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James stepped out from under the shadow of the house and felt his shoulders loosen. He didn’t much like the house either, though he didn’t generally consider himself sensitive to such things. But it was an odd place. The carvings that he’d initially thought whimsical, now seemed something more sinister, as he remembered the number of wooden rats and mice that ran over the skirting boards and up the windows. Mice, he could almost understand, but why the artist had chosen to carve rats, with long tails and noses, he couldn’t quite fathom.
But it was just Marcia’s obvious shock making him feel this way. She was upset, and he was letting it rub off onto him. It had been some sort of morning all right. First Jeremy rushing into the house with his film of the swing in the birdcage moving by itself, and now this – a room full of flying sparrows. They’d been beating the air around Marcia, swarming around her like a living tornado.
He’d seen the broken body of one on the floor as well, when he’d pulled her out. Just a quick glimpse of it, a bundle of brown and grey feathers on the floor, marked with scarlet blood. He grimaced, lips making a little moue of distaste. It had flown in her mouth, she’d said, and she’d bitten down on it hard enough to kill it. No wonder the poor thing was in shock.
But where was Darryl? Neither Martin nor Jeremy had known. They’d been back at the computer, hunched over Marcia’s footage. James had wanted to go look over their shoulders, but he’d promised to find Darryl.
The man wasn’t anywhere inside. He searched the house – quickly – going room by room, forgetting that he could have just got Jeremy to bring them all up on his computer, but they were all still and empty anyway, stuffy in the growing heat of the day. Marcia’s room was a mess of feathers, and that one little body, stiffening on the carpet, and he made a mental note to clean it up when he’d found Darryl. Marcia had a fragile look to her, as though she was turning to glass. When he’d watched her on the show – and he’d binged on the programme when Darryl had got in touch asking him to become a temporary member of the team – Marcia had been strong and competent, if a little vague in her ability. Now she looked drawn and tired, and a little frightened.
Maybe Darryl was looking over the birdcage. James touched the walkie talkie he’d been given, but he’d already tried to reach Darryl on that, getting nothing but static for his efforts. It was hitched to his belt, and he lifted it up, thumbed it on.
‘Darryl? Come in Darryl? You there?’ He felt obscurely silly, but waited for a reply anyway. Nothing but white noise. After the lecture about carrying and answering the things at all times, Darryl was breaking his own golden rule. Had something happened to him?
James hurried his pace, pushed through the small wooden gate into the woods, and followed the track leading under the trees. They gathered him up into their spicy shade and led him onwards. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom, but he saw the birdcage just fine when it loomed up in front of him.
There was a small bird inside it, hopping back and forth on the seat of the swing. A sparrow. James cursed under his breath. He should have brought the camera with him after all. It was still back at the house, on the table beside his personal laptop. He’d thought he would feel stupid, carting it around, filming nothing much of anything, but now he realised how idiotic he’d been. Martin would crucify him if he knew.
Not that there was anything supernatural about the sparrow. It stopped its bobbing about and looked at him, chirruped, then spread its wings and flew between the bars and away into the treetops. There might not have been anything supernatural about it, but it had an air of uncanniness to it. Jeremy too, and Darryl most likely, would be severely annoyed he hadn’t captured it on camera.
Well, none of them had to know. It had just been a bird doing the sorts of things birds do. James wiped his hands on his pants, and looked around the small clearing. There was no one there, no sign of Darryl.
On the opposite side of the clearing, the trail carried on further into the woods. James remembered Darryl saying something about all this land belonging to the house, so it was perfectly conceivable that there could be more to see farther along the track. Casting one backward glance at the birdcage, the professor stepped onto the track and made his way deeper into the woods.
The trees gathered around him, and in their branches, the birds seemed to whisper and gossip at his passing. Glancing upwards, the hubbub stopped, just as it did when his students saw him walk into his lecture room, back in the day. It made the back of his neck prickle. But he shook his head. It really didn’t do to anthropomorphise the birds. He knew better. He was a respected academic, for crying out loud.
This was a new take on field work, however. No longer sure what he’d imagined it would be like, James hadn’t expected anything like this growing feeling of dread. No, dread was too strong a word. Discomfort. Had he even expected anything to happen at all? Part of him hadn’t, he admitted. Part of him thought it would be at most an interesting, if academic exercise. He thought they might get some response. Odd bumps in the night, perhaps. Vague, misty sightings, if they were really lucky.
But here they were, not even started, and things were happening. Looking behind him, he couldn’t see the birdcage anymore, and was relieved. It was because of that. The birdcage. It was an artefact of evil, he decided, and was astonished at his fanciful thought. But it struck him as true. They’d tapped into something with the birdcage, and Martin’s story about it. He just didn’t know what.
It was hot under the trees. It should have been shady and cool, but the air was still, pressing upon him, the trees themselves crowding too close, their branches seeming to bend down to point at him. He blinked rapidly two or three times, trying to clear his head. He was thirsty – how long was he going to walk along this track? Where did it even lead? Darryl wasn’t down here, why would he be? He was in one of the outbuildings, or something. James muttered a curse, why hadn’t he thought of that to begin with? He’d not checked the garage, or the greenhouse.
Plucking the walkie talkie from his belt, he pushed the button and jumped at the squawk of static, then took a deep breath.
‘Darryl? Come in, Darryl?’
A muttered hum of white noise. James pressed the button again, coming to a standstill amongst the trees, wiping perspiration from his face.
‘Martin?’ he said. ‘Jeremy? Anyone there?’
A crackle from the walkie talkie, and Martin’s voice rang through loud and clear.
‘Professor. What’s up?’
For a moment, his mind was blank. Then he swallowed. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘I’m still looking for Darryl. You seen him?’
‘That would be a negative, professor.’ The device crackled again, and it sounded like birds fighting. Did birds fight? Martin’s voice was a relief when it came back through again. ‘Stacy’s back. She’s talking about a temple on the property. Somewhere in the woods.’ Another brief span of white noise, this time the soft beating of wings. ‘Where are you?’
‘Me?’ James asked, distracted, feeling stupid. ‘I’m on the trail past the birdcage clearing.’ He thumbed the button. ‘Over.’
The radio silence was longer this time, the sound of a thousand tiny heartbeats in a thousand feathered breasts.
‘Wait where you are,’ a new voice said. Female – James guessed it was Stacy. He hadn’t had much to do with her yet. ‘We’ll join you in a few minutes. I think the temple might be out there, I want to take a look at it.’ Someone muttered at her. ‘We all want to take a look at it,’ she amended. ‘We’ll join you.’
James gazed around at the trees, close enough to reach out and touch. It was dark in amongst them, he realised. Dark and hot. Claustrophobic. He pressed the button. ‘I’ll wait,’ he said, then fumbled with the button again. ‘What about Marcia? I don’t think she should be left alone.’
‘Roger that,’ said Stacy’s voice. ‘See you shortly.’
Did that mean someone was going to stay with Marcia or not? She’d acknowledged him, so she’d heard what he’d said. He put the two-way radio back on his belt and looked around. The path stretched to the left and to the right, and he was disoriented. Had he turned around while they’d been talking? Which way was forward, and which was back?
The trees looked the same in both directions. None were familiar, not those to his left, or to his right. Peering upwards, he tried to find the sun, as though that could point the way. But the trees were too close together, and there was nothing but the merest glimpse of the sky.
He didn’t want to stay where he was. He’d told Stacy he would, but he’d actually meant he’d walk back to the clearing and meet them there, though the thought of whiling away five minutes by the birdcage was almost more than he could stand. Abruptly, he decided he hated that thing.
But he hated standing right here as well. Reaching up, he made to loosen his tie, and realised he wasn’t wearing one. Bending forward, he put his hands on his knees, and drew in a long slow breath. It was so hot here, the air so close and stuffy, dusty, and it smelt strange too, no longer the fresh tang of eucalyptus and pine, but something dryer, something cloying, that stuck in the throat, something that rustled hot skin, thin bones, dry feathers. He lifted his head, and looked up at the branches.
They gazed back at him. Little stuffed statues, unmoving on the branches. Then one ruffled its feathers and they all stirred, restless now, but eyes, small black seeds, focused on him. He raised his body slowly, cautiously, standing straighter, readying himself for the onslaught, small feathered missiles.
But they didn’t launch. Instead, the birds, sparrows, all of them, sat on the branches all around him, silent except for the occasional shaken wing, and stared at him. Swallowing, James heard his throat click, and tried to decide in which direction to run.