Category: Horror

The old bookstore reeked of dust and something sickly sweet. Oliver ran his fingers over the spines, searching for something rare, something valuable. In the corner, a lone book sat open on a table, its pages curling at the edges as if recently touched. The ink shimmered under the dim light, words shifting slightly when he blinked.

A thrill ran through him. If it was unknown, it was priceless. But the shopkeeper, watching from the shadows, shook his head almost imperceptibly.

Oliver hesitated. Hadn’t he read about cursed texts before? He gritted his teeth. Superstition never made anyone rich. He folded the book shut and tucked it under his coat.

The bell above the door chimed, unnaturally hollow. Outside, the city looked wrong—buildings slumped like melted wax, streetlights pulsed like breathing ribs. A whisper curled in his ear, the same shifting words from the page.

Oliver turned back, but the door was gone, swallowed by the hungry ink spreading over his hands.

Elise found the antique mirror in the attic of her new home, its glass clouded but the frame exquisite. She polished it obsessively, revealing her reflection in sharper detail each day. Strangely, dust settled on everything else—never the mirror.

One night, she saw movement in the glass. Just a trick of the dim light, she told herself, but when she turned, her reflection did not. A tightness gripped her chest, but fascination outweighed fear.

A whisper in the warped wood beneath her feet, a breath of icy air on her neck—she hesitated. Something was wrong. And yet, her image in the mirror looked… perfected. Unblemished, radiant. More her than she was.

Elise reached out. The glass swallowed her fingers like warm water. A moment of panic—then euphoria. She belonged here.

The image in the real world grinned. Elise pounded on the glass, breath fogging from the other side. The reflection turned away. Elise screamed, unheard. Forever trapped.

The old bookstore smelled of dust and leather, a scent Edwin relished. He prided himself on finding rare editions no one else could. Tonight, in the dim light, he traced shaking fingers over a weathered tome locked behind glass. The clerk, a skeletal man with ink-stained hands, watched him with something like pity.

“No one reads that one aloud,” the man murmured, but Edwin hardly listened. He had spent a fortune acquiring lesser works—what would it mean to read lines no one else dared?

Later, in his candlelit study, he hesitated, the skin between his fingers prickling. The book’s cracked spine yawned as he opened it. He spoke the first line in a whisper. Then another.

At first, silence. Relief curled in his chest like warm smoke. But the air shifted. A breath that wasn’t his sighed from the pages. Cold fingers brushed his throat. He tried to close the book, but unseen hands pried it wider. His mouth moved against his will, voice stolen. The words would not stop.

Jonas traced the jagged tree carvings with trembling fingers. A crude spiral, its lines uneven, deeper in some places as if whoever made it had carved in a frenzy. The woods were heavy with the scent of damp earth, the air thick and unmoving.

He had heard the stories—the ones about the disappearances—but Jonas didn’t believe in curses. He only believed in the promise of hidden things, rare finds, the kind that collectors paid fortunes for. And deep in the hollow of the old oak, something gleamed.

A voice in the wind rasped through the trees, almost forming words. His stomach coiled, but he reached in anyway. Metal, cool and pulsing against his palm, slid free. Silence followed.

Then, a sound—deep, wet breaths behind him. He whirled, the carvings now twisting, pulsing like wounds. Something loomed, its body wrong, its mouth too wide. Jonas gasped. The object in his hand was gone, as if it had never been.

Darkness swallowed him. The woods remained silent.

The cabin smelled of damp wood and something faintly metallic. Leon ran a hand over the antique desk, his fingers catching on an etching in the grain—an uneven spiral, carved deep. His stomach tightened, but he shook off the feeling. The estate sale had been a steal, and he wouldn’t let himself get spooked over some scratches.

That night, as wind pressed against the windows, he heard it—the scrape of metal on wood. He turned in bed, pulse quickening. Just the house settling, he told himself. Still, curiosity gnawed at him. He crept to the desk and found the spiral had deepened, fresh shavings curling in the dim light. His breath hitched, sweat cooling on his skin.

Something shifted in the shadows behind him, and suddenly, the smell of rust was overwhelming. A whisper, dry as dead leaves, slithered into his ear.

“Mine now.”

The floor opened beneath him, and the darkness swallowed him whole.

Avery’s fingers trembled as they shoved the rusted padlock open. The antique shop basement smelled of dust and something rancid, but all she saw was the glint of silver. The mirror had been locked away, its surface cloudy, shapes shifting in ways the dim light couldn’t explain.

She hesitated. The old man upstairs, his one good eye darting toward the floorboards, hadn’t met her gaze when she’d asked about it. His shaking hands had made no effort to name a price. She should have left it alone.

But it was valuable—too valuable to pass up.

Avery wiped the glass with her sleeve. Her reflection cleared but didn’t quite match her movements. Her breath hitched. She stepped back. A sigh, not hers, echoed softly.

Then the mirror-hand shot forward, gripping her wrist. Cold, damp fingers dug into her skin. Avery tried to scream, but it pulled—pulled until the shop basement was gone.

The old man never heard a sound. Only glass settling into stillness.

The antique shop smelled of dust and aging wood, but Isaac smelled something else—the sharp tang of old blood. He ignored it. His collection needed one last piece, and the ivory-handled razor gleamed beneath the glass. The shopkeeper’s fingers lingered too long when handing it over, his gaze resting on Isaac’s own reflection in the blade.

That night, Isaac admired himself in the mirror, tilting the razor back and forth. He had always prided himself on his face—the sharp angles, the smooth skin. A perfect shave mattered.

He lathered up, pressed the blade to his throat. A flicker of movement behind him. His pulse quickened, but when he turned, nothing. Just his reflection, watching.

The first pass was smooth. Relief bloomed. Then, another shimmer—his reflection did not stop shaving when he did. Instead, it grinned, and the razor in the glass sank deep.

Hot blood spilled down Isaac’s throat as steel met flesh—on the wrong side of the mirror.

The air inside the abandoned greenhouse was thick with the scent of rotting orchids. Samuel wiped his brow, greedily eyeing the heavy porcelain pot resting on the pedestal. He had heard stories—whispers that things left there should remain untouched—but the pot was old, valuable. Meant for him.

As he reached out, a cicada buzzed loudly from the rafters, its droning cry pressing into his skull. His fingers hovered over the cracked surface. He hesitated. His mind flickered back to the neighbor’s dog, how it had stopped at the threshold, tail between its legs. But rare antiques meant big money.

Lifting the pot, he sighed in relief—nothing happened.

Then his hands burned. No—moved. The porcelain pulsed, cold and wet, as fingers, impossibly long, curled over his wrists. The pot split like flesh, revealing a black, gaping mouth. A wet, sucking noise filled the room.

Samuel tried to scream. Instead, the pot swallowed him whole.

The antique shop smelled of damp wood and moth-eaten fabric, a scent Joseph found oddly intoxicating. His hand lingered on a tarnished music box. The shopkeeper, a pale old man with eyes like cloudy marbles, didn’t stop Joseph from turning the rusty crank, but his throat rasped out an odd wheezing cough as if it pained him to watch. The box played a dissonant melody, notes struggling to stay in tune, and beneath it, faintly, came the sound of children’s laughter.

Joseph hesitated, but no one else seemed to hear it. Greed swirled in his chest. The old man had priced the box absurdly low; it’d fetch triple online. Driven by visions of easy cash, he ignored the laughter and took it.

At home, Joseph polished it, imagining potential buyers, oblivious to the way the laughter was louder now, giggles tickling the edge of his awareness. Each crank of the handle made the children’s voices sharper, closer.

Relief came when he shut the lid after one last turn; silence descended like a blessing. Then, impossibly, the lid unlatched itself. Tiny hands, cracked and gray, clawed their way out, accompanied by sticky, sweet-smelling decay.

The laughter erupted, high-pitched and deafening, as darkness spilled over him.

The antique shop smelled of rot masked with lemon oil, but Daniel didn’t care. He eyed the ornate pocket watch under the glass counter, its brass casing etched with hauntingly intricate raven feathers. He wanted it—needed it. Curiosity about its rumored curse wasn’t enough to deter him. Let the others fear silly superstitions. To him, it was treasure, a thing of beauty, and surely, profit.

As he handed over the cash, the shopkeeper’s fingers lingered on his, cold as a tombstone. “It binds,” she whispered, voice like wind slipping through cracked windows. Daniel barely noticed. Greed gnawed at him like hunger, as always.

At home, the setting shifted—his apartment seemed darker, shadows clinging too long to corners. The watch, warm in his hand now, ticked unnaturally loud. For all its beauty, its sound unsettled him, a rhythm like a heartbeat sinking into his core.

For a moment, he almost shoved it into the drawer. But the thought of its value stopped him. What was fear compared to fortune? He smiled and relaxed.

Until the ticking stopped.

The silence roared. Then came the scraping, slow and deliberate, from inside the walls—metal against plaster, claw-like. A fetid gust of decay filled the room. He turned, frantically searching. That’s when he saw them: the shadows shifting, the faint outline of ravens staring with eyes like molten brass.

Daniel tried to scream, but his voice was stolen, just as the ticking began anew—in his chest.