The Crowmaster’s feet were on the horizontal strut, his hands were on the dish, but he was leaning backwards, away from the mast. He was on the outside, just like the birds.
And the dish. The dish was pointing outwards.
‘You didn’t come below the mast because there’s no signal there,’ I said, the truth finally dawning. ‘The dish itself doesn’t interfere with your control at all. You need the dish. You use it to broadcast the signal, and the dish doesn’t point underneath the mast, it only points outwards.’
‘Well, check out the big brain on you, boy,’ the Crowmaster sneered. ‘Give yourself a pat on the back.’ He held up a gnarled hand. ‘No, wait, don’t do that, you might fall off, and that’d really screw up my plan.’
I felt the colour drain from my face. ‘What plan?’
‘You think you found your way here by accident, boy?’ he cackled. ‘I been leading you here right from the start. I planted them seeds in your head, made you think that little telephone of yours could hurt me. In the bedroom. Down in the mud after I tossed you out the window. It was all an act, boy. All an act to make you think you had a way to stop me.’
‘No,’ I said weakly. ‘That’s not true.’
‘Kidnapping your girl, getting my babies to chase you in just the exact right direction – all this time I been leading you right here. Right to this moment.’
‘Why?’ I asked, my throat suddenly tight.
‘So I could do this.’
The crow on his shoulder squawked, drawing my attention away from the Crowmaster himself. His arm uncoiled like a whip. His hand was on my head, the palm flat across my hair. Then came five sharp, blistering pains. I threw up one hand, trying to break his grip, but his claw-like fingernails were through my skin, pressing in hard against my skull.
I felt the power surge through me, crackling across my scalp, surging to the points where the scarecrow’s fingers met my head.
‘Yeah!’ he screeched. ‘Yeehaw!’
The dark hollows of his eyes were lit up a bright, brilliant blue. Tendrils of electricity crawled across his whole body, standing out like bulging, varicose veins.
‘It’s incredible,’ he crowed, ‘the power! The things you can do, boy. The things you can do!’
I was screaming now, one arm still wrapped around the ladder, the other clutching his wrist. It felt solid, like a plank of wood, and I couldn’t do a thing to break the grip.
‘Now,’ he grinned, holding up his other hand. Energy danced between his fingertips. ‘Watch the birdie.’
He jammed his hand into the centre of the dish. At once, the veins of electricity arced along his arm, spreading out like a spider-web across the dish’s blank grey surface.
The first flurry of movement happened in seconds. They rose from the trees a mile or so to our left, one at a time at first, then in groups of five, then ten or more, until they hung above the forest like a dark fog.
On all sides the crows began to rise up above the treetops, screeching and cawing as they homed in on the Crowmaster’s amplified signal.
In the distance, other birds had appeared over the crest of a hill. Others still swooped towards us from the fields way over on my right. In moments there were hundreds of them – thousands – all drawing together and darkening half of the sky.
‘I almost didn’t believe them things your daddy told me,’ he sniggered, watching as yet more and more of the birds joined the growing flock. ‘Not until I saw it for myself. I did think about just killing you, but then I thought “Why not use him instead?”.’ He leaned in until his mouth was by my ear. ‘You’re gonna be my battery, boy. I’m gonna drain every last drop of that power and use it to send my babies out into the world.
‘I wonder,’ he whispered, barely able to hold back his laughter, ‘how your momma will scream when they’re tearing at her insides? Will she holler your name? I’ll be sure to let you know.’
I smashed my fist against him again. Again he shrugged it off.
‘Don’t look so glum, boy. You know what they say – it’s better to light a candle than to curse the darkness. Try to look on the bright side.’ He pulled me in closer and flashed his rotting teeth in my face. ‘I’m gonna keep you alive for a very long time.’
Light a candle. The phrase buzzed through my skull. Light a candle, light a candle, light a candle.
I dug into my back pocket and found what I was looking for. The metal top of the lighter sprung open as I brought it up and flicked the metal wheel, sparking it up.
A flash of panic whipped across the Crowmaster’s face. I flicked the lighter again, but the wind stole the spark away. Before I could try for a third time, his fingernails slashed across my knuckles, knocking the lighter from my grip.
It sailed off towards the middle of the mast and dropped out of sight, taking my hopes with it. The self-satisfied smirk returned to the scarecrow’s face.
‘She made me watch that movie too many times for me to be caught out by a lighter,’ he told me. ‘You gotta be quicker’n that, boy.’
‘I… made… a… dog!’
The Crowmaster spluttered a laugh and pulled back, his bright blue eyes boring into mine. ‘Say what now?’
The pain was almost unbearable. It started in my head, but washed through me like acid, until it felt like all my insides were swishing around my feet. I could feel my power flowing out of me, draining away, but it felt like something was flowing back in at the same time.
Whether it was my abilities trying to save my life again, or whether I was somehow siphoning off some of the Crowmaster’s regeneration ability, I’ll never know. But as we hung there from the ladder, dangerously far from the ground, my battered body began to heal. I couldn’t see the wounds closing over, but I could feel them, and as each one sealed shut, I could feel my strength returning. And the stronger I became, the clearer I could think.
I had a plan. A plan that was going to work.
‘Do you have… any idea how hard it is t-to make a dog?’ I hissed.
The area above the scarecrow’s eyes furrowed down. ‘Yet again, son, I don’t have the first damn clue what you’re—’
‘It’s really hard,’ I grimaced. ‘There’s the head to think about, then the… then the legs and the tail.’ The Crowmaster was looking more and more bewildered, and as his frown deepened, the pain racking my body lessened a shade. ‘Lungs, liver, brain, eyes, it’s not easy making a dog. And I made one. I made other stuff too. People, even.’
‘So?’
‘So if I can make something as complicated as a dog,’ I said, grabbing hold of his arm, ‘I can definitely make something much simpler. Like a flame.’
A wisp of smoke curled up around my fingertips and a shudder travelled the length of the Crowmaster’s body. The blue light faded from the dark holes of his eyes as the straw of his arm began to smoulder and burn.
‘No!’ he howled. ‘No, no, no, no!’
The fire caught hold properly, forcing me to pull back from the sudden searing heat. The movement tore his arm in half and he gave a scream – not of pain, but of shock and fear.
I pulled the hand with its burning stump from my head and hurled it away from the mast, towards where the huge cloud of crows was almost upon us. I watched them for a moment, mesmerised by their sheer number.
When I turned back to the Crowmaster the right side of his body from his shoulder to his hip was aflame. He twisted and writhed on the ladder, as if trying somehow to shake the flames away.
‘Get me out, get me out,’ he cried, but his voice sounded different – not just his tone, but the actual voice itself. ‘Get me out of this thing!’
Strands of burning straw were carried away on the wind, drifting off into the darkening sky. The fire consumed the scarecrow’s entire body, swallowing his head and his chest, before spreading down to his legs.
As the straw was eaten away, it began to reveal another figure lurking within the Crowmaster’s frame. He was much smaller than the Crowmaster
had been. Smaller than me, even, but with the wrinkled face of an ancient old man.
His hair was black and oily, like the feathers of a crow. He wore a white shirt and a red waistcoat with matching red trousers, all of which seemed completely unharmed by the fire.
He kicked and thrashed the last of the burning straw away, then grabbed for a rung of the ladder with both pudgy hands. ‘My costume,’ he wailed. ‘My favourite costume.’
I looked down at him, too shocked to respond.
‘My costume! You ruined my favourite costume!’ he screamed, froth foaming on his cracked and withered lips.
‘Wait, so you’re… you’re Joe Crow,’ I realised. ‘The real Joe Crow. And that was Marion’s missing scarecrow outfit.’ I shook my head. ‘I’ve been running from a midget in fancy dress.’
‘Shut up!’ he snarled, opening his mouth to reveal two rows of shark-like teeth. ‘I’ll rip your heart out and swallow it whole!’
‘OK, a grumpy midget in fancy dress.’
‘I’m the Crowmaster!’ he howled, stamping his stubby foot on the ladder like an angry toddler. ‘I’m the Crowmaster!’
I looked behind him. ‘You told me you controlled the birds through fear,’ I said.
‘That’s right, that’s right!’ he spat. ‘So?’
My grip on the ladder tightened. ‘I don’t think they’re afraid of you any more.’
And at that, all hell broke loose.
The birds howled around us, swooping and banking and dive-bombing with outstretched claws and snapping beaks. This time, though, it wasn’t me they were targeting.
‘Get them off, get them off!’ Joe Crow pleaded. He swung out with an arm, trying to scare them away, wailing, ‘Make them stop, boy! Make them stop.’
‘You should never have come to my world,’ I told him, shouting to make myself heard above the racket of the birds and his own screams.
I could barely even see him beneath the thrashing mountain of feathers. The birds were relentless in their attack, taking their bloody revenge on the man who had manipulated them. I couldn’t have stopped them, and after everything he’d done to me and the people I cared about, I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
‘You should have stayed in the Darkest Corners,’ I shouted, just before his grip finally slipped and he plunged backwards towards the ground. A cloud of birds swallowed him before he was even halfway down, and, with a sudden jolt, his howls of agony abruptly stopped.
‘I mean, didn’t anyone ever tell you?’ I spoke into the wind, ‘there’s no place like home.’
‘Good grief, that was insane! In. Sane.’
Ameena had finally joined me at the top of the ladder. We stood on the same rung, leaning towards opposite sides, our arms wrapped around the ladder’s frame. I was exhausted, but with my injuries healed up I was feeling stronger than I’d felt in hours. Even my shattered nose had repaired itself, although the five deep scratches on my scalp where the Crowmaster’s claws had caught me hadn’t gone anywhere.
Ameena and I had watched the birds drift off one by one, until there was barely a handful of them left. Of Joe Crow there was no sign, but even from up here the grass looked slick with puddles of red.
‘Tell me about it,’ I nodded, suddenly feeling very queasy.
‘I’d like to see him try to get up from that!’
‘I wouldn’t.’
Ameena nodded. ‘No, suppose not.’
We stood way up there for a few moments, not saying anything, just lost in our own thoughts. When Ameena did speak again, her voice was light, as if the past few hours were already forgotten. ‘So,’ she began, ‘what now?’
‘I need to go and see Mum. Make sure she’s OK.’
Ameena nodded again, but didn’t say anything. We both looked over to the smouldering remains of Marion’s house. For a long time all we did was watch the embers burn.
‘People are going to ask questions,’ she said, at last.
It was my turn to nod and stay silent.
‘They’re going to place you at the scene.’
I gave another nod and scratched one of the claw marks on my head. It was starting to itch.
‘I don’t think they’ll believe the evil imaginary friends thing.’
‘Doubt it,’ I agreed.
‘You might end up doing bird,’ she said, and then broke into a laugh. Only the puzzled expression on my face stopped her. ‘Doing bird,’ she repeated. ‘As in going to jail.’
I winced, more at the joke than the thought of prison. ‘Oh.’
‘Get it?’
‘Got it, thanks.’
‘Genius,’ she grinned. ‘Right, let’s go.’ She moved to take a step down the ladder, but stopped with one foot in mid-air. When she raised her head to look at me there was still a smile on her face, but it was an uncertain one. ‘Oh, and… um… thanks.’
‘For what?’
She glanced down at the ground, then back up to me. Her eyes were narrowed and her brow was creased, as if she was doing some tricky mental calculation. ‘You know, for the…’ she paused and gave a slight shake of her head. ‘That thing that caught me,’ she frowned, ‘that was a flying monkey, right?’
I gazed past Ameena, down to where I’d seen the winged figure snatch her from the air. My stomach tightened, ejecting a snort of nervous laughter out through my nose.
My powers were growing, that much was clear. But my control over them wasn’t keeping pace. The abilities were unpredictable – maybe dangerously so. I had no idea what I was doing half the time, never mind how I was doing it. That was worrying.
But still, a flying monkey. Marion would have been proud.
‘Any time,’ I said, and together we began the long, tiring climb back down to Earth.
Also available in the INVISIBLE FIENDS series:
MR MUMBLES
BAGGY MAGGIE
Coming Soon:
DOC MORTIS
Copyright
Text copyright © Barry Hutchison 2011
ISBN 978-0-00-731517-8
EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780007427260
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The Crowmaster Page 15
