Wolfe and Georg Larson vanished on a Sunday in September in 1900.
They had gone into the deep forest between the Coffin’s Farm and my own, ostensibly in search of deer. When I spoke to their cousins later, I learned it was to see if the stories about Honor’s Path were true.
When the boys didn’t return by nightfall, their father and uncles went looking for them.
Though both Wolfe and Georg were no strangers to the woods, no one in Cross likes the idea of their children in the forest after the sun has set. There are too many creatures about that lack a sort of natural affinity for our own world.
As the men drew closer to Honor’s Path, they were told to stop by a pair of boys claiming to be Georg and Wolfe. Who knows, perhaps they really were. Perhaps the Larson brothers had decided they’d had enough of living with beneath the heavy hand of their father.
Regardless as to whether the boys were themselves, or something entirely different, a short, sharp gunfight ensued.
All the Larson men died in an exchange of gunfire with the boys.
I found the bodies Monday morning. Surprisingly, they were unmolested, if you ignored the bullet wounds. Which I did.
I’ve seen what the creatures on Honor’s Path can do to a body.
It’s been over a hundred years since that Monday morning, and at the end of every August, I make it a point to warn people away from that section of Coffin’s Farm.
And each September, a hunter from Boston or Worcester, New York City or Greenwich, makes the mistake of ignoring the posted signs. And each time the Larson boys kill them.
I leave the bodies where they lay now. I’ve grown damned tired of burying them.
#horror #fear
