Chapter Text
Crows and ravens, historically, have been particularly misunderstood birds, even by those around them. Labeled as evil, or the messengers of death, or just useless carrion birds who spread disease, it was rare for them to be considered anything past a pestilence upon the earth.
However, there were two things that are also largely forgotten about them. The first is the undying loyalty to those they chose to consider family. Ravens in particular to their one True Love, but crows as well to the murder that they created.
The second, by turn of this, is that their familial memory stretched longer than any other. The location of home, the scent of a good meal, the feeling of danger on the wind. The birthplace of avians, the feeling of grace as birds were placed in the sky, the names of all the gods that loved each kind of bird in turn. And, particularly, the name of the one who held ravens and crows most dear, who in the moment of greatest need was said to come to protect all under his wings.
This name was held in the beaks of all corvids before they even grew feathers, entrusted to them by centuries of bloodlines as a safety measure by desperate parents who knew what the cruel world might have to offer their fledglings. This precious name was never forgotten, even if they were removed from their nests far too soon and tied to witches and demons who used them for ill-gotten gain.
The name of the First Familiar, the patron saint of ravens, crows and magpies the world over, and the King Consort of the most powerful Fae Queen to bless the skies.
Diaval.
⧫⧫⧫
It was incredibly clear to Monty that they were losing, and that it was all his fault. Charles was still in the pit with the snake, seemingly unable to defeat it in time to save everyone. Edwin was still shackled to the torture table, even with one hand free, and Niko was on the floor bleeding from a wound she had taken for Crystal, who was being choked in the air by Esther.
All he wanted to do was curl into himself and try to block out the screams and cries. He wanted to ignore all of the stupid human emotions he now couldn’t get rid of, even as a crow. And most of all, he wanted to go back in time and stop himself from ever even taking the Dead Boy Detectives out to the woods to their death.
Pathetically, he hopped from the kitchen to Niko’s side, cawing softly to try to encourage her to hold on, begging her to stay there and not let go. Monty knew the words wouldn’t come, not while he had a beak and feathers, but he hoped his increasingly frantic caws and tugs on her hair would get the message to her while there was still a chance she could make it.
What he hadn’t anticipated was the series of events that would come in quick succession.
First, that Crystal would grab Esther’s arm and enter her mind, causing her to freeze. Monty wasn’t sure exactly what happened, but within five seconds, both women were on the floor.
“What the fuck-!” Esther cried as she scrambled to her feet, lunging for Crystal. “What did you do?! What did you just do?!”
“H-hey! Hey, hey, hey!” Crystal cried as she tried to get away from the enraged witch, before being pushed against the wall, once again by her neck.
“He is going to hurt, more than anything has ever hurt in the history of the world,” Esther declared, in the most demonic voice Monty had ever heard from her. Frantically, he started rattling Niko’s necklace, shirt collar, anything he could grab to try to wake her up, get her to move, get her to run, cawing louder and louder and scratching her arms with his talons.
“Now,” the witch said dramatically as she pulled the psychic from the wall, holding a knife to her throat, “Hold still so I can-”
Then the second thing happened; a huge backlash of magical energy blasting out from the cabinet under the sink as Charles finally, finally, sliced the snake to bits.
The problem with both of these things is that Monty, by way of being Esther’s familiar, was irrevocably tied to her, so damaging her magic so greatly had the effect of flattening him entirely with a beakful of Niko’s white hair. Esther and Crystal were similarly knocked down, and mercifully, blessedly, the machine that Edwin was strapped to turned off.
Shaking his head as he tried to right himself, Monty knew something was very, very wrong with the witch. Very wrong indeed. “No, no,” she said as she grabbed her face. “No!”
As she turned to get off the floor once again, he saw what had been done; Esther was starting to age, horrifically and quickly. He could also feel, through the familiar bond, that her magic that had once been stronger than anything was now next to nothing. This, he wasn’t sure the cause of. Surely the snake had no effect on her power, only her looks and youth?
Croaking, he flapped his wings as he tried to stand back up from where he’d fallen on Niko’s chest. A chest, he noted in some small corner of his mind, that was no longer moving.
This started the third event that Monty hadn’t at all anticipated.
“Monty!” Esther screeched as she grabbed for him, snagging him by a wing as he squawked and scratched, trying to get her to release him.
“It’s too late, you bitch! She’s coming for you, you know She is!” Crystal yelled as she stumbled upright.
Who? Who was coming? Monty’s disoriented mind tried to ask, unable to focus on any one thing, only his desperation of getting the woman to let him go, to stop hurting him, to stop shaking him around like a rag doll so he could figure out which way was up again.
“Do you really think that that’s the only trick I have left?” Esther asked as she shook the wounded bird at her. “I’ll take you to hell myself before She can take me!”
“Crystal? Edwin!” Charles cried as he ran from the kitchen, sprinting past the witch to get to the torture table.
“Charles!” Edwin called back. “She’s got something else planned!”
“Goddamn right I do, ghost boy,” Esther panted, leaning against the doorframe with one hand, the other still holding a frantically screeching bird. “Why do you think we have familiars, to have a friend to hang around with? It's for the emergency battery pack.” And then she ripped off his other wing, and shoved the bleeding appendage into her mouth, feathers and all.
Monty had never screamed like he did then, with his crow and human voice coming together in a cacophony of pain. Not even when she had beaten him to death, or sewed him together again to make a new body. This was a pain of permanence, one he knew he wasn’t going to come back from.
“Oh god, Monty!” Edwin exclaimed in shock, still tied down to the table.
“What the fuck?!” Crystal backed away from the deranged woman. “What the actual fuck, you just ripped his fucking wing off!”
Charles grabbed his sword, raising it up and stepping in front of both Edwin and Crystal. “I don’t know what the hell you’re planning, but put him down.”
“You know what, lover boy, I don’t think I will,” Esther smirked through the blood on her teeth, grabbing one of Monty’s legs. He was so weak from the pain he couldn’t move anymore, couldn’t try to peck her, claw her hand with his talons. “I think the power I put into this stupid, useless, pain in the ass bird will be enough to kill you for the second time, before I use the other one as a new battery to replace the snake you cost me.”
“If you want to get to him, you go through me first, witch,” the ghost said as he stepped closer, the sword now held in both hands.
“Didn’t you hear me, you stupid thing? That was my plan in the first place.” Letting go of Monty’s leg, but still dangling him from his remaining wing with the other, she raised a hand, orange light crackling from her fingertips. “Now hold still so I can hit you.”
Monty wasn’t actually sure how much longer he could hold on. His tongue was heavy in his beak, the caws turning into barely-there croaks. He wasn’t able to move any more, let alone try to fight back, to protect Edwin, to stop Esther. The black was coming far too quickly for that, claiming spots on his eyes as his blood dripped all over the floor. He wondered if anyone would miss him. If Edwin would be sad that he died. If his mother, long since gone from this world, would find him. Ah, his mother.
What had she always said without saying? What was that thing I always knew and never said?
“If you think we’re going to let you get away with that, you bitch, you’re dead wrong,” Crystal said. “You know as well as I do that She’ll find you before you can do anything. Now put him down!”
“Crystal? Who is She?” Charles asked without taking his eyes off of the witch who was trying to aim her magic knife at them.
“Her goddess, the one she lied to for years,” Crystal stated as she locked eyes with Esther. “The one who’s coming for revenge.”
Oh, right. With the last breath he had, Monty pushed one word past his heavy beak.
“Diaval.”
“What? No, Lilith,” Crystal said, confused.
This is where the fifth and final unexpected event happened in very short order, which Monty deliriously thought was an awful lot for a Tuesday afternoon.
First, the front door banged open, revealing a bloodstained woman. Then, a raven, larger than any they had seen before, flew in directly at Esther, slamming her into the staircase.
Honestly, at this point, Monty was just hoping to pass out so the weird would stop just as much as the pain.
Without a word, the woman grabbed Esther’s leg and started to drag her out of the house, Monty still in her clutches as the witch wildly swung at anything and everything to grab onto.
“Excuse me, ma’am,” a kind, Irish voice said over the chaos. “She has something of mine. Can I have that first?”
The bloody woman, Lilith, stopped her path out of the door to stare at the intruder. Where there had once been a raven stood a man in all black, with scars on his face and what was visible of his chest, and a pointed nose.
Without looking away from her, he bowed at the waist, a perfect court bow that Edwin hadn’t seen since before he died. “No disrespect, milady. I won’t stop you from taking her. I just want to make sure one of mine doesn’t go with her.” And with that, he straightened up and walked over to the stunned witch, neatly plucking the hurt crow from her gnarled fingers, gently gathering him into his hands. “There we are. I hope your day finds you well.”
Bowing again, he stepped back out of the way of the goddess, who with her unwavering stare, finished dragging the screaming witch out of the door, slamming it shut with another earth shattering bang.
“Now,” Diaval said to Monty, holding him carefully up to eye level. “What’s to be done about all this?”