Nevermore: A Novel of Love, Loss, & Edgar Allan Poe (7 page)

"Do you mind if I join you?"

"I would be offended if you didn't.
 
I trust you slept well?"

"I slept as if every ounce of energy and strength had been drained from me.
 
There were no dreams, and all things considered, I will consider that a boon."

Lenore laughed, and Edgar took a seat beside her, but not too close.
 
She was drawing, and he didn't want to bump her arm, or to spill something on the work in progress.

"What do you see?" he asked.

"Nothing," she said.
 
"I am as drained as you are.
 
For once, I'm just drawing.
 
It's difficult, creating art – and then cutting out pieces of it – knowing that once the faces and spirits are gone, I'll have to fill back in the blanks.
 
It's how I make my living, such as it is.
 
I sell the drawings.
 
I do portraits.
 
I draw or paint people's homes.
 
It's not a bad life, but it's not always very lucrative, either."

"It sounds very similar to the life of an author," Edgar said.
 
"I am beginning to do a bit better, but it has been a long road, and there have been…problems."

"You live in a cloud," Lenore said.
 
"I saw it last night, but there was too much else to concentrate on.
 
It follows you – and defines you.
 
What is it that has caused such pain?"

"There are many things, but the worst of them is the failing health of my wife.
 
Despite all that I have been able to do for her, none seems able to help.
 
She wastes slowly away…I fear that soon I will lose her."

"Life is a cycle," Lenore said.
 
She turned back to her drawing.

Edgar glanced down at the paper.
 
She had drawn a crow in flight, wings spread and eyes bright.
 
It reminded him of Grimm, and, at the same time it did not.
 
This was a wild creature, young and strong.
 
Grimm was strong – but his strength was of a deeper kind, and he was – as the farmers were fond of saying – no spring chicken.
 
Still, somehow, she had reached inside, and drawn out the spirit.
 
There was no doubt that it was Grimm, and there was no doubt that she possessed an incredible talent.

"It's amazing," he said.
 
"I think you captured him in a different time, or a different life, but it could be no other."

She shaded the feathers of one wing carefully.

"Time does not work like that," she said casually.
 
"It's not a string with an end tied and another winding off into some unknown dimension.
 
It is more like…a plane.
 
Do you study mathematics, Edgar?"

"I have dabbled, but I don't see the connection."

"There is always a connection.
 
Some believe that time is a direct path, beginning to end.
 
Others claim that it is a circle, or a figure eight, winding in and back upon itself like the serpent Ouroboros.
 
History may run in cycles, but time?
 
Time is a static thing.
 
What is happening now – and what happened in your grandfather's time?
 
Both happen simultaneously."

"It's an interesting theory," Edgar said.
 
"But I am not certain it's quite right."

"No?" she glanced up at him.
 
"Then how would you explain the fact that your bird – at the direction of your pen just last night – disrupted a gunshot that occurred a full year ago?
 
Or how the spirit of the man that was killed by that gunshot could have waited, trapped in the branches of a tree, for you to come along and do it?
 
Is he dead now?
 
Was he dead a year ago?
 
Will he ever really be simply dead, or will he be alive, and dead, for eternity?"

"Questions too heavy for early morning sunlight, and offered before a proper cup of coffee."

"Laugh if you will," Lenore said.
 
"I have seen this more times than I can count – never like what happened last night – but there are things that just can't be explained in a linear fashion.
 
If it was not true, I suspect you'd be very short of stories – or at the very least, that your stories would be much more mundane and ordinary.
 
I believe, never having read one, that they must be spectacular.
 
Dark, deep, drenched in mystery – and pain."

"The latter is certainly true," he said.
 
"I have been told more than once that my stories lack hope.
 
That people want to be dropped into the shadows, but only if there is a ladder, or a rope that will bring them back into the light.
 
I write, and I tell my tales, but it seems that I am fresh out of ladders, and there are no ropes in sight…"

“And yet,” she said, “you sensed the need last night, and you responded.
 
You write about the shadows, but I think – maybe – you dream of other things – lighter, happier things.”

“Let’s just agree,” he said, “that it is progress that I dreamed of nothing this past night.”

Lenore’s smile widened.
 
With quick flicks of her wrist, she added sprinkles of shredded corn dropping from the crow’s beak.
 
Edgar watched the way the muscles rippled in her arms, the way her fingers played across the surface of the paper, brushing aside flecks of lead and smoothing the surface.

“So, why are you here?” Edgar asked.
 
“I can’t believe it was accident.
 
I mean – I believe you are traveling, and paying your way with your art.
 
You are very talented.
 
This just doesn't seem like a very … art conscious location?"

"You'd be surprised who might want a drawing, a portrait, or a painting," she said.
 
"This area is filled with old money – it's as old as the country, after all.
 
Still, you read me correctly.
 
I sought this place out.
 
You might say I was drawn here."

There was a loud squawk, and Grimm dropped to the windowsill outside.
 
The bird cocked its head, tilting to one side to stare in at the two seated beyond the glass pane, and at the drawing on the table.

Edgar grinned at the bird.
 
Lenore glanced up, smiled, and then shot back away from the table as if she'd been smacked.
 
She nearly toppled her chair over backward, and it was all that Edgar could do to prevent her smacking her head on the floor as she went over.

"What…" he said.

She shook her head, and then pulled away.
 
She was on her feet in an instant, staring at the window.
 
Grimm sat there, met her gaze for a long, silent moment, and then, with a great cry, leapt from the sill and back into the sky.
 
Edgar stood, stunned, and everyone in the tavern had turned to gape.

"Are you okay?" Edgar said.

Lenore shook her head again, and then turned to him.
 
"I'm not sure.
 
I…I saw something that I did not expect to see – something I can't explain.
 
I'm not even sure that I should tell you – I…"

Edgar took her by the arm and led her back to the table.
 
She took her seat, and he helped her organize her pencils and the loose sheets of paper she'd scattered.
 
Anita walked over, her pretty features twisted in a frown of concern.

"It's probably nothing," Lenore said.
 
"I just saw…I think I … no, I did.
 
I saw something in Grimm – or on her – or – I'm not sure how to explain it."

"Her?" Edgar said.

Lenore turned to him and nodded.
 
"I'm nearly certain.
 
I would not have had any idea before but…"

"But what?"

"I saw a face superimposed over the feathers of the chest.
 
A very young girl.
 
She stared right at me – and I believe she is trapped."

Edgar stared at her, and then down at the drawing on the table.

"What will you do?"

"I…I have no choice," she said.
 
"I will draw what I have seen, and I will set her free."

Edgar sat very still for a moment, and then, he nodded.
 
He knew that what she did was the right thing for those who were trapped, but he had traveled with the bird for a very long time.
 
If what was to come removed the magic – if it ended, and Grimm flew off into the trees and the swamp to never return, he was not certain that he could stand it.

Lenore studied the emotion burning from his eyes, the effort he made to remain calm.

"If she is meant to be with you," Lenore said, "she will be.
 
The girl is trapped, but the crow – Grimm – is a familiar.
 
Your familiar.
 
I do not believe she was a party to whatever happened, or that she could be happy carrying another soul trapped inside her, but neither do I believe anything will be lost."

"If you did, though, you would do this anyway," Edgar said.

"I would.
 
If I did not, I would slowly go insane thinking about it – wondering what evil I might have become a part of."

"And I," Edgar said softly, "will be utterly, and absolutely alone, I'm afraid, if something goes wrong.
 
It is a recurring theme in my work.
 
They say that art mirrors life."

"I don't believe that," Lenore said.
 
"It imitates, at best."

She reached for her drawing of Grimm, and the gum eraser that sat beside it.
 
She worked quickly, and as she worked, she spoke.

"Why does this remind me of a story?" she said.
 
"I don't remember any stories of crows as prisons…"

"There is one," Edgar said softly.
 
"Not a crow…a raven.
 
It was written by the Brothers Grimm – you know their work?"

"Some," Lenore said.
 
She didn't look up from her drawing.
 
"Tell me.
 
What was it called?"

"It was called," Edgar said, "
The Raven
.
 
I will tell it in my own words – I've read it recently, and I have a good memory."

"I love stories," Lenore said.

"As do I.
 
I just can't seem to find one with a happy ending.
 
The Raven
, as you might expect, starts with a young girl.
 
It goes like this…"

The Raven

A Revision with Apologies to the Brothers Grimm

I
n a long ago time, and a faraway place, there lived a queen.
 
The queen had a very young daughter, too small to walk on her own.
 
The child was precocious, and no matter what the queen said, nothing could prevail upon the girl to listen, or to be silent.
 
The crying of the child maddened the queen, and she stormed about the castle in anger until she happened to glance out the window.

Ravens circled the castle, a great unkindness of ravens.
 
They screeched and cried out, and it reminded the queen of her child.
 
She flung open the window in frustration and turned to her daughter.

"I wish you were one of them," she said.
 
"I wish you would become a raven and fly away, screeching as they do, and leave me to my peace.
 
Then I would have some rest."

Now, the story says that at this point, the child was instantly transformed to a raven, and flew away.
 
That is not exactly so.
 
There was an old woman who worked in the service of the queen – her name was Estrella.
 
Though she was named star, there was no light in her.
 
She was conniving, and versed in potions and dark arts she kept to herself.
 
She sometimes cared for the girl as a part of her duties, and that very day, when the Queen made her wish upon an unkindness of ravens, she whisked the princess off to safety.

Later that day, she slipped away with a bag of seed corn in a pouch tied about her waist.
 
She found a clearing in the woods, scattered her corn, and set her trap.
 
It did not take long to lure several ravens close enough, and, eventually, the perfect vessel set off her trap.
 
She scuttled back to the castle with her prize in an ornate iron cage, avoiding its darting beak and using a heavy cloak to muffle its cries.

Estrella lived in an upper room of an all-but-abandoned tower at the rear of the castle.
 
Her rooms were drafty – hot in the summer and bitterly cold in the winter, no matter how she built her fire.
 
None of this bothered her, for she was a sorceress, and the simple threat of weather was of no consequence to her.
 
She rarely slept, and when she did it was usually to snatch a few hours during the brightest light of day, when she was least powerful.