as you know , what is left at donnelaith is this : a quaint inn , a ruined castle , an immense excavation that is slowly revealing a giant cathedral , tales of witchcraft and woe , of earls who died untimely deaths , and of a strange family , gone through europe to america , carrying with them an evil strain in the blood , a potential to give birth to babies or monsters , an evil strain evidenced by the glow of witches ' gifts , a family wooed for that blood and those gifts by lasher-a wily and unforgiving ghost of one of our people .