I looked around, expecting to see a car. “How’d you get here?”

“A rideshare,” she said.

“You told me rideshares were dangerous,” I said pointedly.

“Not for me.”

I looked down the road. “I can tell when someone is bullshitting me.”

Her eyes glinted as she narrowed them at me. “Right. If I told you it was for your own good, would you believe me?”

“Most of the time when people say something’s for your own good, it’s not. So, no.”

Marie looked thoughtful. “What if I told you it was for my own good?”

My skin pricked up. A primal, instinctive fear draped itself around me, much the same way it had when I’d been alone with her in her house. “I might believe you if you said that.”

“Okay then,” she said. “It’s for my own good.”

She gestured toward the cemetery. The graveyard was fenced in by wrought iron that was badly in need of repair. The main gate looked like it had come off its hinges ages ago, and the spiky pickets sat at odd angles between the trees.

Marie slipped her hand into mine and a nervous flutter invaded my stomach. Nyx stayed by the car as Marie pulled me through the cemetery gates.

The place might have been tranquil once, but now bits of pale marble headstones stuck out of the overgrown foliage like broken, jagged teeth. It was so quiet all I could hear was the beat of my heart, which sped up every time Marie readjusted her grip.

My phone rang and Karter’s name flashed on the screen. Marie paused. I tried to silence it, but accidentally declined his call.

“Making friends already?” Marie asked.

“It’s a guy I met at the bookstore. The one on Market Street. He’s my friend. Just my friend.” I wanted to make that really, really clear.

She didn’t even try to hide how happy that made her.

“Market Street?” she asked. “The used-book place?”

“Yeah. You know it?”

“It’s new. Opened a few months ago.”

“Oh.” I thought Karter had mentioned working there longer than that. As I tried to remember what he’d said, I noticed that the overgrown grass was leaning toward me. Marie turned and glanced at the ground. I stepped back, letting go of her hand and swatting at the grass, trying to make it stop reaching for me.

“I’m not surprised by much,” Marie said. “But that ability, that gift you share with the people who have come before you—it never fails to amaze me. It’s nice to see it again after all these years.”

Part of me understood that she knew about me. But hearing her say that and moving on like it was no big deal made me feel like I’d put down a heavy burden.

The fiery evening sky was quickly swallowed by the starry night. In the dying light, ancient-looking oaks twisted in the darkness. As we moved by, they creaked and groaned.

“Most people who’ve died in the last thirty years are buried over in Grasmere Cemetery,” Marie said. “This place is much, much older and holds the remains of families whose lineages stretch back generations.”

A granite tombstone with a sculpted angel draped over it, mourning, sat among a gathering of gnarled trees. The name and date carved on its face read Beekman 1623–1707.

The shadowy path led us to the back side of the iron fence, where two overlapping pieces didn’t quite connect. Marie slipped through the opening and waited on the other side. I hesitated.

“A little farther,” Marie said.

I squeezed through the fence and followed Marie into the thicket behind the graveyard.

“This is the site of the original cemetery,” she said. “Watch your step.”

Grave markers, most of them level to the ground and so broken they lay in heaps among the brush, dotted the ground. I stumbled trying to keep from stepping on them. Marie came to a sudden stop and I bumped into her. She set her hands on my waist to steady me. I lifted my head to meet her gaze but her eyes were downcast. I followed her mournful stare. There, among the weeds, overgrown grass, and twisted roots, was a small white headstone.

CIRCE COLCHIS

OCTOBER 31, 1970 –JANUARY 12, 2020

My attention was drawn to the grave next to Circe’s. It was covered in hellebore, a poisonous black flower with a bright yellow center. They crowded the grave marker.

I bent and brushed them aside. The cold tingling rushed over my fingers and then faded. I didn’t immediately look at the name on the marker. Did I know who it would belong to? Is that why I had bent to clear it without hesitation? I gathered myself and looked at the name.

SELENE COLCHIS

SEPTEMBER 8, 1977–DECEMBER 24, 2007

I set the flowers I’d brought with me against the headstone, and the hellebore coiled around them. An overwhelming sadness enveloped me, stole my next breath, and brought a torrent of silent tears.

“They were always close,” Marie said solemnly. “Like I said, they were private, aside from the business of the apothecary. I think it makes sense that they would’ve wanted to be here together, with the rest of their family.”

I gazed bleary-eyed at the other markers. Every single one that was still readable bore the name Colchis. Perse, Danae, Ares, and all with dates of birth and death ranging from the mid-1800s and some even older than that.

One of the headstones didn’t have a date but read Persephone Colchis and was so crumbled and broken that it probably wouldn’t be legible for much longer.

“They’re all here,” said Marie. “This has been their plot since they came to this place. The house you live in was built on the site of their original homestead. They’ve been here ever since.” Her eyes misted over. “Even after Circe closed down the shop, she was still there like a ghost, walking the halls, mourning every minute of the day.”

I thought of what it must have been like for her. My grandpa Errol was the best man I’d ever known, and when he died, Mo didn’t get out of bed for a week. For a long time, it was like she was going through the motions. She would get up, shower, eat, and go to work, but it was like a shadow was constantly hanging over her—over us, because we mourned with her.

It only got better when we went to counseling and got the help we all needed to process what had happened. I couldn’t imagine how things would have been if we hadn’t gone. Maybe Circe didn’t have that opportunity. Every new thing I learned about these people made them more real.