by Jacob Grey
The memory of his crow falling to the ground hit Caw like a smack in the gut as he followed the others into the nave. Screech was the bravest, most foolhardy crow he’d ever known. He’d almost got himself killed countless times, and still he had kept throwing himself into danger.
We can’t just abandon him, said Glum. Let me go back and look.
Me too! said Shimmer.
“It’s too dangerous,” said Caw.
We’re not asking you to come with us, said Shimmer. We can do it on our own.
“That’s not what I meant,” said Caw. “I need you here. If anything happens to you too—”
I have to know, said Glum, if he’s …
Caw saw his own reflection in the silky black orb of Glum’s eye. He looked haggard, drained.
But it gave him an idea. He turned to Mrs Strickham, who was resting her hand on a fox’s head. “I need your help.”
“With what?” she said.
“You said you could get inside the minds of your foxes,” Caw continued. “Show me how. If I can get inside Screech, I’ll know if he’s still alive.”
The fox feral frowned, clearly doubtful.
“Mum, try,” said Lydia.
“Very well,” said Mrs Strickham. She unfastened her coat and sat cross-legged on the floor. Her foxes all lay down on their bellies a few metres away. “Take a seat, Caw. The rest of you, please be quiet. It takes immense concentration.”
Caw sat opposite Lydia’s mother. He didn’t feel confident.
“Close your eyes and try to relax,” she said. “Empty your thoughts.”
He found it hard. Whenever he shut his eyelids, scenes from the battle at the zoo replayed themselves. The SWAT team, the barrel flares from their guns, the terrified ferals cowering. And Selina’s face as she stood beside her mother.
“I can sense your anger,” said Mrs Strickham. “Caw, you can’t do this unless you let go.”
Caw shooed the thoughts away, but almost at once others crowded in to fill their place. That first meeting with Selina in his old bedroom, the way he’d managed to make her laugh. The rush of pride as she’d said they should meet up again. He’d fallen for it without question, and all the time she’d been laughing not at his feeble jokes, but at the fool she was making of him.
Caw, relax, said Glum. Please, for Screech.
Caw took another deep breath and pushed Selina from his mind. He tried to imagine a black ball of emptiness in his brain, impervious, keeping everything at bay.
“OK, now concentrate on the crow,” said Mrs Strickham. “Speak his name inside your head, think of his form and nothing else.”
Caw began to do what she said.
Screech … Screech … Screech … He imagined the crow in happier times, seated on the edge of the nest.
“His spirit is out there,” said Mrs Strickham. “Find it.”
Screech …
He thought of him swooping down to drink from a puddle.
Screech …
He remembered how he had gobbled up whole chips without even chewing.
Screech …
It happened quite suddenly. The black image in Caw’s mind began to break apart, collapsing into spots of bright light. It felt as though his mind was rending into two, then turning over slowly to open another plane of thought, ancient and alien. The crow disappeared and a different scene began to coalesce. The image seemed curved, bent out of shape, but as the light faded, Caw saw the face of the Police Commissioner, Cynthia Davenport. She held a compact mirror and was applying lipstick. Caw realised he was in the back of a car. There was no sign of Screech.
Cynthia Davenport stopped suddenly and turned to look right at him. Her cold grey eyes narrowed with curiosity.
“I was wondering when you’d come,” she said.
Confused, Caw tried to speak, but all that came out was a crow’s raucous cry. He looked left and right and saw, to his shock, two huge black wings held out, taut, and tied to what looked like the headrest of a car seat. One was crusted with dried blood and broken feathers. He felt suddenly trapped and tried to move. He flexed and heaved his shoulder joints and wished he hadn’t. The wings strained and pain shot through his body. Now he understood what he was seeing. His body was the body of a crow.
He was inside Screech.
“Don’t struggle,” said Davenport softly.
Caw could feel his heart beating rapidly. What was going on? Why did the Police Commissioner have Screech in her car? Did she know about the ferals?
She lowered her face nearer to his. Now Caw saw her features closely, the resemblance to Selina was clear. They had the same flaring nose, porcelain skin and broad forehead. The eyes were completely different though – the mother’s had no kindness or compassion. A squawk of pain escaped his beak.
“You’re probably wondering what all this is about,” she said.
The rear doors on either side of the car opened, and Caw flinched as Mr Silk climbed in from one side, Pinkerton from the other. The rat feral scratched her neck with dirty crooked nails. They knew Mrs Davenport? But …
Mr Silk settled into his seat and tipped his hat towards Selina’s mother. “Ma’am,” he said.
Light flooded over Caw’s confused thoughts as he struggled to keep up with what he was seeing. His slow-burning dread sharpened into terror. They knew her. They were working for her. Which meant …
“Don’t try to speak,” said Cynthia Davenport. “Just listen very carefully. This is not a negotiation, or an idle threat. I have all your kind, and I’ve brought them to the prison where they belong. Bring me the stone by midnight, or I will kill them all. Involve your friends and they will die as well. Your choice is really quite simple, crow talker.”
She smiled, as a small black insect, wings flickering, emerged from behind her ear. Caw watched in horror as it crawled across the perfectly smooth skin of her cheek and scurried up her nostril. She didn’t even flinch.
It was her. It had to be. Cynthia Davenport – Selina’s mother – was the Mother of Flies.
“And now,” she said. “We have no more use for this creature. Are your rats hungry, Pinkerton?”
“A-a-always,” said Pinkerton, her bloodshot eyes widening. “Famished.”
Caw felt his wings wrenched free in Cynthia Davenport’s grip, as she and her cronies climbed from the car. Then the world jolted sideways as she hurled him through the air. He hit the ground and crumpled in agony. Staring at the tarmac, he tried to move on his injured wing, but waves of pain paralysed his body.
Cynthia Davenport looked down on him pitilessly, then her stiletto heels marched away, tip-tapping on the ground.
Caw panicked. Scurrying feet and four furred bodies surrounded him. The rats bared their teeth.
Get up! Caw urged.
He tried to use his talons to ward off the rats. One from behind must have darted forward, because suddenly his wing was being tugged violently. Teeth sank into his back. He flapped and flapped, crying out, but the rats clamped their jaws across his body. They’re tearing me apart!
He felt lancing pain as feathers tore from his skin, and with each bite, Caw sensed his connection to Screech weakening. He focused his mind on the agony. He couldn’t let go. He couldn’t leave his friend.
But they were all over him. They were killing him. The stink of rat was overwhelming as their spittle coated his face and feathers, frantic with greed.
Then a white shape leapt screeching, into the fray, followed by another. Smaller than the rats, but just as vicious, an army of mice piled in. The teeth and claws let go and Caw rolled on to his back, talons wheeling helplessly. Through the blood and pain he saw rats trying to free themselves from the mice.
Caw realised this might be his only chance and he willed his crow body on to its feet. One of his legs was broken, he thought, hopping lopsidedly across the ground. But he forced all his strength into his aching wings and flapped. For the first three or four beats he only managed to drag himself across the tarmac, but then he was airbo
rne, flapping wildly.
The ground dropped away and he saw the mice scattering from the prone bodies of four weakened rats. As he climbed higher, the wind cooled his wings and Blackstone Prison loomed into view. Several armoured vans were parked in a fenced yard, and police were unloading prisoners in handcuffs – the ferals. Caw swooped past and saw a face among them that was staring right at him. It was Pip, struggling in the hands of a police officer.
“Go Screech!” he shouted. “Tell Caw he’s our only chance!”
The officer dragged him back into line.
Caw’s eyes caught a flutter of movement in the air to his left. He’d barely turned to look properly when hundreds of flapping shapes fell over him like a blanket, clouding his vision. Moths! He batted through them with his wings, but with each stroke he felt more clustering on his wings, sapping his strength. It was the sound, dragging him downwards.
Got to get away!
Caw let his wings fold and gravity take him. He dropped away beneath the cloud of moths, then flapped hard, ignoring the pain, scattering the moths from his feathers as he gained speed. The insects followed, but he was quicker. Soon he was flying south, towards the river, the adrenaline seeping away and leaving only a dull ache across his wings. The city swept past and he sensed its updrafts like warm exhalations from a living creature. His crow eye bent the world so he could take in wide peripherals and the horizon all around.
The broken tower of St Francis came into view and Caw angled his wings to a glide. He tipped them to slow and dipped through the hole in the rafters. Pigeons scattered from his descent and he flapped through the long nave, over Mrs Strickham and Lydia.
It’s Screech! he heard Glum cry.
Then he saw a boy sitting cross-legged on the floor, and he realised it was himself, staring with vacant eyes at nothing. He was home – he couldn’t fly any more …
Caw snapped to attention just in time to see Screech land awkwardly and sprawl across the slabs on the church floor. Lydia rushed to the fallen crow, and Glum and Shimmer landed at his side.
Screech? said Shimmer.
Caw tried to stand, but everything felt wrong, and he staggered clumsily against an old pew. It took a few seconds for the pins and needles to fade from his legs and for his limbs to feel like his own again.
“You did it!” said Mrs Strickham. She took hold of his shoulders to keep him from falling.
Wake up, Screech, Glum was saying.
Caw struggled to find his voice and it came out as a croak. “It’s her,” he said. “Mrs Davenport. She’s the Mother of Flies.”
“What?” said Mrs Strickham.
Caw nodded. “Cynthia Davenport. I saw her. She’s the fly feral.”
Mrs Strickham gripped him more tightly. “How do you know?”
“There was a fly on her face. Pinkerton and Mr Silk were with her in a car. And now she’s taken the ferals to the prison.”
Screech was moving weakly. “Are you all right?” Caw asked him.
A bit wobbly, said the crow.
“What’s going on?” asked Crumb, emerging from upstairs again. His eyes widened. “Is that Screech?”
Lydia was crouching beside the crow, slowly helping him extend his wing.
“The Mother of Flies is back in Blackstone,” said Mrs Strickham. “She has our friends at the prison.”
Crumb’s skin went ashen. “You’re not serious?”
“It’s Cynthia Davenport,” said Caw.
“But how can …?” said the pigeon feral. “Are you sure?”
Caw nodded. “It all fits. That’s how Pinkerton and Mr Silk tracked me and Selina to the boat. I wouldn’t have spotted a fly following me.”
“Can’t you see?” said Lydia. “It was Selina! She led you straight there!”
Caw felt sickened. Of course she had.
Mrs Strickham paced and Caw’s mind churned the events over and over. Everything was starting to make sense. Somehow Cynthia Davenport had known that Caw would have the stone. So she planted Selina in his house to track him. The police at Quaker’s must have been working for her too, trying to extract Caw’s whereabouts from the cat feral.
“The Mother of Flies,” murmured Crumb, with a shudder. “What has that creature crawled back to Blackstone for?”
Caw’s skin flushed and his mouth went dry. There was only one thing for it – he had to tell them. If his mother was here, would she have told him to stay silent? There was no way to tell. He had to make his own decisions. And he knew one thing for sure – secret or no secret, it wasn’t just his own life at stake any more.
“She must be planning an attack on the city,” said Mrs Strickham. “Why else would she have taken all the ferals into custody?”
“It isn’t that,” Caw said quietly.
Mrs Strickham turned her eyes on him. “Pardon?”
Caw swallowed. He could hardly breathe and his face was burning. The moment had come, and he didn’t know what to say.
“I … I was going to …”
“Spit it out,” said Crumb. “If you know something, tell us. Pip’s in danger, Caw!”
And so, Caw told them everything he’d held back before, at the zoo, mostly looking at the floor. The words came out in a rush, from the first meeting with the stranger outside his house, to his meeting with Quaker, to the full story about the fight on the boat, and the Mother of Flies’ ultimatum. The only thing he left out was his dream – how could that mean anything to them?
He expected anger, but when he did finally dare to glance up, he saw that Crumb and Mrs Strickham were just puzzled.
“This man outside your house,” said Mrs Strickham. “No hair, you say – none at all?”
“Not that I could see,” said Caw.
Lydia’s mother frowned. “It sounds like the worm feral. Was he very old?”
Caw shrugged. “It was hard to tell. But yes, he looked old and pale.”
Mrs Strickham’s frown deepened. “Bootlace, we used to call him when I was a girl. But he seemed like an old man even back then. He must be ancient if he’s still alive now.”
Caw remembered the worm Shimmer had prised from the earth just before he entered the house. “There was a worm! Perhaps it was just a coincidence, but …”
Mrs Strickham focused her grim stare on Caw again. “You should have told us all this before.”
Caw felt his cheeks burning again. “I’m sorry. Quaker told me it was mine alone to look after. That my mother wouldn’t want me to tell anyone about it.”
“That old fool,” muttered Crumb.
“So where is this stone?” asked Lydia, stiffly. Caw realised at once that she was angry at him. But could he blame her? He hadn’t told her about the stone. After all the kindness she’d shown him, he’d kept it secret from her.
He reached into his pocket and slowly drew out the stone. It looked plainer than before. Utterly lifeless and matt black. Everyone crowded closer.
“May I?” said Mrs Strickham, holding out her hand.
Caw placed it in her palm.
There was a sudden screeching and hissing. Caw spun round to see Mrs Strickham’s foxes had leapt to their feet, hackles bristling across their backs. Mrs Strickham dropped the stone at once. “What on Earth …?” she said, staring at her hands.
“Mum?” said Lydia, looking up from beside Screech.
The foxes settled again and padded towards their mistress. They made soft mewling noises and strange, cautious yowls. Mrs Strickham frowned, glancing at them and then at the stone.
“Yes,” she said to the foxes. “I’m quite all right.”
One by one they rubbed their bodies against her. Caw couldn’t work out what had just happened. He crouched down to take the stone.
“Don’t!” said Mrs Strickham.
Caw paused, as she took a handkerchief out of her pocket. She stooped and picked up the stone in the cloth, more carefully this time, then closely inspected its surface.
“What is it?” said Crumb.
“I’m not at all sure,” said Mrs Strickham. “Only that when I touched it, something didn’t feel right.”
“What kind of ‘not right’?” asked Lydia.
Mrs Strickham glanced at Caw. “You’ve touched it too. Has it affected you?”
Caw started to shake his head, but Shimmer interrupted.
Actually, you have been a bit weird since you got it.
“In what way?” asked Caw.
Well … sort of distant, she said.
“Have I?”
We weren’t going to say anything, added Glum. Sometimes you don’t seem to be listening. We told ourselves you had a lot to think about, but maybe it’s got something to do with that stone.
I don’t like the look of it, added Screech.
“Quaker said it was dangerous,” said Caw. “I think he knew that the Mother of Flies wanted it.”
“The question is, why,” said Mrs Strickham, gazing at the stone. “Caw, think! Is there anything else you can tell us?”
“The crows just told me I’ve not been myself since I got it,” he said. “And actually …” He suddenly remembered the previous night, lying on Lydia’s bedroom floor, and the sudden rush of despair as he touched the stone – the feeling that the crows might have left him. Could that have been the stone’s doing as well?
“Actually what?” said Mrs Strickham.
“It’s just, well …” Caw didn’t know how to put it. “Perhaps it somehow takes away your link with your animals. I tried to turn into a crow when I went to see Quaker, and it didn’t work. And sometimes I don’t hear what the crows are saying any more. Just when I’m touching it.”
“Well, it looks like a lump of rock to me,” said Crumb. “I say we give it to that wretched fly talker and have done with it.”
“You can’t!” said Caw. Before he’d even thought about it, he reached out and snatched the stone back, handkerchief and all.
“Oh, can’t we?” said Crumb. “She’s got Pip, Caw. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”
“Yes, but …”
Crumb turned away with a snort of irritation. “Haven’t you caused enough problems?” he said.
“I agree with Caw,” said Mrs Strickham.
Crumb rounded on them both. “What? Pip’s seven years old!”