The Crowmaster (5 page)

‘What's that?' I asked, spotting a large wooden box like a treasure chest over by the corner of the room.

‘That, young man,' she said, her blue eyes shimmering with excitement, ‘is my dressing-up box!'

I looked at her. ‘You have a dressing-up box?'

‘It's from when I was a girl,' she said, laughing. ‘Of course I don't use it now.'

I pretended to wipe sweat from my brow. ‘Phew.'

‘Although,' she said, almost skipping over to the chest, ‘what's say we have a little look inside?'

‘Um, well, yeah, I suppose,' I said, ‘but it's getting quite late.'

‘Oh, come on, it's been years since I looked in here,' she said, taking hold of a handle on the side of the chest and dragging it into the middle of the room. ‘A quick peek, that's all. What harm could it possibly do?'

I
've never thought of myself as “cool”. If anything, I'm the exact polar opposite of cool. I've been called a lot of names in school. Geek. Dweeb. Dork. Nerd. I've been called them all, mostly by the same three boys.

But not “cool”. No one's ever called me that.

And there, kneeling on the floor beside a fifty-one-year-old woman as she rummaged around in a box full of fancy-dress outfits, I don't think I've ever felt more
uncool
in my life.

‘Look at this! I'd forgotten about this one!' Marion chirped. She pulled out a crumpled pile of green material and looked at it as if it were carved from solid gold.

‘What is it?' I asked, trying to get into the spirit of things, but failing miserably. It had been a long, horrible day and I'd barely slept the night before. I didn't want to look at costumes, I wanted to go to bed.

‘It's a frog,' she said, with a tone that suggested I'd have to be an idiot not to realise what the scraps of cloth were meant to be. ‘It's Mr Froggy.'

‘So it is.'

Marion folded the costume neatly and sat it to one side. ‘What else have we got in here?' she wondered, digging deeper down into the pile.

The frog outfit was the fourth one she'd pulled out. Or maybe it was the fifth. I couldn't say for sure. My ability to count had deserted me twenty minutes ago when she'd opened the chest. So had my will to live. This was torture.

‘I used to fit in this fairy outfit,' she announced, holding up a pink leotard with cardboard wings attached. She was looking at the outfit, but her eyes seemed to stare through it. ‘The fun I used to have,' she said quietly. ‘Long time ago. Long time.'

It was one of those moments when I didn't know whether to speak or not. She was lost in a memory, probably back as a fairy, dancing around this same house. I wondered how many years ago it had been.

‘But listen to me,' she said, shoving the costume carelessly back into the trunk, ‘rattling on about childish things.' She picked up some of the other outfits and began cramming them forcefully back inside the box. Her face was tinged with red, as if she was embarrassed at the way she had drifted off. ‘You don't want to be sat here with me doing this. You'll be wanting your bed.'

I thought of the single chair beneath the kitchen table, and of the bowl of food set out for the dog that would never be coming home.

‘It's fine,' I said. ‘I'm enjoying it.'

She hesitated with a bundle of clothes halfway to the box. ‘Really?'

‘Yeah, it's good. It's interesting. Show me them all.'

‘You sure?' Marion asked. ‘There's quite a lot of them.'

I leaned over and peered inside the box properly. It was full to the top with the outfits. ‘So there are,' I said, smiling too broadly. ‘Must be fifty of them in there.'

‘Probably more. You sure you want to see them all?'

I nodded, the plastic grin still stuck to my face. ‘Yep,' I squeaked.

This was going to be a very long night.

‘That's them all,' Marion said. Her head and shoulders were inside the costume chest, giving her voice a booming, echoing quality. ‘Just odds and sods left.'

‘Aww, that's a shame,' I said, fighting the urge to jump up and run around the room cheering.

‘No, wait, I tell a lie. Here's one.'

I bit my fist. ‘Yay!'

‘Oh, now I remember this,' she said, holding up an orangey-brown jumpsuit with a furry hood. ‘It's the lion.'

‘It's a lion,' I agreed, trying to appear interested.

‘No, it's
the
lion. The cowardly lion, from the film.' ‘What film?'

She nudged me on the arm, almost making me topple over. ‘Were you even watching it?' she asked. Her eyes were narrowed, but she was fighting back a smile. ‘
The Wizard of Oz
.'

‘Oh, right, yes,' I stumbled. ‘Um… I liked the flying monkeys.'

She rolled her eyes and chuckled. ‘Boys!'

‘Sorry,' I said, although I wasn't quite sure why.

She waved her hand, dismissing the apology. ‘At least you pretended to watch it. That's good enough for me.' Her eyes went from the costume to me and back again. Finally she said, ‘Actually, yes, you do owe me an apology. You need to make it up to me.'

I frowned. ‘Um… what?'

‘Put this on,' she said, passing me the lion outfit. ‘See what it looks like.'

I stared down at the tatty orange bundle in my hands. It was made out of a stretchy material, like a thick pair of women's tights. ‘You can't be serious.'

‘Come on, it'll be fun,' she urged. Marion was keeping her face straight, but her eyes twinkled mischievously, like she could burst out laughing at any minute. ‘Been forty years since I saw anyone wearing that outfit. Go put it on. Just for a minute.'

My mouth flapped open and closed as I searched for excuses. ‘It'll be too small. It won't fit.'

‘My friend used to wear it. He was about your size.'

‘But it's… I mean, you can't… It's not…' Unable to find an end to any of those sentences, I decided just to surrender to my fate. ‘OK,' I sighed, standing up. ‘But only for a minute. And no laughing.'

Marion pretended to scratch her nose, but I could tell she was really just covering the smile that had spread across her face. ‘Come on,' she said, her voice cracking. ‘As if I would!'

Ten minutes later I stood outside the living room, adjusting the costume. Putting it on hadn't been the nicest experience. The whole thing smelled of damp and mould, and just as I'd expected, it was way too small. And because it was a one-piece outfit, this was causing me some problems.

For one thing, the sleeves were far too short, coming to a stop halfway along my forearms, but that wasn't the big issue. The real problem lay in the legs.

The legs were exactly like tights in that they had feet at the bottom. This was fine – they stretched to allow my own feet in – but the legs were much shorter than my own. This meant that the crotch of the outfit hung down somewhere around my knees, and I'd had to contort my entire body to get the top part of the outfit up over my shoulders.

Now it was on, the stretched material was trying to snap back together. It pulled down on my shoulders, turning me into a sort of deformed hunchback figure. A deformed hunchback figure dressed as the lion from
The Wizard of Oz
.

Pulling the furry hood up over my head, I sighed and stepped into the living room. How the hell did I find myself in these situations?

‘Ta-daa!' I said, holding out my arms as I entered the room, only to find nobody there. The costumes were still piled on the floor and the chest was still open, but there was no sign of Marion.

I returned to the hall, noticing how silent the house was. Suddenly the forty-year-old fancy-dress costume I was wearing wasn't the only thing making me uncomfortable.

‘Marion?' I said. No reply. I tried again, louder. ‘Marion?' Again nothing.

Creeping across the hall I pushed open the door to the kitchen, half expecting to find a flock of birds in there. Instead I found an empty room, with the back door standing wide open.

‘Marion, you there?' I called, edging towards the open door. Clouds of cold air rolled in through the gap, making me shake and shiver like… well, like a cowardly lion.

As I drew nearer the door I saw her. She was standing just outside the house, looking out into the darkness. A full bowl of dog food was clutched in her hands.

‘There you are,' I said, stepping out to join her and immediately wishing I hadn't. The cold was biting and my current attire was hardly designed for warmth. ‘You OK?'

‘Still no sign of him,' she said. ‘I'm really starting to get worried now.'

I didn't speak. I couldn't tell her the truth. Not now. Not after leaving it so long.

‘He'll be fine.'

‘I'm not so sure,' she said, pulling her cardigan tightly around her neck. ‘It doesn't feel right. Something's wrong. Something's happened.'

She spent another few moments scanning the darkness, before finally turning to face me. Her expression went from sad to surprised to delighted in under a second.

‘Oh my goodness. You look—'

‘Like an idiot?'

‘Well, it's not
quite
the word I'd have chosen,' she grinned. ‘But maybe it
is
a little bit on the neat side. Joe couldn't have been as tall as you, after all.'

‘Joe?' I asked, through chattering teeth.

‘The old friend of mine I mentioned.' She gestured with the dog bowl towards the door. ‘Now get inside before you freeze.'

I gratefully rushed back inside, not stopping until I was in the living room, where the fire crackling in the hearth quickly began to warm me up. Marion arrived a few moments after me, Toto's bowl no longer in her hands.

‘Now,' she said, ‘where's that camera?'

‘Don't you dare!'

‘Kidding,' she laughed. ‘I think you've been tortured quite enough for one night.'

I smiled, relieved. ‘Thanks.'

‘Besides, you're here for ages yet. Plenty more costumes for you to try on.' She caught my expression and gave another laugh. ‘I'm joking. You have to stop taking me so seriously.' Her eyes went to the stash of clothes on the floor as she remembered something. ‘Although, come to think about it…'

I stood there by the fire, hunched over in my badly fitting lion costume, watching her rummage through the outfits. Silently, I gave thanks that Ameena wasn't around to pass comment.

‘I've got Dorothy's dress and the Tin Man's hat,' Marion announced, holding up a blue and white checked outfit and a metal funnel. ‘I'm sure I used to have the full set, but one's missing. That's a shame.' She held the items higher. ‘Fancy either of these?'

‘I'll pass, thanks,' I said.

She nodded and smiled. ‘Fair enough.' Her bones creaked as she got to her feet. ‘Now, it's high time you were in bed.'

I looked at the clock and was shocked to see the hands had crept past midnight. Too late to phone Mum now. ‘Suppose so,' I agreed. I hovered awkwardly near the door for a few moments, then said, ‘Night, then.'

‘Goodnight, Kyle,' Marion said. ‘And thank you.'

‘What for?'

‘For being good company. I haven't had such a laugh in a long time.'

‘Oh,' I said. I didn't think I'd been
that
funny. ‘No problem. I mean, good. I enjoyed it too,' I continued, and I wasn't lying.

Marion sat down in her armchair and gazed into the fire. I moved to leave, but hesitated again just inside the doorway. ‘It must get lonely out here,' I said. ‘All on your own.'

‘Oh, don't worry about me, I'm not on my own,' she replied. ‘I've got Toto.'

Ouch. I quickly changed tack. ‘But, I mean, isn't there anyone else? What about your friend. Joe, did you say his name was? What happened to him?'

Marion adjusted herself in her chair. ‘We… drifted apart. Haven't seen him in decades,' she said with a shrug. ‘Still, these things happen. Friendships come and go.'

I gave another nod. I knew one or two things about broken friendships.

‘I
was
lonely once upon a time, back when I was a girl. No other children for miles. Just my parents for company,' she said, her eyes taking on that faraway look again. ‘And then
he
came along. I think I was five or six when he turned up, and suddenly… I wasn't lonely any more.

‘He was older than me. A lot older, older than my father, even, but it didn't matter because in many ways he was just like a child. We'd go for walks in the woods. Play games. He loved dressing up. We both did. Disguising ourselves, pretending to be other people. It was exciting. In some ways I think he was only truly happy when he was being someone else.'

‘Didn't your parents mind, though? You hanging about with a strange man like that?'

‘Oh no, they didn't really mind,' she said with a chuckle. ‘How could they? They never saw him. No one ever saw him but me.'

The lion costume seemed to become even tighter around me, squeezing the air from my insides. I shifted my weight on my feet, and realised my back was suddenly clammy with sweat.

‘What do you mean,' I said hoarsely, ‘
no one saw him but you
?'

Marion laughed. ‘Makes me sound crazy, doesn't it?' She picked up a poker and jabbed it into the fire, sending sparks fluttering up the chimney. ‘I called him Joe Crow,' she said, smiling wistfully. She looked up at me, and the words she spoke shook me to my core.

‘He was my imaginary friend.'

M
y heart missed a beat. I was on the move before it found the next one.

‘The doors,' I said urgently. ‘Lock the doors.'

Marion's smile faltered. ‘What? Whatever for?'

I didn't dare take the time to explain. Instead I ran from the living room and into the kitchen, where I knew the back-door key was waiting in the lock. I turned it, checked the door was shut tight, and doubled back through to the other room.

Marion was still in the living room, but out of her seat and by the door. ‘Kyle? What's the matter?'

‘Are there shutters on all the windows?' I asked, slowing but not stopping as I made for the front hall.

‘Most of them, yes, but what's—'

‘Listen to me,' I said, locking my eyes on hers, ‘I need you to close all the shutters on the downstairs windows, OK? I'll lock the front door and do the upstairs ones.' I pointed to the hot poker she still held in her hand. ‘Keep that with you, and if you see anything moving, whack it until it stops.'

‘What?' Marion spluttered. ‘Don't be ridiculous. It might be Toto!'

‘Trust me,' I mumbled, hurrying through to the hall, ‘it won't be Toto.'

There was no key in the front-door lock. I glanced around in case it was hanging on a hook or something, but found nothing.

‘Marion, where's the front-door key?' I shouted.

‘I'm not sure,' she replied from right behind me. ‘I don't really bother to lock it.'

‘What are you doing?' I demanded, turning to face her. ‘You need to go and close the shutters. Now!'

‘But why, Kyle?' she asked, making no attempt to hide the concern in her voice. ‘What's the matter? What are you so afraid of?'

‘I'll tell you later, I promise. But for now, we need to get the shutters closed and doors locked, OK?'

She hesitated, then gave a brief nod. ‘All right. I'll get the shutters.' Her eyes darted to the door at my back. ‘But I really don't know where the key is.'

‘Don't worry, I'll sort it,' I told her. ‘Now hurry. We might not have much time.'

The sparks were buzzing through my brain before she'd even left the hall. I had barely begun to picture the lock mechanism moving when it gave a solid
clunk
. Who needed keys when you had an imagination like mine?

I took the narrow stairs two at a time and rushed to the end of the top landing, where a wide window opened out over Marion's vegetable garden. The wooden shutters closed over easily, clipping in place with a small metal latch. As barricades went, they weren't the strongest, but they were all we had.

The window in my room had no shutters, so I pushed the heavy oak wardrobe in front of the glass, then wedged the bottom of the bed against it, jamming the wardrobe in place.

There were no shutters in the bathroom, either, but the window was tiny, and I couldn't see anything dangerous fitting through. I was about to leave it uncovered when I remembered the window in the train toilet compartment. It was just as small as this one – maybe even smaller – but it had been big enough for something to come through and murder the man-baby.

Like a slap to the face, the realisation hit me. The window in the train was too small for a human to get through, but it was big enough for a crow. They'd been flying alongside the train, hadn't they? One must've come through the window and killed the man.

But why? What did he have to do with anything? What was I missing?

I gave myself a shake and focused on the problem at hand. The house had to be secured first. Everything else could wait.

There was a medicine cabinet mounted on the bathroom wall. I unhooked it and jammed it between the window and the metal taps of the sink. The base of the cabinet fitted quite tightly against the taps, so while it wouldn't put up a lot of resistance if something really wanted to get in, it wouldn't just fall off at the first push. It wasn't ideal, but it would have to do.

I rushed through the remaining two rooms – a makeshift study and Marion's pristinely neat bedroom – fastening the shutters in both. When I was satisfied that upstairs was as secure as I could make it, I wasted a few seconds getting out of the lion outfit and back into my own clothes, then I hurried down to join Marion.

I found her in the living room. She was standing by the shuttered window, holding the telephone to her ear. She gave me a worried smile as I entered the room.

‘Who are you phoning?' I asked.

‘Your mum,' she told me, sliding the handset back into its cradle. ‘But there's no answer.'

I stopped, all thoughts of securing the building temporarily forgotten. ‘What,
still
? But it's late. She's never out late.'

‘Maybe there's a problem with the phone line or something. It happens.' Marion sat in her armchair and gazed up at me. The flames in the fireplace threw long shadows across her face. ‘Now,' she said, ‘why don't you tell me what all this is about?'

Half a dozen plausible lies popped into my head. It was hard to choose one, so in the end I didn't. I sat on the couch, gazed into the fire, and quietly told her the truth.

A few hours later, I lay in bed, not quite asleep and not fully awake, listening for anything that sounded like trouble. So far I'd heard nothing unusual, but if Marion's “Joe Crow” had come back, it was surely only a matter of time before he put in an appearance.

The conversation with Marion had gone about as well as expected. Very badly. She'd been nice enough about it all, nodding when she was supposed to, frowning on cue. But it was an act, I knew. No matter how much she tried to pretend otherwise, she hadn't believed a word.

And who could really blame her? There I was, a relative stranger, telling her that not only did I see imaginary friends, but that they kept trying to kill me. Did I honestly expect her to believe any of it?

The fact was, I
didn't
expect her to believe me, but I didn't want to lie to her. I'd lied to her already about Toto, and that was bad enough. Even when she'd thought I was a criminal she had let me into her house. She'd been willing to protect me, and if I'd brought danger to her doorstep, I was going to do everything I could to protect her. Even if it did make her think I was crazy.

I'd tried phoning Mum again – partly so she could back up my story, but mostly to set my own mind at rest. She didn't answer. Nobody answered, not even when I let the phone ring for over five minutes. Marion tried to reassure me, but the way the hairs on the back of my neck stood up told me something was wrong. I made up my mind then that I would be on the first train home in the morning.

The lights were off inside the house, and the wardrobe kept all but the faintest glimmers of moonlight out. I lay there with only the glow from the bedside radio alarm clock for company, willing the dawn to come. Marion had given me a candle and a battered old metal lighter. I'd sat the candle on the bedside table, but made sure the lighter stayed in my jeans pocket on the other side of the room, just in case I was tempted to use it. Light – even a weak one – might attract something, and that was the last thing I wanted to do.

My mobile phone was also on the bedside table, charging up so I could keep trying to get through to Mum during the journey home. It
was
possible there was a fault with the phone line, but I doubted it. It was too much of a coincidence. Something was definitely wrong, and the sooner I could find out what, the better.

It was the warbling of a woman's voice that woke me up. Her high, operatic soprano squawked sharply from the radio alarm, jolting me upright in the bed.

The dim glow of the morning sunlight squeezed through the narrow gaps around the wardrobe and into the room. I was so tired my eyes felt like shrivelled holes in my face, and I had to blink half a dozen times just to bring the bedroom into focus.

When I could see properly, I checked the clock. It was a few minutes past eight – much later than I had planned to sleep. I took my mobile from the bedside table. It gave a faint
bleep
as I switched it on.

Even before the phone had finished starting up, I heard the scratching. Instinctively, my eyes went to the ceiling. Mr Mumbles had first shown up in my attic, making his presence known by scraping on the floor, which was directly above my room.

As this scratching continued, though, I realised I was looking in the wrong place. The noise wasn't coming from above me this time.

It was coming from below.

I lay there and listened, trying to ignore the radio so I could focus on the sound beneath the bed. I've never liked opera music, but playing it on the radio at eight in the morning should be against the law, especially as the urgency of the woman's voice was making me even more nervous than I already was.

As I listened, I realised it wasn't just a scratching beneath my bed. There was another sound too – the occasional soft
thud
of something hitting the wooden floorboards.

Cautiously, I edged my head down over the side of the bed. The space beneath it was filled with shadow, and at first I couldn't see anything. The daylight coming in through the ajar bedroom door took the edge off the darkness, though, and it took my eyes just a few seconds to adjust.

The woman on the radio hit a high note just as I spotted the crow. It was crouching beneath the bed, shuffling awkwardly from side to side. It didn't seem to notice me as it pecked at a little white ball it had found. Every time it pecked at the ball it would flick it a few centimetres into the air, before catching it in its beak and letting it fall back to the floor with a
thud
.

I slowly pulled myself back up into bed, being careful not to make any sound. The crow was big, just like the ones that had descended on Toto the day before. I leaned back against my pillows and tried to figure out the best thing to do.

Creak
. The springs of the mattress groaned as my weight shifted. With a strangled screech, the crow exploded from beneath the bed. The bird rose quickly, flipped in the air, and pulled off an incredibly tight turn. Its eyes shone like black gemstones as it banked and dived straight towards my face.

I threw the covers up above my head, just as the crow hit my pillow. I heard its claws tear through the fabric, felt its beak pecking furiously at the top of the blanket.

Scrambling down the bed, I wriggled out through the feet-end of the covers, close to where the bed frame was wedged against the wardrobe. The bird looked up at me and gave an angry
caw
. Before it could attack, I caught the bottom of the blankets and flipped them over the crow. Leaping back on to the bed, I pinned the covers down, trapping the bird beneath them.

For a few long moments there was no sound in the room but my breathing and the drone of the opera on the radio. The only movement was the heaving of my chest. Beneath the blanket, everything was still.

I cautiously lowered my head towards the covers, turning my ear as I tried to listen for anything that would tell me what the bird was doing. The blankets were thick, and the space beneath them tight. With any luck the crow had suffocated already.

Nothing. The bird seemed silent and still. I inched my ear a little closer, trying to tell for sure if—

The beak tore through the blanket with a single peck. I felt a flash of pain and my hand flew to my ear. When I pulled it away, my fingers were wet with my blood.

The crow's head was squirming through the hole in the covers, each wriggle forcing the tear wider. I leapt backwards off the bed, releasing my pin-hold on the blankets.

Those beady black eyes stayed fixed on me as the bird fought to free itself. I felt the electrical tingle on my scalp, but I was too panicked to know what to do with it. My abilities relied on me using my imagination, and right now my imagination couldn't come up with anything that could deal with a flesh-eating crow.

Before I could think of something, the bird tore free. It beat its oily wings until it was up near the ceiling. Then, with a demonic screech, it swooped towards me.

The next few seconds became a blur as several things happened at once.

The warbling of the woman on the radio became distorted by the buzzing of some sort of interference. Even as the interference began, the crow was veering wildly off course. It thudded headfirst against the wall just as my mobile phone began to ring. I heard the bird's neck snap, and knew it was dead before it hit the floor.

I was too shocked to move at first. Quickly, though, I made a dive for the phone, frantically searching for the button to answer it.

‘You have four new voicemail messages,' a robotic voice informed me. ‘First new message…'

There was a brief pause before Ameena's voice broke in.

‘Kyle, it's me. Listen, if you get this, you have to come back. Now. It's your mum,' the recording said, and I felt my pulse quicken. ‘On the way back from the station, she was… We were attacked. I tried to stop him, but he was too big, I…' Her voice was becoming more panicked. She cleared her throat and when she spoke again she sounded a little less frantic. ‘Listen, just come back when you get this, OK?'

The line gave a
bleep
and the next message began.

‘Me again,' Ameena said. ‘I'm at the hospital. Where are you?'

Bleep
.

‘What's the point in even having a phone if you don't switch it on?' Ameena spat. She was breathless, as if she was running while she was talking. ‘I've just left the hospital. The doctors say your mum's stable for now. I'm going back to the house to get the address you're at, then I'm coming to find you, so stay put. If the guy who attacked your mum comes for you, I don't like your chances on your own.

‘Keep your eyes open for him,' she continued. ‘He's a big fat guy. Fattest guy I've ever seen. If you see him, run. I've seen what he can do, and it… Well, just run, OK? See you soon.'