Cursed (1003 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 0.3 on 57 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by JesterLilt (View user info) at 2008-05-25 16:44:43 EDT
Scarlet crouched over a crystalline pool examining her reflection. A spattering of frost powdered the ground beneath her. Leafless trees and an ominous grey sky created a stark backdrop to her soft features. A deep sadness resided in her gaze. Although young she carried the experience and turmoil of many years. Despite her unblemished smooth skin, full lips and soft smile, her eyes deceived her youth. At her neck a green emerald encased in white gold cast a soft glow on her flesh. Subdued in the crisp winter air she recounted the memory of the emerald.
*
The emerald had been given to her when she was twelve. It had come to her from her grandmother. Her grandmother had lived far way from civilisation, tucked up in the hills, rarely visiting any town. Scarlet remembered she had been visiting her as she often did on a summer's day to help with chores.
On one particular day, she had been playing by a small waterfall she found in the hills. She enjoyed throwing stones at the groups of fish which used to frolic in the quieter areas of the pool beneath the fall. The fish would flee in panic, their iridescent kaleidoscopic scales shimmering in the clear waters as the rocks penetrated their tranquil home.
The sun beat down overhead and Scarlet was hot from a busy morning working. She stripped off down to her underwear jumping in to the clear refreshing water. Happily she splashed about cooling herself down from the mid afternoon heat. Moving towards the waterfall she discovered a large cavity behind. Curious, she ducked her head into the cold stream of fast flowing water; she held her breath and moved behind the waterfall.
Green lichen enveloped the walls. Light from the waterfall cast intricate patterns making it difficult to ascertain the dimensions of the area. Scarlet's fingers slipped over the rock surface as the attempted to stay upright in the water. To the rear of the small chasm she noticed a cave disappearing into the rock face. Pulling with her arms across the slippery rock surface she managed to get up onto the ledge. Gingerly she approached the cave entrance.
Suddenly her knees and hands lost friction and she began to slide. She grasped for the walls spaying her limbs to try and steady herself and control her approach towards the cave entrance. It was to no avail as she accelerated. A scream escaped her lips as the darkness and panic enveloped her.
Once through the cave entrance she felt herself falling. The darkness shrouded her mind, her scream was muted in her throat and her limbs paralysed. The feeling of descent dissipated replaced with weightlessness as if hung timeless in an inky vortex. The tendrils of a voice crept into her consciousness,
Scarlet death bringer, locust, devourer, desecrator of the land.
You will bring death to all that cross you.
The land will turn rotten where you tread.
The air will be poisoned, putrid and rancid.
Where you go, only terror will follow.
Demons you will never be rid.
You are cursed.
The darkness cleared replaced by a grey mist. Scarlet saw her Grandmother bending over her holding the precious emerald encased in white gold she had admired lovingly around her grandmother's neck. Her grandmother kneeled down next to her, bending to lay a kiss softly on her cheek. She placed the emerald necklace around Scarlet's neck and whispered, "Now the curse is yours to carry my sweet. I regret it is you should bear it but alas I do not make these choices. I would have warned you of the waterfall but in this matter the demons forebode me to speak. You cannot end your life, you must bear this burden and for that I am sorry. You will never have love and all that makes you happy will wither before you. I wish you luck but I am afraid it will do you no good." Scarlet fell into a deep slumber lasting many days.
When she awoke she decided the ordeal had been a nightmare. That she must have come down with an ailment affecting her mind. She pulled back the bedclothes and padded softly through to her Grandmother's living area. Her Grandmother sat with her back to her.
"Grandmother, are you awake?" Scarlet asked hesitantly.
No answer came. Scarlet moved to where her Grandmother sat, stepping in front of her so that she might acknowledge her presence. Scarlet fell to the floor, doubled up, vomiting onto her Grandmother's finely woven rug. Her Grandmother sat mottled in her armchair. Maggots wept from her eye sockets. The flesh contorted and bloated around her weathered old face. A stagnant pool of effluent gathered on the floor where her tissues had decomposed.
*
Scarlet shook the memory from her mind and pulled her fur lined hood over her head. She moved back towards the trodden path etched through the woods. Her horse was tethered to a tree. She loosed his bridle and nimbly mounted him, ready to continue her journey. Her grandmother's memory was nothing compared to the suffering which had followed her since that fateful moment at the waterfall.
"I shall never return here," she whispered quietly to her horse Shade. He was a charcoal colour with jet black mane and tail. A strong lithe beast, he carried himself with a gait of elegance.
She turned for one last look at what she left in her wake. Many miles on the horizon, beyond the wood in which she now sat a blaze illuminated the skyline contrasted by a seething black sky above. Flecks of burning ash rained down on the land around. Although inaudible the breeze carried the screams of pain and a town wrought with utter devastation.
A tear, black as the ashen sky beyond welled in the corner of Scarlet's eye before overflowing to roll down her pale cheek. She caught it on her fingertip before it fell. She glanced at it before flicking her finger towards the ground. Where the tear settled and dispersed into the land a sinew of black tendrils interlaced the earth beneath, cracking, pulling the nutrients and goodness from the soil.
Scarlet sniffed. What are you inside me? Why, wherever you take me does death follow? The more life you take, the stronger I am but I am empty now, all I've cared for, you have taken from me.
Oblivious, her fingertips gently caressed the green stone. She draped herself across Shade's back gripping him with both arms around his neck. His bridle hung loose, her eyes closed as he carried her away.
User Reviews
Submitted by psikosismc (user info) at 2008-10-11 14:59:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
No Comment
Submitted by devildog (user info) at 2008-09-04 15:24:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
No Comment
Submitted by Naplander (user info) at 2008-08-30 14:50:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
No Comment
Submitted by bubba69 (user info) at 2008-08-24 15:51:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
No Comment
Submitted by spidy (user info) at 2008-08-18 15:47:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Linus is a jerk
Submitted by Linus (user info) at 2008-08-18 15:20:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
+2 BOOM -- Dunno how much this is gonna do since I've +2d most of your posts anyway =P
Submitted by JohnnyACDC (user info) at 2008-08-12 07:29:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Simon says.......
Submitted by myshit (user info) at 2008-07-23 04:19:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
not so much
Submitted by monkeyswithguns (user info) at 2008-05-29 08:28:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by orphelia (user info) at 2008-05-28 15:25:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
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Submitted by HurtByTheSun (user info) at 2008-05-25 23:41:06 BST (#)
Ranking: 2
The comments on this are hilarious.
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Erm, no.
Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2008-05-28 13:21:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Submitted by orph (user info) at 2008-05-28 09:28:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-28 09:16:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I really hadn't thought about any of that until you asked me. Good thing you did, next time I write something I'll think of all the different ways I can get tripped up and try and compensate / explain them.
Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-05-28 08:21:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Oh yeah. Cool.
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-28 07:40:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-05-27 16:32:58 BST (#)
Ranking: 2
Hmmm. I am just about prepared to accept your demon-horse thing but now answer me this:
If the granny was originally cursed, then why didn't the little girl die as soon as she went to stay at her granny's house? Surely the gran had the same curse, meaning that all whom she loved would perish. And I'm assuming she loved her grand-daughter?
I'm only nit-picking because I liked it so much, you know :o)
=========================
Because she's been chosen. If I'd gone back in time you'd find out that she was the only person allowed to go up and see her granny. She was the only piece of joy in her granny's life. The little girl's parents were long dead. Granny knows the little girl has been chosen
Submitted by Lib (user info) at 2008-05-27 13:18:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-05-27 11:32:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Hmmm. I am just about prepared to accept your demon-horse thing but now answer me this:
If the granny was originally cursed, then why didn't the little girl die as soon as she went to stay at her granny's house? Surely the gran had the same curse, meaning that all whom she loved would perish. And I'm assuming she loved her grand-daughter?
I'm only nit-picking because I liked it so much, you know :o)
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-27 11:08:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Probably should explain the horse. I need to make this longer don't I?
I had been hoping to leave it to your own imaginations but here goes filling in the gaps.
She's cursed, everything she touches dies so I guess she can never love, never have friends or live near anybody. Her granny lived by herself and died when the curse was lifted, the girl's fate will be the same. She didn't ask for it, it happened when she was a child. There is good left in her but everytime something bad happens it eats away. The curse makes her strong but she is empty inside.
The horse is no ordinary horse. The horse is a vehicle, transporting her from one site of destruction to the next. The horse is under some kind of hideous demonic control and is bound to her through the curse. Her draping herself across the horse in the end was sort of supposed to symbolise her not having the strength to fight, that she's doomed to her fate.
It was all very sad in my head.
Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:53:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
What's the story Banjo? Does she hate the horse? Or is it cursed too?
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:49:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:49:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
oops, meant to +2, sorry bout that.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:49:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
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Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:05:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Cool. But wouldn't the horse die too?
i thought that too since she showed the beast love.
Submitted by centaur (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:29:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Kin ace picture.
Submitted by F.J.Bell (user info) at 2008-05-27 09:05:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Cool. But wouldn't the horse die too?
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2008-05-26 18:44:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-26 07:16:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I've got a thing about short to the point sentences. It comes with the job I work in. No flowering up the sentences and no bullshit. Its difficult to get out of as long sentences in my 8 hr a day world usually mean you don't know what the fuck you're on about and you're waffling.
Submitted by supadupapupa (user info) at 2008-05-25 23:00:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
It wasn't bad, please use longer sentences next time... it. felt. so. stacatto. the. entire. time.
Submitted by Director (user info) at 2008-05-25 21:31:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
This was ok, and I'd still fuck you in the mouth.
Submitted by X54 (user info) at 2008-05-25 20:20:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I think this would have read better with fewer adjectives and adverbs. Also, is that really the correct usage of the word, "deceived?"
I liked the setup, though. Made me want to find out what what happened to her.
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 19:38:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Obviously no one knows who is or isn't acting like themselves in daily life. Some people just come off as genuine to me I guess.
Submitted by Linus (user info) at 2008-05-25 19:20:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Define "be real".
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 19:17:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I am glad to see that there has been a little reconciliation. It's really easy to be an insulting asshole where you are anonymous, but the people who try to be real are what makes this site good... plus I like girls kissing each other. So here's to you two.
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-25 19:04:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
PD - hahahahaha, nice try
Submitted by HurtByTheSun (user info) at 2008-05-25 18:41:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
The comments on this are hilarious.
Submitted by Ltap (user info) at 2008-05-25 18:00:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:56:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
hahahaha fuck, it didn't work
we're anorexic
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:55:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
----------------------.---. .---.
---------------------.' / )))^^\\ ) THE BEST PART ABOUT TWO
------------------- (> (( - - ) ) GIRLS KISSING IS THAT
--------------------[_3 ) < (( ) THEY CAN'T TALK IN
------------------ __(/ _ >__) ( ) THE MEANTIME
-------------------/ \ ( ) )
------------------/ .V (\ \( ( ( (\
-----------------/ / ( .) .) \ \)/ \ ) \
--------------,--.\_/ / \ / / `.__
-------------/ \.'\ - \__ / /._/ `''-.
------------/ .^ "/## .' \/ / \ \ `. .-
-----------/ / \ {i}( / / \__>\ c ## \.' \
----------/ .' \___.-._>._/ /\ `. #\\ \ / `""`-..._-._
------_.-' / __/ / \n- '-.____\ /_______________>
--___/ //_.' `./ 3 \ /
( /' `--'
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:48:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
This is nice. Now let me see you two kiss to make it complete.
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:47:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Good.
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:47:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Appreciated and maybe next time I'll write about a 'likeable' character.
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:45:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
*taps nose*
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:44:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Oh now do tell who your intended person was...
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:43:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
hey banjo. here's a truce +2 for your post.
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:41:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
sigh. i can't resist pukingdog's peacemaking efforts.
i wasn't trying to pander to anyone. if you'll read my response to zebra, who is one of the few people on this site to actually offer everyone legitimate writing criticism, it explains why i wrote that. i also intended that piece for one person, so the auto-poetry -2s i didn't care anything about.
if your characters were more likeable, this wouldn't be as meh. every character has to have something you like about them, even villains, if you're to care what happens to them.
just my opinion.
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:33:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Sweet. Well, I am just happy someone still wants to try to write fiction sometimes, whether it be a peachy poem or an underdeveloped story. I see too many dumbass posts I guess. And I liked the peachy poem. Y'all don't fight.
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:31:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Fair enough. A sort of dark childish fairytale waswhat I was going for experima. If that's what you thought of it then job done.
I -2d your peaches post because I find it distasteful when a pretty girl who can obviously write panders to the UberJocks and churns out brain rot. You also can do much better.
Now for goodness sake, can this not stop? I've taken note you're not really a heinous bitch and I think you know by now that neither am I.
I never played with dolls... but I did like fairytales.
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:22:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
i love linus and puking dog. i love them so hard.
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:20:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
i'm not hiding any shitty remark. i'm blasting them all over the front page inn'i? you just admitted to retaliating? that's stupid.
i honestly think this is underdeveloped (as was my peach faggotry) and it is really weakly thought out. is it a fairytale? is it a fantasy? it's just girly silliness with no character development.
you won't suffer me too long, dearie, i've a museum members opening to attend soon.
Submitted by Linus (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:17:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Don't worry; I love both of you.
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:15:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
PD, its old and a bit infuriating actually. Experima and I don't seem to get along and every now and then a bitch war ensues. A tactically placed -2, a hidden bitchy comment, turning a post into a mire of rotten remarks and worthless insults.
-2 my last post so I -2 her peaches post
She drops a hidden shitty remark
She -2s this post
I bite
I probably shouldn't have but hey, I'm sure it will brighten up her and my evening hurling some abuse at somebody we don't know for a few hours. If that's the way she wants to play.
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:09:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
says the woman who made sure she got hers in on mine.
it is old. especially since all i've ever said to you is "what do you know about america?" and you've called me a cunt, a twat, etc. etc. etc., whilst ignoring people who are far more insulting and horrible to you.
don't know why you zeroed in on me, but you did...and honestly, this read as if a 12-yr-old was playing with toy horses and brushing her doll's hair, with all the shadow and scarlet and grandmothers.
i've seen better...from you.
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:07:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
What the fuck just happened here?
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-25 17:05:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Fuck off back at you. If you want to play the -2 game, I'm more than happy to oblige but for goodness sake isn't it getting a bit old now?
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 16:59:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
fuck off, banjo.
Submitted by Banjo (user info) at 2008-05-25 16:58:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
You can't help yourself can you? Are you bleating for round 2? I can't really be bothered with you so fly away and suck on your peaches won't you.
Submitted by experima (user info) at 2008-05-25 16:55:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
"minus two," i whispered
Submitted by PukingDog (user info) at 2008-05-25 16:52:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Some good parts... I like the effort too.