Tarot of Hate, Volume 1

By Antonio Simon, Jr.

Death and vengeance are in the cards in this macabre collection of horror. Each story is accompanied by an illustration from the classic Rider-Waite tarot, first issued in 1910. So cut the deck and deal, if you dare, for no matter which cards you draw, you can be assured there will be blood.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Darkwater Media Group, Inc.
• Release date: Jan 28, 2021
• ISBN: 9781954619142

Book preview

Tarot Of Hate

Volume 1

Eight Stories of

Murder and Revenge

Antonio Simon, Jr.

Tarot of Hate, Volume 1

Published by Darkwater Media Group, Inc.

8004 NW 154 Street #623

Miami Lakes, FL 33016

Copyright © 2017 Antonio Simon, Jr. All rights reserved. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission.

The cover art and illustrations within this book are based upon the Rider-Waite Tarot card illustrations, first published in 1909, which are in the public domain.

This is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents contained in this book are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, and people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Darkwater Media Group, DarkwaterMediaGroup.com, the Darkwater device and other Darkwater Media Group logos and product names are trademarks of Darkwater Media Group, Inc.

www.DarkwaterMediaGroup.com

ISBN: 978-1-954619-14-2

Electronic Edition

Praise For The

Tarot Of Hate Series

A gripping study in pathological development and horror that will especially please readers who look for solid psychological inspection in horror scenarios.

—Midwest Book Review

I laughed, I shuddered, I felt sick to my stomach… in a good way, of course… a mad parade of degeneracy and corruption… with a wicked, impish sense of humour.

—Simon Petersen, horror novelist, author of Slasher Sam

Eight exquisitely written tales that will hook you, draw you in and hold your attention for the whole ride… Overall it’s an extremely impressive anthology with Mr. Simon’s sharp wit a crimson soaked edge trailing blood on every page. Read it.

—Mike Duke, horror novelist, author of Warm, Dark Places Are Best

This is some pretty twisted stuff. Vivid, detailed imagery that stops short just close enough for your imagination to fill in the gaps to make the stories feel more personable, this anthology has some true quality to it.

—Nicholas Paschall, horror novelist, author of The Father of Flesh

A masterful collection of fright, mystery and suspense by a six-gun slinger of words; a man who is quick and slick when it comes to a lightning turn of phrase and wit that will leave the fastest of hands face down dead in the dust before they can clear leather.

—David O. Hughes, horror novelist, author of South By Southwest Wales

What Lurks Herein…

Dogfaced Eve

—A man fights to survive on an island inhabited by a monstrous female with an insatiable appetite for lust.

Toll Road

—A professional kidnapper gets more than he bargained for when his latest abduction leads to terrifying supernatural encounters on the Florida Turnpike.

Fifteen Dollars’ Guilt

—After a close brush with death in a steamship disaster, two strangers discuss the meaning of their lives, inadvertently setting in motion the assassination of President Garfield.

No Thanks

—A meek employee perpetrates a workplace massacre, knowing he can dispel away the consequences with the two most powerful words in the universe.

Red Airwaves

—At the height of the cold war, one man decodes clandestine signals broadcast over a shortwave radio station. His discovery pushes the world to the brink of global nuclear disaster.

Hunter, Hunted

—A reality TV production crew gets the scare of their lives when their latest subject comes on looking for revenge.

Lilith

—A hermit’s life is turned upside-down by the arrival of a mysterious woman in his camp. Only time will tell if Lilith is a heroine, a victim, or a monster.

Water, Ice, And Vice

—Jeremy’s new apartment harbors a demonic wish-granting fridge, which he uses to exact bloody vengeance on his obnoxious roommate.

Table Of Contents

Dogfaced Eve

Toll Road

Fifteen Dollars’ Guilt

No Thanks

Red Airwaves

Hunter, Hunted

Lilith

Water, Ice, And Vice

Introduction

There’s an expression people use when things don’t go their way: It just wasn’t in the cards. I presume the it they’re referring to is good fortune. But if they wanted something to be in the cards so badly, they should have made sure they were playing with the right deck. That said, I’m certain you have some idea of what to expect when you’re dealing from the tarot of hate.

Be forewarned, dear reader, these stories are not for those with weak stomachs or delicate sensibilities. You’re delving into dark territory here—kidnappings, torture, and murder most foul—and I’ve not spared the details. You can back out now if you can’t hack these things. No one will think any less of you if you do, but I figured it was only fair to warn you beforehand.

So cut the deck and deal, if you dare, for no matter which cards you draw, you can be assured there will be blood.

Dogfaced Eve

Everyone wants to be the alpha male

until it’s time to do alpha male shit.

The moment he’d perfected the angles he was falling headlong through the sigil he’d drawn. Where once there had been a floor there had opened a yawning gulf into blackness. Gravity had done the rest. Before he could react, he was hurtling through time, space, and God knew what else, crashing into a sand dune. This was all very wrong for several reasons, not least of which was that up until then he had been sitting in his twelfth-floor apartment in the midst of a Colorado snowstorm. The last place he had expected to find himself shunted to was a sunny beach. But magick was a fickle thing, and however grudgingly it did one’s bidding, it always sought creative ways to fuck people over.

That was a year ago—correction: a year from when he’d started counting, assuming time here passed similarly to how it did on Earth. In that time, he’d built a thatch shelter where the rainforest ended and the beach sand began.

He’d also discovered he wasn’t alone.

When he’d first arrived, he’d ventured from the beach to seek help. He found none, but his trek across the island allowed him to get his bearings. The beach where he’d made his home was on the island’s east side. Traveling west put him in the woods. The ground rose steeply beyond that into a plateau of balmy grassland that stretched to the cliffs ringing the island’s far end.

It was in the fields that he saw her.

The sun had already begun to dip behind the western crags, its burnished bronze glow giving the illusion that the expanse of swaying tall grass was ablaze. Off in the distance he’d seen a human silhouette shimmering like a heat mirage. He’d cupped his eyes against the glare for a better look into the horizon. It was another person—her pair of trim thighs slightly apart as their owner stood rigidly at attention, surveying the prairie.

Hey! he’d shouted, waving his arms over his head.

He knew he’d been heard when her silhouette shifted in his direction; but what he didn’t expect was that she’d drop to all fours and begin sprinting toward him so fast that great dust clouds started billowing up in her wake. He’d turned and run like hell into the safety of the thicket. When he’d heard the thrashing of undergrowth in the wake of her pursuit, he shimmied up a tree and sat on a bough, curled up in fetal position to get as much of him away from her as possible.

The thrashing had slowed, then stopped as his pursuer halted in her tracks. Then there had come a wet snuffling sound as she sniffed the air.

Crunch—branches snapped under her tread.

Crunch—another cautious step.

Pause.

Sniff.

Crunch.

A leg clad in brown fur boots cleared the branches obstructing his view below. She advanced a step. He could only see her from the waist down, but more of her came into view as she stalked closer to his tree. The fur boots stretched up her calves, her thighs, her flanks, across her belly, onto her pair of bare breasts—

He drew an alarmed gasp when he saw her for what she was. Down below was a naked woman, except that a hyena’s coarse brown pelt had sprouted all over her body. She stood erect without difficulty, despite that her legs were decidedly canine, with her knees bending backward as a dog’s might if it stood on its hind legs. Dewclaws sprouted from just above the major joints in her limbs. Her fingers were short and clubbed—they were rudimentary hands but effective nonetheless, as evidenced by the crude spear in her grip. The rough-hewn flint that served as a spear tip was caked with dried blood.

She plodded forward and raised her nose, searching him out. Her wet, black nose was squashed into a shaggy face that was part dog, part bear, and all teeth. Her predatory eyes darted about—wherever she turned her head to sniff the air her eyes followed soon after.

And then she spotted him.

Her flashing eyes locked on him for a heartbeat, and then she threw back her head and let up a rapid-fire yipping. He shimmied in his tree, pressing his back to the trunk in an effort to put more space between him and her, it—whatever that was down on the forest floor.

She yipped again, true to her hyena nature, high-pitched and ululating, sounding almost like human laugher. Almost. There was no mirth in her cackle, and her snapping jaws spoke of her intents. She wanted him for dinner, and that wasn’t a euphemism.

He dug his heels into the bough, pushing backward, creeping up the trunk until he stood. Once he was on his feet, he was at a loss for what to do next.

She decided for him. The hyena woman hurled her spear at him like a javelin. The pointed stick split the air, whistling before crashing into the trunk just beneath him. She’d undershot her mark, but it served her purposes all the same. He jerked instinctively when the spear went airborne, lost his balance and spilled out of the tree.

There was not far to fall. He tumbled fifteen feet to the forest floor, breaking the fall with his arms. The soft ground accepted his weight, dampening the blow, leaving him more dazed than hurt but still too stunned to move. His senses focused to razor clarity when he felt searching paws clutch at his body. She turned him over onto his back. Out of reflex he shielded his face with his arms; she batted them away and squatted atop his hips, upper torso primed to catapult her jaws in a parabolic arc for his throat.

She hooked her stumpy fingers into his waistband and tugged at his pants. He took a wild swipe at her but she caught his wrist in one paw and rammed his forearm into his screaming mouth. Her other paw yanked furiously at his pants until the button popped free of its eyelet. The zipper drew apart under her repeated assault. In moments, his pants were halfway down his thighs, exposing his crotch. The prospect of imminent death and the friction of all this excitement had given him an inadvertent erection.

She paused, head lowered, eyes locked on his member, and gave a sigh that bowed her shoulders. It sounded like the anticipatory breath from an exhausted marathon runner when she has spied the finish line ahead. Then she locked her eyes back into position with his and bared her fangs, lips pulled back beyond her gum line.

He bumped his hips up to pitch her off him but she sat down hard, crushing his pelvis into the ground. He wheezed, feeling like a fresh tube of toothpaste that had been crumpled in a person’s fist. That knocked the fight out of him—he could do little else but watch with glassy eyes as she readied her jaws for a pass at his jugular.

She raised her haunches off him. What looked like a dead black python drooped between her legs—a tail?—and swung in metronomic rhythm like a grandfather clock’s pendulum.

Oh my God! his panicked mind quailed on noticing it was her penis, but the follow-up to that thought was what actually tore the scream from his lips—she had a penis, and she meant to use it on him.

Before he could react, she rammed her appendage into his crotch. The black length of hose between her legs accepted his member into itself then cinched, forming a tight seal around the base of his root and at all points in between. She threw herself into him, hooking her elbows beneath his armpits and her forearms around the back of his head, smashing his face into her perky pair of furry breasts, each only a small handful in size. Her coarse pelt felt like a copper scouring pad against his exposed flesh as she rutted like a bitch in heat, her pelvis jackhammering a fast staccato rhythm against him. She lifted him off the ground each time she pulled back; he plowed a little deeper into the dirt with each thrust. His arms flailed under her, groping blindly for purchase and finding none, fingers threading though fur that was too short to latch onto.

His hand closed around her ear and he tugged on it hard, yoking her head aside. She snaked an arm free and socked him hard in the ribs. His eyes bulged from their sockets. She was taller than he was by a head and deceptively stronger than her trim body put on. And the stink—dear Lord!—her body reeked of wet dog and sun-dried carrion. He was certain that if ever he survived this, he could never scrub that reek from his pores.

An involuntary shudder racked his frame. His biology reacted in the manner that could be expected of it—instinct would not be denied. Her body tensed in anticipation as he blew his load. He hardly realized he’d come until his body slackened, drooping into an exhausted, bloodied heap. It hurt to move. It hurt to even think of moving.

She rose off him and walked away, returning a moment later