I was inside Brenin now. Seeing through his eyes. That’s what Ioan had done. Not a trap, but a surprise. Showing me what the Cŵn Annwn saw, watching through the eyes of their spies.

Would have been a lot easier if he’d just said that.

Easier, perhaps, but not nearly as entertaining. Ioan’s voice, in the hound with me.

I ignored him. I was seeing through Brenin’s eyes, inside the hospital, and that was worth my full attention.

Now that I knew what was happening, I realized it wasn’t exactly like witnessing it myself, but rather like looking through narrow glasses, a sphere of perfect clear vision surrounded by a blurred perimeter. At that periphery, I kept catching glimpses of colors and flashes of motion, but even when Brenin swiveled his head in the right direction, I saw nothing but a wall.

He padded along a corridor filled with debris, leaping over it absently as he trotted, his attention focused on senses other than sight. Tracking those voices. Every now and then one would echo in just the right way for me to catch a word or two, and he’d pause to lift his head.

Liv?

At Ioan’s prompt, I understood Brenin was pausing to give me time to identify the voices.

“One is Walter,” I said. “I don’t recognize…” I trailed off, something poking at the back of my memory, and I amended to, “I don’t think I recognize the other.”

Brenin continued down the corridor. When a pile of debris blocked his path, he nosed it, pushing aside a plank to see that, beyond the blockage, the ceiling had caved in. He snorted in annoyance and headed the other way, faster now, retracing his steps. We passed where we’d come in and hit another block.

This time, nosing aside broken wood let him wriggle through a spot that seemed improbable even for a beast half his size. Then he took a slow look around, assessing his options. Ioan spoke to him in Welsh, his voice low, seeming more to soothe the cŵn’s frustrations than give him directions.

Brenin set out more slowly as he moved along the passage. He stepped into a room, his big head swinging from side to side. Something flickered in the corner, an image that wouldn’t quite take hold. He ignored that and looked instead at a far door. He padded through the room for a closer look. The door was closed, knob long gone. Brenin tilted his head, listening, and I picked up voices again. Walter and…

I recognized the second voice then. Grace’s cousin, Jack, who’d been the one to refer me to Grace’s building. Who’d sent me on my way to Cainsville.

Then, from behind us, a whisper.

“Find the darkness. Need to find the darkness.”