The Shattered Vessel

Mara and I had been friends since we were kids, but it wasn’t until that summer in the abandoned farmhouse that we truly tested the limits of our bond. We’d found an old spirit board in the attic, its surface etched with runes that seemed to writhe in the candlelight. Intrigued, we decided to contact the dead, ignoring the warnings of the locals about the house’s history. The previous owner, a reclusive woman named Ida, had vanished without a trace, leaving behind only her belongings and a strange, crystalline goblet that sat on the kitchen table.

That first session was uneventful, but on the second night, the planchette began to move on its own, spelling out a name: ‘Azazel.’ The entity claimed to be a demon of the depths. As the hours passed, its messages grew more malevolent, urging us to cut our wrists, to end our lives. Terrified, we closed the board and retreated to our sleeping bags, leaving the goblet on the table, half-full of the wine we’d been drinking.

That night, I dreamt of a figure with hollow eyes standing over Mara, snapping her neck with a sickening crack, then tossing me through a window, the glass shattering around me. I woke in a cold sweat to find Mara screaming, her face pale. She’d had the same dream, save for the details: in hers, I was the one thrown through glass. We tried to laugh it off as coincidence, but a cold dread settled in our stomachs.

The next morning, as the first pale light crept through the dusty curtains, we found the goblet on the floor in the center of the room, broken into exactly six pieces. The wine had stained the floorboards like dried blood. We had seen it on the table just twenty minutes earlier when Mara’s cousin, Deke, had come in to check on us. He swore he hadn’t touched it, and the windows were sealed shut with cobwebs, so no draft could have blown it. The only other presence was the oppressive silence of the house.

We interrogated Deke, but he was as baffled as we were. He left, shaking his head, muttering about ‘old houses settling.’ But we knew better. The six pieces seemed to mock us, a number we’d seen scrawled in the dust on the board: 666. As the day wore on, the atmosphere grew thick with unease. Every creak of the floorboards made us jump, and we found ourselves whispering, as if afraid to attract attention.

That evening, the sun set in a blood-red sky, and a storm rolled in, rattling the windows. We decided to leave, to pack our things and escape the farmhouse’s grip. But as we gathered our belongings, we noticed something odd: the spirit board was missing from the attic. We had left it there, but now the room was bare, save for a single word scratched into the floor: ‘STAY.’

A scream pierced the night. It came from outside. Deke had gone to the barn to fetch the truck, and we found him there, sprawled on the hay, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle. The rain hammered down, washing away his blood. We didn’t need a doctor to tell us he was dead.

In a panic, we ran to the truck, but the engine wouldn’t start. The windshield wipers came on by themselves, then the horn blared, and headlights flickered in a pattern—six long, six short, six long. We fled into the storm, clutching each other, the glass shards of the goblet jangling in Mara’s pocket like a curse.

We stumbled into the woods, the trees closing in around us like gnarled fingers. The storm raged, and we lost all sense of direction. Hours later, we emerged onto a road, and a passing motorist picked us up, shivering and incoherent. When we told him about the farmhouse, he grew pale and said the place had been cursed for decades, ever since Ida’s disappearance. No one had dared stay there overnight, and those who had were found dead or insane.

Back in civilization, we tried to piece our lives back together, but the nightmares followed us. Every night, we dreamt of the glass, six shards, each glinting with a hunger. And every morning, we’d wake to find something shattered in our rooms—a mirror, a picture frame, a drinking glass—always in six pieces. We tried to explain it away, to convince ourselves it was stress, but we knew the truth.

One night, Mara called me, her voice trembling. She’d found the spirit board in her closet, despite having burned it. The planchette was spelling out a message, over and over: ‘WHOLE AGAIN.’ I drove to her apartment, and we sat in silence, staring at the board. Then, without warning, a six-sided glass vase on the table exploded, sending shards into the air. One grazed my cheek, drawing blood. Mara started to scream, and in that instant, I saw her reflection in a shard—not her own, but a hollow-eyed visage, grinning.

We fled again, but the curse followed. We drifted apart, unable to face each other, knowing we were marked. I moved across the country, changed my name, but every month, on the sixth day, I’d find a piece of glass in my pocket, a reminder that some vessels can never be mended. And in my dreams, I still see the farmhouse, the storm, and the six broken pieces waiting for me to come home.