A Circle of Crows Read Online Free PDF Page A

under her.
    "Suit yourself, I'm going to check on Morgana."
    Rachael climbed the wooden steps followed by the Dodger. In the dimly lit hallway, she nearly tripped over him. “Watch it, furball. I'm not your master."
    She reached the Autumn Room and looked in to see her daughter asleep on the large mahogany sleigh bed with the television still on. The blue-green light cast a hue over her daughter's face. Rachael shut off the TV and walked over to the bed. She stared at her sleeping daughter for a moment and gave a silent prayer of thanks. Sometimes when she slept, Rachael noticed her husband's contours on Morgana's face and although sad, felt proud that his essence was carried on in their beautiful child.
    Rachael pulled the covers over Morgana and pulled the window shut. She quietly left the room, avoiding each creaky floorboard she had committed to memory, and closed the door with a quiet click.

Chapter 6
    Through the Looking Glass
    "Help me..."
    The sound was barely perceptible at first, just a whisper of the night wind, or perhaps the branches of trees scratching against the window pane.
    "Help me..."
    Morgana rolled over and placed her hand over her eyes in a confused attempt to shut out the sound.
    At first, Morgana felt, rather than heard, Chloe growling on the bed beside her. She sat up in time to see the Jack Russell terrier's hackles raise as her dog barked out loud and jumped off the bed.
    "Quiet, Chloe!"
    Morgana went to the window and stared into the moonlit courtyard separating the inn proper from the cottage where Aunt Bella and Uncle Sam lived. It used to serve as servants quarters in the 1900's and Morgana had always enjoyed the stories her mom would tell her about the history of the inn. She noted that the moon was full tonight and she could make out every detail in the yard below.
    "Help me..."
    Morgana whipped around so fast, that she cricked her neck and immediately began to rub it.
    "Who's there?” she said.
    The floor-length mirror across the room began to shine with a pale white light.
    Morgana crossed the room and peered into it.
    "Hello?"
    The mirror's contents began to swirl madly and the whiteness became thick and churned back and forth.
    Morgana touched the mirror and Chloe growled louder.
    With her touch, a little girl of about four or five appeared, looking up at Morgana with tears streaming down her face.
    "Please help me."
    "Who are you? What is going..."
    The window flew open and autumn leaves began to fly through the room in a tempest; they were so thick, Morgana could no longer see the dog on the ground beside her.
    Her hand, still pressed against the mirror, was suddenly entwined with tiny fingers, which began to pull.
    " No! Help! "
    The Jack Russell could be heard barking wildly, but to Morgana, it sounded as if the dog were miles away, rather than right at her feet, where she remembered her pet to be standing.
    Morgana pulled backward, but the little hand clutched her and she could hear the girl sobbing in terror.
    Then it happened.
    She passed into the mirror.
    The feeling of falling flooded her senses and she felt vertigo and feared she would vomit.
    The lights began to change around her, a psychedelic show of color and sound.
    Visions began to stream past her on either side of her descent.
    A little boy and girl, playing at the water's edge, then screaming and trying to run from an unseen foe in the water.
    A mother crying on a bed, holding a child's old-fashioned boot to her chest, rocking back and forth.
    Then Morgana began to shake involuntarily as she began to smell ... sulphur.
    Through a field on her right, hundreds of people fled in a stampede, all of them looking up toward the sky in terror. To the left and right, fires blazed and burning houses were falling to the ground. And something huge and black could be seen slowly approaching. Its body ascending and descending with each beat of its wings.
    Thud.
    Morgana hit the ground head first. Before she lost consciousness, she