Candle Face Victim #4: The Homeless Man with the Limp
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Time to read 3 min
A man with a limp came to my bedside. He'd lived on the streets of downtown Austin, where people traded stories about Candle Face as a savior for the broken. He called for her and got silence, until the night she finally came. His doubt was the thing she made him pay for.
November 30, 2023
Main subjects:
- Victim #4
- The Lost Souls
Candle Face
As I settled into bed tonight, with twilight throwing long shadows across my room, I wasn’t surprised to see another spirit appear in the corner, arriving the way the others had before. This one walked toward me with a noticeable limp, and each step carried a clear sense of purpose. I felt an odd calm, probably because I’ve gotten used to these nightly visits. As he came closer, I could feel that he had come with a story to tell. Then he spoke:
Every time I limped through downtown Austin, things got quiet. The suit-and-tie types and the folks in fancy clothes would stop talking when I got close, like somebody hit a mute button. As soon as I passed, they’d start right back up, like I wasn’t even there. My limp was steady. Life had hit me hard, and I was still standing. I didn’t mind that nobody looked me in the eye. It was better that way. Trusting people was never for me.
Out in the homeless community, we talked a lot about Candle Face. She was a story people held on to, something to pull attention away from the demons in their own heads. Some called her by another name and said she was a savior for broken people. I wanted to believe that too, but no matter how many times I called for her, she never answered. After a while, the silence ate away at what little belief I had left.
When she finally did show up, she came with a scream, raw and piercing. There was nothing gentle in it. Nothing comforting. She ordered me around. She told me I had to serve her and spread her story. Her demands were one more voice in a mind that already had too many. I lashed out, angry and bitter. Whatever faith I had in her was gone by then.
That was my mistake.
One evening, I was sitting on a bench waiting for the bus when the streetlights started to dim. The shadows stretched in ways they shouldn’t have. Then she came. Candle Face. Hollow eyes. That gaping, empty mouth. I’ll never forget it.
“You do not believe,” she hissed. “Your faith is the light that feeds me, and your doubt... your punishment."
Before I could answer, her hot, sizzling hands grabbed my shoulders, and everything went blank. The sounds of the city dropped away as she dragged me into the shadows around that bus stop.
In her lair, she showed me the truth. Candle Face wasn’t the savior I had imagined. She ruled over a place where spirits stay trapped by their own skepticism. It was her hell, and then it became mine too.
She gathered the lost, the ones whose belief had run out. She fed on disbelief and turned it into power.
My punishment was becoming part of the haunting. I was one of her stories now.
He nodded as if to thank me, then slowly turned and limped back toward the corner where he had first appeared. Then he faded into nothing. Not wanting to lose any of it, I hurried downstairs and wrote out his story right away.
Personal Note to My Readers
This victim was likely a homeless man who spent a lot of time downtown, though not necessarily someone who slept there every night, since he was waiting for a bus late at night. One strong clue is his noticeable limp.
Has anyone heard of a missing homeless man known for limping and spending time downtown? If so, that may be our lead.
Arthur Mills
Arthur Mills served for more than two decades as an Army Intelligence Warrant Officer, specializing in piecing together what others missed: patterns, threats, enemy intent, and clandestine activity. He trained intelligence professionals, built threat models, and briefed commanders and world leaders on global threats and battlefield strategy. After retiring from the military, he moved into private investigation, focusing on missing persons, human trafficking, opposition research, and domestic terrorism. He holds a degree in Counter Terrorism Studies.
He has been writing books since 2006 and is an award-winning author. He publishes under his own name, though much of what he has written has appeared under pseudonyms. Readers may already know those titles without knowing they are his. The separation is intentional. His books invite readers to interpret what is hidden, and so does the way he publishes them.