The Four-Armed Crow

Journals of Josiah Foster.

September 5th, 1870

It wasn’t dark out when I spotted the beast. I wish it had been. Maybe then it would have made sense why this shadowy hellspawn was so brazen or perhaps it would have disguised its truest form from my vision in a manner that would have led me to believe it was mostly my imagination. But it was sunny, and not a cloud could I see from the bayou banks.

My journey, up until this point, had been long. The mud on my boots was caked so thick that walking became arduous at best in that blasted swamp. I had stopped by the riverside to drink and clean the specks of blood and bile off of me before heading into Houma some miles down the road easterly. My last cartridges had unfortunately been spent in a dismal turn of events the day prior.

In my moment of desperate respite, I thought I would finally have tranquility and considered camping on the bank for the evening. But the sun illuminated to me that this was not meant to last. Across the river, two ebony pearls drew my attention. They seemed endless in their dark depths and similarly endless in the discomfort they caused me. Yet I could not draw my attention away. They were watching me… just as I was them. As I stared longer and washed myself with my canteen, the sound of cicadas and toads faded from my ears and a clicking began to sneak up upon them. It was slow, sinister, but there was a beat to the noise. I couldn’t place where it came from, but it sounded almost muffled. Its pace began to grow at a snail's speed as did its volume. The noise broke me from my trance with the pearls, only because I soon noticed the water rippling just below them in time with the muffled clicking.

Careful, I stood and began to slowly back away in time with the ripples encroaching from the opposite shoreline, and much to my horror, the pearls began to come closer. With each step I took the menacing click increased in time, and as the pearls escaped their shadowed embankment I saw a black cloak arching over them. The sun’s light illuminated an oil slick sheen of the cloak and as the water became more shallow, what I initially mistook for dark driftwood floated to the surface and the clicking became clearer. A black beak emerged from the swamp and to my incredulity feathers shunted from the depths and began quivering while brackish water flailed off of them.

I lost my footing in my startled state and fell back into the mud at the sight. I struggled to crawl back and as I turned away to clamber upward, the clicking turned into a rattling caw. Behind me, I heard unmistakable large feet sink into the mud as the creature continued and I began to run as fast as the swamp would let me. The unsettling, fierce flapping of feathers followed me through the trees as I steered off the open road in hopes of hiding. Eventually, I heard the cawing fade and came to a thicket of trees and piles of deadwood that I hurriedly hid among.

It wasn’t long before I heard the beast again, but once more with its sinister clicking. The ground squelched as it came closer and before long I could see it approaching through the dead grove. What I saw, I still do not entirely believe, nor am I certain still what it was. At best I could say… it was a crow. A crow that towered over a normal man while walking just like one. It stood upright and stalked with a skitter around every corner. Beyond its monstrous size, there was another oddity of the hulking fowl. It seemed, through the sparse sun streaming through the trees and the obscurity of the black feather, that four wings protruded from its body. Whether these masses of feathers were enough to pick the beast off of the ground or it was simply too heavy to take flight I am uncertain of. And I hope not to have the opportunity to discover.

I count myself lucky that the crow’s tracking skills were not better and instead seems to rely slightly on ambushing as it did at the riverside. It eventually stalked off in the direction opposite myself and after allowing some time for its steps to fade I escaped my wooden refuge and continued back in the direction of the road. The sooner I arrived in Houma the better. When I once again found the path, my nerves had not lowered. There was no doubt that I was no longer just a traveler, I was in a creature’s hunting grounds. Around what seemed like another half-mile of walking, sure enough, I found the remnants of a carriage. As I approached from the rear I could see scratches in the wood from massive talons. The metal bars and bearings had been snapped and the door on the side had not been opened, but the center had been caved in with some brutal and mighty force. The occupants...it would appear did not survive the encounter and were likely dragged through the jagged opening. The only remnant was a decaying leg that had been caught and severed on the sharp wood as the poor soul was dragged out. In the front lay the stead, dead from what appeared to be a series of large puncture wounds. At this sight, my stomach nearly left me. The poor horse’s skin was felled away from its head leaving only bone. What worried me more though, was the distinct lack of decay. The skin had not spoiled, rather it had recently been ripped and eaten. On the stomach, there was a singular bloodied handprint but I counted only three fingers, all spread from one another. The blood was clear and hadn’t seemed to have faded in any manner and the shapes of the digits were not reminiscent of talons, I couldn’t make much sense of the print and did not see another like it anywhere among the scene. And just then I heard a click.

To my left, in the trees, I saw the head of the massive crow turned and watching me with one eye glaring. It swept up its wings and knocked me back onto the front of the chariot and began its steady cawing as it advanced with feathers quaking all among its body. I was disoriented from the impact and was slow to try a retreat and before I could come to my senses the towering menace had cornered me. I lay there sweating, waiting for the black beak to pierce me. No such blow came. The crow cocked its head in a twitching manner back and forth and its ebony pearls seemed to stare into my soul. I did not believe the situation could grow sourer until four black tendrils began to emanate from the pits of the four-winged beast and grew towards me. As they grew in size and came closer, I screamed as I saw them take the shape of three-fingered hands of shadows. I am surprised my heart did not take me before the beast had its way with me, but in my panicked state, I grasped one of the broken shards of the carriage’s metal frame. With strength I have never known myself to have nor have had since I broke away the metal from its other end and lunged it into the neck of the crow. It reeled back and black bile spilled on the ground. It whirled, falling over the corpse of the horse, and released a horrific sound of pain into the air. I ran, continuing down the road, refusing to look back, the sound of my own heartbeat began to drown out any other and I feared I would collapse at any moment but I refused to stop.

I ran until I reached Houma. I must’ve startled many of the folks here, panting as I was and covered in mud and dried wood. I checked into the inn as soon as I could and paid extra for a bath. As I prepare for my rest, I still feel great fear. That beast, it hunted me. Caught me in an ambush twice. And as much as I wish I could say it was dead, I have the largest and most unfortunate of doubts. I believe I must extend my stay in Houma but will stay in the more dense areas of town until I have caught my nerves. Still, my ears seem to hinge on every noise I hear listening for the faintest click.