Birds of Paradise by Oliver Langmead (read any book .TXT) 📗

at the cutlasses to free them from their housing. They have been fused together with rust, so Adam snaps one in two and pulls the pieces of it apart from the other. The remaining cutlass was never meant to be used as a weapon: its blade is dull, and it is unbalanced and unwieldy, and its tip is a rough globule of rust. It is ideal, Adam thinks, for the agonies he plans to visit upon Frank Sinclair.

The further Adam makes his way through the attic, the less steady the floor is beneath him. The wooden boards give way to bare rafters with nothing but insulation between them, so that Adam has to tread carefully to make sure he doesn’t put his foot through the floor. Those rafters are brittle with age, and the wood warps with each step he takes. There is still no sign of Frank Sinclair, only vague shapes in the dark that might be a man lying in wait, but Adam is meticulous. He moves from shadow to shadow, drawing aside old curtains and tapestries with the tip of his rusted cutlass, and crudely spearing the dark between splintered bits of furniture.

A clear space opens up beneath a particularly wide gap in the roof, and Adam pauses, turning about and studying the darkness of the attic. Nothing moves in the shadows, but the rafters beneath him sigh and shudder, struggling with his weight.

The slightest movement catches his eye, but it comes from outside.

Something flits at the edge of his vision, and he turns to be confronted by the enormous moon, revealed fully beyond the fallen tiles. A shape flutters across it; a shape with pale wings and slender antennae. It looks like a moth, Adam thinks. Except, it isn’t a moth at all. It is a butterfly, made monochrome by the moon.

With a tortured moan, the floor gives way.

The darkness of the house opens beneath Adam as he falls.

With his free hand, he catches himself on one of the jutting rafters. Debris tumbles away on every side of him, smashing onto ballroom tiles far below. One of the huge hall’s great chandeliers glints in the moonlight. He still has hold of his cutlass, but he’s not sure how long the rafter will keep his weight. It shifts perilously beneath his grip as he hangs, suspended from the attic.

Before Adam is able to haul himself back up, a shape emerges from the shadows above. It is the end of a large-calibre rifle – the elephant gun – aimed at Adam’s head, and from its barrel hangs Fox’s brilliant brush.

With one wild eye to the sights of his oversized rifle, Frank Sinclair grimaces. He is dressed in antique clothes like one of the men from the many portraits hanging in the house, and his pale scalp is pitted like the moon that illuminates him. “You beast,” he hisses. “I get it. I get it, now.”

It would be easier to fall, Adam thinks. A few broken bones would be better than being shot in the head. Yet, as he considers his options, he notices a new darkness shrouding the moon. It is not a cloud, nor is it the silhouette of a butterfly. No, this shape is something else. It is a bird, Adam thinks – a bird approaching fast and silent with its claws outstretched.

“I thought it was the first true act of free will,” continues Frank Sinclair, “but I was wrong. Now, I understand. You only took a bite because you were stupid and you were hungry.”

As the silhouette grows larger, it unfurls its magnificent wings.

Frank Sinclair tightens his grip. “I would have made a better you than you!”

There is a chaotic burst of noise as the elephant gun fires, the roof implodes, and Owl screeches all at once. Splinters of wood and feathers rain down around Adam, and he feels the hot rip across his skull where the gun’s shot skims him. Owl’s enormous claws are embedded so deep in the floor that Adam can see them protruding through the ballroom’s ceiling, dripping with an inky liquid that must be blood. The mighty creature, somewhere between man and bird, has eyes that are mostly pupil – two black expanses that glare at the screaming figure pinned beneath him. Owl screeches again, flicking his wings to remain balanced, before striking with his beak.

Throwing his cutlass across the rafters, Adam hauls himself up.

Frank Sinclair has been torn nearly in two. One of his legs is snapped beneath him, and his guts protrude glistening and black from his ripped belly. His eyes, wide and white, roll unseeing as he screams, wet hands fumbling uselessly at Owl’s claws. Owl strips bits of flesh from him, ripping through his ruined clothes and swallowing glinting morsels.

Fetching his cutlass, Adam watches for a while as Frank Sinclair is devoured, considering how best to increase the small man’s suffering. He is barely lucid, and his blood pours from him. It won’t take long for him to die.

There is a cupboard full of clothes nearby, and Adam sifts through them until he finds some old belts and strips of cloth. Casting his cutlass aside, he carefully makes his way across. At first, Owl flicks his wings in warning, but he quickly settles again, returning to the feast at his feet.

Tearing away Frank Sinclair’s clothes, Adam begins to tie tourniquets around the ruined man’s bleeding limbs and sliced torso. When enough of the bleeding has stopped, he slaps the dying man’s cheeks until he rises momentarily from his delirium. “What…” Frank Sinclair’s voice gurgles in his throat. “What are you doing?”

“You’re right,” says Adam.

“What?”

“You’re right. I was stupid, and I was hungry.”

Owl strikes again with his beak, tearing out a chunk of Frank Sinclair’s chest. The dying man wails, and gurgles, and tries to grip hold of Adam’s coat, but his hands are too slippery and they fall away. Owl strikes again, and again, and Adam wanders back over to the wardrobe, leaning up against it