Coven – Horror Story
Short Story : Coven.
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark ( Horror Story)
By Prabir Rai Chaudhuri . All Copyright Reserved 2018
My family is originally from Amacueca. My grandfather had a ranch on the edge of town, in a wooded area.
We used to go to his ranch on weekends to visit, because it is a very nice place to spend the holidays.
What I like to do most there is hiking in the forest.
In a rural area, horror stories are always abundant.
I remember that my grandfather used to tell us some stories about ghosts in the mountains and my favorite story was one where a witch appeared to him as a beautiful woman, who asked him for help because she was lost, but when my grandfather looked at her feet, they looked like those of a duck.
My grandfather talked a lot about that witch, he said that these beings had the power to create hallucinations, to make you lose yourself and then steal your vitality.
Honestly, I found these horror stories very entertaining, but I didn't believe anything he told me. I thought that my grandfather, being away from the city and people for so long, made up these stories so he wouldn't get bored.
Later I would regret having judged my grandfather in that way.
One afternoon, I was walking with my brothers and some cousins, very close to the borders of my grandfather's land. Before, I had never seen anyone else living in the area, but during that walk, we noticed a cabin.
We didn't pay much attention to it at the time, we were just curious to see something like that, because there is nothing in that area and due to the size of the building we couldn't imagine that anyone lived there.
We continued walking along the path until we reached a clearing that was a bit hidden. It was a strange place, something like a mound in the middle of a grove. When we were children, we used to pretend that UFOs landed there.
As we entered the grove, a foul smell greeted us, the smell of a rotting corpse. We quickly realized why it smelled like that.
On the mound were some animal bodies, which, due to their state of decomposition, we could not guess what they were. I suppose some were birds, since there were many black feathers scattered about.
We all pinched our noses and, although we felt disgust, we stood there looking at that dump of shapeless corpses. From a bush, next to a hide, came out a huge black goose, with red eyes, some feathers missing, it looked horrible.
The bird rushed to attack us, uttering horrible squawks.
We immediately backed away and started to run. As I was going slower, the bird managed to grab my pants with its beak. They were moments of pure desperation, because I swear that the bird's squawks sounded like words, it was as if an infernal being were uttering curses into the air.
I don't know how, but I managed to get away from the bird.
I didn't see my brothers or my cousins. Because of the panic that took over me, I strayed off the path without realizing it.
I screamed like crazy for a while, but no one came looking for me.
I tried to retrace my steps, but I only got more lost.
Then I remembered what my grandfather used to say about witches being able to confuse you with hallucinations, so that you would get lost, and I couldn't help but start crying out of fear.
After a while, I tried to calm down, because despite being lost, nothing strange was happening to me, except for the bird attack.
I walked in a straight line, thinking that sooner or later I would have to come out onto a path, although it was already dark.
Who knows how long I had been walking aimlessly, when I finally saw a light in the distance along the path.
I ran in that direction, then I reached the mound in the clearing again, I stopped a few meters away, because I noticed something strange.
The light came from a campfire and next to it were two young women and an old woman. What I saw before me was a scene of complete madness.
The goose that chased me just a few hours ago appeared from the shadows, looking even scarier than when it chased me. I heard its squawks, they sounded even more human, I can almost assure that I understood its words.
Suddenly one of the girls began to convulse on the floor, while the old woman approached the goose, took it in her hands and suddenly cut its neck. The animal let out a scream that was in no way different from the scream of a person.
This forced me to scream.
I thought my scream would draw the attention of the coven of witches, but no, those women seemed lost in their strange sinister ritual. I then took advantage of the opportunity to walk towards the path that would take me to my grandfather's ranch.
It wasn't long before I found my entire family, who were desperately searching for me.
I told them about the coven I had seen on the mound.
After hearing my horror story, everyone told me that this couldn't be possible, since they had also been to that place and found nothing strange, only the corpses of animals.
I couldn't believe what they were telling me, I was very sure of what I saw.
The next morning we walked to the little cabin. Inside it was completely empty, just a few black feathers, but we saw no sign of anyone living there.
When I returned to the ranch, I told my grandfather what had happened to me. He believed me and was very scared. He told me that the bird I saw was very dangerous, because it could be the way the devil himself manifested himself.
That night I couldn't sleep because I heard a loud flapping outside my window and although I didn't dare look out, I'm sure that horrible black goose with red eyes was there. That time I didn't want to go out for a walk anymore and I kept pressuring my parents to go home.
It took a couple of years for us to go back. In fact, we came back because my grandfather was sick.
When we arrived, we found him in bed. According to an aunt, my grandfather would not recover, he had cancer, in an advanced stage, so he just wanted to say goodbye to us before he got any sicker.
When I had to talk to him alone, he told me that he returned to the place where I witnessed the coven.
Just like me, he saw a huge black goose with black eyes come out, but my grandfather, far from being scared, cut its neck with a machete he was carrying. According to my grandfather, the bird continued to squawk after it was dead, and its body took a while to fall.
After my sick grandfather killed the bird, well that's what he said, and also at night he heard the bird's squawks in the yard or outside his window, it always stalked him where he least expected it.
We spent a couple of nights in the house, because my mother wanted to be there until my grandfather passed away.
During those nights, I had a couple of strange dreams, each time I returned to the place in the forest, I found the goose, except that instead of attacking me, it looked at me and spoke clearly, with a woman's voice, its face was deformed, it seemed as if it was transforming into a person.
The scene forced me to wake up screaming.
My grandfather died after a week.
I don't know whether to believe that the cause of his death was revenge on the part of the witches.
I still have many doubts, both about my grandfather's death and about the phenomena I experienced while on the ranch, such as the bird, whether it was really a witch, or was it, as my grandfather said, the way the devil appeared.
Talking with my cousins, I learned that several had encountered the bird in other areas of the forest and had also seen an old woman wandering near the bird.
My mother and her brothers sold the ranch and we never returned.
I know exactly what I saw and I hope the new owners don't have to deal with that evil bird, which sometimes gives me nightmares.