Epilogue
Gretchen’s pulse battered in her chest as she fled down the steps with the ease that could only come from one who had taken a path many times. Someone new to the damp, winding stairwell would lose their footing, but not Gretchen. She needed no eyes to see, only her senses stained with memory, carrying her true.
When she reached the crypts, she tempered her breathing to adjust to the change in air. In the early days, she’d needed time to steady herself, but she’d learned to do that along the way, so that when she reached the bottom, she could do what she’d come to do with nothing holding her back.
“Ash,” she whispered to the darkness. She passed her torch back and forth. Cobwebbed tombs danced in and out of her vision. Hadden. Torrin. Mylannie. Little Hughie. Names etched into e
