The Legend Of Old Cowhead

The children sang of Old Cowhead, a man who lived in the top of the tallest mountain near  town and lived off of what the mountain could give. But every third night of each year Old Cowhead would go down to the village and kidnap one child around the age of 10 and 16 during midnight to supposedly eat them. The old townspeople would lock all doors, board up all windows, prepare their weapons and hide in the shadows while their children were hidden in closets, basements, attics, etc. For if Old Cowhead saw you with his dead cow eyes and you looked into them, you would pass out and wake up at the nearest mountain without remembering who you are or how you got there. So It was preferable to hide and strike Old Cowhead from behind If he managed to get in your house. Unless you were a child, for children were immune to his gaze. Or at least It was said, because no one had managed to even see Old Cowhead not even once, let alone see Cowhead snatch their children. Maybe because the adults who did see Old Cowhead lost their memory and the children who too saw Cowhead were snatched and eaten. People knew of Cowhead's existence through one child who did see Cowhead and had managed to somehow survive.

The child told the story of how he was taken by Cowhead: One night his parents forced him to hide under his bed because of the reports of at least one child going missing every third night of each year and that night was the night. His father kept watch outside while his mother stayed making sure all windows and doors were locked.

The room was dark, no noise was heard except the steps from his mother walking back and forth franticly keeping sure everything was safe, the floor under his bed felt cold, and It was also very dusty, his eyes itched and were watering, he also felt the necessity to sneeze but he was too scared to make any noise so he just held it back. Suddenly he felt some heavy weight dropping down on him, whatever It was It had sat on the bed and was now crushing him. He felt his ribs were being crushed against the floor keeping him from breathing, struggling to breath he tried to call his parents, but he was unable to. That's when saw a weird shaped head poke out from above, It was too dark to see exactly what It was, It smelled like vinegar, and It had 2 shiny bright dark eyes very far from each other as if those from a cow, he then felt 2 big hands grab him through his bed and pull him upwards through the hole that the hands had ripped open. He closed his eyes and tried to scream for help again, but this time one of the hands covered his mouth, suddenly he came to the horrifying realization that he was still being hold by the same 2 hands, he opened his eyes and saw that the weirdly shaped head was staring right at him, he was still unable to tell what the head was like even, but he could still see those eyes.

The hand that covered his mouth slowly let go, and disappeared in the darkness to then come back with a knife, pointing straight to his throat, even a child could tell that was a sign to remain quiet or else...

 But then he finally sneezed, and the door of his bedroom opened the light from the living room shined upon the dark room revealing the head of the one who was staring at him, and It was a man with the head of a cow, lifeless, staring right at him with those dead eyes, the mouth open with the tongue hanging out, but It did not look like it was ripped straight from any cow, It looked as if it was still fresh, still alive... And it was not only him, for 2 more stood there staring down, one holding him, and the other keeping a knife close to his neck. And through the doorway to his living room, more figures with cow heads came walking in slowly in a straight line, with the same heads, the same lifeless expressions, the same interest...

They all looked down on him and he could not avoid fading unconscious.

When he woke up he noticed he could not move his body, let alone feel it, He must had been sedated, but for what? After he had regained most control of his body, that's he noticed that he was in a small cage, in what looked like a big open cave lighted by torches on the walls, next to him lied more cages, all of the same size, and in most of the cages, lied a child, some were older, some were younger, some looked like they had just gotten there, and some looked like they had been trapped for months, most of these children were not even from the same village, so they must had been taking from other nearby villages, the oldest one looked fifteen and his cage was too small for him so he had to remained curled up in a ball the whole time, he was naked and he looked like he hadn't been fed for weeks. Apart from the cages the cave had many barrels, and a strong vinegar smell surrounded the place, further away, up to the other side of the cave there was a man what looked like an old man in robes, sitting on a desk writing on a piece of paper, he had a hood over his head, but when he got up and walked up to one of the cages, It was clear, he too had a cow head, It was odd that he was the only one around, since he had seen more in his bedroom.

The Old Cowhead walked up to the fifteen year old and pulled him out of the cave up to one of the barrels, the boy was too tired to fight back, and so he was pulled like if he was no more than a toy, the Old Cowhead opened the barrel and from there he pulled out another cow head, the child who was watching from his cage closed his eyes right before the Old Cowhead put it on the teenager's head, he could hear the sound of bones cracking, and when he opened his eyes, the teenager was standing on his feet with his new head, staring at the Old Cowhead, as if he was waiting for orders, the Old Cowhead whispered something in the teenager's ear and so he walked out of the cave into the night.

To his horror, the Old Cowhead leaned down to grab something from the ground, It was a head, a human head. It was the boy's head, the cow heads were not like a mask that you could wear at any time. They were replacements.

Old Cowhead put the head in another barrel, when he opened the lid, the smell was so strong that It overlapped the smell of vinegar, It smelled like rotten corpses, Old Cowhead dropped the head in the barrel and closed the lid, then went back to writing on his desk.

The child turned his attention to the other kids who too watched in horror, he wondered why they did not speak nor scream, he guessed they were heavily sedated as well, though it must had been a very strong sedative because some seemed to have been there for much longer than him, and they did not say anything as well. And so he waited until he could feel his jaw and mouth again, and when he did, he noticed something warm was dripping down his chin, he did not know what It was since he could not taste it. That's when he realized, he had no tongue, It was cut off, that's why all the other children said nothing, they too had their tongues removed.

Not much after, another group of Cowheads walked into the cave, holding another child, this one had passed out as well, that time he got a good look on them, they all dressed like normal peasants, some even had rings, pendants, piercings and all kinds of jewelry on their cow heads, but one who apparently was the leader of the group had a bull's head with big long horns that too were decorated with pieces of jewelry. They would communicate by whispering into each other's ears, he noticed that their lips would not move when they whispered. The group put the child in an empty cage, one of the Cowheads handed a knife to who seemed to be that teenager from before, now fully clothed. The new addition obediently kneeled in front of the child but was then stopped by another Cowhead who apparently forgot to give the child what he guessed was the sedative, after that was done, the teenager continued, he opened her mouth, slowly inserted the knife inside and with a quick swing, the teenager was now holding the girl's tongue in his hand, handed It over to the one with the bull head and then he handed It to the Old Cowhead who then put it in a small opaque jar on his desk.

After the Cowheads exchanged a few words, some even seemed to have fun while talking, they parted ways into the night. Leaving him and the other children alone again with the Old Cowhead.

Days passed, and during that time, he never saw the group of Cowheads again, but he did see 2 more children being turned into those monstrosities, he noticed that the Old Cowhead chose his victims at random, It did not matter how long they were there, he just picked off whoever looked good for him, that's when one day, the child was chosen to be a new Cowhead, Old Cowhead opened the child's cage and dragged him up to where the barrels with the heads were, that is when the child took off and ran, Old Cowhead had not expected the child to have energy left to make an escape, but strangely enough the child had managed to escape and tell everyone of the existence of Old Cowhead and his assistants.



''And so that was the story of Old Cowhead, pretty interesting huh? This is a story a patience of mine told me during one of his sessions, he even claimed to know Old Cowhead himself, I made some research on the legend of Old Cowhead and I haven't found anything, so It is most probably made up. I still don't know If I should have called the cops, because what he did days after our last session...made me have nightmares about the Cowhead pal.''

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