One Dark Window

The Twin Alders is hidden in a place with no time. A place of great sorrow and bloodshed and crime. Betwixt ancient trees, where the mist cuts bone-deep, the last Card remains, waiting, asleep. The wood knows no road—no path through the snare. Only I can find the Twin Alders…

“For it was I who left it there.”

The Twin Alders is hidden

blood had not dried. But he did not account for the turn of the tide. For nothing is safe, and nothing is free. Debt follows all men, no matter their plea. When the Shepherd returns, a new day shall ring. Death to the Rowans…

“Long live the King.”

came in the night,” we said, “the black and red horde. They burned down my castle, put my kin to the sword. The usurper was crowned, though

just the wind in the trees, the shadow, and the fright. The echo in the leaves… the nightmare in the night.

Wary I’d grown, so I needed the Well.

She asked for a chamber—a place she might dwell.

To reclaim my good self, I forged the Iron Gate.

The cost was my armor, my golden breastplate.

For the Scythe I wanted power, and her price was quite steep.

I gave her my rest—she claimed all my sleep.

The Mirror was next, to be invisible—unseen.

She wanted old bones, so I gave her my Queen’s.

But it felt incomplete, my collection yet whole.

And so, for the Nightmare…

I bartered my soul.

the Black Horse Card, for power and speed,

The Spirit wanted blood from my warhorse, my steed.

For the Golden Egg Card, abundance and wealth,

I bartered two years of my life’s precious health.

The Prophet came next, the Card of foresight.

She wanted my fear, so I gave her my fright.

When I asked her for courage, the White Eagle Card,

I bartered my skin, which left my hands scarred.

So I begged for the Maiden, for beauty I prayed.

She asked for my hair, shorn off with a blade.

There once was a girl,” he murmured, “clever and good, who tarried in shadow in the depths of the wood. There also was a King—a shepherd by his crook, who reigned over magic and wrote the old book. The two were together, so the two were the same:

“The girl, the King… and the monster they became.”

They call for the Deck and the Deck calls them back.

Unite us, they say, and we’ll cast out the black.

At the King’s namesake tree, with the black blood of salt,

All twelve shall, together, bring sickness to halt.

They’ll lighten the mist from mountain to sea.

New beginnings—new ends…

But nothing comes free.

The twelve call for each other when the shadows grow long—

When the days are cut short and the Spirit is strong.