The First of Seven Ravens

iv - ❝Seven, I think...❞

He tracked the thread with his fingertips. His hand met the wall and rustled among the mass of papers that were tacked to it. The one in the centre, where thread ended, felt square and small. A polaroid photograph. Under his skin he felt the tiny cluster of braille bumps; Dorothy Fortner, 1946. Seventy years, he thought as he irritably tapped her cheek, hardly a recent lead.

A voice called from behind him. "Are you home, Pete?"

The jingle of keys landing on the table broke his concentration. The disembodied voice danced upon the back his neck as the figure looked over his shoulder at the wall.

"Peter?"

"Hmm?"

Peter came to and turned to almost face his brother. He knew from the tone that it was one of the youngest, but it took him a moment to figure out which. The change of accent had thrown him. The American twinge in his own voice was mild in comparison to the rest of his family, whose bodies seemed to adapt willingly to the surroundings. The name of the man gave him trouble too.

As subtly as he could, Peter slipped his hand into his pocket and feel the reminder on a scrap on paper. Their names, now ancient, were listed alongside new aliases. He brushed down under the letter 'c' made itself seen.

C-E-C-Y-L-L, he read. He blinked his one unscarred eyelid and remembered.

"What is it, Caleb?" he asked, feeling the irritation resurface.

"Doesn't matter." the younger murmured.

Peter sat slowly at the table next to, making sure that there was indeed a chair beneath him. He rubbed his palm over his face to combat the temptation of sleep. When he pulled over the scar that closed his right eye, he couldn't hold in the wince.

Caleb sat across from him and paused before passing comment. "It doesn't look good. Does it hurt?"

"No more than normal." he answered emotionlessly. "It gets worse around transformation day." Reaching out for his phone, he held down a small button and a new voice declared that '3 messages were waiting' for him. With an "open messages" the drone voice orated the text he couldn't read himself.

It declared the date and time of receipt and by this time, Peter was already rolling his pasty eye. "Message one, Doctor Thomas Paige: Working late. Lab closed tomorrow, need to finish formula. Don't wait up... End of message. Message two..." Peter took the phone from his ear and smiled.

"I don't remember when I married Triton, do you?" The old name felt strangely foreign in this new tongue, but it didn't distract Caleb from laughing. Peter didn't hear the reply as he stood up to hear the other texts that awaited him.

"Doctor Simon Paige;" Peter often wondered when his siblings became so intelligent. Perhaps they weren't; anyone can convincingly maintain a façade if they have a thousand years to perfect it. "Going to send you another message. It's a recording. It is important and private, listen to it alone... End of message."

Peter sat on a velvet couch in the corner of the room. He held the phone to his ear between his cheek and his should as he inspected an old 'wound' - he has walked into the corner of a coffee table only the previous day and grazed his shin - that he felt bleeding against his trousers. Caleb had heard his older brother's words from the phone and left the room with a heavy tread.

The phone beeped, vibrated and beeped again. Then, the recording began to play mid-sentence.

"-and that's what we do here. These sessions aren't anything to worry about."

Sechnall's voice had deepened greatly since he was a boy - he and Simon Paige almost sounded like different people entirely.

"I'm not worried." The fresh voice seemed quite husky for that of a female, but warm nevertheless. "It's just... I don't like therapy is going to help my... problem."

There was silence as the doctor paused to consider his answer.

"Maybe it wont, but it's worth a shot." The woman sighed and her chair creaked as she shuffled about on it. "Samantha, there is no shame at all in admitting you've been... hurt. You experienced a traumatic situation."

Samantha snorted quietly in amusement. Perhaps it was contempt. Or disgust even.

Peter couldn't tell.

"Okay then," Simon cleared his throat. "You're clearly not ready to talk about it yet. Maybe if we knew each other better - if you had trust in me - you would be more comfortable about opening up to me. What do you think?"

There was another pause. "I guess..." she replied quietly. Peter smiled and breathed a laugh. There had always been an air about Simon; in his soul there was a carer. Beneath the deceptive exterior and layers of centuries worth of lies, there lay a pure goodness at his core.

He had become perhaps the best of all of them.

"Okay then, " he repeated in a smooth purr. "I'll go first. I am the second oldest of a lot of siblings that all drive me crazy-" Peter frowned a little - he hoped that there was more to this message than thinly veiled stabs at his character. "I have a beautiful - if rather strange - wife and a son."

"How old is he?"

"He's just turned four." Peter moved the phone away for a moment and cussed. He's just pissed at me, he thought. What does it matter? The kid won't remember if one of his uncles forgot... "He's at a wonderful age. He just started to learn the alphabet. He thinks it's funny to wake up at 3 in the morning to sing it."

They laughter coming down the phone distracted Peter from the sound of footsteps going past him. The shadow sat silent, unnoticed, on the arm of the couch.

"Your turn." Simon declared.

Samantha cleared her throat after the bout of laughter past and continued. "I - uh... I was basically raised an only child by my dad. He's pretty clever... I mean, a real smart ass. He used to teach European History at Yale when I was a kid."

"Wow," Simon - and Peter, who was beginning to lose concentration - were taken aback. "That is... impressive."

"He was born in Germany so he was always interest in that kinda thing. And - um - I don't have a husband, or wife or whatever. Free and single... No offense."

Simon's laugh bubbled loud and harsh. "None taken. You're still young."

Another pause.

"You said basically an only child," the doctor observed. "What did you mean?"

Her words came out faster but her amiable tone never shift to allow a even a hint of sadness. "When I was young I had older brothers. But they were in a car accident with my mom and you know..."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I was only a baby so I don't remember any of them. My dad doesn't talk about it. It's like he feels guilty - like he was responsible, in a way..."

As Simon explained that experiencing guilt in these situations was often very normal, a thought sparked into life in Peter's head. He sat up from his slumped position on the couch and listened for the question he knew his brother was about to ask.

"May I ask, Samantha, how many brothers did you lose?"

"Seven, I think."

Peter almost dropped the phone after he heard it. He rushed back to the room he had spent all morning in. He snatched the first piece of paper he felt, stamped dots into it, and pinned it to the wall next to Dorothy Fortner's photograph.

"Finally," he smiled as he felt the name Samantha among the scraps hung before him. "It's about time we found another one."