I don't know where they've gone.

They have all gone away, somewhere I cannot follow. I look for them, but I never find them. So, I just keep looking....

I am not completely alone. There is one who remains, locked in restless slumber. He lies nearby...but I do not go there. *Ever.* My presence might disturb him, wake him from his dark dreams.

It frightens me to imagine what might then.

Mostly, I stay near the manor, or go the new house to play with my friend, David. Yesterday, I gave him the toy soldiers that once belonged to my big brothers.

I remember the two of them staging mock battles in the playroom, long after they had outgrown such games. They liked to pretend it was to amuse us little owns, Daniel and me. But really, they just enjoyed pitting their skills of strategies and tactics, one against the other in friendly rivalry.

That was in happier times. Before their battles became all too real, and their rivalry turned deadly.

I cannot stop looking....

David is looking too, though he doesn't yet know why. Or what he seeks. I feel the unhappiness in his heart, the sorrow and lonelinesss that fill his days.

We have much in common.

There are others here, searching. Seeking answers to riddles better left unsolved. Seeking release, and love, and hope...each in their own way. I am needed here, I think. But I still must search, always looking for them -- for the ones gone before me, to that place where I cannot follow. Not yet.

Someone new has come into this house of shadows. She is searching for an identity, a past to call her own. Though she does not know it, she is no stranger here. I know the truth, but I will not tell! She must discover it for herself, or not at all.

How I wish she had not come here! Her very nearness disturbs the dreamer. Hers is the soul for which he longs in his dark prison, the ghost of her love the only balm for his pain.

My dearest brother...

Though it pains me, I beg of you...Do not wake. Sleep on in your cold bed, and dream dark dreams of eternity.

For if you wake, so will another.

And she searches, too.

----------------------------