Now I want to turn back even more, and I wonder why we’re continuing on.

‘I think we should leave,’ I hiss to Liam. ‘I don’t like this. Let’s just go.’

He turns and sees the worry on my face. ‘Don’t worry,’ he says, keeping his voice low. ‘It’ll be fine. I just want to have a word, that’s all. Tell him to leave us alone.’

‘What if he’s dangerous?’

Liam answers by pulling out a switchblade from his pocket. My eyes widen even more in alarm. ‘What are you doing with that?’ I ask in alarm.

‘Protection,’ he explains. ‘In case we need it.’

I swallow hard. ‘This is crazy. We should go back. We shouldn’t be here.’

‘He shouldn’t be here,’ Liam retorts, tugging his hand from mine. ‘He’s trespassing.’

He continues up the stairs toward a small wooden door. I watch him push it open and realise that I am faced with a choice; I can follow him, or I can stay here on my own. I don’t want to do either, but I figure it’s better to stick together and that there’s safety in numbers, so I run up the stairs behind him.

We enter a large hallway – what was once probably a grand entrance hall – with a sweeping staircase leading up to a viewing gallery on the first floor above us. Doors lead off the hall, as well as a long corridor running in both directions the length of the house.

Liam puts his phone away. He doesn’t need the torch any more: sunlight is streaming in through holes in the broken roof above us. I gaze around. Once upon a time there were probably antlers and portraits of ancestors stuck to the wall, and maybe even swords or coats of arms. I imagine it probably looked like a hunting lodge – but now it’s desolate and bare, the stone walls streaked with soot, scorched and blackened from where the flames must have licked it clean. I spot bird nests on the window ledges and droppings all over the pitted flagstone floor. Puddles of water have collected here and there and turned stagnant, giving off a musty odour.

The grand, sweeping staircase that curves around the hallway to the upper level is interrupted in several places, the stones having caved in and formed an avalanche of rubble at the back of the room. There’s no way of getting to the upper storeys now, which is something of a relief.

‘Come on,’ Liam says, walking further into the hall.

Anxiety crawls up my spine and clutches me around the neck like one of those gargoyles outside clinging to the stonework, strangling me and making it hard to breathe.