Long ago there was the Veil. The curtain of night where the Fae dwelled, they lived on dreams of humans and often caused trouble for them as well. In the Veil was where the unicorn danced with doe and where music lulled mortals into the dark branches where they would dance and dance until their bodies transformed. Some would become fair and others foul but what they would become was ultimately His command. 

Him. The Raven King and this was his domain.

A brave mortal ventured into the Veil, for he learned that the Raven King could grant great vast knowledge and power to one that could conquer him in combat. Over the centuries several brave warriors challenged him, vainglorious with youth–all fell to the King’s power, doomed to exist altered and forgotten. 

This mortal would not yield, for he had vigor and prowess beyond any that came before him and soon-the Raven King invited him into his most inner chambers, allowing him the taste of the Fae–revealing to the mortal his name. In return, the mortal weaved beautiful stories of fantasies and dreams from his heart and his deepest desires. Together the mortal and the Raven King grew the Veil into true paradise.

Love bloomed where once hate held sway, the King softened and taught the mortal Fae magics and with that very magic the mortal was able to become a renowned warrior who was revered across the land. Amassing fame, wealth, power…his dreams falling like stars and always, he’d return to the Raven King, who showered him with whatever he desired. 

However this love could never last, the truth revealed itself and shattered everything the mortal held dear as he learned time moved differently within the Veil, years passed as if they were days. Those he loved beyond the Veil aged while he remained young and powerful. The mortal pleaded with the Raven King to welcome his kin into the Veil and for the first time, the King refused him for the King understood the cycle of life and death. Humans could never comprehend eternity. For Fae to thrive, they needed the dreams of man and therefore needed death. For if man no longer feared death, they would lose ambition, no longer dream. 

And so the great war began. The Veil against the kingdom of man. Love became hate, bitterness and sadness. The mortal had syphoned centuries from the King and used that knowledge and power for great evil against Fae. Such cruelty turned the King of Black Bird colder and to prevent ever feeling warmth again, he removed his heart. In doing so, he lost himself, his beauty wretched and monstrous. 

In the end, many were lost. The mortal was fatally wounded and the Raven King chained to the earth in iron chains. The mortal used a sword of black iron, forged from all the hate he had for the King--plunges the blade deep into the King, ending the war. Before the Raven King fell into an eternal slumber, uttered his final words. 

 “Your peaceful slumber, so sublime…shall now be dreamless. My parting gift for your entire line.”

The mortal was victorious and the Veil was sealed away, he became king, creating a kingdom of vast wealth and influence but the mortal-now king never smiled again for he no longer had dreams. Magic and Fae creatures were forbidden under the penalty of death. And so the kingdom created by dreams….was now ruled by the dreamless for generations, starving the Fae near extinction. 

And so, through a twist of fate…the wheel begins to spin and a young man would be born into this life and become a link between the world of men and the world beyond the Veil…

A world of night.

A tale of love and hate....a destiny, a star-crossed fate.

The Raven’s Bride.