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.”