My ears are still ringing from Raven’s summoning cry when a pair of crows appear in the sky above us. They come spiralling down at a dizzying speed and change into a pair of teenage girls just before they touch the ground. I’m impressed with their balance. Neither of them so much as stumbles in her landing.

As soon as they touch the ground they turn to Raven and start jabbering away, the two voices intermingling so that it seems like it’s only one person talking.

“We didn’t kill them.”

“Not even one.”

“I know we didn’t try to stop them.”

“But you never said stop them.”

“You never said anything.”

“You just said find the bogans.”

“You never said what to do when they were found.”

“And you know crow boys.”

“They can be all sharp beaks and talons.”

“So they’re all dead dead dead.”

“Veryvery dead.”

“And in lots of little pieces.”

Raven holds up a hand, and the pair immediately fall silent.

“Crow girls,” Jack says from beside me, his voice soft, the tone implying that it’s a big mistake.

I glance at him, but he only shrugs.

Raven points to where Cassie’s holding Joe.

“I need you to fix this,” he said.

The crow girls look at Joe’s body, and they seem surprised.

“Who did this?” one of them asks.

Raven jerks a thumb in the direction of Minisino’s body.

The other girl shakes her head. “A little buffalo man killed Joe?”

Her—sister? It must be, they look so similar. She nods and says, “How did a little buffalo man get so powerful?”

It’s odd the way they keep referring to Minisino as little. The pair of them are so skinny and small themselves. If Minisino were alive and standing, he’d be twice their height.

“He didn’t,” Raven says. “He struck Joe down from behind.”

I’ve been finding myself agreeing with Jack. Why has Raven brought in a couple of little girls to help us with this? But when he tells them how Joe died, something changes in their eyes. They go dark and old and more dangerous than anything I’ve ever seen before. And then I remember a story that’s sometimes added to the one about the beginning time, about how a pair of crows were already here in the long ago, watching Raven make the world.

“If we bring Joe back,” one of them says, “what will he do?”

The other one nods. “Will he go all Jack Daw on us and start a clan feud with the buffalo?”

“I don’t know,” Raven says. “It’s Joe. Anything could happen. But right now I need you to heal him.”

The girls nod. They study Joe’s body for a long moment, then start to talk in tandem again.

“We’d like to,” one of them says.

“But it’s too late.”

“He’s already gone on.”