Hundreds of gravestones peppered the forest, tucked between the trees, buried beneath twists of thorny underbrush.

Charlotte tugged the sleeve of Jonathan's coat down over her hand and brushed the snow off of the nearest gravestone.

"This is going to take hours," Jonathan sighed.

As quickly as Charlotte's hope had blossomed, it crumpled. It was too cold to think, let alone traipse around a cemetery in the snow. The sun was setting fast. With so many gravestones to search, how could they possibly find anything before it got dark?

There might not be anything to find in the first place.

Charlotte pressed her eyes shut and breathed. She felt as if she was unraveling. There were so few options left. She was constantly scrambling, grasping, struggling for any little piece she could get her hands on to fix this mess she had created.

"Let's just...start looking," she said. "We'll stop by nightfall."

Charlotte and Jonathan picked through the trees and the gravestones, clearing away snow, dirt, and lichen as they went to inspect inscriptions faded by time, age, and weather.

Night crawled after them with long, dark fingers. It wouldn't be long now before visibility was entirely lost...

Then Charlotte stumbled upon the crypt.

Most of the gravestones in the cemetery had been worn, split apart, crumbling. One or two showed signs of attention and care though they were still humble markers—dry, rotting wooden planks, crosses pieced together with bits of rope and spare threads.

But this crypt...it was massive.

It loomed in the dark, composed of smooth thick pillars and a wrought iron gate inlaid with delicate flowers and twining ivy.

There was no mold, no creeping lichen. And the name above the gate, carved into the stone, was clear, crisp, untouched by the effects that had affected so many of the other gravesites.

Elisabeta Dearlove, 1340 – 1346.

Only a child, Charlotte thought.

She didn't recognize the name. Alexander hadn't mentioned her when he recounted the history of his family's curse...

Then again, Alexander probably hadn't mentioned many things.

Charlotte shook her head as if to rid her mind of that thought. Her gaze dropped to the gathering at the front of the crypt.

A makeshift altar lay tucked in one corner by the gate. Wax pooled where candles had once burned. Day old bread, cheese, and precious strips of dried meat in a wooden bowl. A hollowed-out gourd served as a pitcher, frosted over with ice.

At the center of the altar sat a squat clay vase brimming with dried herbs. Most of them Charlotte recognized as customary for funerals and burial sites, to ward off the stench of decomposition, and as a symbol of remembrance.

But there were other herbs tucked within the bouquet, a little dry and wilted.

Sage. Elderberry. Rue.

Herbs used in witchcraft to ward off evil.

Someone touched her shoulder. Charlotte flinched and spun, weak magic sputtering towards her fingers.

Jonathan held up his hand in surrender. "It's just me. What did you find?"

Charlotte released a long, slow breath and harnessed her magic again. She plucked a sprig of elderberry from the bouquet of herbs.

"It's made to look like an offering," she said. "With the food, the drink. But these herbs—and in this combination—are used for witchcraft."

"Another witch did this?"

Charlotte shook her head. "There are no wards, no protections. This crypt is very well kept, compared to the others. It's clearly important. I would guess that this is an approximation of witchcraft. Perhaps someone with good intentions thought they could purge the crypt of evil but without magic, the herbs wouldn't make much difference."

Jonathan curled his fingers into the iron gate and rattled it.

"Locked," he said. "Though I suppose that won't deter you from your desire to enter it and investigate every inch of the place."

In answer, Charlotte dug around in the snow until she found a rock and handed it to him.

"We've come this far," she said. "No use turning back now."

Jonathan sighed and accepted the rock. He struck the lock repeatedly, the clang of metal ricocheting off the trees, jarringly loud in the stillness.

Finally, the gate creaked open.

Jonathan tossed the rock aside, peering into the smothering darkness of the crypt.

"I'm afraid I don't have a lantern with me," he said.

Charlotte retrieved one of the candles from the altar, brushing off the snow, tapping the wick with one finger to test if it was dry enough to light.

Jonathan gestured to his coat Charlotte had bundled herself up in.

"My tinderbox should be in your left pocket," he said.

She fished it out and passed it to him. The flame coughed, shivered, then rippled to life, sending golden light shimmering around them in a halo against the onset of grey shadows.

Charlotte shielded the candle's flame with her hand against the wind to prevent it from guttering out. Jonathan picked up his own candle from the altar and lit it as well.

"I must confess," he said as he turned to face the gaping mouth of the crypt. "I'm not looking forward to this idea of yours."

Neither am I, Charlotte thought as she stepped into the crypt.

Stale, musty air washed over her, infused with the scent of herbs and dry bread. Underneath, faint but there, was the lingering sickness of decay, ever present and overpowering despite the best attempts to annihilate it.

The candles' flames did precious little to illuminate the darkness. Charlotte inched along, her vision reduced to a small, trembling circle of light.

A set of steps appeared in a narrow corridor, descending into the throat of the crypt, waiting to swallow. Charlotte braced her hand against the nearest wall and tested her weight on the smooth stone steps.

They held and didn't give way.

As she descended the steps, she trailed her fingers over the walls, exploring every niche and wobble in the stones.

"Anything?" Jonathan said.

His voice was laden with dread. He didn't wish to go any further into this crypt than necessary and she couldn't blame him.

Charlotte shook her head and continued down the stairs until she found herself in a small, open room. To her left was a stone coffin, polished to a dull gleam in the dark, free of dust.

She raised her candle higher and scanned the ground.

The crypt was spotless. No signs of animal life, no dust, no mold or mildew. Nothing to show that over five hundred years had passed Elisabeta Dearlove had been laid to rest.

"What do you see?" Jonathan said.

"It's what I don't see that's the problem," Charlotte said. "Crypts, tombs, mausoleums...they're never this clean. There are mouse nests and rat droppings. Snakes especially like the cool, dry environment."

Jonathan flinched with a wary glance at the ground.

"Someone—or more than one person—is maintaining that altar outside," Charlotte said. "The offering was fairly recent, maybe three days old. But why would anyone visit a grave like this? It doesn't seem—"

She broke off with a hiss as a shock of heat seared her sternum.

Charlotte scrabbled at her collar, sending buttons skittering across the floor. Her fingers brushed the wraithstone's surface. Normally, it was chilled with a pleasant warmth.

Now it was too hot to touch.

She tugged the cord away from her neck and held it up. A faint pinprick of red at the center of the wraithstone pulsed, blinking madly like an eye.

"It burned me," Charlotte said, surprised. "It's not supposed to do that."

"Hasn't that happened before?" Jonathan said. He took her hand. The rings of red around her fingers had faded to a dull brown.

"The Endless One tore the scrying pool away from me. That's different. This is..."

A globe of heat grew around the necklace, chasing away the icy air of the crypt.

"This is a warning," she said.

The deafening clang of metal echoed in the small chamber. Charlotte startled and nearly dropped the wraithstone. Jonathan inched closer until his shoulder brushed hers. She gripped his arm, to reassure herself as much as comfort him.

"It's just the gate," she said. "The wind must have—"

A footstep.

Charlotte's words died in her throat.