The Order of Crow's...

 The Order.

The rain had begun to bead up on the windshield of the dark blue sedan before Noah Maxwell turned on the windshield wipers, casting sideways glances at his passenger William Crowler suspiciously. The pair rode in silence for much of the drive to Asheville from the airport. As soon as they turned onto Crow's Crossing Road, Noah's mood had become a bit more somber. He slowed down and came to a full stop at turn 23 near the Amherst woods and pulled over to the shoulder. William Crowler eyed him curiously, then almost hesitant to talk. He leaned back in the seat and took a deep breath carefully watching everything around him, and even though William was from the big city and had never step foot on Crow's Crossing Road he was at the very least vaguely familiar with the local lore surrounding this place.

"So, why are we stopping Noah?" He asked.      

Noah smiled.

"Because there's someone here that I think you should meet, William."

William chuckled.

"How do you know they're going to be here?"

Noah Maxwell stared at him blankly.

"Because he's always here."

Both men got out of the car and slowly made their way down a winding trail to the treeline. Noah stopped them within twenty feet from the first oak. 

"You know, William, you're a piece of shit. I know all about you, I know about your propensity to commit crimes, I know how you like to bully, torture and get violent with other people, you get off on it. And I also know that my sister, no matter how many times you've hit her in the past, no matter how many times you beat her up, for whatever reason she has decided to give you a second chance at building a new life with her. I know that you've spent most of your life in and out of the justice system, which is why I called you here without my sisters' knowledge, nobody knows you're here but me and -"

William abruptly interrupted him.

"Let me stop you right there Noah, this is where you are going to warn me that if I hurt your sister, you will kick my ass or something even worse-"   

Noah did not answer at first, instead he walked farther into the woods with an agitated William Crowler following impatiently behind him.

"No William, this is the part where you get your spiritual awakening" He paused to look up at the top of the treeline at the murder of Crows slowly growing in size. "Nope... I'm not going to do anything at all to you... They are." 

All at once, Noah Maxwell pushed him down the hillside to where he came to rest in the wet, rain soaked leaves. He cursed at Noah Maxwell loudly, but soon found his outburst interrupted by a dark figure walking toward him from the opposite rim of the hill. when it began to draw closer he could see that it was an old Indian man with long black hair, adorned in a long black hooded robe, the Crows seemed to follow his lead and swarmed in around William Crowler and began cawing loudly as they landed forming a circle around him, and for the first time in his life William could feel the fear building up inside of him.  As the old Indian drew closer William saw his eyes were glazed white as if he were blind, he lowered the hood and as if looking right at him raised his head in the direction of Noah Maxwell who had his hands out in front of him palms together as if he were in prayer, Noah bowed his head to the old Indian and nodded, the Crows became louder and sounded angry.

The old man slowly placed his cold dead hands on each side of William's head and folded both thumbs over his eyelids and slowly pushed his head backward. And William Crowler began to scream. There in his own tortured thoughts, William not only saw every life that he brought pain and suffering into, all the torture, all the abuse, every life, every face he'd caused pain, he not only saw them all, but he felt all the pain, all the suffering, everyone that he'd hurt they were all there with him. All at once, a lifetime of malice all came rushing back to him... And for all of his screaming, for all of his cries and begging, there was nothing he could do to make it stop... For William Crowler, it felt as though his soul was being ripped from his body, and then the next thing he knew he was pulling himself up the damp hillside toward Noah Maxwell's feet.

Noah turned back toward the highway, and then, barely able to walk,  a broken William Crowler in tow. when they got to within twenty yards of Crow's Crossing Road, William finally collapsed. Noah Maxwell stood over him defiantly looking at him as his eye's slowly began to turn a frosty white, William unable to do anything but lye there in the wet grass shivering, his then blind eyes began to wander aimlessly across the empty black skyline. Noah Maxwell calmly bent down and took his wallet from his pocket, and stood over him. The Crows had returned and begun to circle overhead as the old Indian man appeared once again at the edge of the treeline and stood silently watching. 

Noah turned to face him. He knew he could not see, but still Noah thanked him, throughout his young life Noah Maxwell knew there to be one absolute, whenever something confused or tempted him, whenever his drunken stepfather would berate and beat on him, Noah always knew that he could return there to the Road of Crows, and the old Indian and his flock would somehow always seem help to clear his confusion and ease his pain.  He could never thank them enough. He returned to the sedan and got in and began to drive as the rain intensified, he pulled over at Bane's Bridge above the Saddlehorn. He got out and removed the burner phone from his pocket and dialed 911. when he finished the call, he bent down to pick up a large rock and smashed the phones sim card with it, and then taped William Crowler's driver's license to the rock and threw them both into the rapids of the Saddlehorn River. He looked back in the direction of where he'd left William.  

"Rest in Peace, you piece of shit."

Epilogue: A life lived, a life passed.

They'd responded to the 911 call at just after 3:00 Pm on Friday afternoon, officers from the Jackson County Sheriff's department found the shirtless wet middle-aged man alongside of Crow's Crossing Road, near turn 23 lying in the fetal position in the grass just where the anonymous call had said he would be.  When they asked him who he was, his white eye's aimlessly roamed the sky, his lips were moving, but there were no words. they called the ambulance at 3:15 PM, he had no identification, and as officer George O'Reilly watched the paramedics strap him to the gurney, the unidentified man grabbed his wrist tightly. He began to softly speak in almost a whisper, George O'Reilley heard him say one word over and over again… Repent... The two officers watched in silence as the Murder of Crow's that had been circling above, began to follow the ambulance as it slowly pulled away. Just another day in the life, here on Crow's Crossing Road.

~Scratch.. A.B.T. Copyright © 2019~