Information

Tempting Fate
Legacy Name: Tempting Fate

The Nightmare Rreign
Owner: Fate

Age: 13 years, 6 months, 1 week

Born: October 17th, 2010

Adopted: 13 years, 6 months, 1 week ago

Adopted: October 17th, 2010

Statistics

• Level: 196
   
• Strength: 186
   
• Defense: 205
   
• Speed: 209
   
• Health: 193
   
• HP: 193/193
   
• Intelligence: 5
   
• Books Read: 3
• Food Eaten: 0
• Job: Stock Worker

Black is more than just a colour. Black is when your insides twist into knots. When it feels like a ton of bricks are pressing down on your chest, making it impossible to breathe. When you feel like you are moving as fast as you can without moving at all. Black is when you fall into a pit, can’t see anything, there’s no light and nobody is there to toss you a rope. Black is loss, despair and feeling nothing can save you. Black is where I lived.

The Attic

I wiped the layers of dust off of each item as I attempted to catalogue it. Beside my feet were several rows of boxes each one neatly labelled: Wasted Youth, Misplaced Crap, Why Did I Buy This, Mum and Dad’s stuff (pack well, then mail), and my last “box” was actually a dust bin where I taped my last label: Miserable Bastard’s Shit. Twenty years of marriage and all I have to show for it was a ring-sized white mark messing up my other-wise perfect tan and a bunch of rubbish. It goes to show you that life is not fair. Not like I really thought it was fair anyway, but one tries to hold out hope that the cosmos will align—it’s just in my case they aligned for someone else.

The Beginning of the End

The bottle of wine sat on the table beside me—empty, like how I felt my soul was. The papers were signed and it was almost completely official. My divorce would be final in 9 months. I made a countdown calendar. I don’t know why I felt like celebrating and drinking myself into glorious oblivion at the same time. I was happy to be shot of Miserable Bastard, but hollow because of all the years I wasted—at least that was what I was telling myself was my problem. None of my friends knew what to say—a fact that was proven in my kitchen with the twenty cakes sat on the worktops. Don’t know what to say? No problem, bake a cake and carry on—very British, isn’t it? I stared at the empty wine bottle, willing it to fill itself. With great effort I finally forced myself to get up for another bottle of wine. I walked by the mirror and froze. I looked like a ghost. My pale skin was almost translucent—having a ghostly pallor to it. My eyes were bloodshot with dark black bags under them. I hurried to my kitchen, trying to decide if my appearance bothered me or not. I was halfway through pouring myself a glass of whiskey to chase the wine with, when the doorbell rang. Forgetting that I was in my pyjamas, I went and answered the door. It was Vicar Gibbons. I don’t know why but the sight of him made me very angry and I slammed the door in his face.

Awakened

I stormed to the bathroom and furiously turned on the shower. The nerve of him coming over like this. Who does he think he is? I stepped into the scalding hot water and let my ire drink in the heat. It fuelled me as I muttered darkly, no longer sure what man I was talking about in my livid state. I vowed I would should him—them—the world.

I came out of the shower, red as a lobster and smouldering the embers of hate. At that moment I would have been completely happy if the world suddenly exploded and all was gone. What did I do to piss off whatever higher power there was? Seriously, I am a good person. Okay, so I’ve stolen the odd pen from the bank and cut off people in traffic—but that hardly was a criminal case. So why did I feel so utterly forsaken? I was a torrent of emotions that conflicted with each other. How could I feel all this at one time? The rage in me ebbed and a wave of exhaustion washed over me. I collapsed onto my bed and slept.

I woke feeling empty again. I pulled myself off the bed, checked the alarm clock and decided to go to the library for a book. Maybe drowning in some fictional character’s problems would make me forget my own. I simply love the smell of old paper in a book, turning the pages to discover what happens to the heroine and what danger she faces. With a giant smile on my face, I walked to the library. It surprised me how happy I was about my book idea and how lovely it was outside. There was a light breeze and the sun broke through the clouds offering a nice relief from the steady rain of the last week.

I had planned to look for a book in Science fiction, my all-time favourite genre, but I found myself wandering to the self-help section instead. In the middle of the section, I heard chanting. Looking around, I realized that no one else had heard the voices I did. As I moved about, I heard the voices getting louder—pounding on my head. That’s when I saw it, the black book sitting in the middle of the Freud books. It was warm to the touch, like it had been held by someone for a while. The gold letterings of its title had completely faded. I felt peace holding it; as it had always been mine. I had no idea what the book was but I didn’t care, I wanted it. Against all reason, I never bothered to open it there. I hugged the book tightly and proceeded to the checkout desk. All thoughts of getting a good fiction book or even a self-help book, were completely and utterly gone. All my thoughts were on this worn-down black leather book and getting it privacy of my home—there to uncover its secrets. The clerk stared at me as I tried to check the book out. She looked frazzled.

“Is this some kind of joke?” she inquired.

“How do you mean?” I asked stunned. “I want to check this book out.”

“There’s no barcode on this book, and it clearly has your name written in ink on the front page. If you think pretending your own abused and mistreated books belong to us is funny, then you are sadly mistaken. Please take your book and stop wasting my time.” By this time everyone was staring at me. I took the book from her hands and started backing away from the desk. I felt my cheeks burning from the embarrassing turn of events. Fleeing the library, I didn’t dare stop until the door to my house was safely shut and locked with me and my new book inside.

Sitting in my favourite armchair I opened my new book and what I saw had me gasp. The book fell to the floor open to the first page, which plain as day, had my name written in it. The handwriting looked old, as old as the book itself. No wonder why the librarian thought I was trying to pull one over on her; it really looked like the book belonged to me. But how could that be? I’d never seen it in my life. Reason kicked in. “Clearly the book must have belonged to one of your ancestors and was donated to the library,” I thought to myself. With that more comforting thought I allowed myself to calm down with a nice cup of tea.

In the kitchen with some tea and biscuits on a tray, I resumed pursing the book. There was no official name of the book. The title page seemed to have been ripped out. The table of contents had headings like, The Rule of Threefold, Powers of the Equinox, Vengeance and other strange titles. I couldn’t believe it was a book of a magic. What was a book like this doing in the library with my name on it? The entire situation was surreal. Yet, I couldn’t believe my luck; it was as if providence had just handed me the solution to all my problems. I opened the book to vengeance without really meaning to and could almost hear the book talking to me. That’s silly I tried to reason with myself, books can’t talk—get a grip. Freaked out, I set the book down and decided to make myself food. The entire time I was in the kitchen, I could hear vengeance, vengeance, vengeance. I was so distracted that I couldn’t manage to boil water properly. In the end I made a sandwich and salad.

When I was completely finished with food and washing up, I went back into the other room and screamed. The book was open to the chapter on vengeance. Holy crow! I know I closed that book. Obviously, I’m having some kind of nervous breakdown. I laughed a creepy laugh out loud. Yep that’s right, I’m going completely and utterly bonkers. Ignoring my better judgment, I picked the book back up and sat down reading the chapter on vengeance.

At some point I must have fallen asleep, but when I woke, I had only one thought… using a spell. The thought seemed to pound into my skull like a heartbeat and I just had to use a spell. The book was in my hands before any conscious thought and conventionally opened to a section on intending harm to others.

Repeat this spell three times, envisioning what harm you would like to befall your intended target:
I say these words through malice and hate,
Invoking harm and a twist of fate.
Make my target before me lie,
And suffer the vision I have on them in my mind’s eye.
I don’t know if I realized I had repeated it out loud until I felt a warm breeze surrounding me and I knew at that very moment Miserable Bastard had broken his arm from a wild pitch at the baseball game he was attending. I knew it because I had seen it happen—I made it happen.

Obsession

Things were falling into place. I was skipping down the street to pick up eggs. I was feeling better and better every day the last few months. And I was on my way home from the store with eggs in my hand, practicing my new spell that I wrote.
I say this spell in the name of anger
Let my Ex come into financial danger.
Let him lose all he owns
And reap the consequence of what he’s sown.
As I said it I saw in my mind’s eye, bills upon bills stacked and unpaid; his condo foreclosed on. The miserable bastard, was exactly that, miserable and I was elated.

I was making this all happen. I had power again, I had it all and was making him suffer. Everything felt wonderful.

The Threefold Rule

Black is my soul on these endless nights. Black is the turmoil that I’ve inflicted. Black is the curse which I invoked. Every angry thought I had, every dark joy I took in watching my Ex become a victim of my rage—it all came back to me times three. It consumed me until nothing human was left, and I am just a black shadow. So with these final words I will impart, a warning for others with malice in their heart:
From the fires of hell is sent
I am the nightmare born of malice intent
If ye seek vengeance on another’s life
Ponder my tale of strife
Ask this question before it’s too late,
When tangling with dark forces, are you Tempting Fate?

Story by Ravens

Pet Treasure

Pet Friends