The Crowlands

by T M Creedy

  ‘Why?’ I whisper. ‘Why are you doing this? They’re just children. They deserve to be free.’

  ‘Because I can.’ Comes the arrogant answer. ‘They are defective. Imperfect. Children should be perfect, should they not?’ He settles himself on the side of the bathtub and crosses his legs, as if he and I are having a cosy chat. ‘I have tried for many years to find a cure for the genetic mutation which causes them to be born idiots. At first I was naysaid, my research scorned by my colleagues within the medical profession, but I was steadfast. I never once wavered in my dedication.’

  ‘They’re NOT idiots!’ I protest vehemently. ‘They have every right to the same chances in life as any other child.’ The doctor smirks at me condescendingly.

  ‘You clearly have not had the good fortune to be suitably educated on such matters. Tell me, where was it you went to medical school?’ He wheezes with laughter at his own joke. ‘Ha! A woman doctor. There are such creatures of course but they sensibly stay within the limits of their knowledge, that is to say, they dedicate their time to the study and treatment of diseases of their own sex and to the matters of childbirth. No better than midwives. They certainly lack the necessary intelligence to specialise in conditions of the mind. It’s preposterous to suggest otherwise!’

  Whatever death has done to this man’s body, it sure as hell hasn’t had any effect on his ego.

  ‘Where the devil is that nurse? Surely it doesn’t take so long to fetch one small child’ He mutters into his moth-eaten beard. He stands and paces the small room. ‘Very well. I will find one myself, if I must. Stand aside, girl.’ I’m blocking his way and he reaches out and clasps my wrist in a bony grip with superhuman strength. The feel of his touch is unbearable and I squirm away, pulling downwards hard and fast, the way I was taught in the self-defence classes at school. It works, his ruined fingers can’t keep hold of me and I run as fast as I can to the door of the girl’s bedroom, fumbling for the key in the lock. The door swings open and I edge inside, pulling the small brass key from the outside of the door and using it to lock the door from the inside. The room is pitch black, there’s not even a sliver of light from the bare window. I can hear the doctor footsteps as he drags his useless legs down the corridor, shouting all the while.

  ‘You cannot escape me! Any of you! You think a locked door will best me? I shall drag you out by your hair! I shall plunge your heads beneath the water and laugh as you thrash about for freedom! I shall imprison your souls and feed off them for eternity!’

  A small, cold hand slides into mine. I can’t see which of the children it is until a faint, orange light begins to shine from the corner of the room. As it grows stronger I can make out Gregory’s snub features next to me, one small hand clinging on to me and his other thumb in his mouth. The light is coming from a glass lantern held aloft by Faith McKay, and she has her other arm around Malinda, who is cowering into her.

  ‘I wouldn’t have done it.’ The nurse tells me softly. ‘I know you thought I was obeying orders but it was the only way I could think of to get to the children, keep them safe.’ I nod in understanding.

  ‘What do we do now?’ The children are all here, imploring us to save them from the doctor’s evil intentions this time. Ivy holds Babygirl on her hip. Kirra cowers behind one of the old bed frames and Brian twitches and moans, his damaged brain unable to cope with the doctors menacing threats. Faith looks at me helplessly.

  ‘I don’t know. He won’t give up until he’s got what he wants.’

  At that there is an almighty bang on the locked door.

  ‘Unlock this door and give me the children!’ He screams with fury. The banging on the door grows louder and stronger until we can see the panels bending inwards under the pressure of the doctors’ fists. The wood buckles and bows and won’t hold up to the assault for much longer. We’re trapped in here. All we can do is huddle together and wait, wait until the lock on the door breaks and that repulsive collection of rotting bones and decayed flesh reaches in to snatch the first child he can find.

  ‘Darana!’ Kirra points to the dark corner by the door, the one where the soft light from the lantern fails to reach. ‘Darana!’

  ‘What’s she saying?’ I ask the nurse. She shakes her head.

  ‘I’m not sure. What is it Kirra?’

  ‘Darana! Darana here!’ Kirra keeps gesturing towards the corner where we can see nothing but black shadows. Malinda, peeking out from the nurse’s side, takes up the call.

  ‘Darana! Darana!’ Malinda huffs in frustration at our blank faces. ‘Darana! It’s Dolly!’

  ‘Dolly?’

  The other children clamber excitedly towards the corner, ignoring the repeated bangs and thumps from the other side of the door.

  ‘Dolly’s here!’

  ‘Dolly’s come back for us!’

  ‘Dolly!’

  Slowly, as if she was born of the shadows, the slight figure of a young woman wearing a loose grey dress emerges into the light. She is dark skinned, darker than Malinda or Kirra, and her eyes spark with anger. Nurse McKay steps forward.

  ‘Dolly? Is that you?’

  ‘Dolly not my name! My name Darana!’ She draws herself to her full height. ‘You give me the name Dolly cos you not want me to use my real name. My spirit name! In this world I am Darana. You will call me by my name!’ She says proudly, staring down the nurse. Nurse McKay lowers her gaze first and bows her head.

  ‘Yes, of course. I’m sorry. Your name is Darana.’

  Darana gives a brief nod of acknowledgment. She walks further into the room until she is in front of the window and turns to face us all, the group of frightened children, their long-dead nurse, and me.

  ‘Is time.’ She pronounces solemnly. ‘Time for the doctor to be gone. My ancestors tell me the way. I bring the crows down from the tree and they will deliver justice to his evil soul!’

  She stands for a moment, swaying slightly, before opening her mouth and beginning to sing. It’s not like anything I’ve heard before. It’s part hymn, part prayer and her lilting voice rises and falls in waves, the unfamiliar words and sounds coming together in a melodic chant. After a minute, Malinda and Kirra join in, their sweet high voices echoing the words Darana speaks. It’s mesmerising. Even the doctor’s vile rant fades into nothingness as we listen to the girls sing the ancient song of their people.

  Tap.

  Tap tap.

  They flutter to the windowsill in ones and twos. Tap tap tap on the glass with their beaks. They cock their heads, listening to Darana and the others sing. More and more crows arrive, jostling for space at the closed window until all we can see is a solid block of black, oily feathers and beady eyes. Hundreds of them, all called down from the tree by Darana’s song, all pounding on the glass with their beaks in a frenzy.

  TAP TAP TAP TAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAP.

  Darana finishes her song on one final triumphant note. The crows screech and shriek and peck at each other in their desperation to strike through the window panes. They drum the air with their wings and in one united surge they succeed in breaking through the glass and swarm inside the room, drowning us in a storm of beating wings and scrabbling claws. I can’t see anything other than the black, writhing mass of birds. I sense, rather than hear or see, the door to the bedroom crash open with enough force to lift it off its hinges and the ragged form of the doctor lurches into the room. As if bound by one dominant mind, the crows swirl and circle around him, creating a twisting, rolling blanket of birds which smothers the doctor’s body and forces him to his bony knees.

  ‘Noooooo. Get them off me! Call them off! I will not be defeated!’ The doctor’s raspy shout is almost unheard above the victorious cries of the crows. Darana stands, eyes alight with righteous glee, as she points to the doctor’s prostrate form.

  ‘They come for you! They take you to hell where you belong!’

  The crows renew their frenzied attack, pecking and stabbing at the doctor’s rotten corpse. He screams, an unearthly high
-pitched shriek of pain and rage as the birds gouge great chunks of flesh from his bones. They squabble over his eyeballs, fighting to claim those prized morsels and rip at the tattered skin on his face. The doctor’s howls of protest become frightened squeaks as one of the crows, a huge magnificent beast of a bird, tears his tongue from his mouth and flies away in triumph with the trophy. The crows leave not a scrap of flesh as they scoop furrows into muscle and tug at sinews and cartilage. They plunge their cruel beaks into soft, crumbling organs and gulp down the rancid meat, gorging themselves on the doctor’s corrupt and stinking body. When all the connective tissues have been torn away the crows concentrate on the bones themselves, pecking at the marrow inside and working in groups to lift the skeletal remains from the floor and fly away with them, piece by noisome piece.

  The remaining crows, sated after their fevered feeding, launch themselves languidly from the remains of the broken window and disappear beyond the gumtree, gliding gracefully into the darkness. The floor is a mess of birdshit and dropped feathers, and scraps of blackened skin curling up like dried slugs. But we are safe, all of us. Doctor Silas Baldwin is no more, torn apart into tiny pieces and dragged down to hell for eternity. We are free.

  We sit in peaceful silence while Dolly – Darana I mean – tells us of her guilt at not being able to save the children when she was alive.

  ‘I hid. I never forgive myself for not trying. I disgrace myself by being a coward.’

  ‘There was nothing you could do.’ I tell her. ‘I read your diary. Essie gave it to me. By writing it all down you have saved the children in a way. Their story has been told now, thanks to you, and I will make sure the world knows exactly what went on in this place.’

  ‘The ancestors, they help me to come back. They help me to know the songs to sing the birds down from the tree and to tell them take the doctor. Now the children can leave, go to the skyworld to be with their families’

  The faces of the children light up and they gasp and exclaim with delight, picturing the long awaited reunions with mums and dads, brothers and sisters.

  ‘And you too, Nurse McKay.’ Darana goes on. ‘You can go now. Rest easy.’ The nurse is a picture of rapturous joy. Her death by her own hand is forgiven and she too will be reunited with her loved ones.

  A sliver of soft dawn light appears on the distant horizon, heralding the new day. From the gumtree, the mild rustling of the remaining crows grows louder as one by one the birds fly up to our window. They are ready to finally complete their chore now. They will fly the souls of the children away from here, deliver them to their eternal home, filled with sunlight and love.

  Alice is the first child to leave. She cradles her baby carefully to her breast and smiles beatifically at us.

  ‘Goodbye! Goodbye everyone!’

  The birds circle Alice with infinite gentleness, lifting her up with their wings and moving as one to carry both of them up into the sky. Even as she leaves the house Alice is fading into translucence. Her features blur and shift as she is ferried further and further away until all I can see is a bright beam of light, high up in the clear blue morning. A flash, and she’s gone. Brian is next and I can see the exact moment when he is healed from his miserable afflictions, created by the doctor’s sinister and ignorant experiments. Brian’s eyes clear and they sparkle with mischief and delight. He waves happily as the crows bear him up and then he too is nothing but a flash in the sky. Ivy, Rosie and Peggy are next and they laugh in delight as they are borne up by the birds. Babygirl toddles after them, reluctant to be left behind, but then she is too surrounded by soft feathers and carried in a cradle of crows through the window.

  ‘Mumma!’ She cries with happiness. ‘Mumma!

  I can’t stop the tears falling down my face as I hear Babygirl’s joy at being reunited with her beloved mother. Malinda and Kirra leave next. They look towards the horizon in eager anticipation and for a brief second I can see the outlines of their warrior ancestors, still as statues, waiting to escort the girls to their ancestral lands. Peter goes, then there is just Gregory left. He hugs me tightly as the crows shift and link wings around him. He blinks, once, twice and I’m looking at the brightest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. All sign of his blindness is gone. He focuses on me, patting my face softly with his hands.

  ‘You’re beautiful.’ He tells me.

  ‘So are you, precious boy.’ I kiss his forehead. ‘Go on now, your family’s waiting for you.’

  ‘Mam and Dad!’ He shouts, grinning widely.

  ‘Don’t forget Billy bunny.’ I tuck the soft toy into his shirt and he reaches down to clutch the woolly ears. I watch, sobbing, as he waves the rabbit in the air and fades into the sunlight.

  Nurse McKay takes my hands in hers.

  ‘Thank you, my dear, for everything you’ve done. I shall never forget your kindness to the children.’ She is overjoyed at leaving the house she has been trapped in for so many years. The crows circle and lift and she smiles serenely down at me, waving until the flash of light is gone from my sight.

  It’s just me and Darana left in the room.

  ‘Thank you. Without your diary this would never have been possible. What happens now? Do you go with them?’

  She shakes her head.

  ‘No. I have my own ways of getting there. I’ll go back when I done what I need to do, gots people to see first, gots to make sure that great-great-nephew o’ mine is behaving hisself!’ I laugh, picturing Pindari’s face when his long-dead aunty pops up for a visit. ‘You will tell them? Where to find the bodies – give them a decent burial.’

  ‘Of course. I’ll tell the police today.’

  She nods, and with a swish of her skirts she turns to the corner and is gone, just like that. I stand, utterly alone in this house for the first time since I got here. It feels lighter, no longer weighted down by its past horrors. It’s just a big old empty house now. A big old empty house with one hell of a broken window.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The sun is well up by the time I skip downstairs and open the front door. I stand beneath the gumtree staring up into its leafy canopy. The persistent noise, the raucous cawing that has been the permanent background soundtrack to life here at Crowlands House is gone. The crows have fled; their task is completed. Only one or two birds remain in the tree, barely moving enough to rustle the leaves. Heading back inside I check the laundry room out of curiosity. The door opens freely when I turn the handle and the little room is infused with bright sunshine, the green paint on the walls looking like the colour of fresh leaves instead of the dull bile tone it used to bring to mind. The room has lost its feeling of hopelessness. The shadow of Nurse McKay has gone, leaving only a lingering memory behind. I leave the door open as I leave. It’s a nice little room to be in now. I wish Drew was here so I could tell him everything that happened last night. I need his help with telling the authorities about the bodies in the rose garden too.

  I’m crossing the kitchen, ready to fling open the verandah doors to welcome in the warm sunshine when the house phone rings.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Sara?’ Margie’s voice comes down the line.

  ‘Margie! Hi! How’s it going?’ I’m so pleased to hear from her but she cuts me off in the middle of my sentence.

  ‘Sara. Get out – NOW!’

  ‘What?’ I don’t understand. Why is she being so shitty with me?

  ‘Sara. Listen to me. You need to get out of the house now!’

  ‘No. Margie. It’s OK. The children have all been set free, it’s fine now.’ I reassure her. There’s a scuffle on the other end of the line and Mac comes on, sounding stressed and making a herculean effort to keep calm.

  ‘Sara. You need to listen up, girl. You need to drop everything and get out of the house as soon as you can.’

  I’m stunned into silence.

  ‘But…. but…’

  ‘Sara! Now!’ Mac yells. ‘Sara – there’s someone in the house with you!’

  The line goes
dead and I’m left staring at the silent handset. I’ don’t understand. Why would Margie and Mac think there was someone else here? How would they know? The phone comes to life again, ringing in my hand, but before I can press answer I feel the point of a knife at my throat.

  ‘Don’t answer it.’ The voice is soft and menacing. ‘Just drop it on the floor.’

  I do as he says, unable to breathe or swallow. All I can feel is the chill of the blade against my skin.

  ‘Good girl.’ He says. ‘Well, haven’t you led me a merry dance?’ He grips my shoulder hard and slowly turns me around to face him, keeping the knife at me the whole time. I recognise him instantly, even though this time he is wearing normal clothes, and not dressed head to toe in black. The last time I saw him he had me by the throat, on the darkened stairs of my flat in Peckham, before the fortuitous arrival of the Romanian lads forced him to drop me and run. He’s the man who murdered Sara.

  ‘The things I’ve had to do to find you.’ He tuts, putting painful pressure on my shoulder joint and forcing me to move with him. ‘Thought you were being clever, didn’t you? Using her passport. I thought you looked like her when I first saw you but I never thought you’d have the pluck to try and be her.’

  ‘How did you find me?’ I manage to spit out. He gives a mirthless chuckle.

  ‘That was the easy bit. Once I found out her passport had been used it didn’t take too much figuring out. Tracked you to Melbourne easily enough. Took a few days to pinpoint you here though. Fair play to you for coming up with that one.’ He’s leading me towards the main stairs. ‘Now that I’ve gone to so much trouble, you had better start playing nice and tell me where to find what I’ve come here for.’ At this he gives my arm a vicious twist causing a lightning bolt of pain to travel up my shoulder into my neck, where he still points the knife. It’s painful enough to make me fall to my knees on the carpet runner but his iron grip stops me from collapsing completely and I’m hanging awkwardly in mid-air, trying not to cry out from the red hot agony in my arm.