CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

The man lay in the fetal position in a circle of candles, all melted to puddles on the dirt floor. My first thought was ritual. A sacrifice of some kind. But then I saw the matches lying by his hand. Brenin gingerly stepped over the wax puddles and looked down.

It was a matchbox, rather than a book of matches. I would expect that, given how old the body appeared to be. Leathery skin stretched over a skull topped with dark blond hair, the rest of him seeming no more than a bag of bones encased in clothing.

Then I got a closer look at that matchbox. A perfectly preserved wooden one, with a painted logo for an adventure supply store with a website address.

Brenin moved closer to the body and lowered his head to examine it, starting at the top. It was exactly as I’d thought from farther back—skin stretched tight over bone. But here I could see lesions, like pockmarks, dotting the cheeks.

Definitely male, a young man with stubble and hair a little longer than Ricky’s, drawn into a topknot. A modern hairstyle. Modern clothing, too, from a multi-pocketed khaki jacket to hiking boots to a T-shirt announcing that he’d survived whitewater rafting in the Devil’s Gorge. He didn’t survive this, though. Whatever this was.

When Brenin backed up, I spotted two items, half hidden under the young man’s corpse. A cell phone and an open notebook. Brenin used his nails to tug out the notebook. The ink had smeared too much to read, but words covered the pages, as if the guy had been scribbling notes right up until…well, whatever happened.

Another step back. Off to the side lay a backpack with a crowbar and flashlight. I remembered the hole above, the boards looking as if they’d been pried off.

Urban-explorer dude came into this room. Specifically into this room, tearing through the boards to get to it. Then he wrote that on the wall—

He didn’t write it. Ioan had been quiet, and his mental voice startled me.

The blood isn’t his, he continued.

Blood? Oh, it’s written in…

Yes. We can smell it, and Brenin can tell it’s not the same as that from the body. It’s also older. Significantly older. And from multiple sources.

Multiple…? Oh.

The writing was what this guy had come to see. He’d somehow known this room was down here and broken in to get a look at it.

And then surrounded himself with candles?

Beware the darkness.

He’d brought the candles. He’d come prepared.

He did, a voice said. Yet he didn’t listen. Wouldn’t listen.

It took a moment to realize that wasn’t Ioan’s voice. I looked over to see a man writing on the wall. Brenin moved closer, and I saw the man’s finger…the end bloodied and raw, bone poking through as he wrote in blood.

I gave a start, and Ioan said, Liv? What do you see?

You don’t? I asked.

No.

The man turned. He wasn’t much older than me, dressed in old-fashioned pajamas and a bathrobe, cinched tight. He tucked his hand into his pocket.

“My apologies. That was rude. Nasty to look at, I’m sure. But I had to do something. We all did. We had to warn the others. Not that it ever worked. One can’t hide from the darkness. Which never stops us from trying, does it?”

“You’re talking to me, right?”

He looked around. “I don’t see anyone else.”

His gaze was fixed above the hound’s head, where my face would be if I were standing there. The ghost was addressing what he must have seen and heard as another person.

“Tell me about the darkness,” I said.

A brief, wry smile. “I don’t need to, and that would waste our time, wouldn’t it? The darkness is here. It is always here. It waits, and it feeds. Now it just waits. For you, apparently.”

“Who am I?”

The man chuckled. “If you don’t know that, I can’t help you. If you’re testing me again, it’s a waste of time. I know only that you are the one they’ve been waiting for.” He pursed his lips and tilted his head, as if listening. “Though apparently, you are unfashionably early.”

“Bad habit. Why are you here?”

“Can’t leave. Well, I could, but I avoided that particular fate.” He shuddered. “The red birds. You know of them?”

“Melltithiwyd.”

“Gesundheit.” He smiled. “If that’s what they’re called, I’ll stick with calling them red birds.”

“You escaped them? Does that mean you were supposed to be taken by them?”

“Everyone is, if they’re brought down here. Along with everyone who comes down here voluntarily.” He nodded at the young man’s corpse. “My job is to warn them. My self-appointed task. Most, sadly, paid me no heed. When you’re mad, it’s hard to put much stake in the words of a ghost telling you to run for your life. One hears such things too often to be taken seriously. Some, though, had a chance. Like him. But he wouldn’t listen. Couldn’t seem to hear me, which is a shame, because he came here quite determined to see ghosts. I glimpsed his journal there. He followed some tale about this place. Perhaps a story told by someone I did save? He came quite prepared against the darkness. But not against the darkness, if you know what I mean.”

“Candles don’t hold off that darkness. Not for long.”

“I really did hope to save him. I even wrote on the wall for him, and he could see that and became quite excited. Started taking pictures with his device.” The ghost sighed. “Mortal terror would have been so much more helpful.”

“You said others were brought down here?”

“Food for the darkness. Souls for the…slooy-ah, is it? I heard some say that word, before they died. A couple of the old ones, talking in their old language.”

I nodded. “The sluagh. You were food for the sluagh that lived here.”

“For their bird things. We fed the birds and then became them—the others did, at least. Not quite certain how I escaped, but I’m grateful for it. One might argue that I deserved such a fate. I would disagree. Wasn’t in my right mind. Murder is a mortal sin, but when your child is…” He shook his head. “I went too far in my vengeance. I know that. Something snapped in my head, and I am certain I will pay the price with my immortal soul, but for whatever reason, I did not pay it by becoming one of them.”

“Were the other victims all like you? Here for some crime?”

“There for some crime.” He pointed above, at the hospital. “And then here for it.” He pointed into the room. “Spirited down to await the devouring darkness. Which is not why you’re here at all, though, is it?”

“Why am I here?”

He chuckled again. “I’m hoping that’s another of your tests, and you know the answer. They want you. They’ve been waiting for you. They need you. I don’t know why. The trick, I presume, is not to give them what they want and, with that, to free me and the tormented souls in their flock.” He peered at me. “That is your plan, correct? You don’t wish to join them?”

“I’m not really for jumping on the bandwagon of evil. It’s never as much fun as it seems.”

He grinned. “Excellent. I would agree, which is perhaps why I managed to abstain. You’ll defeat them, then?”

“I’m guessing if I ask for tips, I’ll only get a hearty good luck and fare thee well?”

“Oh, no. I’ve been here a very long time. I cannot physically help you. But I have made observations that could come in handy.”

“Thank you.”