The King of Crows

by Libba Bray

  “What kind of experiment?”

  “I don’t know. Hence my use of the word experiment.”

  “Touché. But I’m not truly a Diviner,” Jericho said.

  “I’m not so sure about that. Your strength—that comes from Marlowe’s serum?”

  “I suppose it does,” Jericho said. “I didn’t have it before.”

  “So he made you into a Diviner. Like all of us. You are a Diviner.”

  A Diviner. A robot. An experiment. That’s what Jericho felt like. Marlowe’s science project. As if Marlowe were a god making something from clay in his image, or the image he desired. A golden son. Only Jericho was no golden boy. He was a mess, all balled up about his Jekyll-and-Hyde nature. He was afraid of his impulses and desires. It made him think of the German film he and Ling had wandered into back in Times Square, with the mad scientist transferring the soul of a woman into a machine.

  “I suppose so,” Jericho said quietly.

  “You are. I’m sure of it. The night we fought the ghosts, and on the night of the memorial—both times, I could feel you in there with us.”

  “You could?” Jericho said. He didn’t know why this made him feel so hopeful all of a sudden.

  Ling nodded. “Could you feel us?”

  “A little.”

  “Well. A little is something. It’s a start,” Ling said.

  She granted him a real smile that made him feel, for just a moment, like he was not alone. He wished he could tell Ling about what he’d seen in the woods, but he was afraid. If he didn’t say it aloud, it was like it didn’t happen. He knew Ling. She would want to know everything. She would want to make sense of it. He’d have to tell her about the Daedalus program. He’d have to tell her that every single one of the men who were involved began to deteriorate over time. They went mad, lost their strength, died. Every single one of them, except Jericho. That was why Marlowe had wanted him as his Übermensch. What was it Marlowe had said? Something about Jericho’s makeup that was exceptional. Something Marlowe coveted for his lousy eugenics program. Jericho didn’t want to be his experiment. He also didn’t want to end up like those other fellas. Like Sergeant Leonard.

  He knew the question she’d ask: You haven’t had anything strange happening to you, have you? No. He would not tell Ling. And then it wouldn’t be true.

  “Tonight, then,” Ling said.

  “Tonight,” Jericho agreed.

  They stopped for gasoline and sandwiches at a little shack near the Clinch River in a pretty valley protected by hills blooming with dogwood. They were huddled over their lunches at two picnic tables, everybody talking about how swinging the Chester B. Mosely Orchestra had been the night before, and Ling liked hearing how the acts would pick up little things from one another, urging one another on toward excellence. She knew that during the next performance, the girls would try something new and daring they’d learned, and maybe it would work and maybe it wouldn’t, but it was all about the risk. A light fog spilled over the tops of the hills. It was pretty, but it gave Ling the heebie-jeebies.

  “Something feels strange about this place,” Ling said, biting into her bologna sandwich. She missed her parents’ cooking.

  Alma peeled back the bread to remove a slimy pickle. “The only strangeness is this sandwich. Ugh,” she said out of earshot of the girl who worked the gas station and who was bringing out a pitcher of iced tea.

  “You mean, like it’s haunted,” Jericho said. He polished off half of his roast beef with nary a complaint.

  “Or will be.” Now, why had she said that? Such an odd thing to say. “Is there a graveyard near here?” Ling asked the girl with the tea.

  “You really know how to make an impression,” Alma muttered and tried to hunch down lower to hide her embarrassment.

  The girl shook her head. “Not that I know of. Why do you ask?”

  “This land—feels like there’s some power in it. Something bad,” Ling said.

  “You’ll have to excuse Miss Chang,” Alma said. “She’s got a delicate condition.”

  “No, I don’t,” Ling protested.

  The girl from the gas station laughed. “You sound like Old Man Hendrix!”

  Jericho’s blond brows furrowed. “Who?”

  “An old coot usedta live ’round here. A soothsayer, I reckon you might call him. He got religion after his little girl died. Shame about that.”

  “The daughter or the religion,” Jericho muttered, and Alma nudged him quiet with her elbow.

  “Golly Moses, the two of you!” she hissed.

  “Mr. John Hendrix spent forty nights in the woods and came out with all manner of visions about this land.”

  Goosepimples rose on Ling’s arms. “What kind of visions?”

  “He said there’d be a town built on Black Oak Ridge with a heap of factories and whatnot, all to fight a great war.”

  “We’ve already had a great war,” Jericho said bitterly. “Wasn’t that enough?”

  “He said whatever was built in those factories would make the earth shake with a terrible noise. Don’t know what to make of it, but folks around here seem to believe he was a true prophet.”

  Ling couldn’t help but think about Jake Marlowe.

  “Say, y’all heard about this Voice of Tomorrow?” Babe asked.

  “What’s that? Is it a new kind of radio?” Eloise said.

  “No. Somebody’s been leaving these poems and stories all around and mailing them to the Daily News back in New York. Whoever it is calls themselves the Voice of Tomorrow.”

  “Roses are red, violets are blue, I sent my love to the Daily Neeews,” Sally Mae said, cracking herself and Sadie up.

  “Not like that. These are serious poems. About hauntings and ghosts and America. Oh, and somebody called the King of Crows.”

  “The what?” Jericho said, choking slightly on his sandwich. Ling elbowed him.

  “The King of Crows.”

  “Who’s that? He got a territory band?” Lupe asked.

  “Do I look like I know?” Babe said. “Anyhow. It’s got folks pretty riled up. It’s got ’em talking about how things are in this country. And how they should be. About darn time, you ask me.”

  “Memphis?” Ling whispered to Jericho.

  Jericho nodded. “Memphis.”

  OPPORTUNITY

  New York City

  The letter, addressed to T. S. Woodhouse, the Daily News, had no return address, but Woody had come to know that handwriting by now. Eagerly, he sliced open the top of the envelope and tugged out the poem inside. The Voice of Tomorrow had sent him another one.

  He checked the postmark—Greenville, Mississippi. Wasn’t that where the flood was? Woody hid the envelope under a stack of racing forms at the back of his drawer. He put the letter to one side and started typing.

  Exclusive to The Daily News

  by T. S. Woodhouse

  Another poetic missive has arrived from the mysterious town crier named the Voice of Tomorrow. Many have wondered, Who is this unknown everyman delving into the state of the nation and into the heart of America’s eternal struggle: Who, exactly, gets to be called an American? Is it America only for a select bunch of swells whose ancestors came over on the Mayflower or the Maine? (And weren’t those same folks fleeing from persecution themselves? I ask you.) What about the Iroquois or the Chippewa, who were here first? As long as we’re asking, shouldn’t they have first say in the matter?

  Well, the Voice of Tomorrow seems to say, if that’s the case, you’re gonna have a mighty small America, in size, in stature, and in that most American of concepts—heart. If the Constitution put down by our Founding Fathers is to be believed and all people are created equal, why is it that one hundred fifty years later, our mysterious scribe seems to say, we still haven’t made good on that promise? Now, some folks call the Voice of Tomorrow a radical. Well, then, so were the fellows who dumped tea in Boston Harbor. For that matter, so were the same folks who gave us that Constitution the politicians li
ke to beat their gums defending when it’s convenient for them and chip away at when it’s not.

  Another reporter named Charlie slapped the morning edition of the paper, open to Woody’s column, down onto Woody’s desk beside his agitating Underwood. “Woody, how come you keep publishing these radical poems?”

  Woody continued typing. “Why, Charlie! When did you learn to read?”

  “Wise guy. C’mon. Who’s this fella sending you this stuff?”

  “The Voice of Tomorrow. Says so right there. Charlie, you might need to fire that reading teacher you hired after all.”

  Charlie leaned forward, hands on the edge of the desk. A shock of his brilliantined hair came loose. “They say he’s some kind of dangerous criminal. A Bolshevik. Or one of those Secret Six types. Or worse! It might even be a whole slew of ’em. A fella’s gotta be careful nowadays.”

  “That’s true, Woody,” another reporter, Ellis, called from two desks over. “Why, you might open up a letter and get your hands blown clean off, like what happened to Mr. Rockefeller’s maid during the Wall Street bombings.”

  Woody made a show of digging out and holding up the paper-thin envelope. “It’d have to be a mighty small bomb.”

  “What if it’s one of those Diviner types? I hear they can do all sorts of magic—disrupt radio signals or read your mind! Even put thoughts in your head—like they did in Times Square! I wouldn’t put it past them to make a bomb. Like that Evie O’Neill. She was friends with Mabel Rose.”

  Woody dropped his amused smile. “Evie O’Neill is no anarchist.”

  The typing reporter laughed. “Aw, look at that. The rat is soft on the Sweetheart Seer.”

  “Excuse me, gentlemen. I must be in the wrong place. I thought this was a news joint fulla reporters, not a bunch of gullible yes men.”

  The other reporter held Woody’s gaze. “Just sayin’. Watch your step, Woodhouse.”

  “That a threat, Charlie?”

  The man’s cheeks pinked up. He shrugged, then turned back to his doughnut, hardening on the plate.

  “Woodhouse!” the news editor barked and jerked his head toward his office.

  Charlie chuckled. “So long, Woody. Been nice knowing ya.”

  “Close the door behind you and take a seat,” the editor grumbled at Woody, who complied. “Who are these letters coming from?”

  “How should I know?”

  “But they come addressed to you.”

  “Lots of stuff comes addressed to me. I’m a reporter.”

  The editor tapped his pencil against the desk, weighing his next words. “Some fellas wanna talk to you. I told them you were out on a story.”

  A prickle of adrenalized dread poked at Woody. He was a reporter, so it was often hard to separate fear from excitement. “What fellas?”

  “Don’t know. Government types, maybe. Not the sort of men you say no to.”

  “You know how you say no to men like that?” Woody paused. “You say, ‘No.’ Try it sometime.”

  “Don’t push your luck with me, Woodhouse, or you’ll be out of a job.” His editor softened. “Just be careful, okay?”

  Woody grinned. “Since when is the American press careful?”

  Woody went back to his typewriter.

  “Hey, Woody. We’re taking bets,” Charlie called.

  “On what?”

  “Margaret Walker. You think they’ll fry her in the chair, or will it be execution by firing squad?”

  “I think you’re dripping mustard onto your page there.”

  “What? Ah, horsefeathers!”

  Woody handed his latest column to the secretary and grabbed his hat. “Sue? Could you be a dear and bring that to the copy boys for the late edition? Thanks.”

  “Sure, Woody. Where ya headed so fast?”

  “Confession.”

  It had taken all of Woody’s gambling pot to get in to see Sister Walker. He’d had to bribe one of the cops he knew was on the take. And he’d had to borrow his cousin Michael’s priestly raiment with a promise he’d come back later to confess his sins and say his Hail Marys.

  Now, with the clerical collar pinching his neck, Woody sat across a table from Margaret Walker. He was allowed only fifteen minutes. He had to make it good.

  “I know about Project Buffalo,” Woody whispered. “I saw the file. A little bird told me. That’s usually a figure of speech, but in this case, it’s not.”

  “I know,” Sister Walker said.

  “Why aren’t you telling them the truth, Miss Walker?”

  She looked at Woody with a mixture of contempt and irritation. “Who listens to women?”

  “I believe Memphis Campbell has been sending me stories. I’ve been printing them in the paper.”

  Sister Walker allowed a small smile at this. It was short-lived. “We have to stop Jake Marlowe from using the Eye.”

  “The Eye?” Woody said, jotting it down in the notebook he’d stashed inside his priestly frock. “Is that the machine Jake Marlowe was building during the war? The one that could supposedly break into another dimension?”

  “He did build it,” Sister Walker said. She leaned forward and lowered her voice to almost a whisper, telling Woody quickly about the Eye, what it had done, what it was still doing.

  Woody’s hands shook as he took his notes.

  “I need you to get the proof, Mr. Woodhouse. Before it’s too late. The Shadow Men—”

  “Shadow Men?”

  “Rogue government agents. They work outside the law. Wherever there’s a coup to protect American interests, you can be sure the Shadow Men were part of it. And they are very invested in this machine of Marlowe’s. In eugenics and in Diviners and in the King of Crows.”

  Woody felt dizzy trying to keep up.

  “They ransacked my apartment. They stole my files. I’m sure they’ve destroyed them by now. I saw the ghost of Will Fitzgerald. He warned me not to go in. I should have listened.”

  “His… ghost?” Woody felt a chill, remembering his own encounter with Will’s ghost.

  “Never mind that. We have to keep Evie and Memphis and the rest of the Diviners safe. This witch hunt is a ruse. They need the Diviners for malevolent purposes.” She leaned close. “For Jake Marlowe.”

  “Marlowe? But he hates Diviners,” Woody said, playing devil’s advocate one more time. No reporter could afford to look too gullible.

  “He helped make Diviners. We all did.”

  “Jake Marlowe? Surely not.”

  Sister Walker scoffed. “Like I said, who listens to women?”

  “I believe you, Miss Walker,” Woody said. Jake Marlowe was the most famous anti-Diviner in the nation. If it turned out that he’d not only made his own stock of Diviners but had been killing them off, well, that was front-page news. Hell, that was career-making news. “What can I do?”

  “Investigate Project Buffalo and the tie to Jake Marlowe and the Founders Club. You’ve got to expose the truth before Marlowe can find our Diviners. Before he can use their power to open the portal between worlds permanently. Before there’s no hope left.”

  Again, Woody felt dizzy. He didn’t understand half of what Miss Walker was saying to him. Woody’s hero, the reporter H. L. Mencken, had made his name in Dayton, Tennessee, reporting on the Scopes Trial—the Trial of the Century. America, with its stated separation of church and state, had been torn asunder over the teaching of evolution and the larger questions it asked: Was humankind descended from apes? Was God a collective delusion? And what was happening to America? The Trial of the Century, though, was really about the soul of the country. The divide between young and old, traditional and modern, past and future. For a nation that believed itself ordained by God, this was a reckoning. For what else might they have to question about themselves, then? What might they have to question about false inheritances? What Margaret Walker was whispering to him now made that story seem nearly insignificant.

  Footsteps sounded in the corridor. Their time was nearly up.

>   “Where should I look first?” Woody asked.

  “There’s an old Department of Paranormal archive in Washington, D.C. In the basement of a building not far from Capitol Hill. Don’t write this down.” She whispered the address and Woody nodded.

  The bribed cop poked his head in. “Time’s up, Father.”

  “They say they’re going to try you for treason,” Woody said as two guards came to take Miss Walker back to her cell.

  “Funny who gets to define treason,” she answered. “If that little bird comes back? Pay attention.”

  Woody pushed through the protestors gathered outside the prison. Some shouted “Death to traitors!” Others cried “Free Sister Walker!”

  When he returned to the Daily News offices on Park Row, there was another letter waiting for him. It was postmarked from Mississippi. There was no return address.

  Marlowe Industries laboratory

  Northern California

  The eager young man apprenticing in Jake Marlowe’s laboratory stood behind Marlowe, waiting for the great man to notice him. When he did not, the young man cleared his throat. “Mr. Marlowe, sir?”

  “Yes? What is it?” Marlowe said, barely glancing up.

  “Mr. Petrovich just… expired, sir.”

  Jake placed a paternal hand on the young man’s shoulder. “Just call him the Diviner. No names. Makes it easier. Less personal.” He patted the young man’s shoulder exactly twice and then peered through the lens at the lightning crackling inside the chamber. It would do for now. The Diviners they were bringing in simply weren’t powerful enough, not even with the extra boost of serum Jake was pumping into them. Some couldn’t take it at all; they convulsed, went mad, left this world burning up from the inside. Others managed a wild boost of Diviner insight into the supernatural realm, but it cost them. No matter what, Jake had to do whatever was necessary to keep the portal from closing until the modifications to the Eye were complete. Once the Eye was rebuilt according to the King of Crows’s specifications, once they got it to Death Valley, it would all be worth it.

  He couldn’t kid himself, though. What he would need to make it happen was the formidable energy of Evie O’Neill, Memphis Campbell, and all their friends. What they had was something special. Something unprecedented. Revolutionary. He was still furious that Sam had managed to escape, and that it had been Evie O’Neill who’d helped him right there in Jake’s own house!