That morning, Hanna had woken up and decided that she wanted to look like a woman on a mission. She'd put on her favorite high-heeled booties, the ones that belonged on a catwalk but that she could run like a Bond girl in, and leather-paneled skinny jeans that made her feel like a total badass. She'd spent the day glaring people down through her false lashes in the halls. She isn't just poking the bear; she's pretty sure she could take him in hand-to-hand combat today.

She hasn't figured out what mission she's on yet, but hell, dressing the part can't hurt on that front.

"So, Spencer," she says, sliding into her seat at their designated lunch table in the courtyard. "Is there a reason that last time you had a breakdown your hair puffed out like a balloon but this time it just keeps getting flatter? Like, how does that work?"

"Hanna!" says Emily, looking scandalized.

"What? I'm asking for science," Hanna says. She looks back over at Spencer, who's raising an eyebrow at her but looks like she wants to laugh. Well, that's one mission accomplished, at least. Hanna grins back at her.

"Afternoon, ladies," says Mona, and Hanna looks up to her right to see Mona putting her lunch down at the table in front of Aria's usual seat.

"Um, what are you doing?" Spencer asks.

Mona rolls her eyes. "You think I don't know about your lunch time powwows?" She tosses her hair over her shoulder and sits. "You can hate me all you want, Spencer, but as long as we're looking for Aria, I'm part of the team. Like it or not, you need me at these things, and you know it."

"Okay, fine," Emily says. "But if you make a single comment –"

"What are you gonna do, Emily?" Mona asks, a slight bite to her voice. "Decide Aria can rot because I hurt your feelings?"

Emily looks like she's going to breathe fire, but she doesn't say anything.

Once the moment of silence has gone on long enough that Hanna thinks it'll give her gas, she reaches over to Mona's tray and grabs her bag of potato chips.

"Really, Han?" Mona asks. She's smiling, though, and Hanna smiles back at her.

"All that salt can't be good for your adrenalized hibernation, or whatever," she says.

"Hyperreality," Spencer corrects.

Hanna ignores her. "I'm doing you a favor, if you think about it," she says, and pops a chip into her mouth. "Taking one for the team."

"Oh, of course," Mona says, and laughs. "You don't get any enjoyment out of this."

"This is just as painful for me as it is for you," Hanna tells her.

Mona's smile reaches all the way to her eyes, which are shining, and the brick that's always weighing in Hanna's chest feels even heavier than usual. This was what it was like, before she found out about Mona last year, as easy breezy as flipping through a copy of Teen Vogue.

Thinking about it makes it hard to breathe for a moment, so Hanna pushes it to whatever corner of her mind she keeps all the other things that hurt like getting hit by a car in, and blazes forward. "So what all do you guys think the Grunwald knows, anyway?"

No one responds for a moment, and then Spencer raises an eyebrow. "The Grunwald?" she asks. Her tone is – there's a word Hanna learned over the summer that describes it perfectly, god – derisive, that's it, her tone is derisive. Hanna resists the urge to roll her eyes; right, because it's one thing that their dead friend is alive, flying planes and wearing masks of her own face, but an actual clairvoyant is clearly going too far.

"I mean, she literally pulled Ali out of her own grave," is what Hanna says instead of any of that. "She might know a little more than she told us about all those secrets she was buried with."

"That's very… poetic, Hanna," Mona says. Her tone is a little condescending and a little admiring.

Hanna does roll her eyes. "I got a 760 on my writing SAT score, bite me."

"A 760?" Spencer asks.

Hanna slams her hands down on the table. "Oh my god, Spence, our friend is literally kidnapped right now, stop freaking out about university for one freaking second." She blows a stray lock of hair out of her face. "I'm gonna drive down to Ravenswood after school."

Mona, Spencer, and Emily all exchange looks; Hanna feels a little like a kid whose parents are trying to decide if she's old enough for the talk.

"Han," Emily says, after a moment, "are you sure you want to do that?"

"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" Hanna asks. "Because Caleb's there?"

Emily doesn't respond, but looks down instead, in a way that clearly means yes, that's exactly why.

"You know," Hanna says, feeling angrier than is really justified, "I'm not just some little girl who can't handle the fact that her boyfriend left her. I can handle myself. I think I've proven that."

"You have," Spencer replies, voice quiet. "I'm – we're sorry."

"Thank you," Hanna says. She shoves the food she has left to the corner of her plate, then grabs her tray and stands up. "I don't think I'm hungry anymore."

The rest of the day drags on way too long, but within five minutes of the last bell ringing, Hanna's sitting in her car with her key in the ignition. She checks her reflection – her mascara is perfectly in place and she doesn't have a stray eyebrow hair in sight. She holds her own gaze until she looks like she's sure of what she's doing, and then she turns the key, looks over her shoulder, and pulls out of her parking spot.

She blasts upbeat breakup songs for the entire drive to Ravenswood, and by the time she's rolling down those creepy streets at that ridiculously low speed limit, she's feeling like she really is an empowered, independent woman who don't need no man. She's got curses under her tongue and a Lily Allen song in her head, and frankly, she doesn't think any exes or spooky ghosts are a match for that.

It's just her luck, though, that when she puts the car in park and looks over to the square across the street, Caleb is stranding right there.

She's considering turning the car back on and speeding away – really, really considering it – and then, like this town really is haunted, she hears Ali's voice in her mind. It's okay if you have to run away, Han, Ali's saying, and Hanna's heart is racing and there are hot tears pricking at her eyes. I'm sure someone will find it cute that you're such a scaredy-cat sooner or later. Well, later, to be honest, but, it'll happen eventually.

She swallows, blinks back the mistiness in her eyes, rolls down her windows, and honks.

Caleb looks over, and Hanna waves a hand over her head so there's no way he can't see her.

"Hanna?" he mouths, and Hanna rolls up her windows and gets out of her car.

"Hey, stranger," she says. Her tone is a little flirtier than she meant it to be, so she closes her mouth and thinks about sounding casual and detached. "Funny meeting you here."

"Hanna, what are you doing in Ravenswood?" Caleb asks.

Hanna raises an eyebrow. "I need to ask the Grunwald a few questions."

Caleb exhales; his shoulders drop. "Han–"

"We have questions, and we think she has answers," Hanna says, as forcefully as she can, so there's no room for objections. "Now, are you gonna help me or not?"

It's clear that Caleb wants his answer to be 'not', which is such a 180 from the Caleb she knows and loves that she thinks something must have happened to him in this freaky little town, but he doesn't say it, just nods and puts his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. "Do you know where to find her?" he asks.

Hanna looks at him like he's from another planet. "Um, hello, aren't you the one who lives here now?" she asks. "You tell me where to find her."

"How would I know where she is?" Caleb asks.

"She's a witch with weird pale eyes who has visions of teenage girls getting murdered," Hanna says. "I feel like she doesn't go unnoticed."

Caleb is silent for a moment. "Visions of teenage girls getting murdered," he repeats at last. "Do you think–"

"We're not an 'us' anymore, Caleb, so I don't think anything," she tells him. "Can you help me find the Grunwald or not?"

It takes him a few minutes, but apparently he can. He leads her back to that creepy mansion she got trapped in last time she was in this godforsaken town, and lo and behold, the Grunwald is a maid or something there, because of course she is. Creepy old ladies and creepy old houses go together like red nails and cosmo glasses.

"Hanna," is what the Grunwald says without turning around, the moment Hanna walks into the room. "I was wondering if you'd turn up today. It's good to see you again."

"Shouldn't you actually see me before you say that?" she asks. Caleb shoots her a look like she's being rude, but she's not trying to be, she means it. Can the Grunwald see out of the back of her head? Or does she mean her psychic sight?

"Quite," says the Grunwald, and turns to face Hanna. Her eyes are even paler than they were last time Hanna saw them, if that's even possible, and she looks washed out like an old photograph. "You look well."

"You don't," Hanna says. "Sorry, but, are you, like, okay?"

"Hanna," Caleb says, voice tense, but the Grunwald just smiles in that cryptic way of hers.

"Your candor is, as always, refreshing," she says, and then she moves to an armchair a few feet away, sitting down carefully. "Please," she says, and extends her hand to gesture to the chair across from her.

Hanna sits. Caleb doesn't, hovering at her shoulder instead. She thinks he's trying to come off like a guard dog, but really, it's more like having a fly in her peripheral vision.

"You have questions for me," the Grunwald says.

Hanna leans forward. "Last time we were here, you told us that the last time you saw Ali was that night."

The Grunwald nods.

"Was that true?" Hanna asks.

Again, the Grunwald nods.

Frustration builds in Hanna's chest. "Okay, by 'saw', did you mean in person or in one of your visions?"

The Grunwald's eyebrows rise; it wouldn't be that noticeable if her face wasn't so eerily still the rest of the time. "A perceptive question," she asks. "You truly are a believer, aren't you?"

Hanna tilts her head. "I've seen weirder things," she says, and crosses her legs, trying to look a little more authoritative. "Are you gonna answer me or not?"

"I will," the Grunwald replies. "I spoke the truth to you and your friends: I have not seen Alison since, with my eyes or with my sight." She turns her head towards the window, but doesn't look at it; a moment later, she turns her head back towards Hanna. "I have, however, heard her."

Hanna narrows her eyes. "Like, on a recording? On the phone?"

"Neither," the Grunwald says. "I've heard her in my mind, like a whisper next to my ear that disappears as soon as I turn to see the speaker."

The Grunwald is silent for a long moment, and Hanna realizes that she's waiting for Hanna to reply. "And what does she say?" Hanna asks.

"A name," the Grunwald says. "The same name, again and again, for two years, now."

Hanna can hear the whirring of the radiator, the creaking of the floorboard under Caleb's shifting weight, the pounding of her own heart in her throat.

"Well?" she asks, when she can't handle waiting any longer. "What name is she saying?"

The corner of the Grunwald's mouth turns up, just a little.

"Charlotte."