Swish… A cloak swept across the grass as heels sank into the soft, mossy ground. A breeze ran through strands of red, unkempt hair that was once kept in a neat braid. This breeze moved and danced around the top hat and cane of a gentleman once thought to be handsome and stately. Now he was growing as gray as the mist that swirled about his feet, and his countenance was somber, and distinctly sullen. The light of a dim lamp caused the eyes of another woman to glow like burning coal in a smoldering fire.

The light shone on the tombstones that surrounded the three figures. Names of the long dead glowed in the hellish gloom. The living souls in that graveyard knew that more than one deceased who were laid to rest there deserved to be in the place from which the light on their graves was derived. Their ancient presence made itself known to the group through the damp smell of rotting wood and flesh, and the all-too-familiar feeling that they were being watched.

Another swish and the man holding the lamp stopped in front of a tombstone. He stooped down and held the lamp high, so as to read the name engraved there. The aura he felt from the tomb wasn’t strong, so he doubted that the body buried there was the one he was looking for.

“’Elgien Sommerson’; nope, not right… I felt the aura, but it was obviously just another curchiel; a trickster spirit, playing with my senses,” the man said.

“Soldon, you stupid boy!” hissed the red-haired woman. “I’ve told you a million times not to let those foolish ghosts mislead you! You have the power to see through their tricks, for God’s sake, use it!”

“Ah, but my dear sister, have you forgotten that we are certainly not here for the sake of God; quite the opposite; and the actions we are about to perform aren’t so holy, either,” said Soldon. The woman with the ember-like eyes snickered slightly, almost maniacally. She then burst out into a fit of hysterical, insane laughter. The other two weren’t surprised; she did this often, and they would rather not think or discuss their family’s tradition of insanity, for they feared that they might one day suffer the same fate.

“Calm yourself Murciela,” Soldon whispered gently, touching her arm. “You don’t want to wake the whole city, do you?” At this, he turned his gaze to the bottom of the elevation they all were standing on, where the city’s lights twinkled and winked at him. They reminded him of the way Murciela’s eyes used to sparkle when she was happy. Though she was his cousin, she felt more like a sister to him than Priscilla ever had. They had always played and been best friends growing up, while his much older sister secluded herself and read books on necromancy and spirits. (Needless to say, members of the Cartika family were experts in the knowledge and ways of the dead, rather than the living.) Soldon and Murciela looked out for one another, took care of each other. Then Soldon’s father forced him to go to boarding school for three years. The parting was somber-laden, but they promised to write one another at least three times a week. They were faithful to that promise for over a year, but then the letters from Murciela lessened, and eventually stopped coming all together.

Her last letters were disoriented; Soldon could not even decipher her thought patter sometimes. Her final letter was disturbing. Soldon remembered tearing through the seal that bore their dark family crest; a raven entwined by two serpents. He read the content; horrified.

Dearest cousin,

I will not be so bold as to say that I am doing well, for that would be a lie. I live in constant fear, day after day, never knowing who will show up at my doorstep, asking for me. The fact is, cousin, that it won’t be much longer now. I will fall to the ones I fear and will be a changed woman. They simply will not leave me be; I am lonely here without you, but these things are not the company I have been longing for. Before the end comes, I want to warn you; never let go of who you are, no matter what they do to you. Guard your spirit, heart, and soul with your life, and never let anyone take that from you. I know you don’t understand, nor is it safe for me to tell you of what matters I speak, but here is something that I hope will help you save our family:

“To find the voice within thine head,

Look to the homes of those long dead,

To find the voice inside thine heart,

Look to one of whom thou art part,

To bring back one whom darkness bore,

To those unexpected thou must implore,

Thou may feel doomed, but thou art blest,

The key lies within the crest.”

That is all I can do for you now. Let these ancient words guide you into the unblemished light that has been taken from our family. I am fading fast, dear cousin, and I’m not sure if I’ll ever come back. Before I go, I want to let you know that you are my brother, no matter what the limbs of our family tree have to say. Until we meet again…Soldon…

Love always,

Murciela

Soldon was upset and shocked that the last thing his dear cousin had to say to him was a riddle. But he trusted Murciela, and was very concerned about her, so after receiving the letter, he returned home, only to find his loved one in the state she was now; undeniably mad and a hazard to herself. Her mother and father wanted to put her in an institution, but Soldon wouldn’t hear of it. He took her in and cared for her. Soldon drifted into debt and poverty as he paid vast sums of money to doctors and psychiatrists, who ran tests to try to discover what the matter with her was. He tried everything to bring her back, but to no avail. She was gone; lost somewhere in a world that only she could reach.

Then there was the riddle; what did it mean? Soldon had deciphered some of the mystery, which is why he was now in a cemetery hunting for a dead body. He had assumed that the voice inside his head that the poem had referred to were the auras and spirits that often invaded the privacy of his own thoughts. He also assumed the “homes of those long dead” meant that he was to look in a graveyard or tomb of some kind. The next line had confused him for a period of time: “To find the voice inside thine heart...” he wasn’t quite sure what to make of that line, but he knew that the next two lines; “Look to one of whom thou art part,” and “To bring back one whom darkness bore,” referred to Murciela. Soldon had always felt that he and Murciela could be of one mind, as close as they were. Their auras were very much the same; not just by blood, but by choice and personality.

Solving the rest of the riddle required a lot of research, and Soldon didn’t even know where to begin. He knew that his mother and father owned a humongous library with all of the family archives, history, and magical reference books and that it would take him a lifetime to go through them all. Luckily for him, they arranged them into subject order, and they even put the history books into chronological order. He didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, but this bit of organization would help him at least a little. He asked his grandfather (one of the few in his family that stayed sane over the years) if there were any enemies who would do something awful to their family, but he couldn’t recall any. Soldon thought that if there were some enemies, he would have a suspect, and maybe even a motive to go on.

His grandfather did, however, tell him about their family crest. The raven was said to be the creature who took the souls of the dead into the afterlife. As their family had always been heavily involved with necromancy, the raven was common place and very symbolic to them. The serpents that entwine the raven were to symbolize a great evil that fell over their family long ago. Soldon knew this was what he was looking for. This evil that plagued his family was the answer, but what it was exactly was a mystery to him. All he knew was that if he found the curse, he’d find the cure as well, or at least it would give him something to go on.

Soldon headed to the library of his parent’s home in search of a book that would help him find the answers he was looking for. As he ran through the dusty tomes, he fantasized about finding the cure… how much better his family and his life would be. No longer would they have to fight the bonds of insanity. No longer would they have to be cared for out of sympathy by others. They would be free. They would take care of themselves and never think twice about it.

The title of a book caught his attention as he daydreamed: “The Watchful Raven: A Chronology and Little Known Facts of the Cartika Family.” It seemed to have been written by a man by the name of Watren Cartika, a name that sounded slightly familiar to Soldon. He picked it off of the shelf and ran his hands over the gold lettering of the title on the leather book cover. There were a few stains on it that horribly resembled blood. Uneasy though he was, Soldon opened the book and searched through it for any sign of a story about the curse or the family crest. Skimming through the chapters, he came across a page entitled “The Symbolism of the Family Crest.” His heart thumped wildly in his chest as he read on.

“The Cartika family crest is extremely unique and symbolic to the group. As they are nearly all experts in the art of necromancy, the raven, said to be the bearer of souls into the afterlife, is depicted. Also present are two serpents that are entwined around the raven. This unfortunately symbolizes the curse that was placed upon the Cartikas in 1495 by Sir Ivan Cartika. After tragically losing his wife to illness, he withdrew into his home and never came out. He secluded himself and never had visitors or even postmen at his door. In his isolation, he began to go mad, but unlike many, he realized what was happening to him. He knew he couldn’t stop the progression of insanity, and in his bitter loneliness, he set a curse upon the name of Cartika. The raven, which is accompanied by spirits on his journeys to and from the afterlife, would no longer take the souls of the dead, but the sanity of the living. Ivan believed that if he had suffered from his own madness, then his kin would as well. After casting the spell and creating a counter curse (which he hid), his guilt took over and he killed himself, leaving a note to explain what had happened. They buried him in Rosewood Cemetery and his family never took the curse seriously.”

As Soldon finished reading the passage, the tingling sensation of a spirit’s aura crept into his head and chest. The book began to glow as he held it in his large hands. It burned into his skin, and so he dropped it on the floor. A dark mist began to seethe from the binding of the book and make its way around Soldon’s arms and legs, holding him in place. This was the work of a spirit, and a clever one at that. An undefined figure began to take shape in the mist as Soldon looked on, horrified. An unearthly sound filled his ears as the figure began to speak.

“Sssseeeeeekkkkkk tttthhhheeee aaaauuuuutttthhhoooorrr, aaaannnndddd yyyyyeeeee shhhhhaaaaallllll fiiiinnnnnddddd aaaaaaaannnnnnnn aaaaannnnssssswwwweeeerrrrr!!” hissed the voice.

“Who are you!?” cried Soldon as he struggled to free himself from the misty bonds. But the figure did not answer him. The mist began to dissipate and Soldon broke free from the mist, but tried to catch it, as if he could make the spirit explain itself. The mist disappeared and he was left shocked and full of questions to which he had no answers. The only thing to do was to follow the book, seeing as how Soldon never trusted a spirit, no matter who it was or what they said. He decided that that night, after he had rounded up Murciela for comfort, and his sister for better protection, he would go to Rosewood Cemetery and find Ivan Cartika’s grave.

And so, here he was. Standing there, thinking back on it all, he realized that Murciela had come to stand beside him, her head leaning on his shoulder. He put his arm around her comfortingly when Priscilla said “Soldon, you idiot, hurry up! Don’t just stand there, find the grave so we can do what needs to be done and go home!” He released her from his embrace and set of in the direction he felt the aura from. It was very strong now.

He once again looked at the name on another grave, and sure enough, it read “Ivan Cartika: 1445-1495” It was moss-covered and crumbling like all the other headstones. Soldon placed his hand on top of it and tried to push himself onto his feet, but as he did so, the chunk of the stone he was leaning on fell back, revealing an alcove in the stone in which sat a candle. There was a small mirror, along with an inscription on the bottom of the fragment of stone that had fallen back. The inscription read; “If ye have the light, then ye have the sight.”

Soldon pondered a moment on the meaning of the rhyme. As his eyes fell upon the candle, he realized that he must light it for something to happen. He hastily took off the casing around the flame in his lamp and held the flame to the candle. After a moment had passed, the candle lit, and the mirror cast a reflection of the light in a beam onto another tombstone. The name read “Watren Cartika.” Soldon could not believe his eyes. He motioned for silence, as his sister had begun to ask him what the matter was. He walked slowly towards the headstone, cautious as to what it could be. The aura he sensed from it was so powerful, he could practically see it.

He crouched down to examine the stone more closely. Suddenly, the letters engraved there began to glow with an eerie red brilliance that Soldon had never seen before. The earth beneath him began to tremble and quake, and as Soldon stepped away from the tomb, there was a great upheaval and he suddenly found the coffin of Watren Cartika above ground.

“No!” he cried as his sister began to perform a barrier spell around the three of them. Murciela stood there, half in laughter, half in fear. “Let me go, and put the barrier around Murciela and yourself. Keep her safe, Priscilla.”

“Fine, now if you’re going, go, so I can put the spell up. I don’t want to be in the middle of all this,” Priscilla said icily.

“You already are,” replied Soldon. He had never expected that he would have had to ask his sister for help, but in any case, he was glad she was there.

He cautiously walked towards the grave, paying extra attention to any spirits or other auras that crept up into his mind. As he stood looking at the coffin, he noticed that the family crest had been deeply engraved into the lid. He went to run his fingers over it, but as he did so, a beam of the same ruby light shot up from the engraving and created a circle in the air, like a picture frame or mirror. Then a trickle blood began to wind itself around the beam of light, making it glow even brighter.

A face formed in the illuminated circle and Soldon had the feeling that this was Watren Caritka. He looked down upon the young man and said, “Wonderful work, Soldon, I knew you would be the one to break the curse. But your journey isn’t over just yet. There is one more thing you must do. To discover what that is, here is the rest of that poem that your dear cousin sent you.” The spirit was unusually kind, but Soldon put aside his suspicions as he read the rest of the poem.

The blood of one mad

And the blood of one whole

Together only these

Can break the curse’s contol.

Hidden in the tomb,

You’ll find the device,

Take thou hand and hers,

And give them both a slice.

The second symbol

Will replace one’s sin

In it’s venom you’ll find

The cure for your kin

-Ivan Cartika

The circle of light dimmed away, but the crest still glowed. Soldon opened the lid and almost gagged at the smell. But there it was, a dagger with a marble handle, and of course, the family crest was on the handle. He pried it from the corpse’s hand and walked over to the aural barrier the surround Murciela and Priscilla. He motioned for his sister to release the barrier. He then took Murciela’s hand and led her to the coffin.

“This will only sting a little, dear,” he said gently as Murciela shied away from the dagger. She then opened her hand slowly and Soldon made a cut, just enough to make it bleed. She shrieked, but then fell silent. Soldon did the same to his hand, the crest all the while glowing brighter and more brilliantly. Soldon walked around to the other side of the coffin and instinctively grabbed Murciela’s sliced hand across the lid. A red mist engulfed their hand as two serpents slithered straight out of the crest. The serpents entwined themselves around their arms and suddenly dug their fangs into the crooks of their elbows. Soldon could feel the venom of the beast making its way through his veins, but he knew from the poem that this was the only thing that could save his family…The only thing that could save Murciela.

He looked over at his cousin through the mist and the wind that now blew fiercely around them. She was crying, practically sobbing. She tilted her blond head back and wailed and screamed at the top of her lungs in agony. Soldon saw something black protruding from her mouth.

First there came a beak, then a head, eyes glowing red. A raven was coming out of her mouth! It pushed its way out and disappeared as it began to fly away. Murciela collapsed as the mist surrounding them dissipated. Soldon ran to her side and held her in his arms, trying to make her wake up. Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked at her surroundings.

“Cousin Soldon?” she inquired softly… This was the first time she had spoken coherently since Soldon had taken her into his home.

“Yes, Murciela, my dearest friend… I am here.”