Raven: Unstoppable: Raven, #2

By R T Green

When Satan's little helper gets real, everyone feels the heat!

An ancient tablet, in the care of an ancient scribe… how can it help Mika find Raven?

This is book two: Unstoppable - Their love torn apart by time itself, Mika searches desperately for Raven. But as Raven's destiny rears its horrific head, finding her may come too late.
Imprisoned in a castle built into a cave in a mountainside, Raven and the girls are losing hope Mika and Rudy will ever find them. The lord and master of the castle is away pillaging, but they know that on his return, there will be only one thing on his mind.
Raven's fiery spirit isn't going to let her wait around for that to happen. She manages to escape their cell, unaware the destiny that awaits her is far more horrific than she ever imagined.
A tragic, bitter-sweet meeting gives Mika the clues she needs to find the woman she loves. As she and Rudy set off on a terrifying journey to a new unknown, she cannot be sure if even the power of the ancient tablet will be enough to defeat the dark forces about to consume Raven.

'Raven: Unstoppable' does contain scenes of a sexual nature.

This is the second book in Raven and Mika's story. Check out the full story on the rtgreen website.

 

Enjoy!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wise Owl
• Release date: May 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9781393866848

R T Green

The RTG mission in life is simple... to not be like everyone else! ‘Going Green’ has taken on a new meaning, in the book world at least. Whilst we applaud the original meaning (ebooks are a perfect way to promote that) we also try to present a different angle to it. The tendency these days is that if you don’t look and read like everyone else, you don’t sell books. Maybe there’s some truth in that, but we simply don’t do it. The RTG books have been described as a ‘breath of fresh literary air’, and, by those discovering us for the first time, ‘unexpectedly good’. We know many readers prefer the same-old same old, and that’s fine. It’s just not what you get from the RTG stable. Those who know about such things said it would take five years to become a proficient author... I scoffed at that. They were wise. It took six. It’s one reason why even today we remodel existing books, and will always do so. Right from the early years the stories were always good, but were put into words less well than they could have been! These days we have several series and a few standalones, the hit Daisy series most popular amongst them. In everything we do, the same provisos apply – Never the same book twice. If we can’t think up a good story, it doesn’t get written. The RTG brand is about exciting and twisty plots, a fast pace which doesn’t waste words, and endearing (sometimes slightly crazy) characters. We can never please everyone, but it works for us, and, it seems, for those who appreciate our work. Enjoy! Richard, Ann and the RTG crew

Book preview

The ‘Raven’ Series

'RAVEN' IS A ROMANTIC comedy with a hell of a difference!  It will make you smile one minute and tug at your heartstrings the next. Raven herself is the kind of gutsy, spirited character who throws herself into life but often gets lost in the game, sometimes without realizing!

On her journey she’s joined by a host of great characters; some funny, some crazy, some dangerous. And the series is also notable for taking you to places you can google! Most of the locations are real, and some of the characters you’ll meet actually did exist... as history will attest to!

An ancient tablet, in the care of an ancient scribe... how can it help Mika find Raven?

This is book two: Unstoppable - Their love torn apart by time itself, Mika searches desperately for Raven. As Raven’s destiny rears its horrific head, finding her may come too late.

Imprisoned in a castle built into a cave in a mountainside, Raven and the girls are losing hope Mika and Rudy will ever find them. The lord and master of the castle is away pillaging, but they know that on his return, there will be only one thing on his mind.

Raven’s fiery spirit isn’t going to let her wait around for that to happen. She manages to escape their cell, unaware the destiny awaiting her is far more horrific than she had ever imagined.

Enjoy!

Richard, Ann, and the RTG crew

RAVEN: UNSTOPPABLE

Some kind of hell...

HONEY LIFTED HER HEAD from the crude pillow, so constantly damp it matted her long blonde hair against her cheek as she slept. She turned to lie on her back, trying to stop her heart breaking once more. It broke every night, when from the coarse wooden bunk above her the sound of Raven's tortured crying filled her ears.

Reluctantly she opened her eyes. The faint light of morning filtered through the square of rock that had been chiselled away to make a window. The wall to the outside world was two feet thick, but it might as well be two inches. Escaping that way was impossible, unless you had a very long rope and a death wish.

Seeing much at all through the opening wasn’t easy, but sometimes she would press her face tight against the crude iron bars set into the window. What could be seen was spectacular. And spectacularly depressing.

Downwards, it seemed to be a sheer drop to a fast-flowing river tumbling over blue-grey rocks two hundred feet below them. To the left, a cart track teetered perilously across the top of the ravine, running from the drawbridge for a short distance before disappearing into a forest of Baltic pines.

To the right, it was just possible to see where the rock face blended into the man-made stone walls of the castle itself. Above... well, above was nothing but ominous grey skies.

She watched desolately from the bed as huge raindrops fell relentlessly from those grey skies, seeped through every crack they could find, and snaking in tiny rivers running across the uneven ground that served as their floor.

Raindrops that had not stopped hammering down for one single minute since the day they arrived.

Honey closed her eyes before her own tears came again. She had to be strong for the others... Ginger and Raven called her mum, and in their desolate present she had to be more of a mother to them than ever before.

As each day passed she was finding that harder. The incessant rain was a constant white noise, and hour by hour slowly destroyed her soul, pounding into ears that didn’t want to hear it, making her want to scream. The few bits of clothing they had were always wet, and their beds smelled of damp mould.

There was no escape from the white noise, or the monotony. Each day was the same mix of nothingness and frustration, driving them slowly insane, turning minds to mindlessness. At least they were never cold... despite the constant rain it was always hot. Humidity was off the scale, and the opening in the rock face seemed to do little to help relieve the stifling captivity of their prison.

Honey was beginning to forget what it was like to be cold, or dry. Finding it hard to remember how wonderful it was to fall asleep in peaceful silence.

She turned on her side once more, and reached out to one of the thick posts supporting Raven's bed above hers. It was the start of a new day, so she made one more mark on the post. She didn't know why she was counting the days, it wasn't like they could ever escape. There was nowhere to escape to, not as far as she could see. The castle built into the side of a mountain they'd stumbled into as they trekked blindly through the rain, had been the first and only sign of civilisation they’d come across for days.

It wasn't much of a choice... stay as captives in their rocky prison cut into the cliff face, but at least be given enough food to survive. Or escape and die... from either starvation or hyperthermia.

Honey felt the tears of desolation welling up once more, screwed up her eyes to send them away, and counted the marks she'd made on the post.

Today was the thirty-second day they'd been there.

Wherever there was.

A different kind of hell...

THE RED NUMBERS ON the clock clicked to 11 pm. Mika’s sad, unseeing eyes stared blankly at an equally-blank screen. The mellow lights in the cabin threw delicate shadows across the small, pine-log room, but somehow they weren’t the warm, comforting shadows they once were. Now they seemed to hold an unseen menace, the dark fingers of desolation and loneliness curling over her like the knurled hands of an evil witch.

Mika wasn’t coping too well. She closed her furtive eyes, and asked herself for the thousandth time how it was possible to miss someone so much who defied the laws of the universe by existing.

Four weeks had passed since she discharged herself from hospital... almost a month had gone by since she’d braved entering the log cabin in the garden, and suddenly found her heart lifted when she’d discovered the photo that couldn’t exist, and then minutes later the raven paid her a visit.

Ever since she’d flown away to take a message to her mistress, she’d not returned, and Mika was beginning to believe she never would. The mysterious and beautiful bird whose feathers shimmered in the light and looked almost dark-blue, was her only link to the non-flying Raven. Without her coming again there was little hope of ever finding the girl who had filled her thoughts since the day she became more than just a character in the book she was writing.

Since the day she became real, and the novel became a biography.

Rudy came to stay for a few days after she left hospital. He was still having difficulty accepting what she told him had happened, had actually happened. Despite the two things he couldn't explain.

The night she got home from hospital, Mika discovered the photo of the book cover in her desk in the cabin. The photo that couldn’t possibly exist if their adventures had been a dream. And when the raven came to call shortly after, somehow she'd had the foresight to take her picture. She’d told the bird it was to prove stuff to Rudy... although that wasn’t the whole truth. She needed to prove it to herself too.

She showed him the photo of the raven sitting on the deck railings, and the picture of the book cover... and yet still he couldn't seem to accept that somehow he’d been through stuff he had no memory of.

Then a few hours later, the pictures flicked some kind of switch inside him. Over the next three days he started getting flashbacks.

Some of them were details of their adventure Mika hadn't told him about.

They decided together she was suffering no after-effects of the coma, and Mika could see by his demeanour he desperately needed to be with his Alex, so she sent him home, telling him to go take some comfort from their closeness.

When things were scaring the hell out of you, you needed to be with those you love.

That was almost four weeks ago, and the moment he’d gone the loneliness kicked in. In the few days after Rudy left Mika went back to the book, writing chapter after chapter in the manuscript that had become... next to the bible anyway... the most powerful book in the history of mankind.

The book where everything she wrote actually came to pass, and the book that had become the personal Facebook page she and Raven used to communicate with each other. The book where she created the ancient scribe whose all-powerful words transported her to Raven, saved her from a fate worse than death, brought them home again, and then took them back to the hell once more.

The book that appeared to have lost all of that power.

And now does none of those things anymore.

Countless times she’d tried, writing passages in the book as the scribe, which before would have taken her to Raven, but now no longer did. As each day passed, desperate frustration turned quickly to heartbreak.

Yet those few weeks had given her time to think. Increasingly crazy theories about what was going on came thick and fast, slowly driving her as crazy as the theories themselves. All had been discarded when rational thought finally kicked in. Except one.

The one implausible yet strangely-logical explanation that might exist. What happened back in hell must have crossed more than one time-frame. More than one world. Raven became flesh-and-blood in her fictitious world after a storm with weird red lightning... the same storm Mika had in her real world. In that moment somehow their lives came together.

Since then they have somehow wrenched apart again. Her search for Raven had to take on an entirely new dimension. So to speak.

It was pointless thinking she was in a different city, or even country. She was very likely in a different time.

Unfortunately Mika didn’t possess a Tardis.

Wherever Raven was, there could be no means of communication. Except for the raven... the bird who seemed to be playing a mysterious yet very important role in whatever it was they were living through. Back in what felt like another lifetime she had appeared from nowhere, taken messages to her mistress, helped lead her to Raven when she was lost in hell, and generally been around keeping a beady eye on things.

So where the hell were you now, you infuriating bird?

Three times in the past, as herself and as the ancient scribe, she’d written the words to summon her. Each time she'd come. Now there was no sign of her.

Mika knew she was missing something, doing the right things but maybe not in the right way. Like using a new programme on the PC... doing what seems right but it refusing to play ball. Then suddenly the brain cells kick in, and one click makes it happen.

One click wasn't making it happen. Not this time. She'd tried every one-click in the book, but was getting nowhere.

The hope of ever finding Raven was rapidly slipping away.

Staring at an empty screen wasn't getting her anywhere. It was almost midnight, and while sleep didn't come very easily just lately, without it her already foggy head would just become even denser. She glanced around the cabin while the PC went through its shut-down motions. Through the thin curtains the light from the two deck-lamps shone dimly outside. Rain was battering down onto the felt roof of the log cabin, rain that had seemed incessant since the day she got back from hospital.

Thankfully there had been no thunder with angry words mixed in, and no strange forks of red lightning that before had been Satan's calling-card. It was just rain... lots of it.

Maybe it was Satan's doing after all. Just letting her know he was still the boss.

The faint hum of the PC died as it finally shut down, and the room fell silent. She lifted her weary, desolate body from the office chair, and was just about to switch off the light when something moving outside caught her eye.

Someone was standing on the deck.

From the silhouette created by the deck-lights, he was the last person she expected to see.

Chapter 1

'PLEASE STOP CRYING, Rave.'

The pain in Ginger's voice was heartbreaking as she called out from her bed on the other side of the room. Honey turned to the wall so her friend wouldn't see the hopelessness on her face. The sobbing didn't stop.

'Rave?' Ginger called out quietly again.

'What?' Raven sat up suddenly, and fixed a cold stare into Ginger.

For a moment Ginger looked wary, lifted the damp blankets and pulled herself round so she was sitting with her feet on the earth floor. 'I... it's hurting me hearing you cry all the time.'

'Oh you poor thing, I'm so sorry I'm spoiling your perfect little life.' Raven found a scrap of fabric and blew her nose in a very loud and unfeminine way. 'Do please forgive me my heartbreak.'

'That's not what I meant and you know it,' Ginger said curtly. 'It hurts me because you're hurting.'

'Well tough, get used to it... like for every day of the rest of your life.'

'Please don't.'

Raven threw herself off the end of the bed above Honey's, landing on her feet in a small puddle lying in a dip in the floor, and sending splashes of muddy brown water everywhere.

'Well that's the feet washed,' she laughed mirthlessly.

'Did you have to do that?' Ginger cried angrily as she wiped the dirty water from her legs.

'Yeah I did. It brightens up my day.'

'You're turning into an evil bitch, Rave.'

'I know. Quite like it actually. Watch this space.'

Ginger buried her face in her hands, and let out a desolate cry. Raven wasn't letting up. 'You should try it sometime, Ging... oh, but that’s not going to work is it? You're far too much of a wuss.'

'Enough!'

Honey threw the stare from hell into Raven and went to Ginger's side, put an arm around her. 'Reel yourself in, Raven... go find a spider and pull its legs off if you want to be evil to something. Don't take your frustrations out on us... we're all you've got remember?'

'Frustrations? You think that’s all it is?' Raven threw her head back, and ran her hands through long black hair that even in the dim light of the morning looked like she'd somehow managed to dye in dark blue highlights. Then she turned, piercing a stare into Honey from deep brown eyes that despite the tears still burned bright with intensity.

'We get captured by weirdo’s with no eyes, locked up in a prison cell carved into a mountainside... and it never stops fucking raining!' She turned away from the others. Honey could see her hands clenching and unclenching as Raven fought to stop tears that wanted to fall again. 'And Mika... Mika is...'

Raven tensed as she felt Honey's hands slip around her waist, but the sudden closeness melted her anger. She turned and buried her face in her friend's neck, as Honey's trembling hand stroked her damp hair. 'Maybe she's here, Rave... perhaps she'll come for us soon.'

Raven shook her head violently. 'No. No she's not. She's probably dead, Hon, and even if she isn't, she's not in this world.'

'You don't know that for sure.'

She pushed herself away. 'I do. Don't ask me how, I just know she's too far away. I've lost her. Lost all hope.' She covered her face with shaking hands. 'I miss her so much... her gentle words, her beautiful smile...'

'She won't stop until she finds us,' Ginger smiled warmly as Raven sat by her side and took her hand.

'I know she won't. But the entire universe is a pretty big place to search isn't it?'

Ginger's eyes lowered, Raven felt her hand squeezed tightly. 'I suppose it is,' she said quietly.

Suddenly the light was blocked out. The strange creature responsible for drawing the metaphoric curtains stood on the rocky ledge the other side of the iron bars, flapped his wings, cocked his feathery head to one side, and grinned a greeting as he chirped out the words.

‘Hey girls.’

‘Go away,’ said a sullen-faced Raven.

‘Charming. I come all this way to see how my besties are doing, and that’s the thanks I get?’

Raven lowered her head. ‘Sorry. Not the best of starts to the day.’

‘Oh dear, dear.’ The half-human, half-avian creature tut-tutted in a sympathetic kind of way, and then began to squeeze his neon-green body through the bars. Strictly speaking it shouldn’t have been humanly or avianly possible to get through a three-inch gap, but as the body that seemed to be made of super-soft rubber contorted and strained through the bars in a slightly-gruesome way, accompanied by a multitude of expletives and breathless grunts, finally he was inside the room.

He straightened his flattened feathers and grinned inanely again. ‘Phew. Really must get more exercise.’

‘What are you doing here, Playdoh?’

‘Really wish you wouldn’t call me that.’

‘After just watching you mould yourself into gruesome shapes to get through those bars, don’t you think it’s kind of suitable?’ Raven found a grin.

‘That’s not the point. It’s insulting. I really must protest about being likened to a kiddie’s toy.’

‘So what is your name?’

‘Um... Storm?’

Ginger shook her head. ‘Not feeling it.’

‘Er... Shadow?’

‘What, with neon-green feathers?’

‘Ok then... Apollo?’

‘You don’t have a name, do you?’

‘Not exactly.’

‘You can’t not exactly not have a name. You either have or you haven’t.’

He lowered his head, and flapped frustrated wings. ‘No one ever gave me one.’

‘But we did... its Playdoh.’

‘Yeah, thanks for that.’

Honey walked over to the four-foot tall slightly comical creature, noticed the tinge of sadness in his manner, and put an arm around his feathery shoulders. ‘We call you that as an affectionate name, because we like you.’

‘Aw geez... really?’

‘No, not really,’ said Raven from the other side of the cell. ‘Really it is an insult.’

‘Really?’

Honey squeezed him a little tighter. ‘Take no notice of her. She’s just in one. We love you really.’

‘Aww...’ A daft expression fluttered across his cartoon-like oval eyes, and a feathered arm slid around Honey’s waist. Then the human hand on the end of his arm-cum-wing curled around her left butt cheek.

‘Hey, less of the groping, ok?’

‘But you said you loved me...’ The voice was full of pretend angst.

‘Not that kind of love.’

‘Not even a peck on the cheek?’

‘Funny guy.’

Playdoh opened his beak to go into pleading mode, but didn’t get that far. The sound of a key turning in the lock of the heavy wooden door sent him scuttling on his stumpy little