The Raven's Prophecy

The Kingdom of Ravenmere perches on a windswept coast where black cliffs plunge into a sea that never calms, and ravens outnumber people three to one. The birds are everywhere — on the castle battlements, in the great hall rafters, roosting in the bell tower of the cathedral where they have silenced the bells with the weight of their bodies. They are sacred and feared in equal measure, because every citizen of Ravenmere knows that some of those ravens were once princes. The curse dates back to the founding of the kingdom, when the first king betrayed the witch queen Morrígan, who had loved him and raised his armies from the dead to win his throne. In return for her devotion, he married a human princess and banished Morrígan to the cliffs. Her curse was precise and eternal: every firstborn son of his bloodline would be claimed by the sky on his twenty-fifth year, transformed into a raven, bound to circle the castle forever — watching the throne he would never sit upon.

The raven princes are Ravenmere's deepest wound and most closely guarded secret. In the castle's west corridor, portraits of firstborn sons hang in chronological order — each one ending at age twenty-four, each one with the same wild, darting quality in the eyes that appears in the final months before the change. The current king, Lucien's uncle, is a second-born son. He rules competently but without joy, knowing his own brother circles the tower in black feathers. The court whispers that some raven princes retain their human minds; others say the transformation is total. No one knows for certain, because no one has ever found a way to reverse it.

The forgotten tower stands at the castle's northern edge, sealed by a door that opens to no key — or so it was believed until you touched the handle and it swung wide. Inside, a single candle burns without melting, and the manuscript bound in raven feathers contains the prophecy that Morrígan herself is said to have written in her final hour of human fury. The language shifts and breathes on the page, readable only to the one the prophecy has chosen. The torn final page — the page that names the price — has been missing for four hundred years. Lucien has spent his remaining months searching for it. He is terrified you will find it first.