Superstitious people are often afraid of crows. Heralds of bad tidings, so goes tradition. But then, that sort of thing isn’t real, now is it?

Cornixomancers are obsessed with crows. A murder of crows follows them wherever they go, sometimes from a distance, sometimes up close. They feed them, talk to them, and love them perhaps more than is healthy. In return, the murder serves its master with perturbing and uncanny intelligence.
Cornixomancers draw on the power of the fear that crows put in people, they use the power of an omen to bring about misfortune and tragedy, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. Their crows foretell the coming of tragedy, tragedy which often takes the form of the Cornixomancer himself.
Symbolic Tension: Crows are hated, feared, and shunned as omens of death, tragedy and general misfortune. However, the tragedies they predict, the scenes of war and death, are more truthfully the result of mankind’s own violence.

Minor Charges: You gain a minor charge by allowing your crows to feast upon the corpse of an animal, or upon someone’s livelihood, like a farmer’s crop or a grocer’s wares. They must be allowed to consume a substantial quantity, and any attempts to shoo them must be foiled or at least delayed for a number of minutes. If the target is a corpse, your crows (and therefore you) must have been in the general area at the time of its death. If multiple animals die in the same event, only one charge is gained.
Significant Charges: Allow your crows to consume the corpse of a person. The rules above still apply.
Major Charges: Allow your crows to feed at a tragedy that takes the lives of many people and receives widespread media attention, or any place where upwards of 100 people die in one event. The rules for minor charges still apply (though only a large group of people could feasibly keep your crows from feeding).
Charging Tips: Crows foretell the coming of death. Crows follow the Cornixomancer. See the connection? Causing the tragedy yourself isn’t just allowed, its encouraged.

Taboo: Crows are not good luck. Whenever the Cornixomancer or anyone around him rolls from 1 to 10 on any test not related to combat or otherwise messing up somebody’s day, he loses all charges. Pretty much anything is bad luck for someone, but as a general rule as long as it isn’t directly endangering someone’s life or livelihood, it breaks taboo. This only applies if the roll below 10 is actually enough to pass.

Minor Formulas:
Beak and Claw (2 charges):
The Cornixomancy minor blast. Causes crows to swarm and aggress a target. Because they actually need to be able to peck the target to hurt it, shelter or riot gear will likely negate damage, but this will still make for a convincing distraction.
Crowspeak (1 charge):
With this formula you can give a murder of crows a simple instruction, like “wait here” or “fly around over there” or give a single crow a complex instruction like “fetch me that man’s hat” or “Go tell Jim the password”. Crows can speak single words as instructed, but cannot relay full sentences and certainly cannot reveal information they have seen.
Caw (2 charges):
The soul-piercing cry of a crow rings out unnaturally loud and clear as crows gather and watch with glassy eyes. Anyone an area may choose to leave that area and avoid it for the next hour or make an Unnatural test with rank equal to half the tens digit of the adept’s Cornixomancy skill, rounded up. That’s a minimum of 1 at 10 and a maximum of 5 at 90.
Harry (3 charges):
A crow follows the target for 1 day plus an additional day for each charge spent. That person takes a minus 5 shift on every test he makes.
Carrion (1 charge):
A target is rendered unpleasant and uncomfortable to be around until they take a bath or shower. Anyone they meet will try to avoid or shoo this person without knowing why. This can be used to distress people and garner suspicion for them in others, and perhaps can be used on an ally to avoid detection; guards will not flee their posts, but they will not approach you either.
Significant Formulas:
Murder (2 charges):
This is the Cornixomancy significant blast.
Tidings of Woe (2 charges):
The target must be able to see or hear at least one crow for this formula to work. The target gains a minus 10 shift on all tests; minus 15 if 3 charges are spent, 20 if 4 and so on. Every time he fails a test, he needs to make a Helplessness test of a rank equal to the number of tests he’s failed since the effect started (1, 2, 3…). The effect ends as soon as the target passes a test.
Macabre Foreshadowing (4 charges):
This chaotic formula causes crows to congregate in an area and ensures that some disaster will befall it. Likely candidates include a disease outbreak, an eight car pile-up, an exploding gas mane… A powerful spell, but impossible to predict. These disasters usually aren’t big enough to generate a major charge, but that doesn’t stop Cornixomancers from trying.
Death Call (4 charges):
Puts a curse on a target that manipulates wounds towards his vitals, turning a paper cut into an infection or a nasty fall into a broken neck. Whenever the target takes damage from any source, roll another d% and add the result to the damage dealt. The effects last for six days.
Nevermore (1 charge):
Forces a target to make a rank 8 Isolation or Unnatural test.
Ornixomancer Major effects:
Kill one person instantaneously, cause a disaster or war from which you cannot receive a major charge, start a plague, make a permanent Tidings of Woe, Carrion, or Caw effect.