“You brought them here!” shouted Bootlace. “To my home!”
“How did you find us?” said Caw. He felt the weight of the stone in his pocket.
“How do you think, crow talker?” said Mr. Silk. “Her children are everywhere. There is nowhere you can hide now.”
Caw drew a deep breath and summoned his crows. If they could sense him from so deep underground. He searched for their black shadows in the ether, but they were faint.
“Give me the stone,” said Mr. Silk. He swiveled the gun to point at Lydia. “I know your weak spots, remember.”
“He doesn’t have it!” said Lydia defiantly. “We’ve hidden it.”
Mr. Silk laughed. “Is that so, my dear? Then why is his hand covering his pocket like that?”
Caw drew it back. Come to me! he willed his crows.
The gun went off with a crack and a barrel flare in the gloom. Lydia leaped and screamed as a bullet ricocheted off the rock beside her.
“Don’t test my patience,” said Mr. Silk.
Caw could feel them now. Their massed feathers and sharp beaks and shrieking voices. The flood of bodies coming through the grave door.
Caw’s eyes went to the entranceway, where the rat feral stood oblivious. Silently he commanded his crows to plow through her.
“Shut the door, if you will,” said Mr. Silk.
Pinkerton looked startled. “The w-w-what?”
“The door, my good lady. Quickly, now.”
The crows swept down the steps, hundreds of them, propelling themselves along the passage in an unstoppable wave.
Pinkerton slammed the door. Caw’s heart sank as a succession of thuds sounded from the other side.
“Th-th-think you can outsmart a rat?” she said.
Her creatures swept toward Caw, and Glum and Screech landed at his feet, their bodies right in the rodents’ path.
Where’s Shim—? began Screech, before the rats swamped him.
Mr. Silk cried out and the gun went off again. Caw heard a bullet ping off the roof of the cavern, and the gun hit the ground. Shimmer shrieked as she clung onto the moth feral’s wrist, pecking and gouging. Blood splattered from his hand.
“Hide!” Caw yelled to the others.
Lydia and Selina ran, leaping through the carpet of rats. Caw saw the air move as a cloud of moths coalesced and dived toward their master. Shimmer was coated from beak to tail and dropped, collapsing to the cave floor.
Caw ran for the gun, but Mr. Silk knelt and snatched it up. Caw saw the barrel turn to face him. “Don’t despair, crow talker,” said Mr. Silk, leering cruelly. “This won’t be the end of your line, I promise. She’ll find some murderer or thief worthy to take charge of the crows.”
He pulled the trigger just as a shape leaped in front of Caw. Bootlace! The worm feral’s body jerked with the impact of the shot. Mr. Silk fired again, and Bootlace was driven back a step, but remained standing. Caw couldn’t see any wounds at all—it was as if his body had just absorbed the bullets.
“If only it were that easy,” said the worm feral with a grotesque smile.
Mr. Silk looked at the gun in confusion, then fired three more shots at point-blank range before staggering as the ground at his feet broke apart. His foot slipped into a hole as worms broke through. “What the . . . ,” he said.
Caw turned, looking for Glum and Screech. Both were pinned, their wings jerking at strange angles as they tried to break free of the rats. Caw kicked one of the rodents aside, then grabbed another by its tail and tossed it. More squirmed up his legs, biting as they went. He fought down his panic. Pinkerton had hopped up onto a rock, laughing maniacally.
Caw looked up to see Mr. Silk finally drag his leg free of the cloying earth and club Bootlace fiercely across the jaw. The worm feral fell to the ground with a grunt.
Shaking off the rats that were clawing up his body, Caw charged at the moth feral, reaching for the gun as Mr. Silk brought it around again. They slammed into the wall together. Teeth gritted, Caw smashed the moth feral’s arms against the rock until he dropped the gun.
Oof! He felt a knee driven into his stomach and crumpled, gasping for breath. He saw that Shimmer had managed to scramble free of the moth swarm. She hooked her talons around the barrel of the gun and pushed herself off the ground, dropping the weapon well clear of the moth feral.
Mr. Silk threw his weight over Caw’s body, hands searching in his pockets. Caw struggled, but the shock of the blow had made him weak. He knew as soon as the moth feral rolled off him that he had lost the Midnight Stone.
“I’ve got it, Pinkerton!” shouted Mr. Silk.
The rat feral jumped down from her boulder. Caw wheezed, unable to move. He could see Selina hiding behind one of the tombs, but where was Lydia? Bootlace was groaning, trying to stand as rats clambered over him.
Mr. Silk was transfixed by the stone, holding it cautiously with the tips of his fingers, as though it might burn him.
“Don’t seem much, does it?” he said. He pocketed the stone, and then his face turned nasty. He kicked Caw in the gut again, throwing him onto his back.
Through the pain, Caw saw Lydia at last. She was moving toward the door, with a finger placed on her lips. What was she up to?
“Time to smash this crow’s brains in,” said Mr. Silk. He knelt, picking up a rock the size of a football and hoisting it over his head. “Good-bye, crow talker.”
Caw heard the door thump open, and Mr. Silk’s eyes flicked sideways. A split second later he was overwhelmed by crows in a black cloud. Through the flapping wings, Caw saw the moth feral’s arms give way and the rock fall to the ground.
Caw rolled aside, gasping. He could hardly see, so alive was the air with insects and birds. Crows veered wildly as the moths assaulted them in swarms. Many of the birds flew straight into the walls, disoriented by the insect plague.
He spotted Bootlace crawling along the ground, dozens of rodents covering his body. The worm feral climbed unsteadily to his feet and advanced on Pinkerton.
“Caw, it’s time to fulfill your promise,” said Bootlace. “I think I’ll take this rat feral with me.”
For a moment Caw wasn’t sure what the worm feral meant, but then he remembered their deal.
He glanced around but couldn’t see the Crow’s Beak.
“Here, Caw!” cried Selina. Somehow she’d gotten hold of the blade. Drawing back her arm, she sent it spinning across the cavern. Caw caught it by the hilt and lifted the point of the blade. The sword thrummed in his hand, as if charged with an electric current. As Caw brought it down in a vertical swipe, he felt the air resist softly, like water. The blade opened a rip of pure blinding light in front of him. The rift widened. Rats and crows shrieked as one, backing away. Pinkerton shielded her eyes.
Blinking, Caw saw Bootlace’s face, openmouthed, his eyes filmed with tears. “It’s beautiful!” he cried.
The worm feral ran at Pinkerton, his gaze fixed on the doorway to the Land of the Dead. He wrapped his arms around the rat feral’s waist and dived headlong. Pinkerton screamed as he bundled her into the portal. Then the light swallowed them both, cutting off her cry midway. The rift shrank, its edges pulling together like a healing wound. As the last point of light vanished, a gust of wind swept across the cave, extinguishing most of the candles and leaving them in semidarkness.
A silence settled through the cave as Caw stared at the Crow’s Beak in his hand. It felt cold and lifeless once more. The Land of the Dead had left a scattering of fine ash over the blade.
After a moment’s pause, his thoughts turned to the Midnight Stone.
He looked to where Mr. Silk had been brought down by the crows, but his heart plummeted. He had gone. Crows landed on the ground beside their injured comrades, but there wasn’t a single living moth to be seen. The gun was missing too.
“Where did he go?” said Caw.
Lydia still stood at the door. She shook her head. “I was watching the portal,” she said.
“Me too,” said Selina. She looked pale with shock. “Where are Bootlace and Pinkerton?”
“Dead,” said Caw.
“Just like that?” said Selina.
Caw nodded. Quickly he crossed the cavern to the spot where Mr. Silk had fallen. There was a pool of blood, then a trail of thick drops. He followed them toward the door.
He must have slipped away, said Glum.
Caw was relieved to see the old crow unharmed apart from a few jutting feathers. Screech was limping beside him on his broken leg, and Shimmer’s beak held a twitching moth. She tossed her head back and swallowed it.
“It’s over then,” said Selina. “We’ve lost the stone.”
Caw looked around at the devastation. The worm feral’s home suddenly seemed more like a crypt than ever. Silent, dark, a place of stillness. Strewn with corpses, the air thick with the essence of lives lost. And though he still stood, Caw knew he was on the vanquished side. For four hundred years, the crow line had protected the Midnight Stone, and now he had let it go. Not only that, but the Mother of Flies now knew exactly what it could do and planned to use it for evil.
Caw fought the despair that threatened to cripple him. Hardening his heart, he sheathed the Crow’s Beak and strode toward the door. His crows fluttered behind him.
“Where are you going?” asked Lydia. “The Mother of Flies has the stone. She has the convicts and she has the animals to create her own ferals.”
“You’re right,” said Caw. But the words of Black Corvus wouldn’t leave his head. The promise of the crow line. We will protect it to our dying breaths. “But that doesn’t mean this is over.”