A Brotherhood of Crows.

It began as a shadow at the foot of Leith Walk. Tendrils of black and grey weaved together in the shadows. It slithered, it slid, and it grew. A shape, a form, a hazy image. A figure of fog and shadow. Smoke curled, cape-like about it, as it rose, to a height too tall to be human. It began as a shadow, and took its first step as a Pale Citizen.

It moved with the callous care of a killer from the shadows, drifting up the now quiet streets. It left a trail of shadow and smoke like a bridal train behind it, sweeping the cold cobbles in its wake. Before it, the air froze, cold enough to frost the breath. Behind it, a thin trail of ice, unexpected shining smear of cold left on this sharp October night. So walked the Pale Citizens. Such were the footsteps of the Long Friends.

All around it became cold. Ice followed in its footsteps, and the air around was chill enough to frost the breath. It drifted, it flowed, it hungered, towards a small flat sitting at the intersection of Broughton Street and Leith Walk.

Eyes dared not meet it, those few passers by who saw the shifting shape slivering. The felt the cold, and shivered and crossed the road, away of a sudden fear but unable to place it. A few, the more astute, those who perhaps knew that what they saw wasn’t always the whole picture, swore to themselves that they heard a voice, whispering the same thing over and over again:

“Give us eyes.”

Finally, with all the urgency of waves devouring low lying coastline, it came to its destination: a simple door, a dark house. A single faint light in an upstairs window.

“Give us eyes.”

Its hunger was palpable now. It longed to feast, to feel itself growing more solid, more real as it sank its teeth into flesh. The smoke parody of one foot began to lethargically move forward when something stopped it dead in its tracks.

Standing on the first step that led up to the door of the house, was a cat.

The Pale Citizen stayed very still. It had no eyes, but the smooth spaces where eyes might have been regarded the cat with unease.

“Give us eyes.”

The Cat was old, a moth eaten thing that only the kindest of owners could have called cute. Its eyes bore into the ghostly figure before it, daring, challenging, contemptuous.

There was a movement behind it. The Pale Citizen’s smokey head turned and it saw another cat behind it - a sleek, elegant Egyptian Mau, its thin face with the same expression as the elderly mange tiger on the doorstep. There was the padding of paws and another cat emerged from the shadows, a fluffy black kitten.

The Pale Citizen knew no panic, it knew no unease. But it knew one thing well, and that was fear.

The three cats began to close in. As they did, the fog and smoke began to recede, being draw into itself as if caught in a draft. The cats hissed, their lips drawing back to reveal their teeth. As their hisses filled the air, the Pale Citizen began to thrash and twist and grew...thinner.

“Give us eyes!”

It was almost a plea for mercy. But it was too late. The Cats closed the gap, and the Pale Citizen’s foggy mouth opened in one last silent cry of anguish, before it exploded into nothing.

Silence now. The sounds of the slumbering city returned. The cats relaxed, and with a brief acknowledgement that seemed almost like a human nod, the Mau and black kitten withdrew into the night. The elderly cat remained where it was, watching the patch of frost where the Pale Citizen had once stood.

Elijah Avaron was nowhere near, but had he been, and had he at that point closed his eyes, and slipped into Elsewhere, he might have heard the old cat say: “You can stick your eyes up your arse, for all I care.”

With that, the old cat curled about itself on the step, and went back to sleep.

Four floors above, Zularna Munro rolled over, and continued to dream.