Unhappily Ever After

Chapter 24 - Morning All

I crossed the room to our new and improved nest — a cereal box stuffed with pigeon feathers, where the crow chick was holding court. It squawked a greeting at me, threw its head back and opened wide. I shovelled in some of our homemade egg, meat and insect paste. Her appetite was growing by the day.

"It's a girl," Eira said at my shoulder, and I pretended like I'd known she was there all along. "You can just tell."

"Oh, yeah?" I challenged her. "And if you're wrong."

"I'm not. It's in the eyes. Boys look at the world like they own it."

"You're verging on sexism there," I muttered. It wasn't a real complaint. Most of Eira's anecdotes were generalised observations in the wrong packaging. Either way, I frowned at the chick and reckoned I could see her point.

She ran a finger along the sleek feathers of the crow's wing. "I'm calling her Raven. You do what you like."

And, just because she'd challenged me, and just because I had to prove I could think of something, anything, I stared at the little thing. It was easy, then — obvious, even. She was darker than the night sky, ink and coal put together, and I said, "Ebony."

Ebony did one of her little hops, bouncing onto my knees and back down again. She spread her wings and waved them about a bit. This was happening more and more often, and I was sure she would be flying soon. Kat wanted to be here for the moment, but that was looking less and less likely by the day.

Because today was the packmeet. The last week had slipped away from us. Three half-hearted escape attempts from Kat, none from Alex (only because Evie had been visiting every other evening). She had struck up an inconvenient friendship with Kat, Eira and Lexi, and the four of them talked while Lee, Vik, Alex and I were left to drink and make conversation.

Ebony made a throaty sound — kaaa kaaaaa — and hopped her way onto my bed, where she promptly emptied her bowels. That made Eira laugh, at least, but it wasn't the first time. It wasn't even the second time.

And as I crossed the room to grab her, I nearly collided with someone coming in the door. After we had skirted each other and caught our balances, I grinned at a familiar mess of chestnut hair.

"Heya," Lee muttered. There was a reason he looked like a drowned rat. He was still refusing to sleep in Lle o Dristwch, out of fear for an imaginary curse, so he had pitched a tent on the field and now he had to walk to the castle every morning, rain or shine. And, being Snowdonia in April, it was rarely shine.

"Ready?" Eira asked him without bothering to return the greeting. I threw my eyes around in an exasperated circle. Every day, they disappeared into the cellars for hours at a time, returning coated in mud, and I couldn't get a word of explanation. Yesterday, half of Lee's raiding team had tagged along. None of them had resurfaced until after the sun set.

Personally, I had spent most of yesterday interrogating the Silver Lake hostages, Alex excluded. Through a combination of intimidation and mental strong-arming, I had looked for any hint that they had been involved in the slaughter at Llechi. Most were too young. One, the veteran in charge, had memories which had made me feel like throwing up my lunch and ripping his head off. Lee had taken the news surprisingly well.

"Ready," he agreed.

I didn't even bother asking. It was like milking a damn bull. As long as the mysterious activity kept Eira busy and my castle was still standing at the end of the day, I had bigger problems. Eira and Lee disappeared in the direction of the cellars, and I cleaned the bird-shit from my bed.

A minute afterwards, Kat returned from the toilet trenches and the two of us went for breakfast. After the flockies had left, I'd given Tom my bank details and the task of organising food, and it had been the best decision I ever made. With one trip to the town, he had bought gas cookers, all the equipment any budding chef could ask for, and enough food to fill our cellars. The big room had turned into a canteen, and volunteers worked in shifts to make three meals a day. It was quite like running a homeless shelter, except the customers smelt worse.