The Jar of Crows

I was nine when we moved to the old farmhouse on the edge of the Thornwood, a place where the trees grew so thick that the sun barely touched the ground. It was a lonely spot, but my father had inherited it from a distant uncle, and we had nowhere else to go. The house itself was drafty and creaked at night, but the worst part was the silence. Not the peaceful kind, but the kind that pressed against your ears, as if the world was holding its breath.

One autumn afternoon, while exploring the overgrown orchard behind the house, I found a jar. It was a mason jar, cloudy with age, with a rusted lid. Inside was a collection of crow feathers, each one black and glossy, tied together with a bit of twine. It was an odd thing, but I was a curious kid, and I took it inside. I set it on the windowsill of my room, thinking it might look cool. That night, I dreamed of crows. They circled above me, their wings blotting out the sky, and on each beak, there was a tiny, blood-red star. I woke with a start, my heart pounding, and in the dim light of the moon, I swore I saw a shadow pass by the window. But it was just the trees.

The next day, I noticed a change in the air. The birds that usually sang in the mornings were gone. The only sound was the cawing of crows, which seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. I went to the window, and there, on the branch of the dead elm, sat a crow. It was larger than any crow I’d ever seen, and it stared at me with eyes that were not black, but a pale, milky white. I watched it for a long time, and then it flew away, leaving behind a single black feather that drifted to the ground.

That evening, my mother complained of a strange headache, something that felt like a sharp pressure behind her eyes. She went to bed early, and I was left alone with my father, who was reading in the living room. I tried to ignore the knot in my stomach, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. I went to my room, and the jar on the windowsill seemed to hum, a low vibration I could feel in my teeth. I picked it up, and inside, the feathers were moving. Not blowing, but undulating, as if they were alive. I opened the lid, and a cold breath of air escaped, carrying the smell of damp earth and something else, something sweet and rotten.

I started to hear whispers. They were faint, like the rustling of leaves, but I could almost make out words. I would turn, expecting someone to be there, but the room was empty. The whispers grew louder each day, and I began to lose track of time. I’d wake up in the middle of the night, standing in front of the jar, my hand reaching for the lid. I’d catch myself and pull away, but the urge was strong.

The crows multiplied. They lined the fence posts, the rooftops, the power lines. They seemed to watch me, and whenever I looked at them, they would stop their cawing and tilt their heads, as if listening for something. I told my father, but he just said it was the season, that the crows were migrating.

One afternoon, I was in the barn, and I heard a child’s voice. It was high and thin, and it called my name. I turned, and there, in the corner, was a girl. She was about my age, but her skin was pale, and her eyes were black pits. She wore a dress made of feathers, and she smiled at me, but her mouth was full of needles. I screamed, and she vanished. I ran back to the house, and I saw that the jar was open on the floor, the feathers scattered. The crows outside began to laugh. It was a horrible sound, a cackling that seemed to come from the trees themselves.

I tried to gather the feathers, but they were sharp, and they cut my fingers. The whisper grew into a shriek, and I felt something cold crawl up my spine. I looked in the mirror, and my reflection was wrong. My eyes were not my own. They were milky white, like the crow’s, and I saw a black shape in the reflection, behind me, reaching for my shoulders.

I begged my parents to leave, but they insisted everything was fine. My mother’s headaches had gotten worse, and she often sat in her chair, staring blankly at the wall. My father stopped leaving the house. They both seemed to have forgotten what it was like before.

On Halloween night, I woke to the sound of scratching at my window. I looked out, and the yard was filled with crows, hundreds of them, all facing the house. The window was open, and the jar was in my hand, the lid off. I could hear a melody, a strange, off-key tune that seemed to come from the jar itself. I put the jar to my ear, and I heard a voice, a woman’s voice, whispering, ‘Let us in, little one. We’ve been waiting so long.’

The crows flew at the window, beating their wings against the glass, and I saw them turning into shapes, human shapes, with beaks for mouths. I dropped the jar, and it shattered, but the feathers rose up like a swarm, surrounding me. I tried to scream, but no sound came out.

They lifted me off my feet, and I remember feeling a strange warmth, and then the flock took me into the night.

My parents searched for me for days, but they never found me. They told the police I must have run away. But sometimes, when the crows gather in the Thornwood, they say that among them, there is a child who runs through the trees on all fours, with eyes like black glass, and feathers growing from her skin. And if you listen closely, you can hear her calling for you, just as I once did, from inside a jar of crows.