Sun Kissed Innsmouth
Part 121
Two village men appeared out of the tree line and started picking their way through the meadow thickets. One of the men dropped his lantern and grunted, he likely found a patch of those thorny seeds. The other man fell nearly face first into the snarled mess of vine chocked undergrowth, he came up sputtering and spitting vegetation.
“The old codger killed Neb in his sleep! He could kill the two of ya standing up, if either of ya could at all.”
The man who dropped his lantern fetched it and stopped in the field to turn around. “It’s a field a thorns, no old man ran through this.”
Ganly, from his spot of safety in the tree line shouted back, “I know the old bastard came through here, we tracked him last time.”
The man who was busy setting down his cudgel and trying to relight his lantern rebutted while trying to get a match to light. “Yeah, I was there Ganly, he killed Keif while we was marching through the rain to here.”
“Then you should know, the old bastard is dangerous, go check that shack, better yet, just toss a match in there. The old place is likely to go up quick, he’ll come right out if he’s hiding then.”
The man who had fallen into the meadow was still wiping at his face and trying to pull thorns out of his hands and arms as he countered, “If he’s there and we burn it, he’ll come out and kill us.”
“Naw, we have a bead on the place, he won’t reach you before we get him, if he’s in there.”
“Fuck that, you come out here and we’ll go light the place up.” The man with the lantern finally managed to get it started and then pointed its light back at the tree line in the distance. For the briefest of moments Felecia could see the fiend backlit against the stand of trees before he hunkered down and barked at the man.
“We got elevation over here, now turn that damn light around and do what you’re told.”
The two men slowly worked their way through the meadow until they reached the corral nearly sunk halfway into the spongy undergrowth. “What about these animals?”
Ganly yelled from the safety of the tree line. “What animals?”
The man with the lantern waved at the top of the corral posts that could just barely be seen above the surrounding vegetation. “There’s goats here, and chickens, they look poxy but these fences are right next to the shack.”
The other man, the one who had already tripped once and nearly did a second time trying to walk through the brambles and the tripping vines. “If you can see so well from over there? Why are we telling you about this?”
The first man chimed in, “Yeah, why didn’t you see this up there?”
Ganly shouted, “Set that damn shack on fire, now! If I have to say another word to either of ya, I’ll just shoot you both and go back and tell the old witch we lost you out here.”
Felecia had managed to stay still, mostly buried in the meadow undergrowth until the final declaration from Ganly. The reluctant men started moving in earnest from their spots out in the meadow toward the corral and it would only be minutes before the lantern light illuminated Felecia and give her away as she lay still. Worsen though, she could stand and make a run for it and notify the two men almost immediately as they stood so close.
Crawling, as undignified and painful in the meadow as it was, seemed like the right thing to do at the time. Crawl where though? The old packing crate home was about to be turned into a funerary pyre for Josephine’s memories, or likely a smoldering, moldy waste of time as the house folded into itself rather harmlessly as the animals outside bleated and cackled over its timely demise. So what then?
Felecia started to worm her way toward the beach. The reality that waited for her there seemed worst of all but it some how seemed right. Crawl on all fours through the nettles and the thorns until she reached the polished stones and sands of the shoreline. Crawl through the thicket until she reached the cold, calculating thing that waited for her out beyond the waves. If the animal was there to greet her, so be it. If it wasn’t there when she arrived, so much the better.