“Seriously?” said Max.
“No,” said Mrs. Redflint. “That honor—”
The crowd of teachers and staff parted slightly to let a small band of students step forward. All of them looked like normal human teenagers now. This made them more than a little hard to recognize at first, but after a few moments the young monsters could make out the features of a couple of boys who had once been minotaurs, as well as Scout and Ranger, the former weredogs. Standing at the front of the group were three girls with perfect smiles and their hair in pink barrettes: Merideath and her vampire minions.
“That honor will be performed by our graduating class,” said Mrs. Redflint. “This battle will be the final exam. The final test necessary before admission to the Upper School.”
“You shall all be surprised,” said Pearl, sitting up, her wings still smoking from Mrs. Redflint’s fire, “if you think you shall defeat us without a fight!”
“Aye, we all expects that you will fight,” said Algol, scampering forward. “But no one supposes you’ll survive. No, we supposes you’ll all be turned to stone!”
Mrs. Redflint looked at the human-looking students. “What do you think, boys and girls? Do you remember when you too looked like these creatures? What do you think of your classmates now? Well?”
“They’re disgusting!” said Pinky, the former Merideath.
“They’re abominations!” said the former Ranger, without a hint of growl or slather.
“They’re outside the mainstream,” said the former Scout.
“Then do what you must do,” said Mrs. Redflint, with a strange smile. “All of you should do what you must do.”
Two strapping young men, formerly minotaurs, rolled forward a large field cannon with its trunnions painted red. A fuse was sticking out of the top, and one of the young men reached forward with a small plastic lighter and ignited it. The spark sizzled toward the vent in the chamber.
“Dude,” said Max. “They have a cannon.”
For a moment everyone was quiet, standing there looking at the hissing fuse.
Then the air exploded with red fire, and all were blinded by the cloud of drifting smoke.
27
A SAD BOY WITH NO MOUTH
Falcon was in a dark, cluttered attic. The room was filled with junk—with birdcages and steamer trunks. There were antique dolls and an old piano, a Victrola and a sewing machine. All around him was the echoing tick of a giant clock and the slow grinding of thousands of interlocking gears.
Falcon knew he had been here before, but he couldn’t remember where he was exactly. The Academy, he thought. The Academy for—something. The Tower of—something else.
“Come back, Falcon,” said a man’s voice. Falcon looked up to see a face he knew. It had pursued him before, down in the catacombs. That had all taken place a long time ago. But what had happened since then? Where was he?
“I sucked your brain,” said the man. “I suppose that hurt.”
“Brain,” said Falcon.
The man was standing before him now. He was wearing tattered black clothes, a collection of fraying rags. He had large black wings that pulsed softly in the air, high above his head.
“Crow,” Falcon said.
“Yes,” said the man. “I am the headmaster. And the master of the clockworks as well.”
“Father,” said Falcon. “Crow.”
“Yes.”
Falcon looked around the Tower of Souls. He’d been here before.
“What did I tell you?” said the Crow. “When we were here last?”
“Seek soul,” said Falcon.
“Yes,” said the Crow. “And what did you find?”
“When?”
“When you went to seek your soul? What?”
“I—” Falcon’s black eye began to pulse. His memory was returning to him now. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know how to find a soul—”
“Of course you do,” said the Crow. “You’ve been seeking it every day. For the whole of your life.”
“I’ve been seeking—you.”
“Yes,” said the Crow. “Indeed.”
“But they told me you were dead—you fell through the ice.”
“Yes,” said the Crow, his face looking thoughtful and sad. “She pushed me through. Your mother. When she found out what I was.”
The Crow’s eyes seemed melancholy as he said this, and the lines around them seemed to deepen.
“What—are you?” said Falcon.
“The same as you, my son.”
“I’m not the same as you,” said Falcon.
Falcon’s black eye began pulsing harder now. It felt as if fire was beginning to burn behind his eyes.
“You feel it, don’t you,” said the Crow. He put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “It burns within you, the black fire.”
Falcon nodded. “I feel it,” he said. “But that’s not all I feel.”
“Of course not,” said the Crow. “A spirit of darkness feels many things. Anger. Sorrow. Even love.”
Falcon looked at his father’s mournful face. “What are you doing up here? Sleeping up in this tower, with all these gears, and all this—junk?”
“It’s my responsibility,” said the Crow, “and my punishment. I am in exile. To leave the Tower of Souls—it is not permitted.”
“You can leave the tower,” said Falcon. “You came down to the catacombs when we were trying to escape.”
“I did,” he said. “But the times of my leaving this tower are not without consequence.”
“What kind of consequence?”
The Crow fingered the stopwatch around his neck; Falcon saw that, for the moment, its hands were not moving. “The time I leave the tower,” he said, “is subtracted elsewhere.”
“What did you do?” said Falcon. “Are you being punished for something?”
The Crow cast a dark eye in Falcon’s direction. “I endangered our kind,” he whispered. “I put us all at risk.”
“How?”
His wings fluttered close to his face. “I fell in love,” he said.
“With Mom?”
The Crow turned toward a dark corner of the attic, where a black cloth was draped over something. “She asked you to destroy your friends, didn’t she?” asked the Crow, making a strange wheezing sound that Falcon realized was his version of laughter. “As if you would do this, with your history and your heart.”
“She…Mom…said I was one of them,” said Falcon. “A guardian.”
“I know,” said the Crow. “That is her great hope. That you will join her. And tip the balance of power to their side.”
Falcon raised one hand to his head. His temples were sore where his father’s hand had been; his eyes were burning now as never before. “What side?” he said.
“The world of the dark spirits—what you call monsters—and the world of the guardians have been in balance for centuries now. Or perhaps ‘balance’ is the wrong word. It is a battle that neither side can win, because we are evenly matched.” He sighed. “Sometimes one side or the other gains a temporary advantage, but never for long. It is the nature of the world, to be balanced between ourselves and them.”
“They said you were evil,” said Falcon. “That monsters hurt people—terrify the innocent—”
“That is a lie!” shouted the Crow, and suddenly a blue flame was lit that hovered and danced just above the man’s head. His wings shuddered in the air. Then the fire grew smaller, so that it was just a tiny flicker. “Once,” he said, “we did this. In the distant times. We sought to take our revenge on the living, on the humans. We were driven by envy then—by jealousy of what we could not have.”
The tattered black rags of the Crow moved as the creature raised one hand to his cheek. The flame grew smaller, and then was extinguished. A small trace of smoke drifted toward the top of the bell tower. “But we are wiser now. We wish only to live in peace, and to be left alone. But this is not possible, because the others—these guardians�
�attack us. Destroy us. We have no enemies but them.”
“Why don’t you just ask them to leave you alone?” said Falcon.
“Do you think we have not tried?” said the Crow. “Do you? We offer them terms. But all they want is our destruction. It is the only thing that drives them, their hatred and their confusion.”
The Crow pulled off the black cloth that covered a rumpled form in the corner. And there, tied to the chair, was Jonny Frankenstein, bound and gagged. He looked at Falcon with terrified, desperate eyes.
“And so they send these spies among us! These murderers and fakes!” He yanked the gag off of Jonny’s mouth. “Did you really think the boy would let you deceive him twice?”
“I was trying to help,” said Jonny. “Falcon, I’m on your side—”
“No one will be tricked by you again,” said the Crow. “I am old, but I am not yet a fool.”
“Falcon—I really am your friend,” said Jonny. “I told you.”
“He is not your friend,” said the Crow. “Ask one who has learned more bitterly than any other what the price is of feeling love for them. I—the great Crow!—now doomed to spend my days in this tower. As a timekeeper! A tinker!”
“You said that if you leave the tower, the time is—subtracted somewhere? What does that mean? Subtracted how?”
“The time I spend out of the tower,” said the Crow, looking at the stopwatch around his neck once more, “is time subtracted from the lives of the ones I love. Each moment I spend beyond these walls is time subtracted from your life, Falcon. That is why I have had to leave you alone, son. If I were to be with you—anywhere but here—each minute would be subtracted from the length of your own life.”
“Her life too,” said Jonny.
“Silence,” said the Crow.
“It’s true,” said Jonny. “You subtract those days from the life of the queen. Because you still care about her. Because you love her, even after everything she did to you!”
The Crow turned angrily toward Jonny, and a small beam of light shot out of his eyes, landing on Jonny’s mouth. A moment later the light ceased. Where Jonny’s mouth had been, now there was only skin.
“What did you do to him?” said Falcon.
“I took his mouth away,” said the Crow. “To stop him from talking.”
“He did try to help us, I think,” said Falcon. “He gave us Quimby’s keys.”
“So that he could prey upon your good nature,” said the Crow. “So that he could sneak back here and destroy us.”
“I don’t think so,” said Falcon.
“Why did he give you the keys?” said the Crow. “So you could set your friends free from the dungeon. So you could lead a revolt against this school. So you could destroy us.” He smiled cruelly. “Isn’t that right?”
“You shouldn’t put all those kids in a dungeon,” said Falcon. “You shouldn’t be teaching them how to be something they’re not.”
The Crow looked at Falcon with a long, thoughtful gaze. “What should we be teaching them, then?” he said.
“To become themselves,” said Falcon, “and not to be ashamed.”
The Crow smiled. “Nicely put. Yes. Nicely put indeed.” He rubbed his chin. “I will make you an offer, son. How about if we do just what you say? Release the prisoners. Let them embrace their monster selves. Live their lives in peace. Is that what you had in mind? Is this the thing you desire for your friends, and for yourself?”
“Yes,” said Falcon. “That’s it.”
“Very well, then. We’ll make that so. Oh, but just one thing you have to do for me in exchange. To show us, once and for all, which side you have chosen.”
“What?”
He pointed toward Jonny. “Destroy Jonny Frankenstein!”
Jonny started squirming and struggling in his chair. He made a desperate screaming sound in his throat, a sound that could not be released because the boy no longer had a mouth.
“What do you mean, destroy?” said Falcon. “How?”
“There are lots of ways to do it, son,” said the Crow. “That eye of yours, for one. Why don’t you let yourself feel the dark fire that burns so brightly within you? You’ve seen me use it; it’s easy. Just direct the anger you feel in that black eye upon a single spot. Or, if you like, use your hands. You could suck his brain out, if you wanted. That would be the more sophisticated method.”
“My hands?” said Falcon. He raised his right hand and looked at it, pictured the fingers cupping against the side of Jonny’s face.
“Or you could just throw him out the window of the tower, if you wanted,” said the Crow. “There are lots of options. The important thing is that you do this. Destroy him, and in so doing make your decision final.”
“Destroy him?” said Falcon.
“Yes,” said the Crow. “This guardian. This traitor, who pretended to be your friend, so he could lead you into danger. Destroy him.”
Falcon remembered the day that Jonny had arrived, how he had been thrown out of that van, then walked up to the Tower of Aberrations and plugged his guitar into his neck. It’s just this thing I can do.
“I think when he came here he intended to destroy us,” said Falcon. “But he changed once he got here. He saw that he and I—had something in common.”
“What could you possibly have in common with that?” said the Crow, pointing at the prisoner.
“Jonny and I—,” said Falcon to his father, “we were both orphans.”
“You were never an orphan,” the Crow said. “All this time I have been protecting you—saving your life—by staying in this tower. By remaining trapped in this chamber, I have kept your days from diminishing.”
“How could I possibly have known that?” said Falcon angrily. His black eye heated up and began to glow with fire. “You left me! You both left me!”
“You know it now,” said the Crow.
Falcon looked at the mouthless Jonny. He was trying to tell Falcon something with his eyes, and Falcon tried to imagine what Jonny would say if he still had the power of speech. I warned you, Falcon. I told you I was a piece of junk.
“He saved Megan,” said Falcon.
“Oh, of course he didn’t,” said the Crow. “He killed her. Didn’t you, Jonny?”
“Megan!” said Falcon, and now an orange fireball shot out of his left eye. It ricocheted around the bell tower, then soared out one of the arches into the air.
“Nice fireball!” said the Crow, impressed. “You’re nearly mature. Now let us focus that, so that the fire can be used with more precision. Try it. Train your energies on Jonny’s heart.”
Falcon went up to Jonny Frankenstein and grabbed him. “Did you kill her?” he said. “Did you?”
“Put your hand on the side of his face, son,” said the Crow. “And find out.”
“Put my—”
“Go on,” said the Crow. “Suck his brain out. Learn the truth!”
Falcon looked at his father, who was smiling harshly. Jonny Frankenstein was shaking his head and trying to say no.
The Crow looked at Falcon and sighed. “Even now, you doubt this choice,” he said. He turned his back on his son for a moment and retrieved something. Then he turned back and placed a small ticking clock directly on Falcon’s chest. Falcon reached down to the timepiece but found it was irrevocably stuck to him. It seemed to tick at the same rate as his monster heart.
“What’s this?” said Falcon.
“It is called a thoughtclock. Think of it as a final piece of persuasion. You now have one minute to make your choice, Falcon. One minute. Do choose wisely.”
“What choice?’
“To chose your path. And destroy your nemesis.”
“And if I don’t—”
“You will be turned to stone.”
“You’d do that to me? Your own son?”
“To save you!” shouted the Crow. “To keep you from becoming one of them! A creature who kills the thing it loves. Just like this one killed your friend Megan Cr
ofton!”
“Did you kill her?” Falcon shouted. “Tell me, Jonny! Tell me!”
He put his hand on the side of Jonny’s face. His black eye burned with dark fire, and he felt Jonny’s thoughts drawing into his fingertips, as if he was drawing blood through a syringe. All sorts of images rushed by. He saw a very young Jonny walking through the halls of an orphanage in the Hidden City. Then Falcon saw his mother, sitting on a throne, next to an empty chair. He saw Jonny Frankenstein dancing with Megan on the night of the Monsters’ Bash. All the while, as these images passed before him, he heard the ticking of the thoughtclock, beating in time with his monster heart.
Then he saw Jonny walking with her on the beach. You have to get away, Megan, he said. Don’t ask me how I know. But you have to take on your wind form now and escape. I’m sorry. It’s the only way.
But Jonny, said Megan. Her eyes were filling with tears, and he took her hand. I thought you liked me.
I do like you, Megan. That’s why you have to get away.
You’re lying, Jonny, she said. You’ve been lying about everything.
I’m not lying about this. Hurry. Do it now.
Megan began to dissolve into her wind form. Jonny’s hair blew around in the breeze. Every time I’ve ever loved anyone, she said, they’ve disappeared.
“No,” said Falcon, staggering backward. His fingers were hot. The ticking of the clock on his chest pounded in his ears.
“You see?” said the Crow. “He did kill her.”
“No, he didn’t,” said Falcon. “He saved her. I saw him!”
The Crow looked at Jonny angrily. “What are you doing, giving him a false memory? I thought you said you were his friend, Jonny—and look at you—lying to him even now!”
Jonny squirmed and shouted, and looked at Falcon in desperation.
“Do it now,” said the Crow. “You’re running out of time! Destroy him, and I’ll grant your request. And save the others!”
“Jonny, I…,” said Falcon, “I’m sorry but I—” Now his blue eye began to throb.
“Stop that,” said the Crow. “Resist that. You must rise above that! Rise above it!”
Falcon felt like his whole head was going to explode, and he raised both hands to his eyes. He staggered backward, blinded, the ticking clock pounding on his chest. The prophecy of Quimby came back, finally complete. Falcon Quinn gets torn in half, makes his choice, and—starts to laugh!
Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror Page 28