They can be so fierce and hard. It always shocks me, even though I’ve seen them like this before. But it’s never easy for me to equate what they really are to the pair of silly corbae girls that I usually know. Except they’re not really like that, are they? Goofy and dancing and always talking about candy. They’re not like that at all.

Joe says that they were here before the long ago, that they watched Raven make the world. When I asked him why they act the way they do, like a pair of goofy little crow clowns, he told me that most of the time they live in the present. They don’t think of the future, they don’t remember the past. They just are. Because the more they remember, the darker and grimmer they can get.

Like they are right now.

Zia’s words hang in the air, and no one says anything for a long moment.

I look at them all, my gaze settling on the seaweed creature that’s got Geordie inside of it.

I remember a time, not so long ago, when all I had to worry about was getting around on my canes. About feeling trapped in my wheelchair. About wanting to paint, so desperately, but not ever being able to recapture the way I used to make magic with pigments on canvas.

For the past couple of years, the one thing I’ve really wanted is to be freed of all those chains on my life.

Now I wish those days were back. I’d trade them in a moment for how everything’s gone all dark and horrible.

And Geordie, my Geordie . . .

No, he’s not my Geordie. Maybe he could have been, but I never opened my heart to him and now it’s too late, unless the crow girls can make a once upon a time happen for me.

They must feel the need in me because they turn back to me.

“How can we help you?” Maida asks.

Zia nods. “Yes, because we promised we would and crow girls always keep their promises.”

“It’s something we’re good at.”

“We’re veryvery good at it.”

“Except when we’re not.”

“But not today.”

“Oh, no no no. Today we’re the opposite of not.”

“We’re the can-do crow girls today,” Zia assures me.

As they fall back into their familiar ways, it feels like the sun coming out from behind a bank of dark clouds. Even depressed as I am about Geordie and what I’ve done to him, I can’t help but smile.

As I tell them what happened, they peer over the edge of the drop.

“Is that all?” Zia says.

“How much of him do you need?” Maida asks Timony.