[1] HOUSE OF CROWS | Haikyuu!! (Murder of Crows) ✓

HOUSE OF CROWS | 15

There's a lot of repetition and fast-paced stuff in this chapter, so I'm sorry if it sounds a bit clunky. The chapter's also pretty short, but at least it's an update aha.

The room was full of shadow and ash, but you saw him the moment you opened the door.

The Crow was stood there, his back turned towards you. When Kuroo's flashlight filtered into the room, his body seemed to fade, flickering around the edges, as if he wasn't really there. An illusion of ink and feathers.

Kuroo gasped sharply when he saw him, and the air around you stilled as if you were both holding your breath. Neither of you moved. Maybe you should have turned and run the other way, but where would you go? The house had changed, and you were trapped. You tried not to think about how Akaashi and Tsukishima were going to get out, but you hadn't heard them come up the stairs behind you. Maybe they had found a different escape.

The Crow turned, his movements slow and taunting, as you and Kuroo stood in the doorway of the room, on the threshold of safety and danger. Neither of you made a noise. Then, as the Crow's gruesome face came into the light, Kuroo's torch gave a sudden, sharp flicker and blinked out, plunging you into darkness so thick you could feel it on your skin, like something alive and hungry.

Then you noticed the window. A curtain of moonlight hung from the glass, like a lantern in the dark, obscured before by the glare of Kuroo's torch. You could see trees outside, standing as thin and crooked as matchsticks. Your way out.

The Crow stood between you and the window, and he was smiling as if he knew. He had you trapped. You couldn't go back. The only way was forward. Into the hungry dark.

"Pass me the torch," you murmured, barely parting your lips to let the words out. Kuroo stayed still for a moment, and you wondered if he hadn't heard you. But then he pressed the light into your hand without taking his eyes off the creature in the middle of the room. Darkness swirled around him like a murder of crows taking flight, shifting wings and feathers and moonlight glinting from glassy eyes. There was something alive about the way those shadows moved, constantly flickering in and out of focus, coalescing from individual feathers into something more solid. Solid was what you wanted. Solid meant it could be hurt.

You took a tentative step into the room, crossing that threshold of danger and safety. Now you were in the Crow's territory.

"What are you doing?" Kuroo hissed, but you ignored him, watching the Crow closely, waiting for him to come at you in a flurry of ash and feathers. The flashlight felt heavy and reassuring in your palm, slightly warm from being in Kuroo's grasp. You focused on that, instead of the fear eating at your mind.

The Crow snarled at you, his lips - thin, bloodless - pulled tight together. Eyes watched you with the intensity of a predator, waiting patiently for its prey to come within claw's reach. Threads of darkness wrapped around you when you met those eyes, interwoven with thin slivers of moonlight, beautiful and dangerous and hungry and alive.

You stood, facing each other. Waiting. Hunter and prey. Beast and human.

Your heart was beating so hard against your chest you thought it might force its way out, rip straight through skin and bone. You sucked in air through your teeth, but it tasted bitter and poisonous. The torch slipped against the sweat on your fingers, and you hefted it back.

The Crow moved first.

You felt it before you saw it, a shift in the air, the brush of feathers and cold shadow on your skin, and then he was there - snarling, hungry, murder flashing in his black eyes like drops of ink. You tried to dodge, but he caught you in the stomach, and you were thrown backwards for the second time that night. You hit the wall shoulder-first, skidding down to your knees, coughing dust and blood. The wound on your arm tore open with a blinding sting of pain, and the flashlight skittered from your hand, flickering once. There was still light inside.

You heard a shout behind you - Kuroo - and when you craned your neck, you saw he was unharmed, and the Crow was nowhere to be seen. He took a step towards you, but then something streaked across the room, blood and ink and feather and shadow, impossibly fast. Kuroo stumbled back, tripped, crashed into the doorframe with a grunt. You struggled to your feet, wheezing through your nose. You could taste blood.

The Crow's gaze fell on you as you leaned heavily against the wall, trying to catch your breath. But you had no time. The Crow moved towards you again, and you threw yourself out of the way, stumbling, catching yourself, reaching down to grasp the torch by your foot. Then you spun, and smashed the torch against the palm of your hand. Light - bright, golden, beautiful - burst forward, straight into the creature's eyes. He staggered back, momentarily blinded, and you shattered the flashlight over the Crow's head, watching him go down.

Then Kuroo was there, pulling you desperately towards the window. White and yellow spots danced over your eyes, but you blinked them away as Kuroo used his elbow to smash the glass, and shards grazed your cheeks, drawing thin lines of blood. "Quickly," Kuroo wheezed, and hands helped you as you climbed through the window, more glass cutting your hands and legs.

You fell to the grass on your knees, blood and pain and moonlight dancing in your vision, but Kuroo hauled you back to your feet. And then you ran.

You ran, and didn't look back.

One more chapter to go... o.O