Within minutes we arrive at the cemetery. We leave the car outside the high iron gates. Bram carries the rifle, Louis the pistol. The instant I set foot within the boundary of the graveyard I am assailed by disturbed and agitated spirits. They clamor and call out, some angry, some frightened, all stirred by the activities that have taken place here. I notice spectral shapes flitting between the headstones, and clearly spy at least two demons.

“We are too late!” I tell the others. “Stricklend has opened a way into the Darkness.”

“And a way out,” says Louis, pointing to a low, growling creature behind a mausoleum.

Bram raises his rifle.

“No!” I tell him. “Let it be. I will try to send it back, to send them all back. But first we must find Stricklend and Willoughby.”

“It’s so dark,” says Bram. “And this place is vast. They could be anywhere. We should split up and search.”

“There is no need.” I lead the way as I speak. “I know precisely where he will be.” Without hesitation I head for my father’s grave. That is where my Cavalier saw him. That is where he will remain until his task is complete. Or until I stop him. I must not be distracted by the foul beasts and tortured souls who dash hither and thither. The closer we get to the fissure in the Rubicon, the nearer to the source of the bitter magic that is being so ruthlessly used, the louder the spirits cry out to me, begging me to help them, to rescue them from the Darkness, to send them to the Land of Night, or even to make them live again and tread the earth once more in the Land of Day.

They know. They all of them know what I am become.

At last we reach the mighty cedar tree. Beneath it I see a swirling mass of spirit forms and phantoms and shape-shifting sorcerers attempting to escape their purgatory. In the midst of it all stands Stricklend, and at his side, as perfectly human to look at as if he had not lived several hundred years ago, Edmund Willoughby. This Dark Spirit is working hard to hold back the hordes that would escape and to rid his master of the troublesome demons. Stricklend whirls about as I approach, and it is satisfying to see the surprise on his face at finding me here.

“You!” he hisses. “Even now, you seek to thwart my plans. Even though you are…”

“Dead? Oh, come now, you surely did not believe I would be so easily disposed of.”

Bram and Louis stand on either side of me. Stricklend sneers at their guns.

“I see you have your own little army, Morningstar. How quaint. Clearly you feel the lack of your own corporeal presence, now that you are required to walk only in spirit.”