The crack of thunder rolled through the alleys of Carter’s Hollow, and rain lashed against the windowpanes, each droplet a drumbeat in the discordant symphony of a night soaked in dread. I’d hunkered down in my old study, the scattered remnants of my life littered about me. Shelves packed tightly with books loomed like silent sentinels, their spines dusty and worn, morose guardians of forgotten knowledge. I had lived here my entire life, nestled deep in a city that felt like a living entity—a monstrous thing breathing its rancid breath over the rooftops and beckoning all manner of shadows to dance in the corners of my mind.
It was during one of those relentless storms that I stumbled upon it—the book. I’d been reorganizing my collection, a futile attempt to wrangle some semblance of order out of the chaos my existence had devolved into. The spine was cracked and worn, and its cover was a mottled shade of brown that made it seem like it had been unearthed from a bog rather than pulled off a shelf. The words “The Grimoire of Forgotten Sorrows” were embossed in faded gold, puzzlingly inviting amid the bleakness of rainy nights.
I should have known better than to indulge my curiosity. I should have chosen to shove it back onto the shelf and forget about it, just as I had forgotten the dreams I once chased, the friends I once had. But the city… it had a way of whispering sweet nothings just before vomiting forth its nightmares. The rusted pipes and creaking timbers of my home echoed with each clap of thunder, and as the wind howled through the cracks in the old house, the book seemed to hum, resonating with a promise that pulled at my soul.
The first few pages were banal, recounting sorrows lost to time: tales of love gone awry, of families torn asunder by the weight of grief, of tragedies born not from malevolence but from mundane choices. I found myself entranced, the ink flowing like blood upon the paper, vivid and alive. The prose was dense, almost intoxicating, and the words clawed at my mind, forcing me to linger longer than I should have. Memories long buried—of my parents’ arguments, of watching my neighbors decay into ghosts of their former selves—flooded back, vivid and painful.
It was on the fourth night, with the wind shrieking and the walls creaking as if alive, that I discovered the true nature of the book. That night, as I flipped through a passage shrouded in darkness—a passage that spoke of a ritual conducted beneath the blood-red moon—I could feel the air thrum with something electric. Shadows twisted, elongating as if pulled by an unseen hand. I barely noticed the time slipping away until the clock struck twelve, sending the world outside into a frenzied chaos as lightning illuminated the darkness, revealing faces that were not there moments before.
You see, I had never ventured far from Carter’s Hollow. It was my haven, yet also a prison—a labyrinth of familiarity tinged with decay. I knew every corner, every rat-infested alley where weeds clawed up through the cracks in the concrete. The book promised an escape, or perhaps a way to unleash the very darkness that lived and thrived in my city, or worse, within me.
The words began to take root in my mind. The more I read, the more I was compelled to act. The ritual, described in ornate detail, called for an offering—a sacrifice to summon forth the sorrows of the city. My heart raced against the backdrop of rain and thunder, and doubt crept in like a thief in the night. Yet, with the storm raging outside, those doubts felt insignificant.
Driven by an inexplicable force, I gathered objects from my home: the old porcelain doll my sister had loved before she vanished into the abyss of addiction, the rusted blade my father had used to carve his last masterpiece, all poignant symbols of loss and decay. The book guided my hands, whispering to me in a voice that felt like a caress but resonated with sinister intent.
I set the altar in the center of my study, the ruined furniture pushed aside to make way for the grim spectacle. With candles flickering, casting jagged shadows that danced like specters alive, I sliced my palm open with the blade, letting blood drip onto the offerings. The air turned heavy, thickening into a tangible cloak of dread that pressed against the walls, threatening to crush the very bones of my house.
A chill swept through the room, an icy hand closing around my throat as I began to recite the incantation.
The moment I spoke the final word, everything changed. A cacophony of screams flooded the air, rising from the depths of my city. The cries of the lost—those who had slipped through the cracks, those who had thrived in the shadows of despair—echoed in fury and grief, swirling around me. I staggered back, the weight of their sorrow crashing over me like relentless waves.
The book had opened a door, and it was not just my anguish that had been summoned but something far darker. The shadows in the corners of the room stretched and writhed, unfurling into shapes that morphed and twisted, taking forms I could scarcely comprehend. Figures with faces washed in grief and despair slithered through the air, clawing at my sanity and whispering secrets of the city’s forgotten histories, dark secrets I had no desire to know.
In that moment of horror, the realization struck me: I had awakened something that could not be controlled—a tide of anguish that wished to consume not only me but the very city I had called home. The air crackled with energy, and I felt the room around me grow alive, morphing into a grotesque mirror of Carter’s Hollow—a place where sorrow and vengeance intertwined, binding the living to the dead.
As I staggered backward, the book, now slick with an otherworldly essence, fluttered open to a new page, its words transforming into a new incantation, a desperate desire for revenge. It was no longer just a tome of forgotten sorrows; it had morphed into a curse, a harbinger of destruction.
I flung it against the wall, but it bounced back, seeming to taunt me with each swell of sorrow that enveloped the room. Shadows slithered closer, the air thickening with despair. The sounds outside, usually muted and familiar, had morphed into a horrid cacophony—screams of the damned that had once been lost to the night, now rising in a vengeful crescendo.
My house became a prison, and as the thunder roared its approval, I knew I was trapped in a nightmare woven from the very fabric of my city’s dark heart. The book had wrung free the past, and as old wounds bled over anew, I realized I had unleashed forces I could never hope to contain. As the shadows engulfed me, swallowing my screams, I could hear the echoes of the city rejoicing—a thirst for vengeance fulfilled. Carter’s Hollow would never let me go.
I had thought I was merely seeking answers but instead had ignited a relentless hunger within the depths of despair, forever binding me to a legacy of horror. My home was now a breeding ground for anguish, a place where the ghosts of the past whispered my name, and I was left to wonder if I had ever truly belonged to this city or if it had consumed me whole long ago, waiting for the right moment to awaken its darkness from the pages of a cursed tome.
Author: Opney. Illustrator: Stab. Publisher: Cyber.
