"Some people believe that raven's guide travelers to their destinations. Others believe that the sight of a solitary raven is considered good luck. While a group of ravens predicts trouble ahead. And a raven right before battle promises victory."

CHAPTER ONE: TAKEN

Peyton Scott sat down on the brown bench in one of the many parks of Charlotte, North Carolina with her black bound sketch book in her left hand and a bag of pencils in her right. She crossed her long, skinny, legs over one another and looked up at the children running around the park. She spotted a little blonde haired girl hopping onto a swing, and pushing her legs back and forth to get to the desired height. That little girl was Sawyer Brooke Scott. She was nothing short of a miracle child. While Peyton was pregnant, there was a cloud of uncertainty hanging over the mother and unborn child's head. The gray cloud of whether or not they would actually make it. Peyton was at a risk for hemorrhaging and there was a chance tha t she AND Sawyer could have died if she decided to give birth naturally but there was a greater chance that the child would survive over the mother. Though her husband, Lucas, wasn't totally pleased that she wanted to keep the baby, she wanted to give him a child. He grasped onto the thought that there was no life without Peyton. Luckily, they had both made it only to leave Tree Hill from all their friends and family and start a new life elsewhere. Only that new life wasn't everything they had dreamed of.

She glanced down to her empty sketchbook. She hadn't drawn in months. She was lacking inspiration; she needed a change of scenery which is why she had decided to take Sawyer to the park. Sawyer needed the fresh air as much as Peyton did. Lucas was at the publishing house, working with his publisher discussing a big book tour that he was supposed to travel on for his third book. His first book, "An Unkindness of Ravens", had been a roaring success, while his second, "The Comet" had been everything BUT that. His third was a fiction novel, and was guaranteed to be just as much as of a success as his first. Peyton was proud of him, but she missed Tree Hill. She missed running Red Bedroom Records with her best friend Haley, and one of her most successful discoveries Mia Catalano. She missed her best friend since they were children, Brooke Davis, well Brooke Baker now. Peyton felt so guilty for not being able to make it back for her wedding but there had been extenuating circumstances. Charlotte wasn't the same. She wished they hadn't come to Charlotte at all.

Her bright green eyes moved back up searching the playground aimlessly for Sawyer who had just been on the swings. She swallowed hard and she threw her sketchbook and pencils aside and ran over to the sand box with the swings planted into it.

"Sawyer! Sawyer! Where are you?!" Peyton frantically screamed for her four year old daughter.

She saw Sawyer's tiny sweater on the ground, hugging the sand. She reached out her hands taking in her little pink sweater into her hands. A white piece of paper fell out of the pocket, and she looked down curiously while the tears streamed down her face. In dark black capital letters was typed:

DO NOT CALL THE COPS. IF YOU DO, THE GIRL DIES. GO HOME AND WAIT FOR A CALL WITH FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS.

Peyton grabbed the sweater and ran towards the wooden bench grabbing her sketchbook and her pencils and running towards her car leaving people who were passing by stunned. Yet, no one bothered to reach out and offer their help even if she wasn't allowed to accept it. Peyton turned the keys in the ignition and sped off from the park towards their familiar town home in the heart of downtown Nashville. She parked the car inside of the garage, and pushed the grey button on the black remote hanging on the wall to shut the steel garage door. She walked inside setting everything down on the table in a panic. Peyton reached out for the phone and dialed Lucas' cell phone number. After a few rings he finally answered.

"Peyton, I'm in a meeting with my publisher, is there any way that this can wait?"

"NO! Lucas, you need to come home right now. It's an emergency."

"Is everything okay? Are you and Sawyer okay?"

"Just come home! I'll explain everything."

Ten minutes later, right on the dot, Lucas came rushing through the back door. In the background she could hear the steel door of the garage closing again. She was pacing in the kitchen, with one hand to her face and the other on her hip. Hot tears were streaming down her face, and Lucas rushed over to her. Lucas was trying to ask her what was wrong, but she couldn't speak. She paused and turned towards the white kitchen island and pushed the familiar white piece of paper towards him. His eyes widened, taking off for the back of the house, searching every crack and crevice for his daughter.

"How could this happen?"

"I just took my eye off her for one second, and I looked up and she was gone. Lucas, why would someone take Sawyer?"

"Maybe they're coming back for the interest on the money from the loan?"

Peyton stood there dumb-founded. When Peyton and Lucas and their brand new baby girl Sawyer had come to Charlotte, they weren't exactly doing well. They also didn't know that the first person they would meet would be part of an underground mob that no one had ever heard of. That's how these things were done though. The cold cases that sat in the back of the police department's file cabinets, that they were never able to link probably belonged to this mob. Did the officials have suspicion of a mob or of certain gangs that were roaming the streets of Charlotte, North Carolina? Yes. They just didn't have enough evidence to tie them to anything. That's how they stayed in business though. Peyton and Lucas were sworn into silence. They had to pay double the loan money, and now Peyton suspected that Lucas knew more than he was saying.

"Mob bosses don't charge interest, Lucas! What are you talking about? What's going on?"

"I don't know! It was just a thought."

They were mid argument when the phone started to ring. Peyton ran for the phone, picking up the black phone in her shaky hands. She held it to her ear and before she could answer she heard deep breathing in her ear.

"What do you want with our daughter?"

"Your daughter is in good hands. Don't worry."

"You sick freak! Just give us back our daughter!"

"Not until you complete the tasks given to us. Home is where the heart is. Home is also where you will find the answers to getting your daughter back. Do not get the authorities involved. If you do, you'll regret it."

The phone made a click noise, and Peyton pulled the phone away from her ear and set it down. She looked over at her husband and rushed over to him. She pushed his chest and begged him for answers, begged him for why these people had taken their daughter, begging for her safe return, but after receiving nothing, she had broken down. His arms caught her as they both fell to the floor, and leaned against the counter. Silent tears streamed down the young man's face at the thought of losing his daughter. He knew that this journey was either going to make or break the young Scott couple, but he was determined to hunt down these monsters and take back his daughter.

"What did he say?"

"He said, 'home is where the heart is. Home is also where you will find the answers to getting your daughter back.' I don't know what it means, and I just want Sawyer back!"

"I know what it means."

Lucas stood up, helping Peyton up, before rushing off to the bedroom where he slammed open the closet doors. He reached out and he grabbed the two big black suitcases out. He zipped them open on the bed, and he started throwing every piece of garment that they owned inside of them from the closet and from the furniture chests. Peyton heard a bunch of racket and followed him, watching her husband frantically pack.

"Where are we going?"

"The guy said, 'home is where the heart is.'"

The blonde author then closed the suitcases and put them next to the bed motioning for Peyton to take them out of the house. He rushed into Sawyer's room and he grabbed her little pink suitcase and he put her clothes into them. He then picked up her favorite doll from her bed that she slept with every single night, and he held it against his chest. It smelled just like his daughter, which only fueled the determination inside of him. Peyton walked back inside of the house and to their daughter's room where he was walking out with Sawyer's suitcase in his hand.

"You still haven't told me what's going on."

"Home is where the heart is, Peyton! We're going back to Tree Hill."

Lucas took his wife by the hand and practically ran out of the house. They got inside of his red car, and backed out of the garage. He shut it, knowing this was probably the last time that he was going to see this house. He peeled out of the driveway and sped down the street. He took off straight for the highway taking the familiar drive home. He hadn't been home to Tree Hill in four years since they had left.

"We're going to get her back."

Lucas said and he reached over putting his hand over Peyton's hand, locking his hand with hers. He looked towards the road and Peyton leaned her blonde head against the window and looked up at the sky silently praying for Sawyer's safe return for about the thousandth time that day since she had been taken from their hands. Circling in the sky, above the city, was a bunch of ravens. Peyton closed her eyes and waited for what seemed like the longest ride home in history.