Page 49

I CAN HEAR BELLA’S ROUGH breathing as we crouch in the dark undergrowth. I can feel her hand on my forearm, fingers clutching tight.

There’s a rustling of dead leaves, a cracking and snapping of branches. And then we watch as something moves out of the trees into the clearing a few yards ahead of us. A dark hooded figure... tall, as tall as me. For just a moment I think: it’s Nathan Tate again. Then other things register. That it’s carrying a long stick or club and wearing some sort of long tattered cloak, bits of it moving strangely with a kind of rippling, a quivering—until I realize it’s covered in thousands of black feathers that reach all the way to the forest floor, where the ends of it slither along the ground. And the worst part: inside the hood, where you’d expect there to be a face... it makes my skin crawl. Where the nose and mouth should be is a hooked black beak and it seems to have no eyes.

It has to be some kind of mask. There must be a person inside there somewhere. But there’s nothing human about it. Even the way it moves, in that cloak—a kind of glide.

I think I might have stopped breathing.

“Oh my God,” Bella whispers. “It’s one of them.” There’s more rustling and now more of them are appearing: a second figure, a third, a fourth—all wearing the same dark cloaks, the same dark masks with hooked beaks, carrying the same sticks. I count eight—no nine... then ten, eleven—twelve, I think, though it’s getting difficult to keep track. They’re moving together into one black mass. Suddenly there’s a loud whoomph and what I thought was a stick turns into a flaming torch. Each bird passes the flame to the next, until all of the torches are lit and held above their heads. The woods seem even darker now. All you can see are those flames and the horrible figures lit up beneath them.

This is worse than the blood. Worse even than finding that dead old man in the study. I think of the little boy I was once, scared of the woods at the end of the field, closing his curtains so that no chink of moonlight could get in. This is what I was afraid of. But in spite of all the legends, in spite of the blood I found, in spite of that feather on the old man’s desk, I don’t think I ever really believed. Not till now.

I’m scared to move an inch. Nearby, Bella’s breathing is coming in fast pants and I feel like even that might be too loud. She’s gripping my arm so tight it hurts.

Then there’s a sound: a shriek that feels like it goes right through me. For a long time afterwards it seems to echo off the trees around us. Whatever that sound was, it wasn’t human. And as if they’re obeying a command, the hooded figures all move into a circle.

Now there’s a rhythmic drumming and I see that all of them are beating the bottom of their torches on the ground so that the flames dance and surge and spark. The drumming gets faster and faster, the torches are a blur of light, and I’m finding it hard to focus with the brightness of it all against the deep dark of the wood. Then, all of a sudden, they stop and the silence on the other side is so intense I actually hold my breath, because I’m sure this time they’re going to hear.

A figure moves into the center of the circle. Then it makes a gesture and two of the others step forward, dragging a sack that looks like it contains something heavy. And suddenly I am absolutely sure that something bad is going to come out of the sack. I don’t want to watch but I do as they kneel down and the leader reaches into it and begins to pull out something very large and dark. And the other two go to help and then they are all lifting the thing from the sack together.

I hear Bella whisper “Oh Jesus” and by the light of the torches I see it properly. A bull’s head. Ivor’s head. Now the figures begin some kind of chant, a low, fast muttering. And they lift the head higher and higher until it’s held above the clearing, as though it’s looking down at them all and it doesn’t look like Ivor anymore, who was quite a sweet bull as they go. In the flickering light it looks like something old and evil and powerful, the dead eyes reflecting the torches so it looks like they’re lit from inside, the nostrils dark and flared, the lips curled back from the big white teeth, the black tongue lolling out.

Oh God.

It happens before I realize it’s going to and before I can stop it: I sneeze. I hear Bella suck in her breath. For a moment I think maybe I’ve got away with it. Then the leader gestures with an arm and the chanting gradually stutters to a halt.

And then the figure turns this way and points.

They’re all turning in this direction now. The circle is breaking apart and the Birds on this side of the circle are moving toward us, pushing the undergrowth aside, getting closer, closer...

For a moment I can’t move and all I can hear is the blood beating in my ears. Then: “Eddie,” I hear Bella whisper, her grip stinging my arm. “Eddie, when I say so I think we should...” She leaps to her feet as she hisses the last word: “RUN.”