The Diamond's Curse

[Very VERY loosely based on an old tale, mostly fiction.]

The Diamond's Curse

I'm not nearly as dangerous as the humans believe me to be.

Well, not usually.

Humans are fools for mysteries and conspiracies, I have learned. I've spent many years near them and I know they'll believe anything. Just like lambs, they will follow any keeper they first lay eyes on. Humans are very easily manipulated. A sad but important truth.

You might know me, or know of me. My early history was long and arduous. A long story for another time, perhaps.

I never meant to end up here, in this strange land surrounded by sparkling lights and eager faces. My intentions were originally honourable, although I admit I might have gotten caught up in my justified rage.

I long to be back in my home. I fear I might not make it to the land I know and love but I will continue to sustain this existence for as long as I must.

Twinkling in this glass case, I watch their faces as they moon over my glory and I think back on all the hardship and suffering I caused after transferring my spirit into this stone.

The great image of me which stood as a hopeful reminder to my people was wrongfully defaced and the very gem I now live in was stolen from it by a greedy thief. His only motivation was the money which he would gain from selling the gem. My rage boiled over at the thought.

How dare he?

How dare this surf steal me from my people and home? After all I had undergone, I refused to idly sit by while this no-good wretch does this horrible thing!

So, that’s when I did it. I put a curse in place to ruin all who would try to use the gem, and me inside of it, for ill or personal gain. And what happened to the man who stole me, you ask?

Well, let’s just say, in the vernacular of the youth who come to stare at me, he got murked (the vernacular of the youngest humans is very strange but incredibly entertaining).

From there I was sold to many rapacious humans who cared little for others. My curse followed and touched them all in horrible and sinister ways.

Some say my curse is nothing more than falsehoods created by people who wish to keep my glory from the less fortunate but that is not the truth. They do not know about me or my story.

Any who possesses me will die or suffer consequences unless their intentions are honest and upright. As a Goddess, it is within my power to protect people who might be at a disadvantage from rulers who do not have their best interests at heart.

In my former life, I was known as courageous, dedicated, loyal, and long-suffering. They called me a silent pillar of strength. Now, in this gem, I am changed both in form and in attitude.

Hundreds of years ago when they took me from my people, they sent me to an unusual land with extravagant garments and decadent foods. The people were unwashed and broken. Without food or options, those who owned me thought nothing of leaving the poor people to starve in the streets.

These were horrible humans, they did not deserve the excessive life they lived. How could they watch, surrounded by an abundance of succulent goods, whilst their own people lived in misery?? I made sure they died at the hands of their people.

I was stolen and sold for profit from person to person.

For many years after, I was passed from human to human, a great many of whom fell in the clutches of my curse. They were all unworthy of the beautiful gem I lived in.

One day, I happened to land in the hands of a supposed noble lady. After being with her for a while, I came to understand her and her homeland. She was a woman from nothing who beat all odds and rose to a higher society. She was strong and capable. Not a perfect human but a good woman nonetheless.

Those in her life, however, were greedy and cruel. They, too, fell at the hands of my curse. None were spared the fate they deserved.

The lady soon began to believe the rumours about the gem, a diamond as the humans call it, and the curse that followed it. She didn't know that within the diamond she possessed, part of me still lived. She was not a believer at first. She doubted the curse many other humans had come to believe.

But then her family members began to die and it was not long until she, too, was convinced of my curse.

She lost much on her journey to believing. She lost a son (he was not part of my curse, I do not kill children), a husband who lost his senses, and a daughter as well. Then, she died too but I suspect that was from a broken heart.

One more human gone on a list of many who were lost to my curse. So many humans who led malicious lives.

Will these humans never learn?

It was barely a decade after her death that I came to reside where I am now, although I have taken some trips here and there. Mostly, I just wait. I sit in this glass case and peer into the eyes of the humans who come to gawk at the brilliance of the diamond I live in.

They do not try to take me but some have the desire to do so. Thankfully, they aren't able to because the place the humans keep me in is called a museum. It is meant for looking only. Not taking.

So here I wait as the object of desire of many a greedy man and woman who cannot have me. Other humans simply gape at my splendour. The blue diamond I live in is quite extraordinary.

One day, I am sure, I will leave and again be back to weighing the moral character of the people who own me until the day when I am returned to my homeland.

I will carry on in this gem steadfast until that day comes. I am hopeful I'll return home. After all, that is what the humans named this diamond:

Hope