Raven

Chapter One - Beginnings

Five years ago

I have been called a lot of nasty names in my life, most of which I'd rather not repeat right now. I have even called a few people insulting names myself. Okay, yes, a lot of people, but they started it, and the point is valid.

But I had never been referred to as an omen. It was weird the first time it happened, especially since it was originally my father who said it, five years ago, and I don't think it was meant as an insult. How right he had been though, as if that was a caution of the future ...

I was nine.

I had just finished my first course of weapons training, and had been sharpening my skills (no pun intended) in mastering swordplay. The reason I came to be playing with sharp objects was because my father (a big important millionaire of this generation named Anthony Stone) insisted that my younger sister Rhea and I learn to defend ourselves, especially after the events of one night back when I was younger. This was in all forms of combat; hand to hand, swords, guns, words, pretty much anything we could think of; skills that would sharpen our wit and ability to be resourceful. This was because, when I was six and Rhea four, our mother, and Rhea's twin brother, were killed by ... something. Dad claimed not to know the cause, which made me suspicious, but I played the good little girl because I accepted that I couldn't help my dead mum by nagging dad for information. But, of course, the question was always at the back of my head. The question was why.

I was set against Storm as per the usual routine, Storm being my instructor who was supposedly pretty handy with any sort of blade. Axes, swords, knives; name one and she probably knew how to use it. She was a short, wiry woman with incredible reflexes and a perpetual smile on her olive-skinned face. She had also once shown me how to make a satisfactory blade in our private lessons out of a piece of scrap metal. I had such an innocent childhood ... only not. I had harboured a strange feeling she had been going easy on me today, because after the first two attempts I disarmed her easily. Raising her eyebrow, Storm picked her blade back up, and gestured that she was ready again.

Our blades clashed together, metal on metal ringing around the hall as we fought. Strike and parry, the exchange took a few seconds as we tested each other's commitment to the match. We were entrenched in this encounter, no backing out unless we surrendered. That wasn't unusual either.

Eventually, I was the one who moved back first, which put me at a disadvantage. Storm would be able to sneak inside my defences if she was committed like I; but apparently she was distracted. For her, that was practically unheard of, and she looked unnaturally pale. I was able to get my breath back and move into another lunge as she watched me in a sort of daze, all of this happening within a minute. I didn't understand it, actually; why a nine-year-old girl was somehow beating a seasoned warrior.

Maybe I was on a roll, having passed my exam with flying colours earlier, or maybe she was just going easy on this one occasion. But, for the first time in my training, I was beating Storm.

She had often joked that she was exactly like her namesake, and was as fast and as deadly as one of the terrible cyclones that swept the north of Australia occasionally. Or, if it was preferred, more like the super cells that showed up once in a decade or however far between they were.

It was really a shame that I had never been able to see her against a real enemy.

Because that was when I knocked my mentor over with the flat of my slender blade (something was horribly wrong with this picture, but I didn't know exactly what). With a faint but excited smile on my face, I gently touched the point of my sharpened sword to her chest, waiting for her joking surrender before she would get back up and resume the spar.

But that wouldn't happen today. Or ever again. Returning my smile briefly, Storm spoke, but seemed to think over each word before she said it out loud.

"I have one more lesson for you, Estella. One that will be crucial for you, if you are to become one of your father's guards like we trained for." There was a resigned look in her eyes that I didn't recognise, one that I would not see nor remember for a very long time. It wasn't until five years later that I would realise the full extent of the contract that working for my father entailed. 'Til death.

Excited, I replied, "Okay, what is it?"

"How to watch someone you love die."

At that, she closed her fingers around the blade and plunged it downwards into her own chest. Blood went everywhere, and I jumped back in fright, letting the hilt go and slipping to the ground as I screamed. No, not again. I had seen mum when I was six, I did not need this.

"Dad!" I screeched in a voice that was shrill even for a nine year old, looking down at my hands which were covered in my mentor's blood. They trembled, just as the rest of me did.

Within minutes, the six-foot-three form of my father ran into the room, but stopped short. Rhea was peeking around his trousers, dark hazel eyes wide.

"Storm ..." His voice cracked with emotion as he stared at the limp form of the dead woman. "Rhea, go back upstairs, now. Go get something to eat or something, and make me some coffee, please. Estella ... what happened here?" There was an undeniable note of command to his voice, and dad was scary when angry. He had very tanned skin, dark grey eyes which both Rhea and I had inherited to some extent, and jet-black hair which my sister also took on. I resembled my mother more, with caramel hair and fair skin, but I liked to think of my eyes as more blue than grey.

There was pure horror on my dad's face, and later I realised that he might have been falling in love with Storm. Which, considering how neither Rhea nor I could let my mother go yet, was a truly scary thought.

I did the obvious thing that someone of nine years old would do if they understood death like I did; burst into tears. I covered my face with my hands, sobbing quietly for a few minutes, before I felt my father's hand on my right shoulder. Oh yeah, there was blood on my face now. Just what I needed.

Looking up, I saw his strained expression. "Estella Rose," he said quietly, and I sniffled at the use of my middle name, "go to your room, please." That same tone was in his voice, as if he expected to be obeyed, and I did just that. I stood up, trembling all over, and stumbled towards the training room door.

When I reached the door, Dad called softly, "Estella." Turning, I looked back at my father with wide eyes. He had sunken to the floor, simply staring at the corpse. "You aren't the child I raised," he said in a low, dangerous voice. "This ... you ... that blasted bird ... an omen of death ..."

I fled the room, not wanting to know what he had meant.