The Gilded Tomb

Fuck. The curse tore from his cracked lips as the freezing wind battered the heavy oak doors of the manor. Aldous tightened his grip on the rusted iron poker. He stared down at the mangled heap of rags and frostbitten flesh bleeding out onto his stone floor. The morning air in this blighted coastal settlement always carried the familiar scent of saltwater and steady motion. Tonight the gale brought only the stench of open graves and copper.

The dying pilgrim convulsed at his feet. The old man had knocked on the door an hour past midnight. He came begging for shelter from the biting frost. Aldous was a usurer. He was a man who bled the local fishermen dry for every copper coin they pulled from the unforgiving tide. He did not offer charity. He offered ruin. When he had opened the door to turn the wretch away into the dark abyss of the storm, the pilgrim had revealed something hidden beneath his filthy cloak. It was a relic. It was a jagged segment of blackened bone wrapped in oily cloth. The blind traveler whispered that the artifact held the power of a forgotten god. He promised it could turn the rot of the earth into boundless harvest and grant a man absolute dominion over all he claimed.

Aldous did not ask questions. He saw only the endless leverage he could hold over the starving lords of the neighboring lands. He brought the iron poker down in a singular brutal arc. The heavy metal crushed the pilgrim’s skull with a sickening crunch. Blood as cold as the sea sprayed across the hearth. Aldous ripped the bone from the dead hands and held it aloft in the flickering firelight. He roared a desperate demand to whatever dark entity listened in the void. He demanded that everything he touched and everything he claimed as his own be rendered incorruptible and eternally valuable. The pilgrim died with a wet hiss. The relic crumbled to ash in the hands of the usurer.

Aldous awoke to a tearing void in his belly. It was an unnatural starvation that felt like a wild beast clawing the inside of his ribs. He staggered from his bed of furs and stumbled into the great hall. He shouted for his terrified servants to bring him food. A young boy rushed forward with a wooden bowl of gray pottage. Aldous shoved his hand into the bowl and scooped the lukewarm mush into his mouth.

The horror was absolute and instantaneous. The moment his saliva touched the food it hardened. It did not turn into the bright and glittering gold of a king’s crown. It became a heavy and dark metal that tasted of sulfur and coagulated blood. The jagged lump of solid alloy tore through his gums. He tried to spit it out but the metal hooked into his flesh.

Panicking, he grabbed a heavy clay jug of ale from the table. He tipped it back to wash down the blood pooling in his mouth. The dark liquid froze the instant it crossed his lips. A solid icicle of yellow-gray metal shoved down his throat. It tore his esophagus open as it forced its way into his chest. He collapsed to the stone floor in agony. He thrashed like a dying fish on the rushes. He vomited thick strings of dark blood that hardened into metallic wire before they ever hit the ground.

His daughter Elspeth ran into the hall. She was the only living thing in the miserable coastal town that Aldous did not view as a commodity to be traded or sold. She saw her father writhing on the ground with his mouth leaking golden slag. She screamed and dropped to her knees beside him. She reached out her delicate hands to lift his head.

Aldous tried to bellow a warning but his vocal cords were choking on heavy metal. The word emerged as a wet click. His frantic and trembling hand struck her forearm. The transformation did not happen with a flash of magical light. It was a violent and skittering infection. Where his calloused fingers touched her skin the flesh turned pale gray and then yellowed like a rotting bruise. Elspeth gasped in pure terror. Her eyes widened as the golden rot raced up her arm. It looked like thousands of tiny metallic parasites burrowing beneath her veins. They hardened her warm muscles into solid alloy.

She tried to pull away from him. Her legs were already fusing to the stone floor. Aldous watched in absolute damnation as the metallic wave climbed her throat. Her beautiful dark hair turned into heavy and razor-sharp wire that cascaded down her shoulders with a dull metallic clang. Her final scream was cut violently short as the gold flooded her mouth. It sealed her lips into a rigid and permanent line of agony. She stood frozen in the center of the hall. She was a heavy and lifeless effigy of terror. Her blind golden eyes stared directly into his soul.

The servants fled the manor within the hour. One desperate groom tried to steal a horse from the stables. Aldous pursued him into the freezing yard with a crazed and desperate fury. He grabbed the flowing wool of the groom’s cloak. The fabric instantly stiffened into a heavy sheet of golden plate. It dragged the screaming man down beneath the frantic hooves of the horse.

The beast itself brushed against the falling metal. It transformed mid-stride into a rigid statue of dark gold. The horse collapsed into the frozen mud with a bone-shattering crash. The golden torso cracked open to reveal a hollow interior completely devoid of blood or organs. Aldous was left utterly alone.

Three days passed in deafening silence. The hunger faded into a cold and ambient agony. The thirst became a white-hot iron spike driven through his brain. His body was betraying him from the inside out. He could feel his internal organs changing and shifting in weight. When he breathed, his ribs scraped against each other with a sound like rusted iron gates swinging in a winter storm.

The curse kept him fiercely alive. It refused him the sweet mercy of death while it slowly replaced his soft tissue with heavy and unyielding alloy. He staggered back into the great hall. His boots clanked heavily against the stones. Every single step required an immense and agonizing effort. His legs felt like tree trunks made of cast iron.

He approached the statue of Elspeth. In the dim light of the overcast afternoon she looked grotesque. The gold was darkening and oxidizing in the damp coastal air. It turned a foul greenish-black around the crevices of her frozen eyes. He reached out with a trembling hand. He let his fingers hover inches from her metallic cheek. He wanted to weep. His tear ducts were completely dry. They were blocked by tiny grains of golden sand that scraped against his eyeballs every time he dared to blink.

A sudden sound shattered the silence of the tomb. The heavy oak doors at the end of the hall creaked open. Three men stepped inside the shadowed room. Their leather armor was caked in the thick mud of the high ridges. They were bandits who had noticed the lack of smoke from the chimneys. They smelled an opportunity for easy plunder. They carried rusted swords and short hunting spears.

The leader spat onto the floor and muttered that the lord of the manor had clearly fled. Then their greedy eyes adjusted to the gloom. They saw Aldous standing in the shadows. They saw the golden statue of the young girl. The bandits froze in their tracks. Their eyes widened with an instantly recognizable rot. It was the frantic and breathless lust of violent men who had never possessed real wealth. They did not notice the sheer horror etched into Elspeth’s frozen expression. They only saw the massive volume of the precious metal. The youngest bandit dropped his spear to the stone floor. He whispered a prayer to his dark gods. He realized the statue was solid.

Aldous turned his heavy body to face the intruders. His movements were slow and deeply mechanical. His face was a horrifying mask of gray skin and yellowing metal. His jaw was locked open in a perpetual and silent snarl. He tried to tell them to get away from his daughter. The words failed. A low and vibrating hum erupted from his metallic throat. The sound shook the iron chandeliers hanging above their heads.

The leader of the bandits pulled his heavy blade. His overwhelming greed completely devoured his fear. He stepped eagerly toward the beautiful statue of Elspeth. He raised his sword high to hack a massive chunk of gold from her frozen shoulder.

A primal and monstrous rage erupted within the dark soul of Aldous. He did not care about his own miserable life. The thought of these filthy dogs defiling the metal corpse of his only child tore away the very last remnants of his human sanity. He lunged forward with a sudden and terrifying speed that defied his heavy frame. His metallic boots cracked the solid stone floor beneath him.

The bandit swung his sword with all his strength. The iron blade struck Aldous squarely in the chest. There was no sickening sound of tearing flesh. There was only a deafening metallic clang that rang through the great hall like a massive cathedral bell. The sword shattered into a dozen useless pieces of shrapnel.

Before the bandit could even register the impossible impact, Aldous grabbed him by the throat. The golden rot erupted from the thick fingers of the usurer like a burst of black lightning. It tore through the leather collar of the bandit and flooded directly into his neck. The skin of the intruder hardened instantly. His veins bulged as liquid gold pumped violently through his circulatory system. It replaced his blood in a matter of frantic heartbeats.

The eyes of the bandit turned into solid yellow spheres. They burst from the immense pressure before hardening into metallic stones. He stiffened completely in the crushing grip of the monster. His entire body turned into a heavy and rigid statue that weighed hundreds of pounds.

The other two bandits turned to flee in absolute terror. Aldous was a brutal force of nature now. He was a juggernaut of metal and pure malice. He lunged across the hall and swept his heavy hands outward. He caught the second bandit by the heel of his boot. The man screamed and fell hard against the stones. His leg hardened into gold the moment it hit the ground. The unstoppable transformation raced up his spine like a roaring wildfire. It froze him perfectly in a pathetic posture of desperate crawling.

The third bandit reached the heavy oak door. He scrambled wildly at the iron latch. Aldous slammed his heavy golden hand against the wooden frame. The entire doorway fused instantly upon contact. The ancient wood turned into a solid and impenetrable sheet of dark metal. It sealed the final exit forever.

The trapped bandit turned around. His back pressed hard against the golden door. He sobbed uncontrollably as the towering metallic shadow of Aldous loomed over him. Aldous did not bother to use a weapon. He merely pressed his open palm firmly against the face of the weeping man. The screams of the bandit were violently muffled as the heavy metal flooded his nose and his open mouth. The frantic thumping against the door faded into a dull and solid silence.

The great hall returned to a deep and unbroken stillness. Five golden statues now populated the room. They were frozen eternally in various poses of terror and intense violence. Aldous stood perfectly still in the very center of his immense wealth. His breathing was a harsh and metallic rattle echoing in his chest. He looked down at his own hands. They were no longer flesh and blood. The skin had completely split and fallen away. It revealed solid and dark golden bones. The metallic tendons moved with a sickening and mechanical precision.

The horrific transformation was nearly complete. Soon his tortured heart would beat its very last fleshly stroke. The unyielding metal would finally claim his core. He felt an overwhelming and crushing weight settling deep in his chest. It was the horrifying realization that he had won the terrible bargain. He had achieved everything he had ever desired in his miserable life. He was now the wealthiest man in the entire realm. He was surrounded completely by magnificent treasure that would never rot and never fade and never be stolen by thieves.

He walked slowly back to the beautiful statue of Elspeth. His heavy steps dragged across the hall. He left deep and metallic gouges in the stone floor. He could feel his own consciousness beginning to dim and fade away. His frantic thoughts were slowing down as the golden rot crept relentlessly into his brain. It was turning all his memories into cold and heavy static.

He threw his heavy and iron-gold arms around the cold statue of his daughter. The moment his chest pressed against her metallic form, the ancient curse recognized them as the exact same property. The dark gold of his body began to bleed rapidly into the dark gold of hers. The metals melted violently together at the point of contact. It fused them permanently at the waist and at the shoulders and at the heart. He could feel her frozen and metallic ribcage pressing tightly against his own hardening chest. They were rapidly becoming one single and monolithic block of gold.

The intense heat of the magical fusion was the very first warmth he had felt in days. It was a terrible and burning heat that smelled strongly of sulfur and old blood.

The dim light in his eyes finally began to fail. The heavy yellow metal clouded his vision completely. It turned the dark world into a dull and uniform amber void. He could no longer hear the freezing wind howling outside the manor. He could no longer feel the desperate hunger tearing at his stomach. There was only the immense and suffocating weight of his own existence. He was trapped forever inside an unbreakable and eternal cage of his own making.

Weeks later, the spring thaws finally broke the bitter cold. A heavily armed party of knights from the regional capital battered down the golden windows of the silent manor house. They found no living survivors, no stores of grain, and absolutely no answers to the mystery.

In the very center of the ruined great hall stood a massive and grotesque mound of dark and blood-flecked gold. It was a chaotic and beautiful nightmare of solid metal. It depicted a father and his young daughter locked forever in a desperate and agonizing embrace. They were surrounded completely by the frozen and metallic ghosts of the violent men who had sought to steal their wealth.

The captain of the guard shouted a strict warning to his men to stay back. He sensed a foul and unholy presence lingering deep within the cold metal. Deep within the very center of that golden mass, a single and dark awareness remained fully alive. It was screaming silently in the pitch black void. It was unable to die and unable to move. It was holding forever onto the terrible wealth that had utterly destroyed it.