Candles flickered to life. Dozens of them were spaced about the room. They lit a wooden floor. They lit the backs of cowering children, huddled in clumps around the room’s corners, their heads bowed as they tried to avoid notice. And they lit the woman behind Leanne.

Patience towered over her. The milky-white eyes stared into her, boring into her soul. They sat in a pale face, emotionless, unmoving, crowned with black hair. Her dress made no noise as she moved. The only sound that came from her was the heavy wooden cane clutched in her bony hand. She lifted it and let it drop. The sound seemed to run through Leanne, coursing along her bones like shivers.

I am so afraid of you. But why? Slowly, heart thundering, Leanne forced herself to look up, to raise her gaze over Patience’s thin lips, over her sharp nose and colourless cheeks, to meet those milky eyes. “Why am I afraid of you?”

“I hope she dies soon,” Leanne whispered.

Henry giggled, bowed over his bowl of stew. Across the table from them, Patience paced, circling the room with steady, measured steps.

At Leanne’s words, the eyes swivelled towards her. The pupils stared through the sheen. Leanne’s heart faltered. She lowered her head, trying to escape those horrible eyes, her throat tight and her stomach squirming. Patience couldn’t have heard. She’d been careful to keep her voice soft. And yet, the clicking noise was moving closer, louder, and she could still feel the eyes on her, unblinking…

The cane thudded a final time on the stones behind Leanne’s chair. She was frozen, terrified, head down, one hand clutching her empty spoon. The hand touched her shoulder. Heavy and cold. Patience bent down, close to her head, so that her wheezing breaths swirled across Leanne’s ear.

“I have been dead for a very long time,” the woman whispered.

Leanne took a shuddering breath. The memory had been lost for decades, but it rushed back, sharp and fresh. Leanne raised her own hand and cautiously rested it on top of Patience’s.

She was hiding in the cupboard, nestled between old blankets and the wooden wall. She hadn’t heard the warning signal that the game of hide-and-seek was over. She hadn’t known Patience was home. And the cane tapped on the hallway floor, growing closer. Louder. Matching the beating of Leanne’s heart.

A shadow moved across the gap at the base of the floor. The cane tapped for a final time, loud enough to echo. The silence was agony.

Leanne raised her second hand to cover her mouth. She was cold all of a sudden. So desperately cold that she wanted to gasp. She closed her eyes, squeezing them, as though she could escape Patience in the black inside her head.