21st-22nd May, 1804

Between the nearly full moon glowing in the cloudless night sky and the numerous streetlamps she would have an easy time navigating the streets without a lantern, she thought. She had never before ventured out alone at night since coming to the city, not even once, and she couldn't help but feel terribly apprehensive.

She slipped on her black cloak, pulled the hood up to cover her hair and moved toward the door silently. Pausing at the front door she turned around and glanced down along the empty hallway. Elizabeth was asleep of course, and Katrina had instructed Anna to watch over her this evening. Stephen had gone upstairs to his room after returning from Nicholas's house, but he wasn't necessarily asleep. The boy was vigilant and very protective of them, particularly when Ichabod was not around, and now that Ichabod was on the nightshift she knew Stephen watched over them extra carefully after dark. She half-expected him to appear in the hallway.

The house was silent save for the ticking of the kitchen clock. She stood motionless for a few minutes, listening for other sounds, waiting for Stephen to appear and question her. The house remained still and no one appeared to stop her. She quietly opened the door and stepped out into the night, pulling the door shut behind her.

William Street was dim and deserted. Although the night air was warm and she was wearing an extra layer Katrina shivered involuntarily. She reached up and touched the warm crucifix that lay against her chest. It hung on a silver chain and the feel of it beneath her fingers was reassuring. She let go of it, pulled her cloak tighter around her body, descended the front steps and began to make her way up the street toward her destination.

Her heart beat rapidly as she approached the edge of the city proper. She'd never been this far north even during the day; there was nobody and nothing here but a jail house, a cemetery and beyond that farms and wilderness. As she approached the gate that enclosed the cemetery she spotted the dark figure.

"Ilona?" she called out softly, startled by the sound of her own voice despite herself.

"Yes," she whispered, beckoning.

She hurried over to meet her friend.

"My husband will kill me if he finds out that I've been wandering around alone at night, in a graveyard no less…"

"He won't find out. His beat is on the other side of town."

"How do you know?"

"Some of my…colleagues…have been keeping watch over him."

Katrina was stunned and did not reply.

They passed through the open gate of wrought-iron and into the cemetery. Ilona led her through several rows of graves before stopping and pointing to one that had been recently covered up.

"The bodies that your husband and his colleagues find are being burned for the most part. But the other ones, those that died at home, in bed, they have been buried. That is the grave of one of those latest victims."

Ilona placed something in Katrina's hands, which turned out to be a long wooden stake, and told her to wait where she stood. Her friend walked a few feet away and reached into a satchel that she was carrying. She withdrew her hand and released what looked like powder onto the ground. Her hand went back into the sack several more times, drawing out more of the powder each time. As she sprinkled the powder she stepped backwards, turning and making a wide arc around Katrina, chanting in her own language. Katrina sensed the change in the energy around her and realized that Ilona was drawing an enchanted circle with the powder, no doubt for protection. The powder was at least partly made up of garlic; the pungent smell reached her nostrils in the still warm air.

After drawing a large full circle around them Ilona began to use her foot to spread out the powder and close any broken parts of the circle. Then she joined Katrina in the center and coaxed her to sit down on the ground next to her.

"We'll be safe in here," she said, taking back the wooden stake that she'd given her.

"Is that garlic you were sprinkling?"

"Garlic and other ingredients, all blessed, of course. I will teach you this protection spell later."

"Thank you. You said that there is something I must see…"

She pointed at the new grave. "Keep your eye on that grave."

Katrina shivered and her heart thudded in her chest again as she gazed at the mound of freshly piled dirt. She was thinking about the story that Ilona had told them the previous evening, of the countess who left her grave at night and roamed about, preying on the living. Was this what she was about to witness?

Ilona's warm hand closed over hers. "They will not be able to cross the boundary into the circle. We will be alright."

"They?" Katrina repeated nervously.

She nodded.

"This is related to the story you told us yesterday night."

"Yes."

"Why…" she paused, uncomfortable, trying to search for the right words. "You said that people you know are watching over my husband? Why have they specifically singled him out? Is he more in danger than anyone else?"

"No more than any of the others who are working or simply out at night. He is the only member of the constabulary who has questioned whether the rash of deaths is truly due to a plague though. Because he is your husband I asked them to keep an eye on him."

Katrina opened her mouth to speak but a noise that seemed to come from underground stopped her. A gasp escaped from her lips and she nearly jumped a foot in the air when she glimpsed out of the corner of her eye movement in the dirt on the new grave. She turned and stared directly at the grave, feeling the blood draining from her face when she saw the soil crumbling and beginning to roll down from the top of the mound, without a doubt disturbed by something underneath.

Ilona squeezed her hand reassuringly. "It will be alright. I told you they cannot get to us while we're in this circle."

oooOooo

His shift had barely started when Ichabod discovered the first victim of the night.

Leaving the Broad Street Watch House after checking in he made his way to Water Street and headed north toward his beat. No sooner had he turned onto Water Street and walked a few feet to reach Mesier's Alley when he caught a glimpse of movement in the dark. He turned into the alley, holding his lantern up high to make his way lighter and glimpsed what appeared to be a dark figure kneeling on the ground. The figure turned toward him as the light hit the alley then stood up.

"Can I be of assistance?" Ichabod called out, moving forward slowly.

He could now see that there was another figure sprawled on the ground there and he began to hurry toward it. The figure that stood now was a man, Ichabod could see, and he wore a black cape. He thought of James Leeds' story of the man in the black cape. Had he stumbled luckily on the culprit? This man was fairly short, certainly shorter than he was, and Leeds' description was that of a tall man. Still, perhaps Leeds had been exaggerating or mistaken, especially given his extreme flight of fancy as to the rest of the tale; and there was also the possibility of more than one culprit at work.

The man stood rather than knelt over the prone figure now, and he appeared to be waiting him. But as Ichabod drew within a few feet of him and had just glimpsed the deathly pale impassive face the man suddenly turned away. Ichabod didn't have the time or presence of mind to call out for him to stop, or for anything else. He stood there in the alley unaware that he had stopped moving and gaped at the spot where the man had been standing, wondering if he'd imagined seeing him; for one moment the man had been standing there in front of him, the next moment he was gone, as if he'd vanished into thin air – or quite impossibly run away at a speed that was faster than the blink of an eye.

"What…on earth…?" Ichabod murmured dazedly.

The second figure was still there, lying unmoving on the ground. Ichabod shook off his stupor and moved over to the body, that of a man. He knelt down and placed his fingers against the carotid artery to check for a pulse, frowning as he felt the familiar holes beneath his fingertips. He wasn't surprised to find that there was no pulse. Shining the lantern on the neck area he examined the wounds, measuring them and noting with dismay that the two holes seemed smaller and slightly closer to each other than those of the ones he'd found on the other corpses that he'd been able to examine.

Rising to his feet after completing a superficial examination of the body Ichabod rang his bell and called out loudly.

"Crane? Is that you?"

"None other," Ichabod called out, recognizing Constable White's voice.

White entered the alley and came up to stand beside him, peering at the corpse.

"I suppose you'll want your doctor to examine this one too."

"Mm-hmm," he answered absently.

"Thompson is summoning the coffin bearers."

Ichabod didn't respond. He was distracted, thinking of the other man that he'd seen in this alley, sure that he hadn't imagined him and wondering how he'd disappeared so quickly, right in front of his eyes yet without his seeing him run off. Again he thought of James Leeds' story. Leeds had described the man he saw as disappearing in a puff of smoke but Ichabod had seen no such thing.

"Ridiculous," he said under his breath and shook his head, unable to believe that he was entertaining that idea.

He turned his thoughts to the size difference of the wounds on this corpse and what that pointed to. Given the number of bodies they'd been finding they either had one very busy assassin or several assassins using the same type of weapon. If he was to assume that there was more than one murderer then it was logical to conclude that this victim had likely been murdered by a different assassin, who was using a slightly different sized weapon.

"It seems there were some deaths at the medical school on the weekend, too," White spoke up again, interrupting his thoughts. "Perhaps it is an epidemic after all, and now that you've involved the medical school with these victims the doctors are getting sick too."

"There are several possible theories as to the cause of these deaths," Ichabod replied evenly.

His colleague muttered something under his breath and didn't pursue any further conversation. They waited in silence until Thompson arrived with the coffin bearers.

oooOooo

The next couple of hours of Ichabod's shift were fairly uneventful. First he went with the coffin bearers to the medical school and met a bleary-eyed Doctor Camden. He explained the size difference of the wounds that he'd noted and the physician advised that he would take exact measurements during his examination.

Then he left the doctor to his work and returned to his beat, paying close attention to Mesier's Alley and the other alleys and small secluded slips where nasty doings and vicious attacks were more likely to occur, unseen. An odd thing about this area, and the city in general, was the extremes that existed side by side, often a single block apart. On the one hand there was Fraunces Tavern on Pearl Street, a fairly nice eating and drinking establishment that boasted a prestigious clientele that had at one time included George Washington; yet walk a mere two blocks away toward the East River and one found themselves in the middle of one of the most dangerous areas in the city.

Ichabod patrolled his area with no further incident until about four in the morning, which was when he arrived back at Coenties Slip and Pearl Street and made the turn onto Coenties Slip. Ahead of him, halfway along the slip, he glimpsed a figure hunched over another prone figure. This time he didn't pause or call out. He ran to the familiar tableau as fast as he could, reaching them in time to see that the kneeling person was holding a weapon of some sort high over his head with both hands, poised to plunge it down into the prone person's chest.

"What do you think you're doing?" Ichabod exclaimed, dropping his lantern to the ground and seizing the assailant's arm.

"Let me go! I have to do this!"

He was taken aback by the voice. It was a male voice on the verge of changing; a young teen.

Prying the weapon loose from the boy's fingers Ichabod discovered that it wasn't a knife but a wooden stake, about a foot long. The sharp point had been aimed at the chest of the prone body.

The boy began to try to scramble to his feet but he was small and very slight of build, and Ichabod restrained him easily with a firm hand on his shoulder. "No, no, you're not going anywhere until you've answered a few questions."

"I didn't do anything wrong," the boy protested, sinking back down onto the ground under the weight of Ichabod's hand.

"Is that so? I've just found you kneeling over the body of a man who appears to be dead, preparing to finish the job."

"I didn't kill him."

"It certainly looks as if you did, or were at the very least about to. Who is he?"

"I don't know. I found him like this, already dead."

"And you decided to ensure that he was? With this of all things?" he asked, indicating the wooden stake that he now held.

Receiving no response Ichabod stooped over, picked up his lantern and held it over him, taken aback once more as he got a clearer glimpse of the boy. His appearance was startling – and reminiscent of Katrina's friend Ilona. He had the same pale skin, the same striking black hair and eyes, and Ichabod imagined that he could see a resemblance. He judged the boy to be about fourteen or so, around Stephen's age.

"Usually when I find a dead body I ring my bell to summon the other constables who are nearby," Ichabod explained kindly but firmly. "But they would automatically assume that you are the culprit, without asking any questions…"

"I didn't kill him. But I have to make sure he is dead," the boy suddenly blurted out.

"I see." Ichabod knelt down beside him, set the lantern on the ground again and laid the stake alongside of it. He reached out, placing his fingers on the prone figure's neck, feeling the familiar holes and no pulse. Holding the lantern up again to shed more light on the body he examined the holes, measuring them with his fingers. He set the lantern down once more and picked up the wooden stake, examining the sharp end, which was too thick to have made the holes; he laid it down on the ground again and turned back to the boy. "Well, I can assure you he is dead. He has no pulse. Are you carrying any other weapons besides this?"

The boy turned out his pockets, revealing some coins and a crucifix but no weapons.

"Did you see who killed the man?"

"No. No one else was here when I came."

The boy reached out frantically then to take the stake back but Ichabod placed his hand on it, not allowing him to take it.

"You fool!" he cried. "He's not really dead yet! You think he is but he isn't! He will only be dead after I drive that stake through his heart!"

Ichabod sighed, thinking of Ilona's tale from the previous night. "I too have heard such superstitious tales from someone. I wonder if we've heard them from the very same someone."

"It isn't superstition," he retorted. This was followed by a stream of unfamiliar syllables, which Ichabod could only deduce were epithets being hurled at him in another language, likely the same language that Ilona spoke.

"Well, I don't know what language you are speaking, but perhaps you are acquainted with the very same person who I've heard these tales from. Her name is Ilona Vajda."

This made the boy pause and he looked at Ichabod stunned.

"She is my wife's friend," he continued. "I am Constable Ichabod Crane."

His eyes went wider and there was a spark of recognition in them. "Crane?"

"That's right. Have you heard of me?"

"Possibly," he mumbled, casting his eyes down at the ground.

"What is your name?"

He looked up and hesitated.

"Surely I didn't ask you that difficult a question," Ichabod said, noting the dilemma that openly showed on the boy's face as to whether he ought to provide his real name or a fake one. But it made no difference what name he gave; Ichabod already knew without having to ask that he had just coincidentally encountered Nicholas, Stephen's new friend who lived a few doors down from them. Why the boy was out at this hour roaming the streets was beyond him. He could only thank God that he hadn't discovered Stephen out with him.

"Miklós," he answered finally.

"Miklós. That is your given name?"

He nodded.

"And your family name, Miklós?"

"Székely."

"Where do you live, Miklós Székely?"

"Are you going to arrest me?"

"Not at this time. As far as I know there is no law against attempting to stab a body that's already dead. But I should like to make certain that you get home safely."

"I don't need help getting home," he answered, sulking.

"Very well, then." Ichabod studied Miklós thoughtfully. The boy looked up and met his gaze, almost challenging him.

"Will you be burning that body?" he asked finally. "The body needs to be either burned or a stake driven through the heart. Otherwise it will rise up and kill others in the same way."

Ichabod shook his head and sighed again. "You seem like an intelligent young man. I cannot believe that you put stock in such nonsense."

"It isn't nonsense." Miklós's frustration and agitation was obvious. "I suppose you didn't believe Ilona Vajda when she told you about it either."

With another sigh Ichabod stood up and coaxed the boy to his feet. "Go home. It is late and you should not be out roaming the streets. You're apt to get into trouble and I assure you that if you run into another constable, things will not be so easy for you."

Miklós went for the wooden stake that lay on the ground next to the lantern but Ichabod quickly moved his leg and trapped it under his foot.

"I shall keep this, if you don't mind, at least for tonight. If we don't meet again I'll give it to Ilona Vajda and ask her to return it to you."

The boy looked up at him with a frown.

"Stay out of trouble now," he warned.

"Wait, Constable. What if I show you?"

"Show me what?"

"I'll show you what happens to the body, after it's been staked. That will prove…"

"I'm afraid I cannot let you deface the body in any way," Ichabod told him, shaking his head. "It must remain intact until the physician can examine it. Now go home."

oooOooo

Katrina's eyes fluttered open and she stirred, waking at the sound of Elizabeth squealing all the way from the ground floor. Seconds later she heard the little footsteps running down the hall to greet her Papa at the door. A smile spread across her face at the sound but instantly morphed into a wince as she made the mistake of turning onto her side.

Her body ached and she was utterly fatigued. She lay still now, listening to the muffled voices downstairs, to the sounds of big and small footsteps as Ichabod and Elizabeth made their way to the drawing room and closed the door. Then silence again. It would be about an hour before Ichabod made his way up to bed unless his concern for her got the better of him and he postponed his play time with Elizabeth. No doubt she was already explaining that Mamma had had a bad night and was still in bed. She closed her eyes again and tried to relax but she was unable to put the previous night's activities out of her mind and too apprehensive about what was to come, particularly where it concerned Ichabod.

She had grown up with the supernatural and with magic, had practiced it her whole life, and when Ilona told them the story of the countess and the undead she didn't question for a moment the possibility that it could be real for she was aware of the odd, unexplainable things that existed in this world.

And yet that still hadn't completely prepared her for what she'd just witnessed in the cemetery a few hours earlier.

Even worse, Ichabod was going to encounter what she'd seen; in fact it was remarkable that, working nearly every single night as he did, he hadn't run into these fiends already. But it was inevitable that he would soon, for it was at night that they prowled. And if she hadn't been totally prepared for what she witnessed, even with her experience in that province, she could only barely imagine how shocking and devastating it would be for Ichabod, who was so high-strung and still in deep denial about such things. This prospect terrified her even more than the things she had seen.

She could only thank all that was good that at least she'd met Ilona, who knew and had informed her about what was happening; and that she had bought Ichabod's crucifix, which was now securely attached to his uniform jacket once again, ensuring his protection. But she didn't know how she could possibly prepare him for the reality of these creatures and chances were he wouldn't believe it until he'd seen it with his own eyes anyway – no doubt he would say she was taking Ilona's fairytales and folklore too much to heart.

Besides, if she told him what she'd seen she would also have to reveal exactly when and where she'd seen it. When he learned that she was not only walking about the city streets at midnight but roaming around in a desolate, deserted area outside of the city proper he was sure to have a minor convulsion.

It was a conversation that would not end well.

Perhaps an hour had passed or maybe longer when she heard Ichabod climbing the stairs. She turned onto her side facing away from his side of the bed, regretting the hasty movement as her over-strained muscles complained. She closed her eyes, lying still as he opened the door quietly. He moved about in silence, closing the door and undressing, then he eased himself into bed carefully, obviously believing she was still asleep and taking great pains not to wake her. His arms slipped around her, he drew her close and kissed her ear.

"I know you're awake," he murmured. "Are you hiding from me?"

She lay still for a minute, her heartbeat quickening. Then she sighed and slowly, gingerly turned to face him and inched closer, returning his embrace and kissing him on the lips. Then he drew back and probed her face with undisguised concern.

"I'm sorry, I'm very tired," she offered sheepishly.

"Hmm. Elizabeth told me you had a 'bad night', to quote her directly."

Katrina laughed softly. "She was quoting me. How…how was your shift? Did you ever speak to the woman that the doctor told you about?"

"Grace Bartlett. No, not yet. Doctor Camden is going to introduce me and then I'll speak with her. It would be awkward for me to simply appear at her house and start asking questions about a wound on her neck."

"Yes, when you put it that way."

"And you are changing the subject. What is going on, Katrina?" he asked gently.

"What do you mean?"

He sighed and reached out, beginning to stroke her cheek gently. "I mean, Stephen gave me a few more details. He told me he heard noise in the house last night at around three o'clock in the morning and got up to investigate, thinking that a prowler had broken in. Instead he discovered you and your friend Ilona in the sitting room upstairs...doing...something...he really had no idea what you were doing. What were you doing? And why was Ilona here in the middle of the night?"

Katrina sighed again. She should have known that Stephen, with his acute hearing and alertness, would hear them, no matter how quiet they kept.

"Ilona came over to help me put protection on the house," she answered finally.

"At three o'clock in the morning?" he exclaimed, incredulous.

"Yes."

His eyes narrowed and she fought the urge to avert her gaze away from his steady piercing stare.

"Don't you think this is just a little bit excessive, Katrina?"

"No. Summer is almost here and soon it will be very hot. We'll need to leave the windows open."

"Is there some sort of problem with leaving the windows open?"

She hesitated for a minute then answered. "Yes. An open window is an automatic invitation."

He groaned and shook his head.

"Ichabod, I don't know how to tell you…but there are things you need to know…"

"Has the entire city gone mad? Tonight on my beat I ran into Stephen's friend Nicholas…"

"Nicholas?"

"I'm certain that is who he was, though he told me his name was Miklós Székely. He recognized Ilona's name when I mentioned it."

"Yes, that's him. Miklós is his Magyar name. Ilona said he usually uses his American name. I suppose he thought you were special. I don't know if you remember, but at dinner the other night she mentioned the Székely family."

"Oh, yes. I didn't remember the name. Anyway, it must have been four o'clock in the morning when I encountered him on Coenties Slip. He was on the ground, kneeling over yet another victim, and I thought maybe he was the culprit. I saw him holding what looked like a weapon over his head, he was poised to plunge it into the body…I assumed it was a knife. It wasn't."

Katrina stiffened. She knew what it was even before he said it. "Oh?"

"No, it was a wooden stake. The boy insisted that the man wasn't dead and that he had to drive the stake through his heart to ensure that he was. I've never heard anything so ridiculous, save for when Ilona suggested that this was a successful method in her country two hundred years ago…"

"Ichabod…"

He paused and took a deep breath. "Forgive me. I shouldn't insult your friend...it's only that I believe you are both being carried away by superstition. And I don't know this boy's family but why on earth are they allowing him to roam the streets in the middle of the night at all, yet alone to stake corpses through the heart?"

"Was the body that you found him with one of your victims…I mean with the same…marks on the neck and everything?"

"Yes." Ichabod leaned in and kissed her again. "I shouldn't be discussing these gruesome things with you..."

"I told you I don't mind. I'm very interested in this."

"Alright, love. But let's talk more about it later. I'm quite tired."

They settled into each other's arms. Katrina buried her face in his shoulder and closed her eyes. Despite the fact that he didn't want to speak of 'gruesome' things with her she knew that he was really avoiding a discussion about the supernatural, about anything outside of the logical. A sense of despair enveloped her as she realized for certain that no matter how much she tried to talk about it, even if she did succeed in having a conversation with him later, she would never succeed in convincing Ichabod, short of him witnessing it himself.