Don’t Tempt Fate
by Holly Jewitt Maurice
The mirror lies splintered on the floor, curving in thick, uneasy spires, and flashing white where it lays indented into Dalia’s palm. Blood oozes round the shards like a mountain brook, ducking, and swerving past graying stone, to freefall from the cliff of a dainty nail.
Outside, a lone magpie lies twitching with the edges of death against the lawn. Its wings are spread wide beside it, snowy white washed red by the crimson dawn that sets the clouds alight. They roll across the sky in burning orange, and a scarlet so deep it could have been pricked from Dalia’s still-dripping wound. Behind them, they drag the weight of thunder, thick, and warm and cloying in the morning air.
‘Beware the hollow knocking wood,’
With trembling hands, Dalia plucks at the glass shards with white-tipped fingers. The blood stains their silver faces and thuds in ugly splatters across the oak beam floor. She feels no pain, but as she grips the hilt of the final splinter, the pale face of a wounded child blinks back at her—eyes placid and calm, while locks of black hair stick to her cheeks with blood and tears.
In another lifetime, she knew the secrets of those cold, blue eyes. In this one, she is just a dream, dissolving into nothing behind the red. She watches as the looking glass shatters against the floor, glittering in silver rainfall like the tears trapped behind those eyes.
‘That sounds at chime of bell.’
Overhead the skies have grown dark, pulsating in a steady stillness that beckons the other worlds. Dalia can feel the viscosity through the double glazing, stirring the trees with its palpable ooze, and rolling the air thin. It’s almost as though the very atmosphere has been sucked out through a straw, leaving nothing but tight, static air that fizzes in the lungs.
Beside the mantle, the horse shoes shiver against the walls, prying themselves from the plaster, and dropping to the floor. Each lands with its feet carving holes into the oak boards, tipping their luck to the underworld, as the tendrils of Kolera creep through the floor and spread the stench of rot.
‘For fates have not fingers to knock–‘
Thick black fissures erupt across the white plaster of the ceiling, slithering with all the brilliant opal of a snake’s beaded back. Slowly they coil around the room, seeping like ink into the midnight-still air, until they’re choking on their own tails and fleeing to the darkness.
The rot of death has burned the floorboards their own shade of silent jet; still cold and creaking underfoot, but melded by the naked eye into simple space. An infinite night pricked faintly with the still fading shades of the magpie’s white wings and Dalia’s own scarlet blood. They melt slowly, like wax tears slipping down a candle's side.
‘And entry may lead to hell.’
With an odd clang, the tune of Dalia’s old grandfather clock echoes through the darkness. The sound seems almost split in half, caught between two worlds as twin chimes flirt cruelly with one another, whispering secrets across the spirit bridge. In the silence, the bell sounds thirteen.
The last chime clings to the still air, pulsing through the darkness in rippling echoes, and spinning the melted colors. Like a web, they twist together, melding obscenely into a viscous brown, and wilting with every breath. It builds like a tumor, spreading from the center, and pushing outwards, pulling at the rotten floor for purchase. It flickers once, slowly creeping into solidity beside Dalia, before stretching tall and long into the black.
A door.
Silence stills the air once more before a knock sends the colors spinning like mist. The sound is like water vapor, thin and without form against the dark-striped Birch wood, fizzling like a match to water as it meets the air.
With careful fingers, Dalia twists the doorknob gently, smearing a trail of crimson against the shiny brass before pushing the door open. It groans on its hinges as they fray beneath its weight, and swings slowly into the abyss.
“Hello Dalia.”
The cadence is strange, as though each word is spoken between twin lips trapped in liminal space.
Beneath the frame, the midnight shudders, prying apart its bones as an ivory figure forces its way through. She smiles wickedly, pearl teeth against skin so white it looks as though it might carry death's kiss.
“I am Laima, Goddess of Fate. Why have you tempted me here today?”
Dalia stands tall and unblinking in the face of those milky eyes, tracing with amusement the matching smirk that twists itself through her own lips.
“There’s no need for such formality, sister,” the words ring among the empty space like a curse. “I have summoned you here because I need your help.”
At that, Laima’s features contort to those of vicious glee. “Very well sister, but you know my price.”
Dalia does, and with a face as hard as Baltic stone, she offers forth the palm of her still dripping hand. The bleeding has slowed by now, but fresh scarlet still springs from the open wounds and dissolves into darkness at her hand's edge.
“Ten years of my life.”
The words ripple like a stone casting waves about the water's edge. Laima simply nods, folding her dove white hands over the crimson to still the stream.
“If that is what you wish, my Dalia, it shall be done.”
Holly Jewitt Maurice (she/her) is a 20-year-old author from England. She has been writing from a young age and recently started competing in poetry and prose competitions; with her piece “The Rotting Oak” being shortlisted under the Nottingham Young Creative awards. Most recently, Holly has made her academic debut with her article on geographies of hope—as seen through the growth of chicken rescue organisations working with the commercial laying industry. This piece is set to be published in the Cambridge University magazine, Compass, in the new year. “Don’t Temp fate” will mark Holly’s first flash fiction publication in a literary journal; a trend which she hopes to continue in the new year.