ALTHOUGH you may not believe in ghosts, demonic entities, or ancient presences, there’s something about certain houses that just look and feel haunted.

It could be their age, their architecture, their geographical location or just the knowledge that something terrible once happened there that awakens something primal in ourselves, and forces our body and mind into a heightened sense of awareness.

As a rule, the older and more remote the house, the greater the potential for terror.

Yet in a digital age where we stay up into the early hours bingeing on Netflix of scouring the web for trivia and tattle, it’s easy to dismiss the shapes in the shadows as the product of an overactive imagination, the creaking of the door as a lack of WD40 and the random banging noses as a boiler that needs servicing.

But what if the witch hasn’t hung up her broom, the dead don’t sleep beneath the ground, foul things continue to walk the earth, and houses are still haunted?

Rationally minded cynics often explain away haunted houses with logical explanations. And in many cases they are right.

In 1921 an American family who moved into an ancient and decrepit house suddenly began to be plagued by hellish visions, disembodied voices, and unexplained fatigue, pain, and headaches.

It turned out their house wasn’t haunted as they believed but they were suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning.

It was by no means an isolated case. In 2016 investigative journalist Carrie Poppy felt a sense of constant dread in her home and couldn’t explain the agonising chest pains she was experiencing.

Psychiatrists and ghost hunters couldn’t help her but the gas man could. Her symptoms were the result of an ongoing and near-lethal gas leak.

It’s easy to scoff that there’s no such thing as a haunted house, particularly if you’re living in a new build surrounded by the reassurance of neon street lights, the chatter and comings and goings of other people, and the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

However, if you live in a remote spot surrounded by nothing but hills, history, and creeping woodland, things could go a little differently.

A rational mindset is all well and good until you’re in a heightened state of alert in the small hours and every primal fibre in your body is screaming that something wicked this way comes.

In an environment where the endless expanse of the night sky and the silhouettes of brooding mountains serve as a constant reminder of just how alone and insignificant you really are, isn’t it possible that even the most steel trap mind and bulletproof soul can be receptive to ancient forces both benevolent and malevolent?

Such forces may have no power in a realm ruled by electricity and broadband, but in the places where the wild things grow, they may still well reign supreme.

And these ancient and chaotic forces might even seek to remind you that once, in the unfathomable and indifferent universe of long ago, they were the only reality.

Ask the Rich family what they think and they’ll tell you those forces aren’t just real but they lived in a house that was governed by them. A house that had dramatic and life-changing consequences for them all.

It was a spring day in 1989 and there was an air of optimism on the breeze for Bill and Liz Rich who were leaving the claustrophobic confines of an end-of-terrace to begin a new life in a remote and picturesque spot in the heart of the Brecon Beacons.

Traveling with them was Bill’s 14-year-old son from his first marriage, Laurence.

Their new home was an ancient barn that had been converted into a house in the 1950s and was named Heol Fanog - road to the peaks.

It was a fresh start for them all.

When they first moved in it felt like life couldn’t be any better. They had spectacular views, no nosy neighbours to worry about, and the space and freedom of the natural world on their doorstep.

It was a perfect place to raise a family and live a peaceful and contented life.

As a professional painter, Bill was overjoyed to finally have the space and room to set up his own studio.

In the Channel 4 True Horror documentary “Hellfire Farm,” Liz explained that at first they all felt very safe at Heol Fanog and thought it was idyllic.

Yet there were always little signs that something wasn’t quite right with their new home.

One day Bill stumbled across the bar bill for the last meal they had before moving in. It was £6.66. Added to this was the receipt from the supermarket they had used to stock up with supplies before moving in - it amounted to £66.69.

A quirky little coincidence perhaps?

Yet things got even stranger when Bill and Liz recalled the Volvo that nearly hit them when they were buying house furniture for Heol Fanog. Its number plate was BST 666.

With their first child on the way, the couple had far more important things to worry about, and nervously laughed off the slightly sinister synchronicity.

Yet not long after their son Ben was born in August 1989, what should have been a joyous period began to turn a little fraught when they began to both hear unexplained footsteps in the hall upstairs.

At first, they tried to dismiss it, but the footsteps kept returning and it didn’t feel just like any mischievous ghost in hobnail boots but a malignant, watching and waiting presence that meant serious harm.

Almost overnight, the atmosphere in the house turned oppressive and threatening, and as Liz explained to True Horror, “The feeling of being watched was more frightening than seeing things.”

Over the coming days, weeks, and months, the couple would also notice the distinct smell of sulphur and bizarre fluctuations in room temperature.

Even more peculiar was their electricity bill. When they received a statement for their first quarter it was a staggering £750.

They got in touch with SWALEC to demand what was going on, but when they visited the inspector was at a loss to explain the sudden surge in demand.

Nevertheless he still insisted they pay what was owed or they’d be cut off.

With a huge bill hanging over their heads, things took a turn for the worse when some of Bill’s work contracts were cancelled out of the blue.

At the same time Bill and Liz were worried about Laurence who had painted his room an intense blood-red colour and was demonstrating the sort of behaviour they felt was hostile and disturbing, even for a teenager.

They began to feel a little cursed and because finances dictated that moving wasn’t a viable option, a little trapped.

At their wit's end, they asked a Priest from Brecon Cathedral to perform an exorcism.

Things briefly improved for a few days but one day when returning from a walk with her son, Liz looked up at the house and saw the face of an old woman in the nursery window gazing at her with black pebble eyes that were both haunted and sad.

Although Liz felt no evil presence emanating from the woman, it was unsettling.

During their seven-year tenure at Heol Fanog, Liz’s children would also see the old woman who never moved or spoke, but it was later discovered from an old photograph that she looked almost identical to an old lady who had lived there previously.

A chance conversation with a local builder revealed that when converting Heol Fanog they had used stones from the nearby old Manor House. He explained that some of those stones could have well been sourced from the ancient graveyard in the garden of the derelict manor.

Their next move was to call the Head of the Spiritualist Church in Cardiff.

Laurence’s behaviour had since taken a turn for the worse. He would spend nights in his room watching horror films, and on one occasion, howling in distress.

After one stand-out confrontation with Bill, he had spat in his father’s face. Bill would later describe his son’s facial expression at that exact moment as alien to him and “Much older and incalculably evil.”

The spiritualist explained to Bill and Liz that Laurence was the focal point for poltergeist activity and should be removed from the house for his own safety.

The spiritualist performed a house cleansing and the couple made the difficult decision to send Laurence to a nearby boarding school.

For a while, the ‘psychic wall’ put in place by the spiritualists appeared to work, but at a time when Liz was pregnant with her second child, the sense of a malignant presence in the house returned and became more intense than ever.

Reverend Roy Matthews from Abergavenny’s Holy Trinity Church visited to perform an exorcism. He explained there were four entities in the house, two young men, an old woman, and a demonic being. Yet by the time he left, he was confident he had driven them out.

For three months, the family knew peace and then all hell broke loose.

Liz saw the black silhouette of a seven-foot man in a hall and explained it was like coming face to face with pure evil.

It was the final straw. They fled the house to stay with Liz’s mother in Cowbridge, but realising they had to return to the place they reluctantly called home they asked the Rev David Holmwood for help.

During his car journey to Heol Fanog, an owl hit his windscreen.

Liz explained, “David was a caring and lovely person but the house wanted us there and anyone coming to help was not welcome.”

David said he could perform an exorcism but warned, “Spirits won’t leave until you want them to leave!” He insisted on taking away and burning many of Bill’s books and paintings because they were acting as a gateway for evil to access this realm.

Mark Chadbourn who wrote the definitive book on the case, ‘Testimony’, explained, “I found it very hard to accept many of the things David said. Because I found them quite damaging psychologically to people that were vulnerable.”

During the exorcism, David read Ephesians 6:12, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”

In his wake, the mood in the house was said too lighten.

In the months that followed both Liz and Rich became Baptists and between July 1991 and Spring, 1993, it appeared the haunting was over.

Yet the calm was shattered when the seven-foot figure returned only this time it had the head of a fierce-looking bird.

The atmosphere darkened and the house once again became less of a home but more of a sinister and sentient presence.

Bill’s paintings began to reflect his inner turmoil. They were getting darker and more disturbed. They included representations of brides covered in blood, and dead bodies floating through air. They symbolised a world where everything was broken and damaged.

He began to feel the world unravel and the darkness move in.

Mark Chadbourn explained, “He told me he had terrible black thoughts. Thoughts of self-harm. He saw a knife on the side and thought I could just end it all by killing myself.”

Finally, famed spiritualist Eddie Burks was called. He performed two exorcisms. One where he freed human ghosts and another where he exorcised what he called a pre-Christian Celtic nature spirit.

It appeared to work. After experiencing more exorcisms than any other house in British history, Heol Fanog was finally at peace.

Yet ultimately, Bill and Liz were not. They would later leave the house and get a divorce.

Heol Fanog still stands and it is still lived in. As far as anyone knows, it is no longer haunted.

There are many theories surrounding the exact nature of the haunting at Heol Fanog.

Some believe there was a witches' coven on the site, and others that the house was built upon an extreme crisscrossing of key lines that generated a malevolent and dark energy.

As well as the theory about ancient gravestones used in its structure, local folklore also points to a gypsy being murdered at a bridge that spans a nearby stream.

In the 19th century, it was reported that 18-year-old James Griffiths was beaten to death by 23-year-old Thomas Edwards with an axe and then buried near the site. Edwards was later hung.

Speculation has it that Griffiths witnessed satanic rituals at the site and was later killed by Edwards who was employed by the Satanists to silence him. They then promised that Edwards would be given a last-minute reprieve from the gallows but failed to keep their word.

Others believe that a Celtic tribe in the area once summoned a powerful natural deity to do their bidding but failed to contain it.

There is even a story that in his younger days Bill was once going to be initiated into a coven by the famed king of the witches Alex Sanders, but pulled out at the last minute. Did this attract the attention of certain dark forces?

Interestingly, the Channel 4 documentary on the subject, explains that just before they moved to the farm, Bill, Liz, and Laurence, visited the Pyramid of Cheops where they saw strange blue lights and felt an unsettling presence.

Liz explains that she saw the same blue lights in their barn at Heol Fanog.

Could the seven-foot man with the head of a bird be the Egyptian God Horus? Was he or one of his four sons, Imsety, Hapy, Duamutef, or Qebehsenuef, whose role it was to protect the dead, haunting Heol Fanog?

Do one, none or all of these stories carry an element of truth?

We are all haunted by our own ghosts and personal demons to a degree, but do some people act as a conduit for energies so fierce and frantic that they overwhelm them and everyone in their vicinity and alter the very fabric of reality?

To play devil’s advocate for a moment, do these energies have a supernatural edge or are they simply as Nietzche would say, human, all too human?

Were the happenings at Heol Fanog a manifestation of spirits without or spirits within? Or perhaps some ill-defined middle ground between the two?

Whatever your thoughts, when the shadows fall, the moon becomes sovereign, and the boundary separating the dead from the living becomes a little blurred, remember, the devil’s best trick is always convincing people he doesn’t exist.