Tag: fiction

They say a mother’s love is unconditional. While I personally have not had such a relationship with my own mother, I know it to be true for others.

I discovered what I consider to be the finest example of this on July 1. There were reports of a bear attacking some of the livestock near the northern border of town. Like everyone else, I took these reports seriously and went to investigate. Unlike my fellow townsmen, I traveled along the deep paths, searching the darker recesses of my property, as well as the islands in Blood Pond.

I found the bear and his mate. As well as their children.

The bear was a shifter, from a little-known tribe and one, to be perfectly honest, I thought had died out completely. His wife was none other than Charlene Coffin, who had left Cross nearly twenty years before.

The family had built a home on the smallest of my islands, close enough to shore so the husband could hunt, far enough so that they could see anyone coming for them. Their home was rough-hewn but well-made. Within it, Charlene and her husband were raising their twins, a boy, and a girl, neither of whom were weened. One of the children, the girl, shifted as she fed, and Charlene smiled at me.

“It’s why we don’t bother to clothe her when it’s time to eat,” she said. “The girl shifts whenever she’s at the teat.”

Post Script: The shifters live on the island still, and, damn them, occasionally take some of my sheep. Still, I’ve had worse neighbors.

#horror #CrossMassachusetts #monsters #supernatural #skulls #death #fear #evil #horrorobsessed #scary #ghosts #DuncanBlood

When Ellen Reich died at the age of 9 at the turn of the century, her parents were distraught. Her mother soon left, abandoning the world for the safety of a convent. Her father, Franz, remained in Cross to be close to his daughter’s grave. Shortly after her mother’s flight, Ellen returned.

For eleven years, Ellen remained with her father. She was often seen sitting upon his lap, where the man would read the dead child’s favorite story to her.

In 1911, the Catholic priest learned of this situation and attempted to intervene on behalf of not only the child’s mother but for the sake of Franz. Franz, however, wanted neither salvation nor interference. Soon, the mother returned, clad in her nun’s habit, and with the priest, they forced their way into the home.

One of Franz’s neighbors alerted me to the situation. I arrived too late.

The mother was dead, having hung herself from the rafters in the attic. The priest had clawed his own eyes out and was beating his head against a kitchen wall.

Franz and Ellen were in their chair, reading peacefully.

I convinced the police that the mother had blinded the priest and then hung herself out of shame for her act. The priest eventually died of his self-inflicted injuries.

Post Script: Franz died in 1933. His chair and her book are in my home, tucked away in a small room. It is not uncommon for me to find the dead father and child reading in the evening.

#horror #CrossMassachusetts #monsters #supernatural #skulls #death #fear #evil #horrorobsessed #scary #ghosts #books

None of the undead are pleasant. They are parasitic and, like all parasites, need to be removed when discovered.

Early in September, animals were discovered along the far edge of Boston Post Road. These creatures ranged from squirrels to cows, and they all had been slain in the same fashion. Their blood had been drained from them, leaving them desiccated. Not even the ravens would pick at the corpses.

When I exhausted my own books, I traveled into Boston and sought out members of other communities, describing the bodies I witnessed.

It was the Chinese who told me of the Jiangshi, the hopping vampire. They told me where to look for the creature and what I must do to defeat it. What I learned did not please me. I trust in steel and bullets, and I confess some nervousness at the idea of a thing I could not at least knock down with my Colts.

So, on October 1^st, I entered the shallow hills along the border of Gods’ Hollow and hunted through the caves for two weeks. On the fifteenth, I found it.

The Jiangshi was dressed in tattered silken clothes, and when it sprang at me, I threw a bag of coins in front of it, forcing the maniacal vampire to stop and count them. While it did so, I took the wood of a peach tree and drove it deep into the Jiangshi’s heart. Then, as it screamed and clawed at me, I dragged the thrice-damned thing into the sunlight and lit the creature on fire.

When the flames were done, and nothing but ashes remained, I doused them with vinegar.

Here’s hoping no more of the damned things find their way to Cross.

#horror #CrossMassachusetts #monsters #supernatural #skulls #death #fear #evil #horrorobsessed #scary #China #vampire