoped to accomplish two things: the first was to investigate the birds—please don’t be snitchtalons. And the second was to emerge through the woods and meet Trey in the village on the other side. He remembered everything about his prior heart loss, every Stormcellar scene from Ruby’s memories. Swishy had learned every tree cluster, every clearing, every home. He could hardly call this exploring—he knew the way.
He kept his secret third goal close to his chest: find The Stormcellar’s altar, the origin of Ruby’s arcane journey. From his memories, he knew the village guarded it.
Swishy worked out the path in his head: forest, village, altar, then High Chasm. He was proud of his routing—but he wished to shower in Trey’s pride of him.
How potato-headed of me to run off. I need to be tougher.
His mind snapped back to the project at hand—to make things right. A non-Myst altar certainly seemed like the start. If he was going to survive the Ruby situation, he’d need the power to rival her. Memories of his kneeling beatdown flashed into his head. The slaps of wind, the waning of his soul—he couldn’t allow for such a thing ever again. Next time he suspected Ruby would use a more permanent measure.
A traditional death wasn’t in the cards for him. In fact, non-existence—one without desire or worry—was almost appealing. The problem was Ruby’s creativity: an eternity of her design bristled him fully.
Swishy pressed through the woods, eyes peeled, neck on a swivel. Any lurking danger was preparation for Ruby. He considered the type of wish he’d make when he found the altar. He wanted so much—too much honestly. There were shadowclaw souls to retrieve from human bodies. There were kid-crows to receive from scarecrow bodies. There were his own wings to construct. The skies were his home. The skies were as close to the unthinking void as he could conceive of in the vast un-dark.
But he’d pay the cost. He’d go into all kinds of Cearth-style debt to ‘make things right’. His heart clenched up but Swishy scolded it.
Shut up, shut up. I know already, but this isn’t just about us anymore…
That didn’t calm his heart any. Jackhammering rustles had risen from his chest. His altar goals unnerved him. In a city of wishes, he found it funny that he was the only one that hadn’t seemed to make a petition of his own. He was determined to change that. Closed mouths—closed gourds—were never fed or sustained. They were sacrificed. And Swishy knew that no matter what he had to fight the impositions of these greedy sugar-wraiths.
The boy received a visitor then, the most needling of shadows.
Myst, reading his mind, decided to speak hers: “If you want to make a wish, you only have to say so. Treat yourself!”
Swishy cringed away from Myst’s vaporous presence. “But please don’t read my mind.”
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“You should know it doesn’t work that way. Every soul in my presence is clear as water. Altars know no deception, only truth. There’s nothing you or I could do to make me not see you.”
“Either bring Trey or go away.”
“Oh don’t be so selfish with him. He’s my friend, too.”
“Bring our friend here then. We can be a party.”
“Is that a wish? Would you like to pay for such a favor?”
”But we came here together. Don’t be like that.”
“Don’t be like what? The altar? Now Swishy. I like you and Trey but don’t get carried away here.”
”I don’t like you. That’s why I’m going to find The Stormcellar altar.”
“Come on, kiddo. You’d trust a strange altar over your friendly neighborhood wish machine?”
“Yes.”
“You should be thankful for what you have. Please tell me Trey had GRATITUDE in that deck of his?”
“Maybe I used it. Maybe I ate it. You never know with me.”
“Please, Swishy, I only ask kindness of you. Lighten up. Have a straw-chew.”
“I make those already. Why would I need a—”
“Yes, it’s called a joke. Hehe or haha—give me one of those. It’s easy, please try.”
”No.”
“Perhaps I should demonstrate.” Myst strung together low, stuttered cackles, then appeared to disappear—in body at least but not in eyes.
“Ugh.”
The boy stepped between the trees, thinly smiling at the fat storybook mushrooms, their caps adorned with red-and-white dots. A tortoise crawled out of a hollow with a small rabbit riding along on its back, whispering jokes into its ear. A hummingbird fluttered around a group of blackflowers tucked against the bulbous roots of an aged willow. What in the fairy tale…Though Swishy smiled at the irony. A boy of straw traverses a forest of kind and loving creatures until…darkness. What a fairy tale indeed!
But he didn’t let his guard down. The postcard world was beautiful indeed—beautiful and nosey. Swishy felt the dark dwellers quietly simmer as they jealousy tracked him. Ruby had temporarily let him off the hook, but the curses always had other plans.
The crackling carbonation returned. Sizz-sizz-sizz, the environment’s buzz growing in sound. The modest sizzling grew steadily into a chorus, a crescendo, and finally an overwhelming orchestra which resembled jangling chains.
Swishy turned and turned, clutching the rake against his body. An enemy—or enemies—were present. When were they not? Blacks and golds spread through his conflicted weapon.
And suddenly…quiet. A moment of stillness within the mournful splendor of the tropical paradise. And then the winds started up. Gusts blew in unnatural directions—even from the sky downwards and the ground upwards. Tiny flecks of angry curses converged before him, a pale gray swirling wind becoming slate, then charcoal, then black. The dark mass, formerly small, grew and grew.
A soul-curdling feeling seeped through Swishy, slackening his limbs.
He gazed at the sky but the canopy of branches shifted over him. The Curseworks narrowed, stealing the clouds, the sun, the violet skies. Only a dark ceiling remained, which appeared to lower with each passing second. The air itself deconstructed into a staticky hex, everything vibrating. The postcard world was undone into blue language: ocean and horizon and sunset and wow. Scenic words benignly floated like careless bubbles, a picture—a postcard—worth a thousand words. Yet in this darkness only one word mattered. Wickedly robust letters rose from the swirl ground in a black vapor trail: WRATHRAVEN.
An obsidian geyser burst from the ground before him, towering above, even spraying dark particles like a sickly rain. The pitter-patter, pitter-patter of the landing dark drops was menacing. Swishy could feel a mild soul-stinging upon contact. But he didn’t move. He couldn’t. His gaze locked onto the sinister abyss.
Sizz-sizz, sizz-sizz…
Swishy knew the phenomena—he’d been through this himself. A summoning, a birth, a dark dweller taking shape.
The physical structure then materialized around the formless soul.
The torso came first, a soulful powder thickening into a series of bones, a rib cage. The gaseous soul spread outwards towards the being’s required body parts. Massive talons emerged underneath the core—no thighs or legs—only free-floating claws, an all bone construction of adamantine murder. The bird was devoid of a muscular torso, and instead had a mass of whirling shadow in loose orbit around its bones.
The head shot from the amorphous core of the rib cage. The spirit energy spread upwards into `something like a spinal column, a neck, an avian skull. The bones hardened, the sharp rows of dragon-y teeth cracked through the jawline. The orbital sockets also formed, but remained empty…at least until a soulful smoke emerged. Swishy recognized himself in those eyes, their ghostly presentation—except instead of blue they were gaseously red, no blackwheat required.
Swishy’s gaze locked onto the main event: the wings. The humerus, ulna, and metacarpals were gradually constructed. He was ignorant of the anatomy names but knew the bone shapes from the Straw Fried™ fast food spot. People liked to wrap their oily bones into napkins before throwing them away.
The last thing Swishy expected was for his curiosity to stir—but it did. He wondered about himself. Was he a shadowclaw or a wrathraven? Could he choose?
He was scared, the quilled alertness compelling his battle pose, but his face gleamed with awe—such was the effect flighted creatures had on him. The scarecrow loved crow-kind, simple as that. So he enjoyed the show as the dark wings achieved feather and form.
Myst entered his mind as a miniature girl, dancing across the wings of the Swishy’s wrathraven imaginings. The scarecrow bristled in shock while the mysterious dark entity beamed at his roguish thoughts.
“How bad of you, little one, to get giddy over the creature of your demise.”
“Please don’t tell Trey.”
“Oh, that’s what you’re worried about?”
“A little yes. Why aren’t you with him? Is he okay?”
“I’m hurt. Trey, Trey, Trey. What about me? Am I not your friend?”
“You’re okay I guess.”
“I’m plagued by such cold, cold boys.”
“I can’t even feel coldness so I can’t relate.” Swishy stuck an ethereal tongue out at Myst.
Myst gleefully inspected Swishy’s mindscape, running her hands through the layered plumage of the boy’s imagination. The scarecrow was entranced by the wrathraven’s still-growing wings, a wonderfully pair of shadowclaw feathers with demonically tapered structure. “You’re really taken with this creature, aren’t you? But you know, it’s not even done.
The Swishy head-tilt, dual question marks bubbling in his eyes.
“You’re missing some body parts.”
“There’s a head, talons, wings…”
“Yes. Only two wings. Keep watching.”
The giant bird floated without flapping, suspended by sheer darkness and audacity. The feathers, however, drifted about the sky swaying in unnatural arcs, stray plumage cutting a sickle’d trail into the air. The wings, the wings! They were still coming in—not two, not three, not four.
Six. Swishy counted six full wings tapered with dragon-y drama.
Shimmering air, crackling darkness—and one boy who both trembled and welcomed it at once.
The land came alive with the wrathraven’s riled darkness. Every blade of grass stood at attention. The tree roots bulged from the ground, rending the terrain into a knotted chaos. The thick branches of the willows bent into sharp and obscene angles, and the treetops twisted towards Swishy as if they were a collection of obsessed faces. Each and every dark entity was privy to the rise of their many-winged leader.
The wrathraven—and its newly claimed domain—laid judgment upon Swishy.
Once again, the boy was laid bare, no hiding, no secrets as to what his fate entailed. Swishy’s mind and heart and inner turmoil were displayed in sound and soul. The Curseworks evaluated everything he cared about, everyone he loved, everyone he so earnestly sought to save. And they knew everything he wanted, including The Stormcellar’s altar—there was no way they didn’t.
The scarecrow was seen, and the DEFIANCE within him formed a crust around his heart. Swishy’s mere presence made it clear that this darkness, Ruby’s darkness, couldn’t have him. The shadows bubbled, a boiling froth of resentment, a cauldron of spring-loaded curses.
The wrathraven before them spread its wings and flexed its awful form. Every movement creaked and cracked, its long dormant bones finding function and use after its too-long stint of disuse. Muscles, tendons, visceral rumblings within its throat and belly. The beast snapped from its sluggishness, relearning the fact of a body. It stretched its wings and upper back, and it even closed and flexed its talons. Swishy watched the bird’s terrifying warm-up, its every action so normal, boring even—but colossal, definitely colossal.
“Will you need my help?” Myst offered.
“It’s not help if it costs my whole being. Now go away.”
“Cheeky little Jack O Lantern. Careful what you wish for. You might need me, y’know?”
“Will I?”
“You will.”
Swishy looked beyond the calisthenics-occupied wrathraven at the endless darkness…He hated that he agreed with Myst. He would need her, but he feared whatever would drive him to that point.
Myst, forever in their minds, laughed. “Now that we have an understanding, don’t be afraid to ask for help. I have a lot to offer. And you as well.”
The scarecrow knew what that meant. He crossed his arms and shook his head.
“Oh don’t be like that. You can share that heart…my heart. You know…because it was mine in the first place?”
The boy had a feeling that she was telling the truth. She was the altar and he came from the altar. The math was math-ing—regretfully. It wasn’t a crazy ask when he really thought about it. SHARING? He’d learned that card. Sharing with Myst? He’d rather feed himself to the wrathraven.
“You’re asking too much. Losing heart hurts, you know.”
“Yes…” Myst was solemn for a flicker of a moment—before her mocking smile returned. “That’s perfectly relatable. Painfully relatable.”
“I’m sorry,” Swishy instinctually said. He didn’t know how he’d offended Myst. She was an altar, a genie, an all-powerful shadow. What could she know of hurt and loss? And then he remembered she could fully read him—he’d screwed up. “I’m sorry,” he repeated, a little desperate.
She was gone, though. Not fake gone either. Myst, the forever open, sealed herself for now.
A scarecrow, a wrathraven, and darkness. During Myst’s visit, the bird’s biology was on reflexive autopilot, pitiful and dumb. But a hungry light stole into the wrathraven’s eyes. The beast steadily drifted towards Swishy, identifying its meal of whole-grain, heart-healthy roughage.
Swishy breathed in, breathed out, his soul-blues swimming through his gourd. The ghosts in his head mentally paced, struggling to calm. Golds and blacks—in equal measure—slithered around his rake prongs. Inside, he struggled. But he was ready to fight.
The beast seethed at the scarecrow’s challenge. The wrathraven raised its wings, gathering power, marinating Swishy in anticipatory dread. One second…two seconds…and then it swiftly flapped of its six wings—which sounded like six cannons, six sonic booms—as it rocketed towards Swishy.
His rake-grip tightened. Six wings…that’s so greedy. I’ll remove one—I’ll remove them all…