Night covered the town like an old shabby shroud. Darkness spilled over the narrow streets, slipped into the alleyways, hid in the gaps between the old bricks of the houses. A sticky fog drifted across the ground, clinging to the alleyways, as if reluctant to let the day go.

John Price walked at a quick, measured pace, trying not to linger in the open stretches of the street. He didn't like this place-it was too quiet, too empty. It was as if something was waiting here, lurking around the corner, watching every movement. But even in the midst of this gloomy atmosphere he could not foresee what happened next.

He saw it.

The figure stood under the lantern, shrouded in a halo of faint light, but even in that illumination Price realized at once who it was. The air thickened, a chill ran down his spine. His breath hitched.

• You," he whispered, but his voice sounded rough, almost threatening.

The man he'd known. The man who had been mourned.

The man who had once died.

But the dead didn't stand like that-with a slight smirk, arms crossed over his chest, that familiar squint that could mean anything: mockery, defiance, hidden threat.

Price's chest tightened as if someone had taken his breath away with icy fingers. His brain refused to accept what he was seeing. His heart pounded in his chest, and his hand involuntarily reached for his weapon, as if his instinct for self-preservation demanded that he be sure he was not a ghost, not a hallucination, but something very real.

• Are you alive? - He asked at last, but there was distrust in his voice, and his fingers were still gripping the handle of the gun.

The stranger - no, not a stranger, you were too familiar - tilted his head slightly, as if studying his reaction. Then he took a step forward, and the lamp above you flickered, as if deciding whether to illuminate someone who shouldn't be standing here.

• And you wanted me dead? - The voice was calm, but there was something... elusive in it.