It wasn't the darkness that killed people. It was the people who carried the darkness within them that did.

But anger is the world’s worst—and arguably most contagious—plague. It might look ugly on the outside, but it eats you from the inside out. If you catch it—and you will—you must accept it. It stems from the fear: understand that. You must fight it, you must heal, and you must let it go. Anger, when dealt with, is en ember that eventually dies out if you give it enough space and understanding.

Fear is a question, really.What are you afraid of, and why? There's a history to every horror. Fear is a training master whom you run from or you face. Defining your backstory is the prelude to the story. That's how you solve fear.You rewrite it.

Something new prowled these floors, something that sucked the space into its lungs and pressed up against people's eyeballs. She felt the darkness and told herself she could walk away from it, forgetting how difficult it is to run from that which you cannot see coming.

Most people feared the darkness. Some people feared, more wisely, the things within the darkness. Gabriel feared both, and with good reason. He walked anyway. That had always been his way. He had a complicated history with the woodlands of the world. He'd met his share of the Cyclops and the Circes that lurked within.And the world never seemed to run out of monsters.