Crows. The cawing of crows. The cawing of thousands of crows. Even as she started to shiver, they appeared, black shapes against the predawn sky, from the direction Bernard faced, flying low over the trees. Hundreds of them, thousands, flooded through the air like a living shadow, blackening the sky, flying north and east over the Calderon Valley, moving with an uncanny certainty, with a purpose.
