What's the Opposite of a Fairy Tale? | ONC 2024

19. Master of Mayhem

Just as I'd suspected, there was another— apparently secret— exit from the birds' main assembly room. Did they really think I was so stupid that I wouldn't notice? Really, that kind of thing was starting to hurt my feelings.

The throne was backed fairly close to the wall, making it almost difficult to get in the space. But as I've said before, I was a lot more flexible now than I was as a human. So while the human me would never have been able to make a corner that sharp on all fours, the cat me managed to do it without too many difficulties. I peaked my head in and took stock of the situation.

The tunnel leading out of the assembly room was even smaller than the first one, and I actually had a hard time crouching low enough to drag myself through. At least this tunnel wasn't as long, and it didn't spiral sharply downwards; I could see the end before I even got in.

Hesitantly, I crawled inside. There was almost no room for me to move; I ended up practically dragging myself along with my claws, really hoping Comet appreciated all I was doing for his stupid gang of cats.

It was even darker here than it had been in the room I'd just come from, and even my cat eyes took a moment to adjust. The only light seemed to be a strange, sickly green glow that flickered on and off.

As I peered into this new room, I saw that there were only six birds here, in a kind of semi-circle. The good news was that this looked much more manageable. The bad news was that their ritual had clearly been going on for some time. It looked like the chatterbox who's speech I'd interrupted was just having a sort of self-congratulatory ceremony for the flock.

This secret room was lined in a ring of whitish crystals that had been placed along the wall, like some sort of stony picket fence. They looked an awful lot like the one I'd seen that scrub jay dragging. But as I watched, I noticed a kind of faint green glow emanating from within some of them. Others slowly started to emit a kind of rose-colored light. And then finally, the remaining ones had a kind of sky-blue inside. And even in the small amount of time I'd been there, I could see the light grow brighter and brighter, until they were almost the same shades as the ley lines just outside.

"Now, it's time!" one of the birds called out. I recognized him as the one I'd seen in the tree who'd called me a moron— Fluffy's friend.

"It is time," the rest of the birds twittered in a strange monotone.

"Let the power of the ley lines that converge over our heads fill these precious crystals that surround us! Let the energy from the blood moon permeate these sprigs of mugwort to purify that energy!"

"Let the power of the ley lines fill these crystals," the group of birds murmured, sounding almost trance-like.

The stones continued to glow, the light filling the room and giving the walls an almost pleasant kaleidoscope effect. The energy within each one seemed to twist and coalesce until each was filled with a color even brighter than the ley lines above. It almost literally hurt to watch.

Then, a flash of white light lit up the room, searing through my eyes and blinding me for a few seconds.

I blinked rapidly, trying not to panic. I'd never really had a problem with tight spaces, but being stuck in a place where I could barely move, couldn't see, and with six hostile creatures in front of me was not exactly my idea of a good time.

Finally, the room started to come back into focus. I could see that there was now a thin coil of energy reaching from each crystal and slowly spreading towards the spiky green leaves that had been piled in the center of the room.

Again, I charged into the relatively small space, bowling through the ring of birds. I couldn't let those strands of light touch the mugwort. I wasn't sure what would happen, but I was willing to bet it would be the conclusion of this ritual— and of my chance to get this curse lifted.