Korvus Skurr is one of the two main antagonists of the Redwall series book, Doomwyte. He is a large and powerful raven and the leader of the Doomwytes, a horde of birds and reptiles within Mossflower Woods.
History[]
Korvus first appears as the sinister leader of the Doomwytes, a horde of birds and reptiles that live within a large cavern in Mossflower Woods. On the regular, they would sacrifice whichever creatures wind up being lured by Doomwytes using their glow and captured by them. The sacrifices involve the creatures being boiled alive to death in a steaming, bubbling pool and/or fed to a catfish. Their skeletal remains would be displayed in large piles within the lair that had rotted for a while. According to Skurr, this horde has existed for thousands of seasons. The horde worships a statue of a raven with a snake on top of its head; however, the eyes of both creatures are missing. His advisor, Sicariss, is perched on top of his head. She frequently leaves to speak to the massive catfish, Welzz, whom Skurr believes can see the future and feeds his victims to. His ultimate goal is to find the eyes of the statue, the Great Doomwyte Idol, the eyes being emeralds which had been stolen long ago by Gonff the Mousethief. He would usually interrogate whichever creatures that get captured on if they know about the whereabouts of the eyes and sacrifices them to their horrible fates if they don't know, having Sicariss hypnotize them to confirm the truth too.
Once he hears that the eyes of the Doomwyte statue are hidden somewhere in Redwall Abbey, he sends some of his Ravenwytes, whom he considers his brothers, to retrieve them. When they fail and return, one of them has been killed and Skurr refuses to feed him to the Welzz. Instead, he chooses to feed it the Snakewytes, Sicariss's own minions. When Skurr decides he needs something to strike fear into the hearts of the Redwallers, he makes a pact with the blind adder Baliss. In return for terrorizing the Redwallers, Skurr promises him all the reptiles in his domain as food, much to the horror of Sicariss. Baliss fails, and, as a result, gets the bunch of hedgehog spikes lodged in his snout. The pain drives Baliss insane and seeks to get revenge on the one he blames for his pain, Korvus Skurr.
After seeing one of their brothers, who the Redwallers killed earlier, being eaten by Baliss, the other ravens begin to desert Korvus. Once Baliss begins his rampage through the Doomwyte's domain, Skurr loses full command of his horde. After Baliss kills Welzz, Skurr and his army attempt to escape, but are caught in a battle with the Redwallers. Korvus tries to make his escape, but his light, which is a glowing liquid all Wytes wear on their forehead, is quickly spotted by Zaran, an otter whose family was murdered by Skurr. The two wrestle until Korvus drowns in a stream. The remaining Wytes are killed shortly after, and the cavern is brought down, killing Baliss.