Chapter One: The Shadow Man The second hand raced around the clock with a steady urgency, yet the boy's movements were deliberately slow, calculated. The wainscotting of the hallway reflected the shine on the floor as his mop travelled in lazy arcs, doing its best to polish floors dulled down by a decade of foot traffic spills, and bodily fluids. The latter is how he ended up with extra chores. The boy’s eyes flicked from his pathway to the wall clock and back again. His pr

Cover art for The Conduit, a new horror story featured in the Ink & Shadows Blog. Pointe au Baril, 2023 Dean watched her creep toward that shitty little townhouse. He drowsed. Alarms in his head blared he was sending his baby off to the gallows. How can you just sit there while she goes in? He tried to lift his head. He listened. The whispering started quietly. They sounded like a man’s voice until he really tried to focus on them. The tone would shift and evade him compreh