Something was wrong with the church. Former Officier de Police Judiciaire Eric Guilliot would have said he felt it in his bones, except he was a ghost and didn’t have any. But it was there nonetheless, and he felt it in whatever remained of his essence. Being a detective made him suspicious and cynical, but he trusted his instincts.

He looked around the dim and mostly vacant nave of the small parish of Saint Julien. He appeared to be the only ghost, but a few of the Living had joined him on this winter morning to pray, meditate, or just be silent and closer to their faith.

A white-haired woman knelt in the pew across the aisle, head bent over her folded hands. She was in her nineties at least, seemingly frozen in time sixty years ago: Her beige wool coat was tied by a cumbersome belt around her bony frame, and her black pillbox hat sat perfectly straight atop her head, the half-veil cresting her eyebrows. Even her hands were covered by black lace gloves, pulled up to her gold watch on the left wrist, and to her diamond tennis bracelet on the right.

A twenty-something man sat erect in the pew two rows in front of Eric. He wore a blue hoodie and had neatly clipped dark hair. Near the back of the church, a balding older man in a green ball-cap and a worn flak jacket sat with his hands folded over his belly, snoring. Impossible to tell his exact age, but the crags of his face indicated that, like the woman, he, too, neared the century mark.

It was midmorning on a Friday, so the priest was off doing whatever priests did when not performing the Mass or sitting for confessions. The parish had supported nuns at one point, but the church had sold their land and converted the neighboring convent to an orphanage during World War I. Now it was used for low-income housing.

So the nave was quiet. Peaceful. Except for the underlying sense of dread, a certainty that something malevolent lurked below, or above, or within the pews.

Eric shifted in his seat. After four months, it was still odd, being a ghost. He couldn’t smell the incense he knew permeated the vaulted space or feel the air drifting from the rafters. Yet, if he sat too long, he still felt the need to stretch what Hyacinth called his “non-corporeal” limbs.

Hyacinth.

The thought of her was a raw wound that hadn’t healed in the weeks since he’d last seen her, on a hill in Turkey, working to save Jason, the man she’d chosen over Eric. Man—bah. She’d chosen a demon—and he was a member of the Dioguardi mafia, who were responsible for killing Eric’s sister two decades ago.

Worse, helping to extract Jason from Hell was Eric’s own son, Stefan, with whom he had barely reconnected after twenty years apart. Worrying for Stefan’s safety, both in Hell and with his new demon powers, was even more intolerable than thinking of Hyacinth, so Eric shoved them both from his mind. He took a slow ghost breath, another unnecessary yet habitual act, and settled himself, focusing on the sensations he could still perceive.

The nave was laid out in typical cruciform fashion, with stained-glass clerestory windows depicting the stations of the cross. The stone floor was covered with worn red carpeting, and wood beams and arches, black with age, broke the space into sections. Due to Christmas being a mere twelve days away, the sanctuary was decorated with garlands, poinsettias, and a large wreath holding four pillar candles: two partially burned purple ones, with a single pink and a third purple still untouched, awaiting the final two Sundays of Advent.

 The north transept wasn’t visible from where Eric sat, but through the open door in the southern one, he could just see into the tiny graveyard. If there were other ghosts present, that would be a logical spot for them to congregate. But he felt certain that whatever the…thing…was, it was not another of the Dead.

In fact, everything seemed just as it should. Frustrated, he rose and exited the pew, genuflecting briefly. The woman in the beige coat shivered, and he wondered if she sensed his presence. It happened sometimes, even with those of the Living who couldn’t see him. Yet another reminder of his altered circumstances, so he hurried away from her, past the still-snoring older man. Reflexively, he dipped his fingers in the baptismal font and crossed himself, even though no Holy Water touched him. Then he moved through the arched doorway into the narthex.

And that’s when he heard it, a long, drawn-out wail, like a distant cry brought by the wind on a stormy night: I am here…this must end…you are the one…

Eric turned sharply. No Dead, no demons, only the Living visible. So if the presence was something else, then…what was it?