Ravens love riddles—you may already know this if you have read the first Gabriel Finley adventure and want to jump ahead to the next chapter. But if you didn’t know this, you may be surprised, perhaps even astonished, by what I am about to tell you.
Ravens, you see, greet each other with riddles, just as you might shake the hand of a stranger. One raven will bow to another and say something like this:
“What will make you smart with just a tap?”
And the other raven might reply, “A pin, because a pinprick really smarts!”
Both will utter a raspy chuckle and they will become fast friends.
Long ago, these clever, mischievous birds were our most loyal companions. If a human answered a raven’s riddle, he or she might become that raven’s amicus—which means “friend,” but something more as well. They could communicate without speaking, simply by telepathy, as well as paravolate, which means to merge together and fly, as one, above the trees and rooftops. Which of course was the most remarkable thing of all.
In those wondrous days, a raven watched out for you if you were his amicus. He warned you when a thunderstorm was coming, cheered you up when you were sad by telling jokes, and brought you medicine if you were sick or wounded in battle. Even better, if you were in trouble, your raven could rescue you, and take you aloft, far from harm.
Meeting a raven was thrilling, for if that raven asked you a riddle, it guaranteed many extraordinary adventures for the rest of your life.
But unfortunately, something very tragic changed all this.
During some foolish and misbegotten war, there was a battle between armies on a barren moor. Ironclad knights clashed for days while their foot soldiers fought with pikes and sticks. Nobody won, and those who survived fled, leaving the dead or badly injured behind. These wounded soldiers lay near death, attended only by their loyal ravens.
Just before dawn, a phantom bird flew down and alighted on a bare tree to survey the misery. At first glance, the bird resembled a raven because of its black satin feathers (although they were unusually tattered and thin). It had black talons (but they were jagged and gnarled from age). Its eyes were the most unsettling feature—they showed no joy, no kindness, no laughter, just a sickly, menacing yellow glow.
One raven, named Concord, was tending to a fallen knight who was too sick to paravolate. All Concord could do was offer words of hope.
“Master, you must hold on to life,” he whispered. “When the sun rises, its warmth will make you strong again!”
“Your human will not live to see the sun,” interjected the phantom bird. “He will die, and then you will be friendless and lonely. But if you act now, you may gain something better than life itself.”
Concord was puzzled. “What could that be?”
“Immortality!” replied the phantom. “Never to be sad or fearful of death again.”
“Is it really possible?” Concord asked, for he saw death’s hand all over the battlefield.
“Yes, you can cheat death. It’s quite easy.”
The phantom directed Concord to take one bite of his master’s flesh. “After all,” the creature said, “he’s going to die anyway.”
Trembling, Concord took a small peck from his master’s wound. As he swallowed it, the last glimmer of life left his master’s eyes and Concord realized he had done a terrible thing. But it was too late. His amicus had died, and some new transformation was happening.
The raven’s heart beat faster and faster until the beats became one big roar. And then, inexplicably, it stopped. Just like that. No beat, no pulse—and yet Concord knew he was not dead.
An icy chill crept into his veins. He felt strangely untethered and weightless and noticed a gap in his chest where his heart had been. The sun, a faint orange glow on the horizon, seemed to shoot across the sky as if time itself had released him from all restraints.
What has happened to me? he wondered.
“You are free—the minutes, hours, days have lost their grip on you,” said the phantom bird. “You are immortal!”
In the weeks that followed, Concord watched the phantom recruit more ravens from the battlefields. The odd gap in his chest began to ache terribly. He realized he had made a devil’s bargain—in exchange for immortality he felt an endless hunger, a joyless spirit, and great loneliness. All living creatures seemed to fear him because of an eerie yellow glow in his eyes.
When the humans began to notice these valravens—for that is what Concord and others who had eaten their masters’ flesh were called—and the corpses of their amici, they became superstitious and fearful of any black bird. Waving swords and sticks, they drove all ravens away. Soon no raven dared approach a human lest he be attacked or caged. The phantom bird had divided ravens from their most trusted friends.
That would have been the end of my story, but for this:
Once in a while, a raven still did pose a riddle to a child. Perhaps, just as we humans wish for good times, ravens do too. In these rare cases, a raven might strike up a friendship that lasts a lifetime. The first Gabriel Finley book described exactly that: the extraordinary adventures of one boy and a raven.
But what if a raven chooses the worst possible child?
A generation before Gabriel was born, there was another boy, named Corax Finley.
Corax was mean, with a smirk on his lips and dark, unruly hair that swept across his forehead. He was cruel to cats and dogs, and not much nicer to people. He lived in a neighborhood of Brooklyn on a tree-lined block full of tall brownstone houses with flickering gaslights.
Corax was walking home from school one day when a voice in his head interrupted his thoughts.
I have no will, no heart, no soul.
I’m flat and smooth and stiff in back.
All who see me stop and stare,
And if they smile, I’ll smile right back.
What am I?
Corax didn’t know any riddles. In fact, he hated riddles. They were annoying and stupid and a waste of time. He was about to ignore the voice when he noticed a raven watching him. Perched on a fence, it had a deep, intelligent stare. It bowed to him and seemed to be waiting eagerly for his answer.
Corax struggled to think of one. Finally, he said, “Is it a clown?”
The bird shook its head.
Wrong. Try again tomorrow!
The bird flew away. Fascinated, Corax stared after it. How had its voice entered his thoughts? And what would happen if he answered its riddle correctly? He decided to be ready for its return.
Corax knew a girl who was quite good at riddles. She was a friend of his sister; he had always ignored her, but now he realized she might be useful to him.
“My friend Trudy likes you,” his sister Jasmine once told him. “She would do anything for you.”
When he found the girls at home that afternoon, Corax softened his voice and looked into Trudy’s bright sapphire eyes.
“Hey there,” he said. “I have a riddle for you…,” and he repeated the words he’d heard.
Trudy seemed delighted to have Corax’s attention.
“Hmm…no will, no heart, no soul,” she replied. “It sounds like something that’s not alive. Flat and smooth and stiff, something that people stop and stare at, like a picture, or a TV screen, or a…” She suddenly became excited. “Wait! People stop and stare at a mirror! And if they smile, the reflection smiles back. Could it be a mirror?”
“Very good!” said Corax, as if he’d known the answer all along, and he bounded upstairs.
“I have a feeling he just used you to find out the answer,” Jasmine said.
“Oh, I don’t mind,” Trudy replied.
Even the cruelest or most careless people can have a strange power over others. This was true of Corax. Trudy would have answered many more riddles for him.
After school the next day Corax found the raven at the very same spot.
“I have the answer,” he said. “It’s a mirror.”
The raven bowed. Correct, he said, again without speaking. My name is Silverwing. Will you be my amicus?
“What’s that?” asked Corax.
The loyal friend of a raven. It is an ancient tradition. A raven and his amicus may talk telepathically, and paravolate, or fly as one, the raven explained.
So I can just think what I want to say to you and you’ll hear it—like this? asked Corax in his head.
Exactly.
But Corax was even more excited about the possibility of flying. Show me how we paravolate, he said.
Pay attention, said Silverwing. Raise your arms and take enormous breaths until every particle in your body seems to tingle. Then jump!
Corax did as he was instructed. For a brief instant he was terrified. He felt crushed and cramped as he merged with the raven’s muscles and bones, and heard the deafening beat of Silverwing’s heart (much faster than any human heartbeat). Then this cramped feeling passed and Corax saw that he had a new body—satin wings, a handsome black beak, and slender talons.
Now that the two souls were one, they took off, soaring above the fences, the oak trees, the rooftops, and chimneys until they were circling the borough of Brooklyn with its perfectly arrayed streets and chockablock houses. They swooped over the glittering East River, the Brooklyn Bridge, the ships moored in the bay, the blinking lights of the Verrazano Bridge and the Coney Island Wonder Wheel.
By the time Corax got home that evening he was giddy thinking about all the things—out of reach to normal people—that now lay within his grasp.
The very next afternoon, he and Silverwing landed on the sill of an open window of a tall building. They entered, and after poking around, stole a ring with a bright sapphire stone.
Once Corax started stealing, he couldn’t stop. They entered open windows all over the city and took anything that shone, sparkled, or gleamed.
Corax gathered the spoils from these flights on the shelves of his bedroom. He had jars of medals, jars of gold rings, jars of garnets, amethysts, and rubies, necklaces and bracelets. There were boxes of earrings, velvet bags of coins and wristwatches. He had so much fun stealing that he stayed out later and later each evening.
One night, after Silverwing had returned Corax to his bedroom and the boy sprang back into his own body, he noticed a silhouette standing in the doorway.
“So,” said Dr. Ulysses Finley. “You answered a raven’s riddle?”
Corax was startled by his father’s question. “How did you know?”
“You are not the only one in this family who has been a raven’s amicus,” the doctor answered.
At that moment, a large raven landed on Dr. Finley’s shoulder. Flexing its wings, it directed a stern gaze toward the jars on Corax’s shelves.
“When I was your age I answered a raven’s riddle, too,” said Dr. Finley. “This is Humboldt.” Both the raven and Dr. Finley frowned at Corax. “But you, my boy, are the first to use your new powers to steal. I’m deeply disappointed, and I forbid you to use this gift for such mischief.”
After school the next day, Corax found that his father had removed all the jars and boxes. Immediately, he threw open his window, summoned Silverwing, and took off over the rooftops.
In the days that followed, Corax swooped down and stole from fruit stalls, newsstands, and candy stores. He flew over people, using his human voice to scare them. Each day his mischief grew worse until, one evening, he taunted a boy so badly that the terrified child ran into the path of a passing bus.
Realizing, for once, that he had done something terrible, Corax hurried home. He separated from Silverwing, entered by the front door, and went upstairs to his room.
There he found his father driving nails into his window frame.
“What’s going on?” Corax asked.
“You will never fly again,” his father said.
“But I didn’t do anything!”
Dr. Finley gazed with disappointment at his son. “Humboldt has just informed me that a boy has been killed because of your cruelty. I should take you to the police, but I’d have to explain that my son had merged with a raven….” Corax’s father winced. “Instead I must punish you myself. Humboldt will take Silverwing away tomorrow.”
“No!” cried Corax. “He can’t!”
His father regarded him sadly. “He can and he will.”
That night, Corax moaned and wailed in his bed. His cries were pitiful at first, then furious, then frightening. Finally, there was quiet, and the Finleys believed the worst was over.
But a crash of shattering glass and splintered wood woke the family. Corax’s parents hurried upstairs to find the room empty. The boy and the bird were gone.
Dr. Finley turned sadly to his wife. “I believe Corax has fled with his amicus. We may never see him again.”
Although Dr. Finley’s prediction was correct, Jasmine did glimpse her brother at unexpected moments over the years—in a crowd or watching her walk with friends down the street. Over time, it became obvious that he only appeared when she was with Trudy. She guessed that he had not forgotten that Trudy helped him solve that riddle, and might help him again.
Ten years later, another Finley child answered the riddle of a raven. The child was Adam, Corax and Jasmine’s little brother. From his raven, Baldasarre, he found out exactly what had happened to Corax.
He killed his companion, Silverwing, the bird explained. Then he ate the bird’s flesh and was transformed into a hideous creature, half human, half raven. Now your brother rules over all valravens and countless other birds, in a domain called Aviopolis—a city built of marble and gemstone inside a vast underground cavern. It was constructed a thousand years ago by an army of warrior dwarfs. A towering citadel stands in its center, and Corax commands his valravens from its battlements.
“Where is this place?” asked Adam.
Deep below us, but I warn you…Corax has his eye on the world above. He seeks to rule it.
“How could one person do that?” asked Adam doubtfully.
Ravens and valravens have fought for centuries over a magic necklace called a torc—a silver semicircle with a raven’s head carved on both ends. Forged with black magic, it grants the wearer any wish. But every wish is bestowed with a horribly malicious twist, and most come to regret their wishes. It is pure evil. Corax sent his valravens across the world to find it.
“I don’t understand why anyone would want it,” Adam replied.
For its power, said Baldasarre. If you thrive on tragedy and misfortune, the torc will serve you well. But no decent person would want it. Ravens have tried to keep it far from reach. In Corax’s clutches, it would be like putting a spark to a keg of gunpowder; the torc will seek to flourish, and imperil a million souls.
“Then my brother must never find it,” Adam decided.
In time, Adam went to college and studied myths of all kinds. He found evidence of the torc in several ancient manuscripts that confirmed its amazing power.
Adam’s university sent him to Iceland to continue his studies. He met his wife, Tabitha, there. Shortly after their son, Gabriel, was born, he learned of the tomb of a king buried with a mysterious wishing necklace.
Could this be the wicked torc, forged in black magic? Adam wondered.
He hiked into the northern caverns to find the tomb, but fell into a crevasse and gashed his leg. Limping and weary, he stumbled on until he arrived at a chamber filled with an ancient king’s possessions. A warning was written on the walls:
Forged a thousand years ago, conceived with wicked glee,
Be wary, stranger, of the curse this torc bestows on thee.
Take heed, take care, and look out! We caution every host,
For it will boldly steal from you what you may cherish most!
But there was no necklace to be found, so Adam took the plainest-looking stick from the chamber to help him hobble back.
As he made his slow return through the caves, his flashlight battery died, and he became lost in the darkness. “I wish I could get home,” Adam whispered to himself.
Suddenly, his leg stopped hurting, his flashlight lit up, and the difficult hike became much easier.
That plain, ordinary stick, you see, had the notorious torc wrapped around one end, concealed by centuries of dust and grime. The torc had granted Adam’s wish…with one dreadful catch.
For when Adam arrived home, his baby, Gabriel, was in his crib and a hot meal waited on the table—but his wife, Tabitha, was nowhere to be seen. She had vanished the moment he walked through the door.
The words on the tomb wall had warned him to no avail: For it will boldly steal from you what you may cherish most!
Brokenhearted, Adam gave the evil torc to his amicus, Baldasarre, and asked him to hide it, then went back to his old home in Brooklyn with his baby son.
When Corax was advised by a valraven that his brother had found the torc, he returned to the Finley house to claim it.
Adam had been an infant when Corax fled as a boy, so when the two men faced each other, they were startled to see the same dark eyes and curly hair in the other. The resemblance was so striking that it might have brought them to smile and embrace if Corax had not suddenly thrust out his hand. “Give me the torc,” he demanded.
“What? I don’t even know where it is,” Adam explained. “My raven, Baldasarre, has hidden it so skillfully that only my son—your nephew—Gabriel, will be able to find it. If you try to harm him before that time, the torc will be lost forever.”
Corax was furious. “Then you’ll be my hostage until the boy is old enough to come looking for you!”
And so he took his brother to Aviopolis, in effect leaving Gabriel an orphan, to be raised by his aunt Jasmine.
The hero of our first story (and of this one, too), Gabriel Finley, had a passion for riddles. When he turned twelve, he answered the riddle of a raven named Paladin, became his amicus, and went on a dangerous but successful quest for the torc, just as his father had predicted.
With the torc and its staff in hand, Gabriel, Paladin, and several of Gabriel’s best friends ventured to Aviopolis to bargain for his father’s release. In a dangerous duel of riddles, Gabriel defeated Corax, but Corax seized the torc and made one devastating wish: for the torc’s enormous power to enter him.
The wish backfired. Uttering agonized cries, Corax’s soul was ripped from his body, which vanished in a flash. His formless presence hovered, bewildered and enraged, over the scene of his defeat.
From overhead, Corax’s lieutenant, a robin named Snitcher, fluttered down and seized the necklace. With the torc wrapped around his neck, the dim-witted bird fled the collapsing city of Aviopolis.
Gabriel and Paladin pursued the robin, but they lost track of him. Dodging the shattering rocks and tumbling rubble, they emerged into the cool night air of Brooklyn just as the entrance caved in on itself.
It appeared that Aviopolis was sealed for good and their troubles were over. Gabriel had rescued his father and they had safely escaped with Gabriel’s friends. But his victory over Corax was tainted by one regret: he had lost the torc.
Up above the twinkling lights of Brooklyn, the gleeful robin savored his stolen prize—until his happy mood was interrupted by a voice in his head.
Ah, my little lieutenant, it is good that we are together.
“Who spoke?” sputtered the robin.
It is me, Corax, your lord and master. It appears that the necklace you’re wearing contains my soul.
“What?” said the worried bird. “Where is the rest of you?”
I wish I knew, but you shall remain my servant until the day I find it.