The riverbank is a graveyard of broken boats. A

woman in a faded green coat steps over the

rusted hulls, her boots sinking into mud thick

with ash. The air smells of burnt wood and iron.

She stops at the edge of the old mill, where the

stone wall has crumbled into a jagged scar.

A child’s voice calls from the field. It’s the

same tone as the one that woke her every morning

in the camp. She turns, but no one is there. The

wind carries the scent of wet wool and something

sharper—burnt hair.

She finds the entrance beneath the mill. A metal

door, rusted shut, but the lock is new. She

pries it open with a shillelagh she took from

the pub. Inside, the air is cold, still. A

tunnel slopes downward, lit by flickering bulbs

strung along the walls.

At the end, a chamber. A table, a chair, a

single photograph on the wall. It shows a group

of men in military coats, standing beside a

church. The woman recognizes the face of the

priest who once blessed her mother’s grave.

A voice echoes from the dark. “You shouldn’t be

here.”

She turns. A man steps from the shadows. His

eyes are pale, his skin tight over bone. He

holds a lantern, its light casting long fingers

across the walls.

“You’re not from around here,” he says.

She doesn’t answer. She knows what he’s thinking.

The village was abandoned after the fire. No one

lived here after 1923.

He gestures to the photograph. “They didn’t burn

the church. They buried it. And everything

inside.”

She steps closer. The photo is dated 1916. The

men are wearing British uniforms. The church is

the same one she passed on the road, its spire

broken.

A rule bites: no one enters the underground

without permission. The man’s hand moves to his

belt. A knife glints.

She reaches into her coat. Pulls out a folded

paper. A map. It shows the route she took,

marked with symbols she learned in the camp. The

man stiffens.

“You’re one of them,” he says.

She doesn’t confirm. She steps back, toward the

exit. The tunnel narrows behind her.

The next day, the village wakes to a new smell—

burnt parchment. The church doors are open.

Inside, the altar is gone. The pews are empty. A

single note lies on the floor: We remember.

The woman is gone. But the villagers find a

locket hidden beneath the stones. Inside, a

portrait of a girl with red hair and a crooked

smile.

No one knows who she was. But the fire didn’t

kill the past. It just buried it.