House of Vultures

by Maggie Claire

  “I am fine,” Warbler answers softly, the stew pot shaking slightly as she dishes a bowl for Panther. “Leave me be.”

  “You’re not fine!” I shout, regretting the outburst when I watch her flinch. “This is Creeper’s doing, isn’t it? I swear, I will kill him.”

  “I can take care of myself, Mynah. I am not a baby!” Warbler hisses at me, shoving a tray of food along the table.

  “What did he do to you?” I demand, not leaving the room until I have an answer. To prove my point, I slump into the nearest chair, motioning for her to do the same.

  “You are not my mother, and I never asked you to pretend to be, did I?” Warbler yells at me. “Everything was fine until you and the other girls put your noses where they didn’t belong. My arrangement with Creeper was working! Then we had our argument about it, and suddenly I find Creeper ogling Grouse in the shower.”

  “How did you get hurt, Warbler?” I struggle to keep my voice level, my hands clenching into fists under the table.

  “I confronted him about it, and he told me how he’d heard us fighting. He was so angry. ‘I thought you liked me,’ he raged over and over, spitting in my face. When I told him that our arrangement was over, he lost it. That’s how I got these bruises and the cuts on my hand. He attacked me because of our fight! This is all your doing, Mynah!” Warbler quivers as she speaks, her breaths coming rapidly as her eyes dart back and forth searching for Creeper, as if telling this story might make him magically appear.

  “How the hell is it my fault? I voiced my concerns—obviously justifiable now that he’s injured you—and you assured me that you had everything under control!” I pound my fist into the table just to keep from grabbing at Warbler.

  “If you had just kept your judgements to yourself, none of this would have happened!” Tears well in Warbler’s eyes as she holds her wounded hand out to me.

  “Of course it would have! He’s an abuser! Can’t you see that he is perverse? He will never be able to stop himself from watching women. There’s no telling how many others he’s probably hurt in the past. You are lucky that he stopped when he did. Most women who get stalked do not survive the attack.”

  “I want you to leave me alone,” Warbler murmurs, turning back to her cooking pit. “If our past friendship meant anything to you—”

  I knock over my chair, regretting the action immediately as pain radiates along my stitches. However, this pain is nothing when compared to the agony in my heart. “Don’t you dare throw our friendship back at me! You’re mad because I tried to protect you from yourself!”

  “So now you are blaming me?” Warbler cries, a spoon trembling in her hand as she raises it toward me like a weapon.

  “Nothing gives a monster like Creeper the right to hurt a woman!” I exclaim, pointing at her bandaged wrist. “However, you’re not exactly innocent in this situation either, are you? You liked having control over Creeper. You enjoyed using your body to keep him in line. You tempted him, indulged his proclivities, and fed his fetishes! You want to cry foul now that he’s showing his true nature, but in the moment, you enjoyed your power. That makes you nothing but a prostitute parading around this House like a wannabe queen!”

  Heavy tears roll down Warblers cheeks, a sob cracking her melodious voice. “Mynah!”

  “No! You’ve been spoiled by me for far too long. I’ve protected you from the things you find distasteful. I’ve allowed you to live a sheltered life in the safety of this House. This is the first time you’ve felt the consequences of your mistakes. Well no more! You want to be taken seriously. You want to be seen as an adult, well you got it! You’ll take shifts in the forests just like the rest of us. You’ll kill and skin meat, make your own clothes, everything!” Picking up the tray of food, I stride toward the door, desperate to get out of the kitchen.

  “So, you’re going to punish me? I hate you!” Warbler wails, throwing a skillet at the door, narrowly missing my head.

  “And I’m ashamed that I ever called you my friend. I hope that you and Creeper work through your differences. You two deserve each other,” I snap, hurrying out into the hallway, desperate to get away from her. I replay our argument on my way to the staircase, my thoughts tormenting me with everything that I did wrong. She deserves better than Creeper—I wish I hadn’t made it seem like I wanted them to get back together. If she had only listened when Bittern, Grouse, and I tried to warn her! I wish I would have controlled my temper. She doesn’t need my anger right now, she needs my help!

  “Not going to have any half breed mutants running around here anytime soon, right, Mynah?” Goldeneye spits at me distastefully as he saunters into the kitchen. “You know birds and dogs can’t—”

  I do not stick around to hear his vulgarity, nor do I answer any of Warbler’s feeble attempts to call me back to her. “Foolish child,” I mutter under my breath, not sure if I am speaking of Warbler or myself as I push open my door.

  “Mynah? Is that you at last?” Antero’s sleepy voice calls out to me as he yawns.

  I slip into the room, startled by its stark change from how I left it. I am not an extremely tidy person, but my space is spotless. My clothes are folded and neatly laying on the open shelves, patches sewn over the holey places. It has been freshly dusted; the carpets even look like someone gave them a once over with tape to pick up fallen particles of mud and dirt. “What did you do? Why?”

  “You made me stay in here for three days. I needed something to do,” Panther retorts, his mask dangling from the chair. I run over to it, throwing it into his lap.

  “You idiot, get that on your face right now!”

  “You do not truly expect me to sleep in it, do you?”

  “There are holes in these walls!” I shriek, my voice growing louder. Holes that could provide someone with the perfect place to listen into this conversation.

  “So, what is the plan?” Panther demands as he ties the mask onto his face once more. He stares after me as if I’ve gone crazy as I wander around the room inspecting my coverage of Creeper’s peepholes.

  “Did anyone come in here?” The one just below the doorknob is still covered by the wax seal I put there a month ago.

  “Not that I know of. I locked it like you said,” Panther whines at me, a look of indignation on his face.

  “And you locked the deadbolt too, right?” The hole right above my shelves close to the nails that secure it to the wall is still good too.

  Panther does not answer, his fingers shaking as he points at me accusingly. “You never said I had to do both locks!”

  I swear under my breath, my eyes searching for the last hole that I am aware of in this room. This one is waist high, right along the edges of my closet doors. When I find it, I ball my hands into fist as I holler. “Creeper! If you don’t get out of that bathroom right now, I’m going to poke my blade through this hole! And I swear that I’ll cut off whatever it connects with!” A shuffle and a giggle emanate from the bathroom as the door slams shut. His heavy footsteps thunder downstairs. Damn nuisance! How did Condor ever let him into the House of Vultures? I wonder as I peek through the hole, making sure that no one else’s eyes are watching from afar.

  I dig around in my pocket for the wax candle I always keep on me, lighting it as soon as it falls into my fingers. I let the wax drip into the hole, filling it full, then blowing on it until it hardens to my touch.

  “He watches you?” Panther cries, a look of embarrassed horror in his eyes.

  “He mostly listens to me for information. He knows that if I ever caught him leering at me, I’d come right out to find him and make sure he never saw anything ever again. That kinda puts a damper on his fantasies as far as I’m concerned.”

  “How do you live like this?” Panther sneers, his chin raising as though he’s suddenly better than such a mundane life as this.

  “You telling me you’ve never looked at a woman before?” Despite how horrible I think Creeper is, I will not hear my life insulted, especially by a child
of Déchets. “Your country tried to obliterate mine, so I think you are hardly in a place to pass judgment, Panther.” I can tell by the way that haughty chin falls that I’ve made my point. Somehow, being right does nothing to make me feel better.

  “What happens now, Mynah?”

  I lower myself to my bed, wondering the exact same thing.

  Chapter 7

  Two weeks after my return to the House of Vultures, I am going stir crazy. Condor won’t even let me sit on the porch. There is really nothing to do inside the House except sleep. If I don’t get a change of scenery soon, I will go mad. “You want to use me as bait, so just dangle me outside the House a little. I don’t even have to go beyond the fence,” I plead, hating the whining sound of my own voice.

  “You already are bait. I am certain that everyday Wolf does not see you, he is planning some foolish escape attempt. His desperation will make him careless, and I will come out the victor.” Condor slowly looks over my slender frame, his lips shifting into a tiny smile. “So unless you can make it worth my while in some other way, you are camping yourself in this House.”

  I may be desperate for sunlight, but not that desperate. Instead I huff and trounce to the living room, draping my limbs over the scruffy couch with cushions that are held together by duct tape and a book under one leg to stabilize it. I barely make it fifteen minutes before I am up, pacing around the room once more.

  I will not go to the kitchen, I remind myself, even as my feet point in its direction. Warbler and I have not spoken since our fight. I will give her the space she wanted, and I will not apologize for my words. I care about her enough to tell her the truth, even if she doesn’t want to hear it. Warbler and I have never had a fight last this long before. The few times that I can remember quarrelling with her, we had made amends by the next day. I have missed talking to my friend. These long days cooped up inside would have been less daunting if I could have spent my time with her in the kitchens.

  Ten minutes later, I am entering Warbler’s domain despite my resolution to stay away, seeking my bright little sunshine. However, when I enter the room, I find that Warbler is not at her post around the fire pit, nor is she washing dishes at the basin in the pantry.

  Circling around the table, I stare at the full chairs. Grouse and Bittern watch me with tentative faces. “What is it?” I demand as they look at each other slowly. “What’s going on?”

  “Warbler is gone,” Bittern mutters, her eyes on the door suddenly, as though she cannot bear to see my face.

  The thought is laughable to me. “What are you talking about? She never leaves the House.” Even after I demanded she take shifts in the forests, she has not been able to leave the porch without screaming. The sound of her terror haunts me even now.

  “She did this time,” Grouse adds, watching the bundled pheasant feathers over the door sway in the breeze of the open window. Just like Warbler, a decoration that brings light into this dismal place. She probably made it herself just to make us all smile at the sight of something pretty. “What if she did not leave of her own accord, Mynah?”

  “You think Creeper took her?” I demand, my hands clenching into fists. “How long has she been missing?”

  “I don’t remember seeing her yesterday,” Bittern confesses, her eyes bloodshot as if she has been sitting at this table all night, waiting for Warbler to appear. “Grouse just told me that she hasn’t noticed Creeper skulking around the House for a couple days either.”

  “And you’re tell me this now when she’s been missing for at least twenty-four hours? Why the hell would you wait so long?” I scream, hurrying out of the kitchen before either of them has the chance to say another word to me.

  The very thought of Warbler alone with Creeper turns my blood to ice as I hunt through the house for its inhabitants. I am not surprised when I find that they are the only two missing. I feel a sickening punch to my stomach as I hurry up the stairs to investigate Creeper’s quarters. On the dresser I see a collection of trinkets, most of them useless to my way of thinking. A glass marble the color of the grass, an old glass bottle with the label long since faded, and other menial objects. In the center of his collection, I see a clean white handkerchief, folded neatly in half.

  My breath catches as I open the dainty white tissue. A lock of golden hair tied together with a yellow twine drapes gracefully on the soft fabric. Warbler’s hair. These are trophies! I realize, feeling bile rise in my throat. There must be at least twenty women represented by these objects. Now Warbler is counted among his conquests. How could no one in the House know—unless he does not leave any victim alive. He intends to kill her!

  I stomp down the staircase, lacing my blade into my belt as I move. “Where are you going?” Condor halts my progress, standing in front of the entrance. He crosses his arms as he blocks my path outside.

  “Do you know what kind of monster he is? Do you even care?” I scream, slapping Condor’s arms in my rage. “Where did Creeper take her? What is he going to do?”

  “Oh, I think even you can figure that out,” Falcon answers with a mocking laugh as she sidles up to Condor. “If he were to choose any of our House for his uses…then Warbler is the best pick, don’t you think?”

  I enjoy the sound her jaw makes as my fist cracks into it. My fingers claw at the mask ties around her ears, desperate to rip it from her head.

  “You wouldn’t have the guts to kill me,” Falcon shrieks, jerking away from me. “It would put you on the same level as Creeper!”

  “I am nothing like that monster!” I snarl, scratching Falcon’s arms as she feebly attempts to defend herself. “But you’re wrong if you think that I wouldn’t relish watching you die, Falcon. You’ve known exactly what kind of man he is all along, haven’t you?”

  “Falcon, what is she talking about?” Condor barks as he pulls me off his second in command. “Tell me plainly!”

  “Oh, come on, Condor!” Falcon admonishes with a wicked laugh. “Surely you knew that Creeper is demented! He’s been picking off the weakest women of the House for years! Besides, you both had to realize something like this would happen. After all, Mynah brought that Panther into our home—he needs a proper bed to sleep in. And the only way he’ll get it is if someone gives up their space. At least that’s what I mentioned to Creeper two days ago. Haven’t really seen him since.”

  Cursing at Falcon, I burst through the door and out into the forest, using my swiftness of foot to keep myself out of Condor’s reach. “Mynah! Let me go with you! Slow down!” I hear Condor shouting behind me. However, with time already working against me, I do not even waste a breath in answering him.

  I comb through the forest once I lose my leader’s pursuit, but deep down I realize the effort is like finding a blade of grass in a pile of fresh cuttings. Adrenaline eases the pain of my broken ribs, but I can tell by the oozing wetness on my back that I have popped some stitches again. “Warbler!” My voice is hollow with my fear. Panther calls on our bond, rattling through my mind, but I do not relent. I will not stop until I find my friend.

  It is almost dusk when my feet slip in the mud, and I slide down a small ravine. A brook laughs beside me, its waters rippling with their ridicule. “Ugh! This is useless!” I cry, rolling out of the mud with the intent of traveling further.

  A moan stops me in my tracks. The faint outline of a body catches my eye not twenty paces from the spot where I stand. Warbler is face down in the mud, her hair chopped painstakingly close to her skull. Her clothes are in tatters on the ground, and her legs appear to be bleeding. I rip my own shirt off my body, cursing myself for leaving my good coat behind in my haste. Carefully I pull Warbler out of the stream, draping my grungy shirt over her frail shoulders. She is freezing cold, a faint whisper of breath still miraculously forming inside her.

  “Oh, my gods! What did he do to you?” I cry, a shriek building on my lips. She seems aware enough to hear my words, her eyes flicker open at the sound of my outrage.

  “Mynah?”
She cries softly, her whole form trembling hysterically. “You were right! You were right! I’m so sorry.” Her voice sounds broken, as though she’d been out screaming for many hours, desperately hoping to be found. “He…he….” She cannot bring herself to finish the sentence.

  “Shhh. Rest now, Warbler.”

  “No…look,” She slowly pulls at the edge of my shirt, and I recoil at the sight of her broken fingers. Two long cuts mar her ribcage, and to my horror, I see two blood clouded tubes sewn into each side of her chest. “He punctured…my lungs with them, Mynah. To hear…the sounds of my breathing. Face down…the tubes drain out. Keeps me alive…he keeps coming back. Hurts me, Mynah! Now…they are filling…with blood. I will soon choke. I cannot…survive this.”

  “There’s got to be some way to save you!” I protest, tears pouring down my cheeks.

  “Lost too much...blood, Mynah. Travel to the House…would kill me anyway. Nothing to be done.” Her voice grows fainter with every word, the gurgling from the tubes sputtering louder as they fill with her life blood.

  Bitter, hot tears pour down my cheeks. “It’s my fault,” I wail. “Falcon let this happen because of me. If I hadn’t brought Panther home, she’d never have let Creeper take you.”

  “No…I brought this…on myself.” Warbler chokes, a bloody hacking cough in her throat. “Don’t leave me.”

  “Never,” I mumble as I cradle her body close to my heart, blood gushing out the tubes as I gently shift her body closer to me.

  “I love…you,” Warbler wheezes as she convulses, her body going into shock.

  “You were my best friend,” I whimper, holding her long past the moment when her rustling breath stops. When I finally do let go, I claw through the dirt by the stream, using my blade like a shovel until I almost break it in half. I switch to my hands, ignoring the pain as my fingernails catch on rocks and twigs. Nothing stops me as I use my fury to dig a grave, my tears watering the soil as I place her carefully into its unfeeling embrace.