The rain fell in thin, silver threads, stitching the mist to the earth. It was a quiet night in Ratwood, the kind that kept the living indoors and left the dead to their peace. The iron gate of the Shrine of the Undermaiden's graveyard stood half-open, as it always did, because Necra had long ago decided that closing it implied the sleepers wished to be shut away. They did not.

A fresh mound of dark soil lay near the north wall, steam rising faintly from it in the cold. The burial had been simple—a woodsman named Geddry, taken by the fever that swept through the lumber camps last week. Necra had placed a Solari coin on his tongue, folded his shroud with the precision of centuries, and sung him down into the earth with the same lullaby she hummed now, soft and low beneath her breath.

Morticia padded beside her, a sliver of black against the wet grass, her mismatched eyes catching the faint glow of the lantern hanging from Necra's belt. The cat paused at a tilted stone, sniffed it with regal disapproval, and sneezed.

"Bless you." Necra murmured, not breaking stride.

She walked the rows as she always did, her hood drawn low, the gravedigger's shovel resting across her shoulder. Mist coiled around the older headstones, and the rain tapped a gentle rhythm on the leaves of the old maple by the low stone wall.

"Good evening, Master Ironwright." Her fingers brushed the top of a weathered granite stone. "Your daughter visited today. Brought white myrtle. She's well—her youngest has your eyes, I think."

A few steps farther, she paused at a smaller grave, its stone carved with a crude lamb. "Rest easy, little Alden. No nightmares tonight. The rain will sing you to sleep."

Morticia meowed, sharp and pointed, from somewhere ahead.

"Yes, I know," Necra said, her serene smile unchanging. "The garden needs weeding near the north wall. Tomorrow, when the rain stops."

She turned down the central path, her boots making no sound on the wet gravel. Somewhere in the distance, the River Korvalis murmured its own lullaby, and the bells of Ratwood's militia tower rang the hour—muffled, as though the mist itself was wrapping its hands around them.

She reached down to scratch behind Morticia's ear, but the cat's gold eye had fixed on something beyond the gate—the road leading into town. Her tail flicked once.

Necra straightened, her silver-gray eyes turning toward the mist-shrouded path. "A visitor," she said, her voice as calm as still water. "At this hour."

The rain continued to fall. The shadows between the graves did not move. And Necra waited, her shovel resting easy in her hand, her smile as peaceful as the sleepers beneath her feet.

The rain fell in cold, unhurried sheets over the Creepwood, threading through the iron fence of the Shrine of the Undermaiden's graveyard and pooling in the low places between the headstones. Mist coiled up from the River Korvalis like the breath of something vast and sleeping, and the only light came from a single lantern hung on a post near the gate, its flame guttering behind rain-streaked glass.

Two men crouched over a freshly turned grave near the old maple. The stone was modest but well-carved: Captain Alfonse Benethil, fallen at Westwatch Garrison eight days past. His sword had been buried with him, along with a silver signet ring and a purse of thirty Solari—payment for his last patrol, placed on his chest by his weeping sergeant.

"Graveyards," the first bandit muttered, driving his crowbar into the earth, "are the easiest coin you'll ever earn. No guards, no dogs, just dead men and their trinkets."

"Aye," the second grunted, working a spade through the wet soil. "And who's going to stop us? The ghosts?"

They both laughed, rain dripping from the brims of their hoods. "I would ask that you not disturb the sleepers."

The voice came from directly behind them—soft, calm, almost gentle. Both men spun, nearly losing their footing in the mud.

She stood not three feet away, a black-robed figure with a gravedigger's shovel resting across one shoulder. Her hood was low, casting her face in shadow save for the faint, serene smile that curved her lips. Rainwater beaded on the fabric of her robe and ran in rivulets down the iron spade, but she did not seem to notice the cold or the wet. She had not made a sound approaching. Even now, standing before them in the mud, her presence felt less like an arrival and more like something that had always been there, simply waiting to be noticed.

"This is consecrated ground," she continued, her tone unhurried, almost motherly. "The sleepers beneath you have earned their rest. I must ask you to leave my garden."

The first bandit exchanged a glance with his partner, then barked out a laugh. "An old hag with a shovel? That's the best this place can muster?" He gestured at her with the crowbar. "Walk away, granny, unless you fancy being thrown into one of these holes yourself."

The second bandit smirked. "Yeah. Plenty of room down there."

Necra's smile did not waver. If anything, it grew a fraction gentler—the expression of someone who had offered mercy and watched it be refused a thousand times before. She let out a soft, almost mournful breath. "Then I shall send you to Kroxys."

The first bandit lunged with the crowbar, swinging for her head. It was a brutish strike, and Necra did not so much dodge as simply not be where it landed—her body flowing to the side with the unhurried grace of tall grass bending in a breeze. The shovel came down in the same motion, the flat of the spade cracking against his wrist. The crowbar flew into the dark as he screamed.

The second bandit came at her with the spade, thrusting it like a spear. Necra turned it aside with the haft of her shovel, stepped inside his reach, and drove the butt of the handle into his ribs. The air left him in a choked gasp. Before he could recover, the shovel arced around in a tight, economical swing, the blessed iron spade catching him across the temple. He crumpled into the mud without another sound.

The first bandit, cradling his broken wrist, stumbled backward. His eyes were wide now, fixed on the old woman who still wore that gentle, terrible smile.

"Wait—!" he stammered in horror. "Wait, we'll go, we'll—"

Necra brought the shovel down once more, and the bandit joined his companion in the cold, rain-soaked earth.

For a long moment, the only sound was the hiss of rain and the distant rumble of thunder. Necra planted the shovel's spade in the mud and leaned on the handle, surveying the two unconscious men with the same placid expression she might wear while checking the growth of roses along the north wall.

"You would have found nothing," she murmured, more to herself than to the prone bodies at her feet. "Captain Benethil was buried with his honor. His silver was given to the widows' fund in Ratwood three days past."

A low meow sounded from atop the old maple. Morticia sat perched on a branch, one gold eye and one silver gleaming through the rain, her tail flicking with what might have been approval—or mockery. With Morticia, it was often both.

"Yes, I know, Morty." Necra said, tilting her head up toward the cat. "I gave them a chance."

She crouched beside the two bandits, pressing two fingers to each of their throats in turn. Still alive, good. Killing was a failure of care, and she had not failed tonight. She straightened, hoisted the shovel back onto her shoulder, and began the slow, quiet work of dragging them toward the gate, where Leorica and Auriel are probably approaching by now. By morning, the two bandits would wake in a cell in Ratwood with headaches, bruised ribs, and a story no one would believe.

The rain continued to fall. The sleepers remained undisturbed. And Necra hummed her low, repetitive lullaby under her breath as she worked—the same one Kroxys was said to sing to the newly dead.

The rain fell in cold, steady sheets over the graveyard, drumming against headstones and turning the earth to dark, clinging mud. Mist coiled between the monuments like something alive, thickening the space between the old iron gates and the Shrine of the Undermaiden. The air smelled of wet stone, disturbed soil, and the faint, sour residue of failed magic.

Necra moved through it all without sound.

Her hooded figure emerged from the fog as though the mist itself had simply shaped her into being. The heavy black robe clung wetly to her shoulders, but her pace remained unhurried, her shovel balanced across one shoulder. Before her, scattered among the graves near the old maple, half a dozen figures shambled in sluggish, jerking motion—freshly raised corpses still shedding the grave-earth from their shrouds.

A seventh lay crumpled near the north wall. The necromancer. The boy—and he had been a boy, barely twenty, his face still frozen in the surprise of death—had tried to raise a warband. The sleepers had woken angry, and he had paid for his arrogance before Necra could cross the grounds to stop him herself.

She stepped past his body without a glance. The living could wait, the sleepers could not.

The nearest corpse lurched toward her, a militiaman by the look of his tattered tunic, his jaw working soundlessly. Necra drew the shovel from her shoulder in a single, fluid motion and brought the flat of the spade around in a sweeping arc. The iron connected with his temple, consecrated steel flaring silver-white on impact. The corpse crumpled, and she caught him before he hit the ground, lowering him gently to the mud.

"Back to sleep now," she murmured, her voice barely above a whisper. "You were not meant to walk tonight."

Another came at her from the left, a woman this time—Mrs. Aldridge, buried just last spring. Necra sidestepped the grasping hands and hooked the shovel's edge behind the woman's knee, pulling her off balance. A second strike, precise and final, laid her beside the militiaman.

She worked her way through the rest with the same methodical patience. No wasted movement, and no anger. When the last sleeper collapsed into the wet grass, his undead vigor drained by the soft gray radiance still fading from her palm, she knelt beside him and closed his eyes with two fingers.

"I am sorry for the disturbance," she said, as if apologizing for a spilled cup of tea. "You should not have been called up. The fault is not yours."

Light flickered at the cemetery gate. Two figures hurried through the rain—one in the gleaming plate of a paladin, the other in the soaked white robes of a priestess. Leorica's hand was on her sword hilt, her red hair plastered to her face. Auriel clutched a lantern in one hand and a bundled cloth in the other, her expression pinched with worry.

"Gravekeeper!" Leorica's voice cut through the rain, sharp with alarm that softened the instant she saw the stilled corpses and Necra kneeling among them. "We heard the bells—are you hurt? Is it—?"

She stopped, her eyes finding the crumpled figure near the wall. "Oh, saints! A necromancer?"

"A fool of a boy," Necra said, rising with the shovel balanced once more across her shoulder. The serene smile never left her face. "He woke the sleepers, and they returned his haste with an early grave. I have already apologized to them on his behalf."

Auriel hurried forward, holding the lantern higher to scatter the mist. "Do you need help carrying them back to their graves? Leorica can lift twice her weight when she's done confessing."

"I have no sins to confess tonight," Leorica muttered, though her face flushed.

Necra regarded them both, the faint glow of her silver eyes softening a little more. "The sleepers are quiet now. I will return them to their beds myself—it is my duty, and it must be done properly."

Auriel looked ready to argue, but Leorica laid a hand on her arm. "We can at least keep vigil," the paladin offered, her voice steadier now. "Until you're done."

Necra considered them for a moment, the silence filled only by the rain. Then she nodded, a tiny, almost imperceptible gesture.

"Then sit by the old maple," she said. "The sleepers do not mind your company."

And she turned back to her garden, the first of the fallen already cradled in her arms as she began the slow, careful walk toward the open graves.

The rain fell in a steady, mournful rhythm over Ratwood, turning the unpaved roads to mud and filling the air with the smell of wet stone and wild myrtle. Mist curled between the tombstones of the Shrine of the Undermaiden's graveyard like pale fingers searching for something lost.

Inside the temple, the Mayor stood with his arms crossed, listening with thinning patience as Leorica and Auriel discussed the latest burial tithes. One of his guards lingered by the window, staring out into the night—and then he stiffened.

"There," the guard said, pointing through the rain-streaked glass. "Someone's in the graveyard."

All four of them gathered at the window. Through the shifting mist, a dark figure moved among the stones. Robed and hooded, it drifted with an unsettling silence and darkness, and in its hand, the faint glint of a blade caught the temple's candlelight.

"A weapon?" the Mayor muttered, his face darkening. "Grave robbers, or maybe worse." He starts marching. "Everyone, on my watch."

Leorica was already reaching for her sword. Auriel grabbed a lantern. Within moments, they were out the door and into the rain, boots splashing through puddles as they crossed the wet grass toward the graveyard.

The figure did not flee. It did not even seem to notice them. It continued its slow, deliberate path between the headstones, then stopped near the north wall and knelt in the mud.

"Hold!" the Mayor commanded, his own blade drawn now. "In the name of Ratwood, identify yourself!"

The guard flanked left, Leorica right, and Auriel raised the lantern high, casting a trembling yellow glow across the kneeling shape. Water trickled down their weapons, their faces taut with tension.

The figure turned.

Beneath the hood, a serene smile greeted them. Pale silver eyes glowed faintly in the lantern light. In her hand was not a dagger but a small gardening knife, caked with mud and weed fibers.

Leorica's sword dropped an inch. She let out a long breath that misted in the cold air. "Sorry, Necra. We thought you were a thief or cultist."

Auriel lowered the lantern, clapping a hand over her mouth as her shoulders shook with quiet laughter.

The Mayor's face flushed scarlet. He jammed his blade back into its sheath with more force than necessary. "By the Pantheon, why do you have to be this creepy, woman!?"

Necra rose slowly, the knife in one hand, a clump of dripping weeds in the other. The smile never faltered. "The garden needed weeding near the north wall. The rain loosens the roots."

Leorica bowed stiffly, rain dripping from the tip of her nose. "We will let you continue, Necra. We apologize again."

The group retreated through the mud, their earlier urgency deflated into grumbling and damp embarrassment. The guard lingered a moment longer, fixing Necra with a look somewhere between frustration and genuine unease. "Maybe lower your hood," he muttered, "or wear less scary clothes next time."

Then they were gone, their footsteps swallowed by the rain.

Necra stood alone once more, the mist settling around her like an old familiar blanket. Morticia, perched on a nearby headstone, flicked her tail with the air of a creature long accustomed to such interruptions.

"Now now," Necra murmured, kneeling back down before Master Ironwright's grave—dead these twelve years, remembered every day. "They meant well. The living always do."

Morticia yawned.

Necra resumed her work, the little knife cutting carefully around the headstone's base, and began to hum a low, repetitive tune under her breath. Kroxys' Lullaby, the sleepers knew it well.

The rain fell without haste, a steady, silver-gray hush that blurred the shapes of gravestones into patient silhouettes. Mist coiled low along the ground, drifting between yews and weathering angels, as if the earth itself were exhaling. The Shrine of the Undermaiden’s cemetery lay silent beneath the night, save for the soft, rhythmic squelch of a shovel’s heel meeting sodden soil in a slow, methodical patrol.

Necra moved through her garden the way a shadow might—unhurried, formless until she was suddenly there, a deeper darkness in the fog. Her black hooded robe drank the wet air, its hem heavy with dew and the faint, clean scent of old stone. Her shovel rested across one shoulder, its bright spade catching occasional glints of what little light the clouded moon allowed. At her side padded Morticia, the immortal cat with one eye of polished gold and one of tarnished silver, tail flicking droplets as she threaded between headstones with practiced disdain for the weather.

Necra’s voice rose only slightly above the rain, a low, melodic murmur that had no audience but the sleepers. The tune was old, older than the kingdom that now called itself Cinderfall, older than many of the names on the stones. Kroxys’ Lullaby, the very same the Undermaiden whispered to the newly dead.

"Oh, Death... Won’t you spare me over another year?"

Her lips moved around the words with absent reverence as she paused by a tilted marker, its inscription half-eaten by moss. She pressed a gloved palm gently to the wet stone, not to read, but to remember. Martha Goodwell, who had loved lavender. The bush she’d planted beside the grave years ago was now a fragrant sprawl, drooping under the weight of rain.

Morticia meowed once—a curt, scratchy sound—and sat deliberately upon the grave of Alton Ironwright, blinking slowly as if to point out a drifting leaf that had dared to land there. Necra bent, a faint, serene smile unchanged, and brushed the leaf aside.

"But what is this that I can’t see, with ice cold hands taking hold of me?"

She straightened and resumed her walk, the lullaby threading seamlessly back into the rhythm of her steps. She nudged a loose clod of earth back into a sunken patch near the north wall, her shovel gently patting it flat. The garden needed little weeding tonight; the sleepers were at peace.

"No wealth, no ruin, no silver, no gold, nothing satisfies me but your soul."

At the old maple, where the low stone wall offered a seat for the grieving, she stopped. Morticia leapt onto the wall and shook herself, scattering water with obvious satisfaction. Necra looked out over the tilted field of stones, her silver-gray eyes catching the faintest glow from within, and simply listened. No distant chime tolled in her mind tonight. The Ledger of Steps remained closed in her cottage. No new sleeper had crossed the threshold.

"Quiet tonight, Morticia," she murmured, her voice the same soft tone she might use to comfort a weeping child. "The river-hush and the wet stone keep them snug."

The cat’s mismatched eyes narrowed into slits of smug agreement. Necra let the lullaby trail into a hum once more as she turned back along the path, a hooded figure dissolving into the mist, her shovel’s spade a thin crescent of light in the darkness.

"My name is Death and the end is here..."

The last line faded, swallowed by the rain. But her smile, faint and eternal, remained.