On November 15, 2015, I first uploaded WotQ (I later uploaded it on ) - and now, it's one year and one day old! :D

Thank you for all the favourites, follows, reviews and kind words! And that you stuck with me for one year!

Halloween Special:

The Green Ghost of Nephelius Cemetery – Part II

The Reaper, First Encounter

"... the day Life and Death meet."

Countryside, England, United Kingdom ‒ October 1842

~Cedric~

I didn't like Halloween.

For decades, I was always taking October 31 off. And for decades, I always played chess with myself and baked biscuits all day long on All Hallows' Eve. But after nearly fifty years, this activity had become extraordinarily boring. I couldn't see my bone-shaped biscuits anymore, and chess games were finished after a couple of minutes. I needed a change, or I would drive myself insane. I couldn't believe it that I had actually done that for so many years now.

I longed for change so much that I had even decided to converse with my fellow Grim Reapers.

"Hello, Eddy!" Cedric Rossdale yelled through the entire corridor, waving at his colleague.

With an annoyed sigh, Edmund Oxley stopped walking and turned around. He and Cedric had been partnered together for their final entrance exam in the "Grim Reaper training program." They had passed it and become professional Grim Reapers. Edmund had never liked Cedric and avoided him ever since they had finished their mission, but Cedric loved it to tease him from time to time.

"What do you want, Rossdale?" Edmund wanted to know, sounding incredibly sourly. He had just talked to Cadan Cahill, Grady Taylor, and Catrina Dapper who had also stopped walking when Cedric had called Edmund.

With a smile on his face, Cedric approached them. None of them looked very happy to see him. "I just wanted to know if you planned something for today."

"I planned to leave," Edmund replied, scowling.

"The Dispatch?" Cedric theatrically widened his eyes. "Why would you do that? Deserters aren't well-received by the bosses. I cannot understand why someone of your calibre..."

"I don't want to leave the Dispatch," Edmund harshly interrupted him. "I want to leave your immediate presence."

Cedric burst into laughter. "That was a good one, Eddy!"

Edmund sighed. "How often do I have to tell you that you shouldn't call me 'Eddy,' Rossdale?"

Cedric ignored him and turned his attention to Catrina, Cadan, and Grady. "And did you plan something for today? I am asking because I don't know what to do myself today."

"You could go and scare some children," Edmund mumbled, and Catrina glared at him.

"Don't be so rude," she said before she smiled at Cedric and politely answered his question. "I have to reap a few souls in Belgravia."

"Catrina asked me to help her because she is not capable of doing it on her own," Cadan said, earning a glare from her.

"I wanted to spend the rest of the day with drinking tea and finishing some clothes I was working on," Grady told Cedric. The numerous scars covering Grady's face shone in the white light of the corridor. Despite his menacing appearance, Grady Taylor was one of the gentlest persons Cedric knew. He and his friends, Catrina and Cadan, were very friendly. Therefore, Cedric had no clue why they spent time with Edmund who was annoyed by almost everything and everyone – Cedric being at the top of his list.

"If you want, you can come with Catrina and me to Belgravia," Cadan suggested. "I guess that she would feel even more secure if you came with us." He leaned to Cedric and whispered: "I think she is afraid of the octopus ghosts which apparently appeared in London districts where rich people live and who, well, have a strange preference for eating Reapers."

Cedric giggled. "That's a good one."

"Isn't it? I am brilliant," Cadan silently said before he spoke louder: "And? Do you want to come with us?"

"If you don't want to go with them," Grady said, "you can also join me."

"No, that's fine," Cedric waved away. "Thanks for the offers, but I just remembered that I have to do something today."

"Are you sure, Cedric?" Catrina asked, and Cedric nodded. "Yes, I am. Have fun in Belgravia, and with tailoring." With these words, Cedric turned around and walked down the corridor.

Grady, Catrina, and Cadan were good people, and they would not have minded it if I had joined them in their activities, but I knew that I would have constantly felt misplaced if I had. Because even though I barely knew them, I knew that Catrina and Cadan preferred to go to Belgravia on their own because they liked each other a lot, and that Grady loved to make clothes in a silent room with nobody else but him. I did not want to disturb their natural order. Also, I knew that it would not have made me happy to reap souls today or try to tailor clothes.

I did not belong to them, and it had been foolish of me to think that I could just go and talk to them without this thought haunting me.

And now, I was back in my room again, not knowing what to do. I sighed.

I could not go back to making biscuits or to playing chess with myself. I needed fresh air – figuratively and literally. I gazed one last time at my lonely chess board and my bone-shaped biscuit cutter before I grabbed my coat and left my room again.

I hurried through the corridors, desperately trying to find myself something new and refreshing. None of my fellow Reapers wasted a glance on me, but I looked at all of them until I caught a glimpse of Oxley vanishing behind a door. I stopped in the middle of the crowded corridor and others threw curses at me because of that, but I did not mind it.

What had Oxley said before? "You could go and scare some children." And wasn't it Halloween? Today was the perfect day to go and pretend to be a ghost. Perhaps, this was one of the few valuable things Oxley had ever said.

Oh, it would be so much fun!

Excited, I turned the around – and almost walked into someone.

In front of me stood the Grim Reaper with the saddest fate out of all of us – a Grim Reaper, forever bound to stay small and petite with the face of a child until her crime would be forgiven. Physically, she was the youngest among us, but I wasn't sure if she was also the youngest in age. There weren't many children who had committed suicide, so her story must be one of the most tragic ones here. However, nobody except herself and the Reapers on the very top of the community knew about it as she rarely talked to anyone, especially not about her past.

Everyone in the Dispatch knew about her, but only a few knew her name.

I wasn't one of them.

"I am sorry," Cedric apologised, and the girl blinked up at him. She had the same eyes like everyone else here, but hers were blanker than the others and reflected so much sadness that it hurt him in his chest to look into them.

"It is all right," the girl replied without expressing any emotion. "You don't have to apologise."

He shook his head. "Of course, I do. I nearly walked right into you,..."

"You can call me 'Em,'" the girl, Em, helped him. It surprised him that she had told him her name without reluctance.

"I am Cedric," he told her, but she did not react to it. "Uh, well...," Cedric started. "Do you happen to know a nice cemetery in London and surroundings?"

Didn't children go to cemeteries on All Hallows' Eve for tests of courage? Therefore, it would be a good place to scare them properly and test how brave they really were.

Em looked at him for a few moments before a faint, sad smile appeared on her lips. She played with a streak of her reddish brown hair when she said: "Nephelius Cemetery in St. Lacey is a good one. It's only a few hours away from London." Then, she suddenly turned around and vanished in the masses.

"Thanks!" Cedric shouted after her, although he knew that she didn't hear it.

I sat next to a broken angel statue in Nephelius Cemetery, waiting for anyone I could frighten to come when I noticed that a big celebration was going on in St. Lacey. Invisible to humans' eyes, I watched how a young girl in a dark blue dress held a speech as an adult. I narrowed my eyes. I knew this girl. The black hair, the blue eyes, the pale skin, and the atmosphere around her which should not belong to a child...

This was the current Watchdog.

When she had been activated in May, the new Countess of Phantomhive had been the content of almost every conversation in the Dispatch. After all, Watchdogs were there to kill – and to give us more work. Everyone wondered if she would be like the others because she was only twelve years old. All the previous Watchdogs had been older when they had been decorated. But she was still a Phantomhive – why wouldn't she go hunting for the blood of others? Her family was rotten to the core, so I didn't think that her age would matter.

After she was done with her speech, she climbed on a float with the Phantomhive emblem on it – undoubtedly, this girl was Cloudia Phantomhive.

I had the feeling that it had been a good decision to come here. With the Queen's Watchdog nearby, today would definitely turn out nicely.

Cedric watched the parade and the ceremonial opening of Phantomhive Manor. He followed everyone to the garden, and if he had not stuck out too much with his silver hair and odd clothes, Cedric would have loved to participate in the games. But only watching Cloudia Phantomhive and the other children playing wheat carving or "bobbing for apples" was amusing enough. He chuckled when he caught Cloudia throwing her apple at a man with a funny moustache when nobody else was looking.

It was very entertaining to follow the festivity, to see all these people happy and laughing. When it was around seven o'clock, Cedric was watching a few little children ‒ it were four: three with blond hair and one with black; the black-haired boy, the youngest out of them, gloomily searched for the others – playing Hide and Seek when he saw Cloudia going to the buffet in the corner of his eyes. Cedric left the four children alone and followed the young Watchdog.

Cloudia and six other children in her age – one boy and five girls – ate all a slice of an odd looking bread, and for some reason, all of them found an object in their slice. Cloudia found a ring at which she stared until she was hugged by a blonde-haired girl. "Congratulation!" the girl screamed, and with a displeased look on her face, Cloudia tore her away from her. A second later, the man with the funny moustache came and yelled: "You got a ring, I see!" He grinned at Cloudia. "I hope you know what that means."

"Of course, I do," she replied, scowling at him.

"And I hope that you also know that I won't allow you to enter a romantic relationship until you're not at least forty-four."

"I assure you that you don't have to worry about me having a 'romantic relationship.' Also, even if this impossible scenario ever happened, I doubt that you would have to decide on it."

The man laughed and gave Cloudia a pat on the back. "Your father also used to say that he would never fall in love or marry. Then, Si met your mother, and he fell so hard for her that he was even shocked at himself. Also, you're still so young, Dia. You can never know where your heart will lead you."

"Yes!" the blonde-haired girl exclaimed. "You can never know what will await you in the future. Or do you think that Romeo and Juliet knew from the very beginning what would await them?"

"The Most Excellent and Lamentable Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy," Cloudia replied, her voice dripping with annoyance. "It's about not falling in love too easily and rushing everything. Also, Romeo Montague and Juliet Capulet are over-dramatic idiots who do not even know what love actually is. They barely knew each other and already wanted to get married! Juliet was thirteen! Romeo could have been a crazy ax-murderer – oh, wait, he did murder Tybalt, his wife's cousin! No matter if Tybalt was a villain, a maniac or not, he still was like a brother to Juliet!"

I burst into laughter. Good that nobody could hear and see me.

This Watchdog was hilarious! I had surely made a good choice.

The blonde girl screamed at Cloudia, her face glowing bright red: "And what do you know about love?" A second after the words had left her mouth, she put her hands on her mouth, her eyes wide because of the shock of what she had just said.

Cedric raised an eyebrow when he saw Cloudia trying to run away, but was stopped by a brown-haired girl in the last second.

Why did it Blondie's words bother her so much?

"Cloudia," the brunette girl said sweetly, letting go of Cloudia's arm. "Connie did not intend to hurt you. Right, Connie?"

The blonde girl whose name or nickname was apparently Connie nodded. Tears were glittering in her eyes. "I am so, so sorry, L... Cloudia! I should have never said that. I knew that I shouldn't have, and I am sorry that I still did." Connie tried to hug Cloudia but was roughly pushed away.

"Yes, you still did it," Cloudia Phantomhive snapped at her, her blue eyes burning. Behind the fire in her eyes, she looked so hurt that it surprised Cedric. Wasn't this girl supposed to be a cold-blooded killer? An ice queen?

"You still did it even though you knew that you shouldn't – and that is the only thing which matters," she continued.

"Dia, are you not a little bit too harsh...," the man with the moustache started, but Cloudia interrupted him. "'A little bit too harsh'?" she repeated and chuckled bitterly. "Of course, I am the harsh one after Lady Matthews here said that I could have no idea of love because I had never experienced love and never will because my father died and I have no memory of him anymore, my mother locked herself away and does not want to see me, and because I did not only grow up completely isolated from the world, bound to a gruesome system and a dreadful governess, but also with liars." She rubbed her temples. "If I am the harsh one, I guess that I should also be the one to apologise, right? Sorry, everyone, for having me as a relative."

Then, Cloudia turned around and quickly walked away. Cedric, relieved that he was invisible, followed her.

If someone had asked me yesterday if I felt sorry for the Watchdog, I would have laughed and said "no." But today, after seeing her like this – so vulnerable, so full of sadness –, I wondered if I had been wrong all the time. If it really mattered how old she was.

I followed her into a labyrinth and watched her sitting on a bench, her legs against her body and her arms wrapped around it. She did not move, did not cry, only sat there in lonely silence.

I sat down right in front of her on the ground. It surprised me that I wanted to show myself to her so badly, to hug and comfort her.

I had heard her story when she had snapped at Connie and was incredibly saddened by it. I didn't know this girl, but I felt pity for her. Perhaps because we were so similar to each other: I had also lost so much when I had still been young, had not the easiest of lives afterwards, and the people I had thought loved me had lied to me.

When the Reapers talked about her in the Dispatch, they only dealt with the question when Cloudia Phantomhive would murder someone for the first time. They only saw her as a killer, a murderer, an emotionless puppet to the Queen – and they had seen the Watchdogs before her in the same way.

But just like them, I had forgotten that the Phantomhives were still humans despite their "curse" – until now.

In this very moment, Cloudia Phantomhive didn't look like an emotionless puppet to me, but like a hurt, broken person. And if I had never seen her before, I would have never thought that this girl was supposed to be the feared ruler of the Underworld.

Cedric stayed with Cloudia, not wanting to leave her alone, and after a few hours, a man blond hair and brown eyes in a dark green suit found Cloudia.

"Are you all right, Cloudia?" the man asked, sitting down next to her on the bench. She didn't reply to his question.

"Connie told me everything," he said. "She really didn't want to hurt you, Cloudia. You know Connie – she often says things she does not actually mean. It happens on accident."

"I don't care," Cloudia murmured and hugged her legs even tighter against her body.

"Cloudia – there had never been a person more important in the lives of Simon and Penelope than you," the man said. "Penelope locked herself away because she could not deal with the sudden loss of her husband. She did not lock herself because of you. And she is only so reluctant to see you because she does not want you to see her in her current state."

"I don't care," Cloudia replied, and her voice shook so much at these words that Cedric's heart broke. "She left me all alone to the Phantomhive System – her confused four-year-old daughter without any memories."

"Penelope had her reasons, Cloudia."

"I do not care about her reasons. She abandoned me. Sometimes, I wish that she would have just died alongside my father. It would not have hurt as much as knowing that she is living in the same building as you but refuses to come out or let you in."

I stood up and left the labyrinth. I didn't want to hear that. I wasn't supposed to hear it. This was a private conversation between her and this man.

This girl should be the cold and mysterious Watchdog. But right now, she only seemed like a little child to me who had spent all her life without anyone who could have given her the love and attention she had deserved.

And I wondered if the previous Watchdogs had been like her – cursed to be broken and alone for all their lives. With their only purpose to serve the Royal family, and only the Royal family.

I watched the four children again. The gloomy boy had found the others. A boy, not much older than he, smiled at him while one of the girls – the taller one – folded her arms in front of her body and glared at the little boy, looking like she could vomit at his sight at any second.

I let my gaze wander around other party guests: There was a red-haired girl with freckles who sat on a chair and drew people. A crowd of children with shining eyes had surrounded her, begging her to be the next one she would draw. There was a young woman with short brown hair who talked to two men – one with messy black hair and grey eyes, and one whose face was half-covered by his glasses and dark hair. I saw a mesmerising beauty with glossy black hair decently laughing at the joke of a man with sparse dark hair. A brown-haired boy showed around a girl. What he seemed to lack on emotions was reflected on the girl's face which shone when he spoke to her. I caught a pale girl stealing cake of someone else when he was gazing into a different direction, and chuckled. At the other end of the garden, a tall boy amazed his audience by letting a small object fly through the sky. It was making me smile to see all these people having so much fun. I wished that I could join them.

And then, some time later, two men announced that the scavenger hunt would soon start and everyone who would like to participate should come to them. Immediately, almost every child hurried to them. The men explained the rules to them and handed them envelopes.

The scavenger hunt was almost about to begin when Cloudia came back and joined it. I smiled when I saw that she felt better already.

She was reading the riddle on her card when a boy tried to sneak up on her.

"Howdy, La-," the boy said – and was cut off when Cloudia whirled around and hit his arm.

"What did I tell you about sneaking up on me?" she said, scowling.

The boy replied her scowl and rubbed his arm. "It's pointless."

She nodded. "Exactly."

"Oh, no. Seems like we're on the same team, Lady," sighed the boy when he glimpsed on her card before he showed her his own.

Cloudia sighed too. They didn't seem to like each other a lot. "Of course, I had to get sorted into the same team with something as annoying as you. Do you have a clue who's Number Three? Don't tell me it's Lily or Matt."

They talked a little bit about Lily and Matt, and even though Cedric didn't know them, they sounded hopelessly ridiculous. Good that nobody could hear his sounding laughter.

"Hello," a little girl greeted Cloudia and the boy after a while who then turned around to her.

They found out that they all belonged to a team and after introducing each other – the boy's name was Thomas, and the little girl's Ilex – and complaining about the game's level of difficulty, they headed out.

Cedric followed them when they went through the forest, collected acorns and other items, walked through rivers and solved puzzles. It was nice to see them interact as each of them was incredibly hilarious – and in this constellation, it was even more amusing.

When had been the last time I had laughed so much and sincerely?

When Cloudia, Ilex, and Thomas went to Place Nine, I remembered why I had come here in the first place: To scare someone. And who could I scare better than these three? I would love to see their frightened faces. Especially Cloudia's.

I quickly returned to my room in the Dispatch to write a riddle which would lead them to Nephelius Cemetery. After all, graveyards and abandoned buildings were perfect locations when it came to scaring people.

"I am a terrible beauty entangled in ivy," I wrote on simple stationery. "Fallen from the light, forever I am bound to the earth. My kin abandoned me. My kin fears me. I am the matter of their darkest dreams."

This would definitely guide Ilex, Cloudia, and Thomas to the old cemetery. All I had to do now was to go back and find out where Place Twelve would be so that I could go there in advance and quickly exchange the cards leading them to Place Thirteen.

I grinned.

"I will look for the item, then," Thomas said when he and the others arrived at the angel statue, Cedric had sat next to earlier. He quickly vanished behind it, and Ilex leaned to Cloudia to whisper something into her ear. Cedric stood right next to them and perked up his ears to hear what she was saying.

"Who wrote the riddle? And don't try to fool me – I know that it hadn't been the Viscount and the Baron. The last riddle looked remarkably different than the previous twelve," Ilex quietly said.

"I have no idea," Cloudia replied.

Ilex frowned. "And you still brought us here?"

Cloudia shrugged. "At first, I didn't want you to come with me, but because there are more people in the village this year, I thought that it would be okay to take you with me. Also, I wanted to know why the Secret Someone exchanged the cards and led us here."

The "Secret Someone" stood right next to them and giggled before he quickly moved, visible, behind the wall of ivy.

The next moment, Thomas ran back to the girls and started screaming hysterically. "There was something! There was something! Something flew by! It was the ghost, it was t-" Something or someone interrupted Thomas before Cedric, holding his belly in laughter, could hear Ilex. "Stay calm, Horse Boy," she said a second before Cedric made the next step in his plan to frighten them.

He grabbed through the ivy, and took hold of Ilex's legs. Then, he pulled her through the ivy. She fell down and he dragged her over the ground before he gently put her to sleep with a practised gesture. From the other side, he could Thomas' girlish cry and smiled.

Cedric picked Ilex up and quickly carried her through the graveyard. A second after he had arrived at the other side of the cemetery, he heard someone – most likely Cloudia – violently cutting through the ivy in the distance. Even from here, Cedric could make out Thomas' hysteric outburst: "It was the ghost, Lady! It was the ghost! Don't roll your eyes at me! Ilex suddenly vanished! She was dragged by something through the ivy! How could it be something else but a ghost?"

He began to laugh and accidentally let Ilex fall into the mud. Cedric held back a chuckle before he picked her up again and continued to hurry through the cemetery, in the hope that Thomas and Cloudia would see him and get scared at the sight of something clad in black moving around at such a speed.

Cedric hid Ilex behind a bush when Cloudia and Thomas, just like he had wanted, tried to chase him. He went to watch them arguing.

Their arguments were more entertaining than watching television.

"I am a formidable runner," Thomas meant after Cloudia had made a remark on his breathlessness. "It's just that I am not in the best state to run right now."

"You mean scared as hell," she replied and took out a strange object. Cedric frowned.

"You had that with you?" Thomas asked, and Cloudia handed the object to him. "Oh, I have even more," she replied and lit it up. Probably, it was some kind of match.

"We need to find Ilex," she said. "I-"

"Don't suggest that we split up," Thomas quickly said, his eyes wide and full of panic. Cloudia sighed. "Of course, we won't split up, idiot. It is easier to attack whatever or whoever is out here when we stay together. Also, this thing or person won't have it easy to attack us." She gave him a knife from out of her sleeve. "Take that in case we run into whoever or whatever took Ilex. Out priority is to rescue her, understood? The moment you panic and scream and cry, I will personally murder you. You will only hinder this mission and endanger Ilex's life. When the right opportunity comes, I will give you a sign, and you will run as fast as you can out of the graveyard and get help, understood?"

Would an emotionless murderer really act like that? Of course, she had threatened Thomas, but only to emphasise the severity of her words – of her wish to find and rescue Ilex. A girl she had known for only a couple of hours.

Slowly, Thomas nodded. He had become quite pale. "But what if...," he whispered with a shaking voice. "What if Ilex is already..."

"Then, the least we can do is bring her body back to her parents," Cloudia replied, her eyes reflecting seriousness.

"I don't want to die, Lady."

"Then, don't get yourself killed."

"Come, we need to find Ilex," Cloudia said and walked away. Cedric, as he was visible right now, was not supposed to laugh, but her seriousness was comical enough not to laugh, and a short chuckle escaped his lips, resulting in Cloudia to stop and frown.

"Did you hear that?" she asked Thomas.

"Hear what?" he replied, perplexed.

"The laugh. Someone just laughed – and it wasn't you or me. Not even Ilex."

"Can ghosts laugh?" Thomas gulped which made Cloudia yell at him: "GHOSTS DO NOT EXIST. SOMEONE GRABBED ILEX, YOU ZOUNDERKITE. GHOSTS CANNOT TOUCH MATERIAL THINGS."

Ghosts didn't exist, she said? Well, then, let's see if I can change her opinion.

I turned invisible and walked towards Cloudia, putting out the glowing match. Of course, Thomas cried out immediately. Still, she tried to find a rational explanation and blamed the wind for the put-out match.

I raised an eyebrow. Apparently, it took more to change her mind. Therefore, I went to Thomas and tickled him. Grim Reapers, when invisible, could still touch objects, which was why we had to stay away from people and animals when we were concealed to the normal world. Thus, it looked like Thomas had started to laugh all of a sudden – and not because he got tickled.

"Why the damn hell are you laughing?" Cloudia yelled, staring at Thomas who giggled with tears in his eyes.

"I don't know," he struggled to say before he fell to the ground where Cedric continued to tickle him.

"Stop this nonsense and stand up," Cloudia demanded, annoyed.

"This is no nonsense!" Thomas replied. "Help me! I am possessed or something."

"GODDAMMIT, THOMAS, THE ONLY THING YOU'RE POSSESSED OF IS DUMBNESS," she screamed at him – and the next instance, Cedric, laughing loudly, lifted Thomas up and vanished with him behind the trees where Cedric knocked him out. It must have looked unbelievable to Cloudia who wasn't able to see Cedric.

I was just about to hide Thomas where I had hidden Ilex earlier and take her with me when I heard Cloudia's voice in the distance.

"Ghost or whoever took my teammates," Cloudia yelled, "can you please give them back to me? It's getting late, and if we don't return soon, Constantia will definitely start to panic and force everyone to search for us. And you really don't want to meet Constantia – I tell you."

I couldn't help myself but smile.

I made myself visible again before I gently took Ilex in my arms and walked through Nephelius Cemetery. I found a thin and high tombstone and tied together her legs before I attached the rope to the tombstone. Ilex was slowly waking up. Thus I had to be fast.

When I was finished, I ran back to Thomas. The second I picked him up, I could hear Cloudia talking to Ilex. And again, all I could do was to smile.

I tied Thomas to the angel statue and waited for them to come. To my own surprise, only Cloudia came and quickly freed the boy. Immediately, Thomas, having woken up faster than Ilex, took Cloudia's hand and dragged her out of the graveyard. But right at the gate, Cloudia stopped, shook off his hand and turned back while he ran away.

I had followed them. I had clandestinely followed them out of the cemetery while I had been fully visible to everyone.

And then, Cloudia had turned to look back.

Gazing right into my eyes, and I gazed into hers.

For moments, we stood there, not moving, not breathing, only staring at each other like we had been put under her spell. A spell forcing me to look into her midnight blue eyes for all eternity. In the silver of the faint moonlight, her eyes shone like two dark stars.

The time seemed to move slower and in my mind appeared a tiny voice spoke words in a whisper which left me shocked: "It's like two destined people have found each other."

And then, Thomas' voice through the darkness and undid the spell which had mesmerised Cloudia and me, taking us back to reality which now seemed so strange.

Cloudia turned her head towards Thomas for a second – a second which I used to turn invisible. And when she looked back into the graveyard again, I was gone for her. But she was not gone for me.

And I gazed after her when she hurried back to Thomas – not turning back again.

~Cloudia~

I ran all the way back to Phantomhive Manor. My thoughts were tumbling in my head. What has just happened out there? I thought, while my heart raced in my chest.

Thomas had gone home, having enough of this crazy evening. Therefore, I returned to the garden all on my own. Uncle Aidan and Uncle Jonathan waved me to them, but I ignored it. I had to find Izzy.

I spotted him at the buffet. Out of breath – not because of the sprint, I was a good runner, but because of my strange encounter at the cemetery –, I arrived next to him.

"Cloudia!" Isidore exclaimed, putting down his overloaded plate. "There you are – you and your team took so long. We wanted to send out a group to search for you if you hadn't come back in the next thirty minutes."

"Ilex and Thomas are at home," Cloudia quickly told him. "Izzy – I was at Nephelius Cemetery."

I wanted to tell him the whole story – how the cards had been exchanged; how someone had wanted us to go to the graveyard; how Ilex and Thomas had been kidnapped for a brief time –, but I couldn't. He would only worry about me. I was the Watchdog and had a lot of enemies – he would think that it had been one of them. No matter how abstruse this was.

But it hadn't been one of them. It had been someone, something, else.

Isidore raised an eyebrow. "Oh, you were?"

Cloudia nodded.

His eyes widened. "Don't tell me you saw the ghost?!"

Hadn't it, he, been a ghost? I wasn't completely sure. But I had indeed seen something.

"Yes, I did," she answered.

And I had seen so much more.

Countryside, England, United Kingdom ‒ October 1847

~Cedric~

I remembered that day. It had been the best October 31 I ever had. Even though I had not been able to see Cloudia's frightened face.

Cloudia leaned her head against the tree behind her. "You must think I am insane," she said after she had finished telling her story.

"No, I don't," Cedric sincerely replied. "I don't think you're insane, Countess."

She turned her head to him and briefly smiled at him before she stood up, brushing the dirt from her dress. "Whatever. We need to return to the manor." Cloudia started walking, and Cedric rose up and followed her.

"Ilex and Thomas will be at the party," she told him while they walked through St. Lacey. "Ilex will come with her younger brother, Orion. He's just like his sister. And they are just like their parents. You really need to meet Grosvenor Galloan and Athena Evergreen-Galloan and their children. They are wonderful people. And I do not usually compliment anyone. And Thomas... well, if you want, you can meet him too. But Thomas is not someone you really want to talk to. Especially because he always tells everyone at the Halloween party about how heroic he acted back then in 1842. Ilex and I can only roll our eyes at that."

"But what about the ghost?" Cedric asked her. "Didn't you want to wait for him?"

Cloudia sighed. "That was five years ago, Undertaker. Uncle Isidore said that my father saw the ghost every year. But after I saw him back then, I didn't see him again. Like I've chased him away. I don't think that I will come back again too. This year was the last years that I did it."

"But can't we go back to the cemetery? You can show me the sculpture. I would really like to see it," Cedric said, grinning at her.

She scowled at him before she sighed. "Very well. Follow me."

The statue still looked the same. It felt good to see it again after all these years.

"Can we go now?" Cloudia asked, already about to turn around.

"I think you should keep this tradition," Cedric suddenly said, and Cloudia sighed. "But I doubt that the Green Ghost of Nephelius Cemetery will ever return."

"It doesn't matter. You should continue it. It's something you're father did – and you can never know if the ghost will really never appear again."

Cloudia scowled at him. "You are terribly annoying, do you know that, Undertaker?"

He grinned. "I am not annoying – I am persistent."

"Persistent things or people are annoying," she pointed out. "Take persistent dirt or mould, for example."

"I cannot believe that you just compared me to mould."

"I cannot believe that you are so escapist that you don't even know how annoying you are."

Cedric laughed, and they walked through the cemetery and towards the exit.

"You should not stop the tradition," he started again, making Cloudia sigh. "Countess – what if you met him one day again? You can never know."

And what if you already met him again, Countess? I asked her in my mind. Or at least the ghost you saw.

I sincerely wanted her to continue – I wasn't the ghost her father had seen. And just as suddenly as the real ghost had stopped to appear some years ago, the real ghost could come back again.

We almost left Nephelius Cemetery when I spotted a tombstone on which two doves were resting who were leaning their heads against each other and whose beaks were slightly entangled. On the tombstone which didn't look new but newer than the other weren't any names. It only said:

"Here lie two lovers and my greatest shame. May you rest in the peace which I took away from you. ~ Augustus."

I stared at the gravestone until Cloudia called me.

"Undertaker!" she yelled. "Are you coming?"

Cedric gazed into the direction from which her voice had come from and walked to her, not looking back again.

Hope you enjoyed the chapter! :)

I have one question: Does someone still read this story? I mean, actively? I am not a "review-digger," but I would really like to know if somebody still reads this - or if I am talking to an internet brick wall.

It's just that, right now, while I love writing this story, I have no clue if I should continue it. Or if I should let it die because nobody reads it anyway, and I would save a lot of life time with it.

I don't know. On the one hand, I love writing WotQ, on the other, I don't like writing or talking to people which could possibly not even exist... I hope you understand it.