10/09/2024
I sat across from Will in his office, the dim light filtering through heavy curtains, casting long, creeping shadows across the room.
The sky outside was overcast, the kind of brooding grey that seemed to press down on the world, mirroring the weight I’d carried for as long as I could remember.
“I’m so tired, Will,” I said, my voice barely more than a whisper. “It’s like I’ve been dragging this darkness with me all my life, making every wrong decision, pushing people away, especially anyone who’s ever tried to love me. It feels like something’s on me — in me — pulling me down.”
Will leaned forward slightly, his gaze intent but patient, as always. “Where do you feel it, Julie? Where does the weight settle in your body?”
I closed my eyes and tried to focus. The sensation was always there, lurking beneath the surface, but I’d never really faced it. “Everywhere,” I muttered. “It’s in my chest, my limbs… it’s like a shadow crawling under my skin.”
“Let’s work with that,” Will said softly. “I want you to picture it. Give that darkness a form. It can be anything—whatever comes to mind first.”
I hesitated, my breath catching. My heart pounded as I felt the familiar weight pushing down on me, growing heavier by the second.
Then, slowly, an image formed. It wasn’t just a feeling anymore; it was real, vivid in my mind.
“A bird,” I whispered. “A black bird. A raven.” I could see it so clearly, perched on the edge of something — no, hovering above a crib. My crib. It wasn’t a bird just sitting there passively; it was watching. Waiting. Its eyes gleamed with something cold, something far more ancient and sinister than a simple bird should carry.
The raven was over me as a newborn, its talons wrapped tightly around the edge of the crib, as if staking its claim.
I shuddered, my voice trembling as I continued, “It’s been there all along. Since I was born.”
Will’s voice was a steady anchor.
“What does it want, Julie? What’s its purpose?”
“I don’t know… it feels like it owns me. Like it’s been controlling everything I do.”
The memory shifted as I watched the bird’s eyes gleam with satisfaction, its feathers dark as night.
“I see myself as I grow older, and it’s still there, always hovering, always watching.” The image sharpened further — now the raven stood over me as a child, its talons gripping something invisible, but I could feel it pulling strings, binding me. “It’s kept me from everything,” I said, my voice breaking. “Love, happiness, anything. It made me think I needed something outside of myself… that I needed saving.”
I sucked in a breath, the weight of it all rushing back at once. “It made me believe I was *Sleeping Beauty*, cursed to wait for some prince’s kiss to wake me up. All that time, I thought love was out of reach because of the curse… because I wasn’t worthy.
But that was the raven’s lie, wasn’t it?” Will nodded, his voice firm now. “Yes. That was the spell. The raven kept you captive, made you believe you were powerless, that you needed saving when in reality, it was keeping you in a prison of your own mind. And now that you see it, you have the power to break that spell.”
The raven in my mind flapped its wings, and for a moment, I followed its movement, watching as it ascended from the crib and soared into the darkening sky. Its wings stretched out like great shadows, blacker than the storm clouds gathering above.
I followed the bird’s path as it rose, climbing higher until it settled on the tangled wires of telegraph poles above the city, its eyes gleaming as it surveyed the landscape below.
Suddenly, the bird began to communicate, its wings trembling, sending ripples through the wires like blood pulsing through veins. The wires hummed with life, connecting to other black birds perched along the lines, their beaks opening and closing in silent, insidious messages.
They weren’t just birds—they were a network, controlling the flow of darkness, spreading their influence like a disease. The raven, the Master Raven, was at the center of it all, giving its orders to the rest.
Will’s voice grounded me once more. “Julie, it’s time. It’s time to destroy this thing. You don’t need saving from anyone else. You have the power within you. Call on the elements — fire, wind, earth — and destroy the raven.”
I stood outside that room in my mind, staring at the raven now trapped within its glass walls. Its dark feathers shimmered with malice, and I knew this was the moment.
It had stolen enough from me, kept me in chains for too long.
First, I called on fire. Flames roared to life around the edges of the room, licking the walls, bright and hungry. The heat was intense, crackling with energy, and I could feel it burning away the darkness that had clung to me.
The raven screeched, its wings flapping wildly as the flames drew closer, consuming the room with searing light. But it wasn’t enough. I needed more.
Next came the wind. A whirlwind tore through the room, ripping through the raven’s feathers, scattering them into the air like ash.
The force of it was overwhelming, a wild storm that battered the glass and sent shudders through the ground beneath me. The raven struggled, but I could see it weakening, its form flickering in and out of existence.
Finally, I called on the earth. The ground trembled beneath my feet, and from the cracks in the floor, thick roots emerged, twisting and coiling, wrapping themselves around the raven. The earth itself rose up to claim it, pulling the creature down, down into the dark, binding it there forever.
And then… silence. The room collapsed into nothingness, the bird vanishing with it, swallowed by the very elements I had called upon. I stood there, breathing hard, the weight lifting from my chest for the first time in what felt like centuries. I was free. But as I stood there, breathing hard, the weight lifting from my chest for the first time in what felt like centuries, I hesitated. I was free.
The raven was gone, but I could still feel it—its absence like an echo that clung to the edges of my mind.
I turned back to the room in my vision, the one where I had watched myself grow, where the black raven had presided over my life. There, standing in the ashes of what had been, was the child version of me. Her eyes were wide, full of sadness and fear, but also curiosity. She stepped forward, her small hands reaching for me.
“You’re free now,” I whispered, tears pricking my eyes. “You don’t have to wait for anyone. You’re not cursed.”
The child nodded slowly, and as she took my hand, I felt something shift inside me. She wasn’t just a memory or a vision. She was me — the part of me that had been lost, hijacked by the raven’s lies. She had been waiting for love, for a prince to come and kiss her awake, but it had all been a trick. A way to keep me powerless. “I was Sleeping Beauty,” I said quietly, the truth finally settling in. “But the raven made me believe the curse was real. It made me reject love, made me push everyone away because I thought I wasn’t worthy. That only ‘true love’s kiss’ could save me. But it was all a lie.”
Will’s voice broke through the haze of the vision, steady and calm. “That’s right. You believed you needed someone else to rescue you, but it was the raven’s spell keeping you asleep, keeping you in the dark. Love wasn’t the curse — the belief that you needed saving was. To keep you powerless the raven made her make decisions to keep you powerless, weak and sad. Sometimes that girl came to you and you felt her sadness and her prison and called it depression, but really it was a sign you shouldn't have ignored or tried to change; it was an alert that something was wrong. there is no reason for you to ever feel powerless in life - apart from if something had hijacked your power itself.”
I closed my eyes, letting that sink in. All the years of regret, all the pain I’d carried for bad decisions - it had been the malevolent Raven. I had been under the ravens control - it had hijacked my system leaving it disconnected from others and the world and connected up to its system. Now, as the storm outside grew quieter and the darkness in the room lightened, I realised something else.
The depression that had weighed on me wasn’t just sadness. It was that lost part of myself, the little girl who had been locked away for so long, trying to come back to me. Every time I pushed love away, every time I made a bad decision or turned down a chance at happiness, it had been the raven, feeding on that emptiness. It kept me trapped, thinking I wasn’t worthy of anything better.
But now, standing here, with the fire and wind and earth still humming in the air around me, I knew I had the power to take it back. To reclaim all those lost years.
I pulled the child version of me closer, wrapping my arms around her, and as I did, I felt the last of the raven’s influence shatter.
She wasn’t just a piece of me anymore; she was me, whole and complete. “I’m not waiting anymore,” I said, my voice stronger now. “I’m not going to be afraid of love, or life, or anything.
The raven’s gone.” But even as I said it, I felt a lingering presence, something faint but undeniable.
The raven was destroyed, but the world it had come from—the others like it—still watched, still waited. I could sense them just beyond the veil, eavesdropping, always listening. And then, from the corner of the room, something shimmered. Golden tendrils materialized from the air, twisting and coiling like living threads. I froze, my breath catching in my throat as I watched them press against the empty space, warping the light.
Something beyond them was watching me, unseen but palpable. For a second, I felt its mind touch mine — cold, ancient, and all-knowing. It wasn’t just watching. It was dissecting me, pulling apart my thoughts as easily as if I were nothing more than an insect under a magnifying glass.
And then, just as quickly, it was gone. Slipping back into the void, leaving only the faintest echo of its presence.
“They’re still there, aren’t they?” I whispered, more to myself than to Will. He nodded. “They never really leave. They’re part of something bigger, something ancient. But they don’t have control over you anymore. You broke free.”
I felt the weight of that truth, the finality of it settling in. The raven might have been part of a greater web, but it no longer held power over me. I was no longer Sleeping Beauty, no longer waiting for a prince, or anyone, to save me. I had awakened myself.
extract from my book - the tesseract agenda.
