The Crowmaster
After Kyle's ordeal at school, his mother packs him off to the safety of the countryside, where there will be no temptation to use his powers, and he can forget the bad things - like the fact that his dad is a monster determined to destroy the world.But here's the thing about the countryside: it's full of nature, and nature sometimes has claws.Followed by a spindly figure in the woods and attacked by crows, Kyle is about to discover that NOWHERE is safe from the invisible fiends…
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BARRY HUTCHISON
INVISIBLE
FIENDS
THE CROWMASTER
For my big sis, Carol Anne.
Sorry for turning your Bucks Fizz record into a clock.
But it was 18 years ago.
Let it go.
Contents
Prologue
NINETEEN DAYS EARLIER...
Chapter One - BROUGHT TO LIFE
Chapter Two - OF MONSTERS PAST
Chapter Three - A GOODBYE
Chapter Four - JOSEPH
Chapter Five - MEETING MARION
Chapter Six - LOST
Chapter Seven - UNDER ATTACK
Chapter Eight - DRESSING UP
Chapter Nine - RUDE AWAKENING
Chapter Ten - SHEDDING SKIN
Chapter Eleven - THROUGH THE SQUARE WINDOW
Chapter Twelve - GUARDIAN ANGELS
Chapter Thirteen - CAUGHT BY THE CROWS
Chapter Fourteen - A FALL TO RUINS
Chapter Fifteen - INTO THE BIRDHOUSE
Chapter Sixteen - FLAMING CLOSE
Chapter Seventeen - DEMON IN DISGUISE
Chapter Eighteen - SNEAK ATTACK
Chapter Nineteen - THE MAST
Chapter Twenty - THE MONSTER WITHIN
Also available in the INVISIBLE FIENDS series
Copyright
About the Publisher
PROLOGUE
What had I expected to see? I wasnât sure. An empty street. One or two late-night wanderers, maybe.
But not this. Never this.
There were hundreds of them. Thousands. They scuttled and scurried through the darkness, swarming over the village like an infection; relentless and unstoppable.
I leaned closer to the window and looked down at the front of the hospital. One of the larger creatures was tearing through the fence, its claws slicing through the wrought-iron bars as if they were cardboard. My breath fogged the glass and the monster vanished behind a cloud of condensation. By the time the pane cleared the thing would be inside the hospital. It would be up the stairs in moments. Everyone in here was as good as dead.
The distant thunder of gunfire ricocheted from somewhere near the village centre. A scream followed â short and sharp, then suddenly silenced. There were no more gunshots after that, just the triumphant roar of something sickening and grotesque.
I heard Ameena take a step closer behind me. I didnât need to look at her reflection in the window to know how terrified she was. The crack in her voice said it all.
âItâs the same everywhere,â she whispered.
I nodded, slowly. âThe town as well?â
She hesitated long enough for me to realise what she meant. I turned away from the devastation outside. âWait⦠You really mean everywhere, donât you?â
Her only reply was a single nod of her head.
âLiar!â I snapped. It couldnât be true. This couldnât be happening. She stooped and picked up the TV remote from the day-room coffee table. It shook in her hand as she held it out to me.
âSee for yourself.â
Hesitantly, I took the remote. âWhat channel?â
She glanced at the ceiling, steadying her voice. âAny of them.â
The old television set gave a faint clunk as I switched it on. In a few seconds, an all-too-familiar scene appeared.
Hundreds of the creatures. Cars and buildings ablaze. People screaming. People running. People dying.
Hell on Earth.
âThatâs New York,â she said.
Click. Another channel, but the footage was almost identical.
âLondon.â
Click.
âIâm⦠Iâm not sure. Somewhere in Japan. Tokyo, maybe?â
It could have been Tokyo, but then again it could have been anywhere. I clicked through half a dozen more channels, but the images were always the same.
âIt happened,â I gasped. âIt actually happened.â
I turned back to the window and gazed out. The clouds above the next town were tinged with orange and red. It was already burning. They were destroying everything, just like heâd told me they would.
This was it.
The world was ending.
Armageddon.
And it was all my fault.
NINETEEN DAYS
EARLIER...
Chapter One BROUGHT TO LIFE
The house was quieter than I ever remembered it being. The stairs didnât creak as I tiptoed barefoot down them. The kitchen door didnât make a sound when I edged it open. Even the fridge, which usually gives a strange gurgle when anyone so much as touches it, stayed silent as I pulled back the door and blinked in the faint orange glow of the light.
The floor was cold beneath my feet. I curled my toes in and tried to balance on my heels, minimising contact between my skin and the chill of the lino. Iâd been given slippers at Christmas, but in all the⦠excitement of the day, theyâd got lost.
The shelves of the fridge were almost bare. Tomorrow was shopping day â well, technically, since it was after midnight, today was shopping day, but since I hadnât been to sleep yet I was still classing it as âtomorrowâ. Pity. There was never anything decent in the fridge on the day before shopping day.
The milk carton felt light when I picked it up and carried it across to the table. If I drank some there probably wouldnât be enough left for cereal in the morning. I grabbed a glass from the draining board and half filled it anyway. Nan always said milky drinks were good for helping you get to sleep, and drinks donât come much milkier than milk.
On the wall above the microwave the plastic hands of the clock crept past 3 a.m. There were no ticks, no tocks, just the same flat silence that seemed to have fallen like a blanket across the world.
