Roses and Ravens

De: Darlene Zagata

Narrado por: Virtual Voice

The raven arrived at midnight.

It perched on the iron gate of Blackwood University, its obsidian eyes reflecting the amber glow of Victorian streetlamps. In its beak, a single white rose, its petals unblemished except for three drops of crimson at its heart.

Professor Helena Ashford watched from her office window, the familiar weight of ritual settling over her like a silk shroud. Twenty-seven years she had kept the vigil. Twenty-seven years of roses and ravens, beauty and darkness, life and necessary death.

The bird released the rose. It tumbled through autumn air, landing on the cobblestones below where a young woman's shadow had stood just hours before.

"Another one has questions," Helena whispered to the darkness.

The raven cawed once—a sound like tearing paper—and vanished into the October night.

By morning, the rose would be gone. By morning, someone new would begin asking the questions that could never be answered. By morning, the cycle would begin again, as it had for over a century.

Helena closed her eyes and recited the words she had learned all those years ago, when she too had been curious, brilliant, and foolish enough to believe some doors should be opened:

"Beauty feeds the soul. Darkness keeps it honest. Together, they make us whole."

She locked her office door and descended the spiral staircase that didn't appear on any campus map.

The Society was calling.