-Susan-

Chayton and I walk up to the ferry ticket office and I place the card Walter gave me on the counter. The clerk notices Chayton's ritual robes. Though it's unusual to him, he doesn't comment on it. He looks at the card, then says, "Yes ma'am, we've been expecting you. The ferry is ready for your departure." Oh?

"Well that's a surprise. Thank you." I smile. We turn and head for the gangway. The ferry master is standing onboard at the other end, waiting for us. When we reach him, he says, "We will be underway momentarily. Please sit down." He waves his hand at two men standing on the dock. They remove the gangway and untie the ferry. The ferry master picks up a microphone and announces over the speaker system, "Underway." The ferry begins to move away from the dock.

While we're crossing the Sound, Chayton and I take this opportunity to summon our spirit guides for special guidance to help open ourselves to the spirit world and to protect us from any harm. Mine is a distant relative and his is a shaman from the 1700's. In doing this, we will be able to see whatever is on the island.

We arrive at the landing, get off the ferry, thanking the ferry master along the way, and immediately follow the path leading to the castle.

As we're walking, our senses are stirred by the presence of spirits long past. Some are American Indians. None of them speak; they only watch us. Chayton slightly bows to a few of them, paying respect to them. They peacefully gesture in acknowledgement.

Soon, I begin to sense hatred and the feeling as though someone planned to murder someone close to them. It's coming from my right, in the trees. This is residual energy; a replay of things from the past. I look in that direction. There's a woman in a formal white and yellow Edwardian dress, walking with a man, holding hands with him. His face is blurry. Sometimes this happens; sometimes their faces are not fully revealed–or at all. I narrow my eyes as I try to understand what I'm witnessing. My spirit guide brings the scene closer to me in a vision that's almost like watching it live.

The woman seems very familiar but I can't place her yet. There's white light coming out of her eyes and her mouth every time she opens it. Her skin is perfect; everything about her projects angelic. Even her body has a white aura around it. But I can feel this is all a lie. She's bad–very bad. Anytime I see something like that, it ends up being the opposite of what it portrays itself as.
Everything is happening in flashes now.

The man pulls her down to a blanket and whispers something I assume is romantic to her, which draws a smile from her. They both have secret plans, now I'm realizing. She wants energy–his energy, and more of it–and he wants to kill her because he knows she's eventually going to kill him. Now I'm really beginning to think she's that thing inside Mr. Francis.

Chayton stops to join in the vision, then he utters a low disturbed grunt.
The man and woman start to kiss, and in the middle of that, he reaches behind him and pulls a pistol out. She doesn't notice. Suddenly, he shoots her in the temple. As she falls back, he glowers at her, watching her blood stream onto the blanket. In an instant, I see a bolt of white energy leave her mouth and go straight into his head. At that same instant, the spirit of the woman rises and stands a few feet away silently glaring. She then fades away like a mist blown in the wind.

He backs away and stands up from the blanket dropping the gun with a painful shout and grabs his face, pressing on his temples hard. It does no good. He falls to his knees and then hits the ground, unconscious.

I squeeze my eyes shut, then look to a different place.
One of her victims. I do wonder how many she's had.

"Medea." Chayton mutters.
I questionably glance at him, "...That woman out there?"

He nods ahead, "You didn't hear it?"
"Hear what...?" I slowly ask.

"The whispers within the trees said the imposture's name is Medea. She possessed someone living here at this castle." He then looks at me, "Her name is not Rozalia; her name is Medea. That is her true name. She is an ancient entity from another world; an inter-dimensional traveler. She came here because humans are easy prey. The people of this land learned this and told me."

"Oh my god," I murmur. "You said possessed...not possesses. She doesn't anymore?"
"She has moved to a new host." He says.
"I wonder if we will meet again..." I say.

As we're getting closer to the castle, we start to see Walter patiently waiting outside the front doors. I study the place up and down, admiring it, but also watching some other residual spirits. Some of the men that were hired to help build this place are still hammering nails into wood and the stonemasons are still laying bricks down. A few of them died on the job over the few years it took to build this magnificent building.

Finally, we reach Walter. He bows in greeting. Chayton does the same back and I smile. "Good morning Walter, this is Chayton. He is a shaman from one of the greater tribes of New York. I will be assisting him in the cleansing. I must say...this is a very beautiful castle."

He smiles proudly, "Yes it is. Thank you and good morning to you. It's a pleasure to meet you sir." Chayton smiles briefly at him, then forms a very serious look as he stares straight ahead.

"Is there anyone in the castle or on the property?" I ask.
"No Ms. Winters, as per your instructions."

"Good. Before we get started Walter...there are some things I must warn you about."
"Yes Miss Winters?"

"We ask that you keep an open mind during this cleansing and you may experience some discomfort."

"Discomfort? How do you mean?"
"You may be touched, or feel extreme cold or heat; also, you may feel ill or dizzy. These spirits can make you uncomfortable in an effort to make us stop the cleansing. We ask that you do what you can to get through this."

"Miss Winters...I don't believe most of what you say. But, I will get through this regardless of the circumstances." He opens a door and waves us in, "Please come inside."
I nod, Chayton firmly dips his head, and we move on.

My first step inside sends a highly overwhelming mixture of emotions through my body. I don't like this at all. I turn to see Chayton coming through the door and I hear a gush of wind. Suddenly I have a feeling something ferocious is filling my personal space. I look in front of me and see a very, very tall coal-black entity suddenly materialize. It bends down into my face then quickly switches to Chayton while forming the facial features of a malicious vampiric woman. She takes in a deep breath and screams, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?! GET OUT!!!" Her voice is extremely shrill and rough. It hurts! Walter cannot see or hear any of this. I gesture him to stay behind me just in case.

I've never seen anything like that before either!
Walter notices us reacting to something, but sees nothing.

Chayton takes a peacock feather out of his bag and swipes it at her. She vanishes immediately with an angry wail.

He turns to me, "We begin the cleansing now. Is there a basement?"
"Yes there is... This way." Walter says. We follow him across the grand room to a hall on the left side of the staircase. We walk up it until he stops at a nondescript door and opens it. There inside, is a single-man set of stairs leading down. He offers to go first, but Chayton says no. Walter stands by and waits for Chayton and I to proceed down when I hear him say ouch. I turn around and see him reaching around to his lower back. "Are you alright Walter?" He has a look of confusion and seems to be a little out of breath. "I believe I feel a burning sensation."

"Do you want me to look at it?" I ask. He straightens himself and looks me in the eyes, "No Miss Winters...let us continue." Chayton lets out an impatient sigh and turns back around. "We go now." he says. I light a sage stick and blow it out so it smolders. The smoke is prevalent and has an immediate effect on the general feeling of the area. I also have a spray bottle containing holy water just in case.

We get to the bottom of the stairs without any other incident and begin to go into every room in the basement. There are many, and Walter is unlocking every one. Most of the rooms are empty, and some have old furniture in storage. We come to a door that he hesitates to open.

"Is there a problem Walter?" I ask.
"This room is the private files room. Ordinarily, I would not open this door for anyone, but...Mr. Francis did say complete access..." He unlocks the door and just when he turns the knob, it flies open with great force and a gust of hot damp air hits all of us in the face. The air smells like road kill. Then we hear all manner of noises coming from the room. Screaming, laughing, banging–just total demonic unrest! Walter hears and sees all of this, and now he is as white as a sheet of paper. I tell him, "Please stay here in the hall if it helps you." He looks at both of us in amazement–probably because we don't appear to be frightened. We know this is all for show, but he doesn't. He decides to stick with us and follows us in.

Chayton's attention is focused on the far left corner of the room. We turned the lights on, but that corner is completely dark. I can hear some breathing coming from there. The darkness begins to envelope the room one inch at a time. It's moving toward us and we feel the temperature dropping. Chayton stands his ground and begins to chant. He holds the feather toward the darkness and I see his eyes narrowing. I start retreating to the door with Walter but stop short of backing into him. Chayton is chanting faster as the darkness reaches him. I see the face of a woman in the middle of it and she is screaming at him. He chants even louder to match her voice and then he disappears inside the darkness. I panic and scream at it. My spirit guide reaches for me in my mind and tells me, "Do not be afraid...it is an illusion." Walter is holding my right arm very tight and it's beginning to hurt. The light from the hall is starting to glow brighter and all of a sudden I can see Chayton again. He is standing in front of me with his hands together holding the feather.

"This room is finished, let's move on." He says. I cannot explain what happened. I just know this is why I asked him to be here. The rest of the basement is quiet, but we still must do every room.

We return to the grand room and continue on the main floor.
Chayton reaches into his bag hanging from his shoulder and takes out a rattle. It's handmade and looks pretty old. Next, he takes out another feather and a bottle of water. Walter asks, "Is that Holy water?" Chayton then smiles and says, "No...sometimes I get a little thirsty when I do this." Walter looks at me as I smile up at him. Chayton hands me the feather and says, "For protection." I take it and we continue to follow the shaman around the grand room as he shakes his rattle, gently sways his feather and chants something in the language of his people in a low voice. While he's doing this, I fan the smoke from my sage stick around with my feather.

There are many ghosts from different eras here; most of them are friends to Mr. Francis. But they're like the men outside; they're residual. They're walking around, holding beverages of all sorts, smoking cigars and behaving like there is a party going on. At least they're happy. The few friends that are aware of their surroundings come to me with warning; "You shouldn't be here! Rozalia will return soon!" I look at them and say through my mind, "You don't have to worry about her anymore. You're free." They get quiet and very curious.

They follow us past the grand staircase, into a hallway and through a door that leads into the Ballroom. There, we meet an older Romanian man named Corneliu. He is very protective of the castle and is concerned for Nicolai. He speaks broken English; but it's well enough for me to understand.

His problem is...he believes his life ended way too early and all he wants now is for 'Rozalia' to be gone. Or so he should know–her name is Medea. I tell him everything will be taken care of and not to worry.

He follows us around, constantly in my ear about making sure I do this right. It's a little annoying. He also mentions the one that got in my face earlier is Jennifer and he strongly advises that I should be careful about her.

The farther we go, the more we start to hear banging, pops, screams, glass shattering and things sliding across the floor. The screams are from two distinct female spirits. I recognize one from earlier at the front door but the other is unknown as of yet. I get a strong feeling like someone was held against their will down here. My wrists are getting a little sore as this becomes clearer to me. I can't understand it fully.

I'm seeing something about a woman from the 1920's being pushed up against a wall by a big man. He pins her wrists against the stone wall, aggressively kissing and licking her neck. He thinks she's funny. She gasps and screams as he suddenly clamps his jaw down on her neck. My eyes light up. He throws his head back with a deep throaty laugh as she slides down the wall, holding the bloody bite mark and crying. He stops laughing and yanks her back up to lick her neck again. Then suddenly, the episode ends.

I realize I haven't taken a breath for some time now. A few more times, I rub my wrists and choose to keep this to myself. I'm curious to know who these people were. What a strange, evil, twisted man. I hope he's paying for what he's done. That girl is residual, thank goodness. She's moved on. This scene is a memory that will never leave the castle. Terrible–just terrible.

We leave the Ballroom through a side door and enter a long hallway. There is a sitting room just across and over to my right. When we go in there, we all notice the pictures on the walls are tilting sideways while the vases on the table near the fireplace tremble. There are two chandeliers swinging back and forth and an ashtray keeps sliding around in a perfect circle on the floor. It amazes Walter. He's watching it all with wide eyes.

"Keep an open mind Walter." I remind him.
His response is a mere nod.

Chayton never stops chanting or shaking his rattle. Sometimes he raises his voice. The smoke from my sage stick makes each room we go in feel so much heavier than before. It's a little hard on my body. All this activity stops before we leave each room. Chayton will not move on until it does. The last place we go to on this floor is the kitchen.

We step inside and immediately, the hanging pots start to shake, the cabinet drawers open and slam shut as well as the cupboard doors, and the lights are flickering on and off. I hear bare feet slapping the floor around the counter closest to me. I raise an eyebrow. 'I hear you but I can't see you...' I think to myself. I get a sudden flash of a dark-haired vampiric woman in my mind. It's a different woman; this one is vicious but not nearly as bad as Jennifer. I ask her name–in case she might still have one. My answer is a scream and a jab in the nape of my neck, making me wince and grunt. I wait for a few seconds. Nothing. I sense she's left the room. The pain from the jab makes me want to rub my neck, but I can't put my feather or sage down. This is too important.

Chayton doesn't lose his focus, though I know he is a little concerned by what just happened. Walter is trying to stay as calm as possible but he wears a worried expression as he looks at a double sink. The water is coming out of the faucet but it's curving into the other sink.

"I've never seen this happen before." he says in a voice as if trying not to gasp while he watches everything moving in random ways. He then asks me, "Are you alright?"
Fanning smoke toward the counter, I glance at him and say, "I was poked in the back of my neck but I'm okay." He becomes a bit fazed.

We leave the kitchen and head upstairs to the second floor.
The bedrooms aren't as active but we are definitely in the presence of those malevolent ones. They really don't want us here and are trying to do everything in their power to force us out. The mattresses on the beds shake and slightly jump up and down, and the curtains blow around. Corneliu stands by us with little to no emotion on his face, but I know he is disgusted by what is going on. This is not Jennifer causing all the chaos in here; it's the one that poked me. She's back to hiding herself. I already know she hasn't been dead long; it truly stuns me that she has advanced so quickly in such a short amount of time. Even with help from other spirits, it couldn't work. Spirits learn in their own time. But then again, I don't think this one is human. I don't know what she is.

Every room on this floor is quite extraordinary, I must admit. Walter explains that each bedroom represents a castle Mr. Vladoiu, the owner of this castle, has been to. Some of them are very unique; so exquisite I fall in love with them right off the bat. Chayton seems to like them too. However, we don't have much time to admire them like we want to. This floor is just mad with a feeling of vertigo. Balls of bright light come at us at terrific speeds just missing our bodies as they go by. These spirits really hate us.

We leave one room and start to enter another but we stop in our tracks to seeing ourselves walking at the other end of the hallway.

"How is that possible?!" Walter asks. Chayton looks at him and I, saying, "Sometimes, they can make you see what they want you to see. They want you to think you have lost your mind and want to leave this place. I have seen this many times. We will continue and finish what we are here for." Hesitant, Walter nods and puts his hand on my shoulder. He was very skeptical before we started, but now I am pretty sure he has no doubts about any of this. He looks quite worried, but in a positive way.

We go upstairs to the third floor. Some rooms are very eerie, less active and give off the gut-wrenching, sick feeling. In almost every one we step into, we're greeted by different odors. Some are pleasant; like flowers or perfume...and others are just terrible with the scent of rotting flesh. But nothing really happens–except the walls sounding like they're going to bow in on us. Little shadows continue to jump from one side of the hallway to the other. They're making the lights flash. Overall...I would say everything is calm before the storm...

We go to the last door in the hall first. It's locked. Automatically, I feel sick to my stomach. I turn to Walter and gesture towards the knob. He lets out a heavy sigh, "This is Mr. Francis' private quarters..." Oh...I see.
I remind him, "We must have full access." He purses his lips and nods, unlocking the door.

I step in first and my attention immediately focuses on the bed. The bedspread in on the floor and there is someone or something writhing under the sheets. Chayton sees this and quickly goes around me, raising his voice and flicking his feather at the bed. The sheets go flat and tight to the mattress. He turns to me and smiles like a little kid who just did something wonderful. "Let's move on." he says. I think he is really enjoying himself now.

The things making me feel sick are black entities everywhere in all shapes and sizes, created by the living and the dead. They're called PK manifestations, which are confused as poltergeists but are made by humans who have abilities. They are complete darkness; never were human; all made of negative energy. It's up to Chayton to get rid of them. But he needs me with him in the areas they stay in most. Both he and I use our feathers on the masses. I make sure to fan extra smoke at them. They don't like this at all. Their forms contort and squirm along the walls, toward the closet. We follow them into it. Another wave of uneasiness sickens me. It's very, very strong now.

I smell and feel death straight ahead. The words 'kill' and 'murder' keep going through my head. I don't understand it but I know this–it's really bad. The masses are gone. I would voice my opinion on this stuff but I don't want to scare Walter any more.

We walk into the adjoining kitchen suite and notice something rattling. Our eyes trace the sound to the glasses and dishware in the cabinets. A plate flies off a shelf and smashes into a wall, a loud bloodcurdling screech filling our ears at that same moment. I wince and quickly wave sage smoke toward the counters and shelves. A low grumble starts vibrating the floor. It sounds like something is building up. My attention trails over near the sink where a bottle of wine is starting to boil. I continue waving the smoke in that direction, more seriously now. Chayton puts his rattle away and sprays holy water at it. There's an infuriated hiss and a door swings open, almost coming off the hinges.

The room has now fallen silent.
Whoever that is, they've just left.

Staring wide-eyed at the boiling wine, Walter clears his throat and nods once at us.
He then leads us into Mr. Francis's office.

Everything is calm in here–despite the nonstop banging, door slamming, pops, creaking and screaming outside. I look around suspiciously. There's a very odd sound coming from the desk; something like stepping on and off an old squeaky floorboard. It looks like it isn't moving, but I'm positive that's where the noise is coming from. Walter is focusing on it intently. Suddenly, it jumps and slides across the floor toward him. He gasps, quickly backing up. I hurry toward it, swish smoke at it and we all hear a loud growl. He holds his chest, "Oh my!" I place a hand on his shoulder once the desk stops moving, "Keep as calm as you can." He inhales deeply and blinks a couple times in amazement.

"AaaaaAAAAHHH!!!" The lights brighten as the glass-shattering scream shakes the windows. Suddenly the bulbs burst, and the door to the hall slowly opens. I hear a breath behind me. Slightly, I turn my head, but just as I do, something shoots into my back and squeezes my heart tightly. "Ugh!" I clutch my chest, wincing, breathing quickly. I'm surprised I'm not dropping to the floor. "Miss Winters, are you alright?" Walter gasps. I scowl, "No, I will not let you IN!!!" I cross my feather over my heart and flick it at the door. I'm instantly released and nearly fall to my knees. Chayton approaches me and searches my face. I breathe heavily a few times before I sigh, "I'm fine." Staring at me, he gives me a gentle nod and then Walter an assuring, permissive expression. Hesitantly, Walter bows his head and we follow him out.

For a little bit, each room we go in only feels heavy. It's the feeling of being targeted by something lingering in the shadows, toying with us. Some rooms are extremely uncomfortable. I think I'm being targeted most of all. On and off, I'm getting images of my worst fear; shadow people murdering my family and imprisoning them in the afterlife. My family would be tortured and used until they fade to nothing. Very powerful entities or spirits can do that. It's very hard to continue with this happening to me. I almost want to stop, but I remind myself of the poor man in the hospital...and that creature I saw. No, this is just a threat–a threat that I choose not to believe. Nothing will stop me!

We go back out into the hallway, now halfway to the end. Chayton and I can hear coarse whispers and labored breathing. We're starting to see black muddy water sliding out from the tops and bottoms of each door and zigzagging up the hall from one door to the next. Some of it is sliding across the walls and ceiling. It's one of the freakiest things I've ever seen!

Suddenly, in the center of it all, we see Jennifer shoot up out of the floor. She drops her head to a side while her form is beginning to flicker like a clicking, snapping flame.

"Do not go any farther." Corneliu warns.
"That's what she wants." I whisper. I walk forward with Chayton at my side.
Walter only hears things and shivers from the temperature dropping.

Waving the smoke out all around us as we go into the darkness, I stare at the unmoving Jennifer. She doesn't think we'll pass her. How arrogant she is. Because of the look I'm giving her, she is becoming more furious with me. My focusing on her will allow me to see certain things about her that she's trying to keep secret–and she really hates that.

I'm able to see one of her memories of when she was alive. She walked out of a bar with a drunken businessman who was having serious issues with his wife. They were supposed to go to her hotel room. I see now; she was a high-end prostitute. This was about 5 years before she met a man named Dmitri...or so, that's what I'm getting so far.

They walked down a dark, empty alleyway, laughing. Then he pushed her against a wall and clumsily locked lips with her. She behaved as though she enjoyed him fondling her body and kissing her like this, but then she suddenly plunged a knife into his heart. He gasped and grabbed her hands on the handle. She twisted the blade slowly. His eyes grew while he struggled to breathe. I feel this and it's hell on my body.

She got in his ear to whisper with a crooked smile, "It would've been fun." she yanked the knife out and looked at it in a sort of adoring way. Just to see more fright in his eyes, she dragged the slick side of the bloody knife over her tongue. He gasped again, sliding down the wall. She wiped the rest of the blood off on the inside of her black blouse and then went to pull his wallet out of his pocket. Footfalls and laughing started getting close. She stood back up, took her small heels off, tossed them, pulled him behind a cluster of metal trashcans and then ran off after picking her heels up again.

Now back into reality, my eyes narrow.
This psychopath definitely has to go before she tries to kill again.

Chayton walks ahead of me toward her. She stiffens in annoyance. Her body shrinks into a needle-thin shadow and darts in my direction. She disappears for a second, then all of a sudden,

she's in my face, screaming, "GET–OUUT!!!!" Leaning my head back in amazement, I almost forget what I have in my hands, but quickly though, I wave my sage wand at her and swipe the feather through her head. "RAHH!!!" She wails, vanishing from our sight. All the lights shut off at once. We hear a hissing noise at the very end. It's coming toward us. Before it meets us, the lights click back on and there's nothing there.

I quickly sigh and glance back at Walter. He's surrounded by the non-residual ghosts from the grand room. They're protecting him, making him feel more comfortable as he looks around in search of what is making the noises.

We move on and soon get to the farthest point of the castle–The Sunroom, Walter calls it. We can hear creaking inside there. I look at Walter. He nods. We proceed, but then the door slams shut, startling us. My eyes widen and narrow shortly after. Walter takes a key out of his pocket and carefully goes to open the door.

Once he pushes it, our jaws fall open to the sight of orbs bouncing off the walls, the lights flickering and the furniture piling up in strange ways. The whispers are very strong in here, more vehement with their quick incomprehensible speech. Chayton and I see shadows crawling all over the place on the ceiling, looking like little spidery entities. They're causing the room to have an intense feeling of vertigo. And we see Jennifer in half-shadow form, standing in the middle of it with her head down, eyes staring up through her lashes. The woman that poked me earlier is climbing up the wall. I slightly grimace. She starts laughing at me when she gets to the ceiling. Walter can only hear her. But Chayton goes inside fearlessly with his dancelike walk and his tone is getting lower, more serious.

I proceed with Walter cautiously following behind, then he quickly decides to go stand against a wall in the clearest corner as Chayton and I begin to circle the room.

The woman on the ceiling disappears and Jennifer blocks me and attempts to enter my body every time I try to move closer to a window. I continue to take a step back but I never stop moving forward to finish this task. This is by far one of the most challenging places I've been to. The spidery creatures fall from the ceiling like rain, a female scream per drop. It really hurts my ears. Chayton only flinches a little. Walter hears it but doesn't see them. It doesn't harm him much. The chairs and tables start shaking more rapidly as I get closer to the farthest window.

The woman that vanished from the ceiling reappears at both sides of me and shouts, "YOU WILL NOT GO ANY FARTHER!" The room fills with wind and the windows begin to tremble. The furniture twitches, then it all flies toward the windows like pieces of iron slamming into magnets. The glass shows cracks moving up about midway. Walter clutches his chest and repeatedly looks from me to the door, "Susan, I can't take this!" I quickly look at him, "It'll be over soon!" I turn back and wave what smoke is left from my sage wand around while heading for the window again. Jennifer slides up from the floor into my face, hissing at me like a snake, "Didn't you hear Maria? YOU WON'T GO ANY FARTHER!" I look down at my feather, she follows my actions, then she shouts at me, "NO!" I try to swipe it at her. She snatches my wrist, shooting her negative energy into me, making me gasp and drop it. I quickly wave my smudge wand at her while digging in my pocket for the holy water. The smoke causes most of the darkness about her to grate away, forcing her to collapse with a scream. I snap my head up and spray her with the holy water. Her face begins to come apart as she falls. I see Chayton opening the window. Breathing quickly, I look at Walter and then hurry over to shield him from what damage is likely to occur.

Chayton finally pushes it open and his chanting is ROARING with authority. He swishes his feather from the room to the window, back and forth many times. Maria wails as the shadows around her begin to fade into ashes and blow toward the window. She drops to her knees with her hands reaching up, "JENNIFER! SAVE ME!" The lights are brightening as if about they're to burn out. Coming through the door, white streams of light race toward the window, going past Corneliu who is inspecting his hands in a very worried way. Slowly, he looks up at me and then we both look at Jennifer and Maria. Some of the lights are circling around their feet. Maria hisses while trying to fight them and Jennifer uses the remaining shadows to defend herself. But the two aren't strong enough anymore. The lights force them to the floor and they slam their hands down to hold on as their bodies are being pulled away; shadowy embers are splitting away from their forms. My eyes have widened greatly and my mouth has fallen open, now that I realize these lights are the non-residual ones from the grand room. And they are pulling the evil out with them.

I look for Corneliu and find him in the same state as Jennifer and Maria; only he's being pushed to walk toward the window. A few white figures are on both sides of him. I hear Jennifer and Maria scream once more, along with loud scratching noises. Quickly, I look at them again. They're clawing at the windowpanes as the darkness lastly slips away from their faces, revealing them as women who never seemed nonhuman. The force becomes so strong they can barely hang on anymore. Jennifer shouts "NOOO!!!" and Maria cries, "JENNIFER-!" They're pushed out, disappearing outside the window. Corneliu stumbles over himself on his way to it, trying not to fall. "DMITRI!" he splutters. As the darkness tears away from him, he yells in pain. I watch him closely, furrowing my brows in wonder about who 'Dmitri' is.

In the moment he meets the window at last, I get a vision from him of the past he had with this person–Dmitri–how he adopted him from his brother and sister in-law.

They were returning to his manor in a horse-drawn carriage after going on a trip somewhere. He waited outside with the restless baby Dmitri in his arms. He could hear them coming up the hill on the dirt road. But then there was a disturbance with the horse. His brother suddenly shouted, his wife screamed and the horse was neighing in fright.

Corneliu hurried toward them, holding Dmitri close all the while, but when he got close enough, he noticed the horse was startled by a wild animal and caused the carriage to flip over, crushing everything inside. He was extremely devastated; he didn't know what to do at first. His brother's wife was still breathing but his brother had a wooden pole through his neck. She was also impaled; in the stomach and heart by pieces of the roof. She told Corneliu to take care of her son. He held her hand and agreed as tears filled his eyes. She looked at the silent Dmitri and slowly managed one last smile. Corneliu watched the light in her eyes fade away and he hugged Dmitri closer.

I blink, but now he's gone. The shadows are gone and two more white figures are last to go out. The wind is slowing down, the orbs have vanished and the heavy feeling isn't as intense as before. When the final spirit leaves, the furniture drops and the wind ceases completely.

All the air in my lungs belts out of me as my eyes wander the room. I look at Walter, forming a small, stunned type of smile, "...Now the castle is clean and everyone is free." He stares at me in amazement, then we look at Chayton.

Tucking his rattle and feather away in his bag, he says, "Cleansed, yes–spiritually." he looks at the mess of papers, an overturned desk, chairs, bookcases and other pieces of furniture spread out or piled in corners.

Walter sighs as he puts his hands on his hips and inspects everything, "Well...I don't think the maids will like this..."

Chayton and I then glance at each other.