Ravenfell Chronicles: Origins

by Brand J. Alexander

  “Destroy him!” one of the Guardians raged. “Devour his soul and take what is rightfully ours.”

  Beaumont hoped the Raven King had caught on to his hint. He had suspected it was possible when he left his feathered friend behind, but now that he stood within the world of death, he knew it to be true. The fragment of death was a part of his very being. No veil or Guardian could dictate the laws of such a place or who could traverse it. He was lord and master of the death within him, and he welcomed the Raven King home openly.

  He reached within himself in a similar fashion to drawing from his Well of Corruption, feeling the haze of the raven’s remaining veil entwined with his soul. Though the Guardians had hoped to cut him off from the Raven King’s protections, the fragment within kept the connection intact. And he used that connection to send his plea.

  “It is time to retake your throne, my friend,” he called through their link. “No veil stands in your way within my soul.”

  For a moment, Beaumont questioned whether the message was received as he watched the Guardians close in around him. But the sounds of wing flaps within his mind and a building force within his soul confirmed he was heard.

  A flurry of feathers black as midnight erupted from Beaumont’s chest, rising from the fragment within his soul. It was the gateway through which the Raven King could return. A flock of ravens, imbued with the souls of fallen Ravenfells, followed in his wake.

  “Impossible!” the dark spirits howled. “We control the passage between worlds.”

  “Only I control the fragment of the Netherworld within me. And no veil or Guardian shall dictate who may enter,” Beaumont challenged as the Raven King settled upon his shoulder once more.

  The Guardians hastily withdrew from the advancing flock of ravens. They were spirit-blessed, and their beaks and talons posed a significant threat. But the Guardians were not completely daunted. By consuming the spirits of magic creatures and weaving themselves into the new veil, they had become something entirely new, and they were not as vulnerable as they once might have been.

  The Guardians gathered and raised a shield of woven specters to slow the screeching attackers. Then they worked in unison, transforming the malleable veil and the Netherworld into a weapon to unleash death upon the living trespassers.

  “Destroy them!” the Guardians demanded. “You must serve us, ravens. We made a bargain.” Yet the ravens swooped towards the shield tearing shreds of shimmering essence as eagerly as rotting flesh.

  “I made a new bargain,” the Raven King declared triumphantly. “And it supersedes yours. The Ravenfell Curse is broken. The veil is mine once more.”

  Through their connection, Beaumont could feel the Raven King countering the Guardians’ work. He controlled the veil once again, though the spirits maintained control of the Netherworld. Both worked to suppress the opposing side.

  Reality shifted erratically, woven and rewoven from the essence of helpless spirits like in the Mad Witchdoctors’ jungle. Monstrous tentacles of darkness writhed in violent arcs swiping birds from the air and threatening to pummel anything that dared approach the spirit shield. Deep pits of gnashing teeth and gulping emptiness opened randomly, devouring anything in reach.

  The Guardians knew the potential of the Netherworld. They had been trapped beyond the veil since its founding, and they understood how to wield its essence with skill. But the Raven King was imbued with the very spirits who forged this place and its laws, and he countered their threats with equal precision.

  Nightmares proliferated everywhere Beaumont looked. Enraged spirits of fallen legendary beasts materialized to protect their Guardian masters, only to be set upon by Ravenfell beaks or have their flesh melted away in decaying clouds wielded by the Raven King. It was almost too much for a mortal mind to bear, but only one scene held his attention, the Guardians huddled within their shield.

  Beaumont stepped forward, but the ground opened beneath him in a gaping maw. Only the rapidly expanding wings of the Raven King and the sharp pinch of claws on his shoulder prevented Beaumont from tumbling in. He turned, but madness stood in his path.

  “They retain too much of their stolen power to approach,” the Raven King warned. “They will not be so easily destroyed.”

  “They don’t have to be destroyed, merely controlled,” Beaumont answered. He closed his eyes for a moment focusing on the dark fragment within, drawing from the understanding of this place it provided. “Death is a part of me. I have nothing to fear from it,” he declared, stepping forward.

  “Take another step, and we shall destroy you,” the spirits raged as a wall of lashing tendrils arose in his path.

  “I must insist,” Beaumont replied. “You consumed my parents to gain your power over the new veil. That makes us family. I think it’s time for a reunion. There is one law in this world that the Ravenfells understand profoundly. It is the basis of our heritage. Blood commands spirits born of the same blood.”

  “We are gods!” the Guardians howled.

  “But your divinity was stolen from Ravenfells. And as a Ravenfell, I hold the power to command you.”

  Beaumont opened the dark void within him as he had with the spirit of the Mawgrithe. The Netherworld was forged with an insatiable hunger for spirits of the fallen, and the fragment within him was no different. It was why the Netherworld drew close to the living world in places where death grew strong. It fed upon them. It consumed their essence. Only the hunger within Beaumont was dictated by his own will, and he commanded it to consume everything that stood within his path.

  Chaos swirled in a maddened frenzy around him as the Guardians tried to halt his advance, but their tools were woven of spirit. The dark fragment within him absorbed it all, feeding on the power and channeling it to him. Black flames billowed in a growing inferno around him as the essence of death raged through his body. Still, the spirits resisted.

  Their shield shredded beneath his flames and devouring touch until only the seven Guardians that murdered his parents hovered before him.

  “We will never stop until the veil is destroyed,” they roared.

  “You have no choice. Come to me, spirits of blood. Enter my death, feed the might of the Ravenfells.”

  They howled and raged at the injustice, but the Guardians were bound by the laws of this world. Blood commanded blood. They could not refuse.

  As each spirit passed through Beaumont’s soul into the fragment of beyond, their stolen magic was devoured and reborn within him. In fitting retribution, he gave them the same fate they offered his parents and him. He consumed their souls to feed his ascension.

  Beaumont had returned home at last. By doing so, he had become more than a Ravenfell with the ability to cross the veil between worlds. He had taken control of one side and stood as lord of his domain. Beaumont Ravenfell had become the lord of death.

  Chapter 17:

  Lord and his Manor

  Returning to the world of the living was smoother than Beaumont’s journey into death. The Guardians’ layer of the veil was no longer there to resist him. Its essence now resided within the dark fragment of his soul or had been absorbed into the barrier now returned to the Raven King’s caretaking.

  Something new resisted his crossing in its stead, a desire to remain. The world of death, newly revealed to him, felt familiar and comfortable in a way the living realm never had. He had spent his entire life mastering power to remake the world into a place where magical beings like himself belonged, but only after crossing the veil had he achieved the potential to do so. With his gifts, the Netherworld could be whatever he willed it to be, and he was anxious to test the possibilities.

  Yet Beaumont was still a living being. Despite his wishes, he did not belong here. Part of the Netherworld’s purpose was to shield the dead from the pain of watching life go on without them. Remaining here while breath still escaped him would be cruel to those who sought peace, and it disrupted the balance between the sides in ways, even with his vast knowledge, he cou
ld not predict. There was something more, however, beyond the logical reasoning that called him back to that desolate hollow, the hope of creating something more for himself.

  Beaumont returned to a corpse-littered landscape, cluttered with the fallen remains of the Guardians’ army. To Beaumont’s relief, the Lady Katerina did not appear to be one of them. At least, he did not find her body where the Guardians had bound her as he dreaded. Of all the fears he had faced down, this was the most pressing that remained.

  A feverish grunt drew his attention from his search. One corpse still ambled about among the desolation. The cursed gravedigger was working feverishly to return the fallen to the earth. His frustration with the task ahead was evident, but compulsion drove him on.

  “We left quite a mess for him, didn’t we?” the Raven King commented. Despite retaking his throne and power over the veil, he chose to remain as a raven perched upon Beaumont’s shoulder. Though they never discussed it, Beaumont felt right with him there, and he suspected his feathered friend felt the same.

  “Perhaps I should offer him some assistance,” Beaumont suggested. “Creature. Do you have a name?” He wasn’t sure what he expected since the beast had remained nonverbal since they encountered him.

  “Even dead things deserve names,” the raven croaked.

  The corpse gave a grunt of acknowledgment in their direction but continued his task of interring the dead.

  “Then we shall merely call you Gravedigger. I suspect we will need your services for a while.” Beaumont glanced around at the field of carnage, assessing the monumental job before him. “But as has been made abundantly clear to me lately, some tasks require more than your work alone.”

  He attempted to reach out with his Overlord mastery but quickly discovered that his Well of Corruption was empty. Any other time in his life, the absence of such power would have left him anxious and hungering like withdrawal from a drug. The power of death, however, still permeated his entire being, pulsing through his veins from the dark fragment at his core.

  Unlike his corruption, this magic did not seem to dissipate over time but instead grew as it waited to be wielded. The implications of that were immeasurable, and his scholarly mind could not wait to test its possibilities. He already had his first experiment in mind.

  With a sip of demon blood, he recharged his well and summoned the fiery Dominators to him. They were astonishingly more subservient than usual, clearly cowed by the new powers he held and the feats he had wrought. They did not even hiss in angered submission as he gave them their new orders.

  “Assemble the more useful bodies to be awakened. There are graves to be dug and a manor to build,” Beaumont instructed them.

  “Do you really think the witchdoctors will raise them again?” the raven asked curiously. “Speaking of which, where are those two?”

  “I do not require their assistance anymore,” Beaumont answered.

  The knowledge gained from the other side guided him. He drew upon the magic within his dark heart and brought forth a small vortex of black flame within his hand. He seared the symbols of summoning into the ground with the roiling dark magic, designed from the Common Arts but bound with his newly discovered inborn talent. Within moments a cloud of spirits gathered within the chilling flames of the ring.

  “Place the corpses within to be awakened and begin work,” he commanded the Dominators.

  The demons quietly acquiesced, though, among their kind, they were commanders, not laborers. It was a testament to his new standing among the magical world.

  “Impressive,” the raven clucked. “Dorga created spirit wells in a similar fashion. Will you build your manor of flesh and bone as he did as well?” There was no malice in it. Beaumont had grown accustomed to the taunting nature of the raven and understood it was just part of who he was.

  “I grew up beneath the roots of the Ravenwood. My home has always been part of the land. It will be no different in this place. This manor will be part of the land and the death that permeates it. It will be a part of the living realm as much as it is part of the Netherworld, like me.”

  “At least there will be plenty of tasty well-aged morsels around.”

  They found the Mad Witchdoctors not long after. The two corpses had survived in a rather surprising manner. The spider queen’s webbing, coincidentally, was not only capable of ensnaring spirits but also keeping them out, and both corpses were completely cocooned by it. Their protective prison was so successful that it took the magic of Beaumont’s enchanted dagger to cut them free.

  The majestic spider queen, Araxxis, was not so fortunate. The Spirit Weaver explained how she was injured in the battle and had woven them into their armor in a final effort to protect them. She wasn’t gone yet, though it wouldn’t be long. Her consort Aranax had carried her away so that she might prepare the next generation to follow in her passing. Though the two crazed corpses often laughed uproariously at death, they seemed burdened by this outcome. Yet, they held hope for the new clutch to come.

  “I thought you were supposed to reweave the veil,” Beaumont inquired as they finished their chanted tale of the spider queen’s fall.

  “We did. Your tree tore it apart, and we rewove it,” the Spirit Weaver replied. “Do you not feel how it is tied to this place. The veil is bound to the Ravenwood, the Raven King, and the Ravenfell line. All of it is focused on this place between worlds. All of it controlled by a man who stands on both sides by right of his birth. A living being whose name resounds through the veil.”

  “Lord of Death,” the drummer chanted.

  “This place, bound in your blood, stands suspended between both worlds. A gateway that links and divides them. From here, you must watch and protect so that nothing like this ever happens again. You and the Raven King now stand between the world of the living and the forces of death. We trust that you will maintain order.”

  “But from the shadows, we will watch,” the drummer added.

  “To make certain you don’t slip up,” the weaver added with a rotting grin.

  “No shadows needed. You may remain here if you wish. Your magic would be appreciated in building this place.”

  “And the other?” the weaver inquired.

  “The lady awaits to discover her fate.”

  “The Lady of the Harvest as well,” Beaumont conceded. He offered a twisted smile to the corpses in parting. Then he left to find the one he had been searching for all along.

  Beaumont found her walking among the withered vines of her harvest, cracking open the Soul Gourds to collect the black seeds within. She showed each fruit reverence as she broke them and gently deposited the seeds in her bottle. She was a marvel of contradictions, cruel yet restrained, lethal yet caring. Those traits fascinated him, and for the first time in his life, he truly wished to know more about another living soul besides Hildegard.

  “I see you survived your trial,” she greeted with a smile. “I expected as much since I still draw breath.”

  “You as well. Last I saw, you were very close to the end,” he answered.

  “You were a fool. You should not have made such a sacrifice,” she scolded, though there was a softness to it.

  “I told you we made a bargain. What good would that deal be if you did not survive to see that your charges were safe? Besides, I had a plan.”

  “I suspect you have a plan for all of this as well?” she asked, gesturing to their surroundings. “I do not know the full extent to what you have done to this place, but it is different. It cannot be left for just anyone to stumble upon.”

  “I have a few. One of them involves you.”

  “And that would be?” she raised an eyebrow in menacing curiosity.

  “I promised you a safe place for your charges. But now I would like to offer you a place to live so that you can oversee them. I am building a manor here. Once built, I would like to offer you the hospitality of its halls. With my new powers, I can easily provide whatever you require. You are practically a Ravenfell
now, after all.”

  “She grew the Ravenwood,” the Raven King interjected. “A feat only managed by one of the first of the family. I suspect she has earned the honors if not the blood.”

  “I barely know you yet, Ravenfell,” she replied, then paused. “Though I hope to change that. I shall live among the forests of your manor for now. Nature will provide for my needs.”

  “What forests? Everything is dead here,” the raven exclaimed.

  “Which means there is an awful lot of potential for one to grow,” Katerina replied. “I must establish a place for my charges while you see to the construction of your new home. But we shall speak again soon.”

  As she turned and walked away, a bed of black raven-winged ivy sprouted beneath her feet in a path of twining darkness. Beaumont couldn’t help but watch her depart with a hint of regret.

  “What of these other plans?” the raven questioned as the witch left.

  “I wish to bind this place with enough magic to protect it from both sides of the veil forever. But I will not forget that we were driven here. There is a price that must be paid for that.”

  “So, you do intend to take up Dorga’s mantle?”

  “I intend to never allow the mortal realm to forget about their fear of the darkness and what lurks there. What we unleashed upon them has left a scar upon their memory, but I refuse to allow it to fade. In a year, when the balance thins the veil once more, I will summon Terror again. Beneath her wail, death will walk the living realm once more. The creatures who have fled here, if only for one night, shall return. We will not let them forget ever.”

  “So, your new home is also a catalyst for your revenge?” the raven mused. “Fitting. But shouldn’t such a place have a name to strike fear into the souls of man?”

  Beaumont looked up at the shining black leaves of the Ravenwood above. Its branches spread out over the land protectively. The souls of his lineage intertwined through branch and leaf.

  “Hildegard named the Ravenwood in honor of our family’s founding, and it now binds the spirits of our line to this land for eternity. There is only one name worthy of a place that bridges the worlds of life and death, I think. Ravenfell Manor.”