The Lovers Cabin of Wicked Hallows

Trigger Warning: The murder scene is discussed in very minor detail towards the end! If you wouldn't prefer to read that, you are free to scroll to the next story. This is an excerpt from a book that I am currently working on at the moment where I implemented Reedsy's prompt in for the sake of the contest. Please be kind as this is my first story on Reedsy. Be sure to leave your support if you enjoy it!

The grandfather clock in my living room struck with the ring of a new hour. My entire body immediately jolted from my chair. How long had I been asleep?

The clock's hand rested precisely at 3:00 a.m. to indicate that it had been five hours. My desktop computer was nearly dead from all the time it sat on. I rubbed my eyes quickly and placed my glasses on so that I could locate its charger. Once I found it, I placed the adapter in the computer.

An article I was working on was still on the screen from earlier. It discussed the success of this year's Salem Society Festival, a festival which celebrates Halloween and brings mom and pop shops to the upper northern New England frontier from Salem, Massachusetts.

I continued to scroll on to the next section of the drafted layout to see my co-writers work for this week's newspaper. She was writing about the awareness of last Halloween night. It has now been a year since the accident happened. A year since my curiosity got the best of me...

The article was titled ''The Lovers Cabin of Wicked Hallows.'' The title's print was in hauntingly bold black letters that appeared as though they could come through the screen and mock me. The headline below sent chills down my spine while I paused to read it.

A pair of two couples staying in Lovers Cabin #08 left three dead an alleged suspect missing over a charade of jack-o-lantern carving. What really happened that night?

-

What is Lovers Cabin, you ask? Well, I'll start from the beginning, although I might not make it to the end of the story. Lovers Cabin is a resort retreat that lies in our small town of Westborrow, Maine. The cabins have been around since 1971 as well as the utterly dingy sign that stands at the entrance. There is a long gravel that lasts for nearly 13 miles into the woods where the secluded area lies. If you're patient enough to endure that, anyway.

Quite usually you'll come across wild black bears passing through the trail, or large balsam fir trees that were cut down to hinder your journey to the destination of the cabins. If that isn't enough, there are signs along the way that warn you to turn around. The site was once a harmonious place where teens would share s'mores by the fireside and piggyback each other all the way to the ocean on a lovely star-crossed night. Unfortunately, there were only four years that Lovers Cabin knew peace before those same teens were papers nailed to utility poles.

A string of murders began on October 31st, 1975, when two bodies were found near an incredibly tall lighthouse, known as Wicked Hallows point. Now, there are two boogeyman stories you'll hear about Wicked Hallows. Some say that the murderer lives in the lighthouse and lurks in search for his next victims at Lovers Cabin. Others say that five girls who were convicted as witches escaped north from the Salem Witch Trials, and they were caught and murdered right in the spot where the lighthouse was built nearly two centuries later. Our townspeople will tell you that the spirits of the girls seek revenge on those of the innocent since they were believed to be falsely convicted themselves.

Let's just say that no one would truly know the real truth since it is forbidden to access the lighthouse. I don't believe anyone is brave enough to do so since the murders leading up to the cabins and the entirety of the witch story frightens people away.

As an aspiring journalist, gaining experience while doing the town's newspaper allowed me to venture to Lovers Cabin the morning after the crime. I could say that made me the brave one along with a few others apart from our newspaper staff. Even so, I would be far from right since it was the most traumatic day of my life.

The flashbacks constantly remind me of the awful things I saw...

''Remember not to go beyond this point, ya hear? You're here to be a journalist not a detective. Let them handle everything and you'll continue with a short interview process like you were assigned.''

I could hear the east Tennessean drawl in my co-writers voice. It was almost as if her accent transported me to the Appalachian mountains searching for infamous cryptids instead of a cold blooded killer in the heart of Maine. She walked away before I could respond and spoke to the rest.

The neon yellow caution tape strung around the property of Lovers Cabin #08 where the murder occurred. The gust of the chilly October night felt as though razors were cutting at my hands. I tried to numb out the feeling while I wrote down some questions on a scratch sheet of paper in my notebook. My mind continued to wonder about what the detectives were witnessing in there.

Later, I could hear the ear shattering creak of the ancient cabin door as a male detective with dark hair down to the middle of his back and a buff physique came out. A black handkerchief was held in place over his mouth by his band. The aging in the eye bags below his eyes displayed how he had seen years of cases like this. It puzzled me to see him in such of distress as another detective scurried over to him.

''Call over the forensics team. We're going to really need them for this one.'' He exchanged words with the woman beside him who tugged at her beige trench coat for her phone.

They both went over to the rest of the newspaper staff to speak over the situation. I will tell you that there was a good reason my co-writer told me to stay away. An uncontrollable voice gnawed at me inside like a monster. It spoke so loud that it was as if I could hear it whispering a chant all around me in the woods. Was it all in my head? What was happening?

Go to the cabin. The cabin has secrets. Go to the cabin. The cabin has secrets...

I dropped my pencil and my notebook among the fall leaves on the ground.

You better run, boy. The cabin has secrets...

I crawled under the caution tape and ran straight towards the cabin. I could hear the sounds of many voices. The detectives, my newspaper staff, the ones aloud, and another that came from the reckoning fear inside me for my brainless action. The blow of the wind swung the door open as I tripped over the stairs in front of it.

My hands and legs were the first to hit the floor. I will say that all of my senses abandoned me for a few seconds, except for two. The pungent smell of overnight blood that lingered in my nostrils and the sight of an evidence marker with a blemished knife beside it. I was now like the detective when I placed the neck of my shirt over my mouth. I braced myself to look up and scope the rest of the room in front of me.

What all the newspapers said didn't exaggerate exactly what happened. The bodily remains of the victims were marked over with gaping gashes that resembled X's all over them. I won't describe in too much detail of the other graphic monstrosities I encountered.

They were allocated across a gigantic plastic sheet on the floor that was just enough for the victims and the pumpkins they were carving. There were three pumpkins that were unfinished with leftover pulp and pumpkin seeds all around them. The fourth pumpkin was finished, but it didn't have any leftovers around it. A small flicker sourced from the luminosity of a tea light left the sight of the perfectly etched words...

Who is next?

All I can remember after that was the swarm of flies that flew around me before I passed out on the floor. The flies were talking. Talking, I tell you! They only repeated one word from what I heard from earlier in the woods just before my consciousness dissipated.

Secrets...

Secrets...

Secrets...