The cemetery wasn’t on any map.

It sat on the outskirts of Las Viñas, a forgotten village tucked between blood-red hills and whispering woods. On Día de los Muertos, the veil between the living and the dead was thinnest, and the locals never dared wander near after dusk. But Solene De la Cruz had never listened to warnings—especially not tonight.

Her abuela’s voice echoed in her mind.

“Some souls don’t rest, mija. They wait.”

Solene tightened the shawl around her shoulders, the candlelight from her offering flickering wildly in the wind. The marigolds she carried trembled in her grip as she crossed beneath the iron gate—twisted into thorny roses that had no rust, no age.

The air changed. Not colder—just… older.

Graves lined the earth in crooked rows, their names long faded, but the candles lit at their bases burned anyway. As if someone else had been here. Recently.

Solene kneeled before her mother’s grave and laid the offering down—pan de muerto, hot chocolate, the tiny hand-stitched doll her mother once gave her. She whispered a prayer.

Then came the voice.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

It came from the shadows, deep and low, more wind than sound. Solene stood slowly, heart thundering against her ribs.

“I could say the same,” she said, turning toward the figure leaning against a mausoleum. He was tall, draped in a long, charcoal-gray coat. His skin had the pale warmth of moonlit stone, and his eyes burned like melted gold.

He stepped forward, boots crunching softly over dry leaves. “The dead speak louder here,” he said. “And they don’t like being interrupted.”

“Who are you?”

A smile, sharp and knowing. “I’m the gravekeeper. I tend to what’s buried… and what isn’t.”

Solene should have run. Every instinct screamed it. But something about him tugged at her—like déjà vu in her bones.

“You know my mother?” she asked.

“I knew her soul,” he said, gently. “She feared the dark. You don’t.”

“I was born in it.”

He took another step, close enough for her to see the shadow of something inked on his throat—markings like vines, like chains. “That’s why they call to you,” he whispered. “Why I do.”

The wind howled, and with it came soft murmurs—voices long gone, rustling like lace. The gravekeeper looked skyward, jaw tight.

“Time’s running out,” he said. “When the veil closes, so does my world. But if you stay—”

“I’ll be trapped,” Solene finished.

He nodded.

Her heart cracked under the weight of it. Something ancient and tender curled between them, the kind of longing that felt stitched into past lives. Solene stepped closer, until her fingers nearly brushed his chest.

“Why me?” she asked.

“Because,” he said, “you’re the only one who ever saw me… and didn’t run.”

He leaned in, lips grazing her ear. “And because even the dead can love.”

With trembling hands, she cupped his face. His skin was cold, yet sparks danced across her fingers like fire meeting ice. Their kiss tasted of smoke and cinnamon, of aching goodbyes and promises that couldn’t be kept.

The first bell rang in the distance. Midnight.

The gravekeeper pulled away, eyes dark with grief. “Next year,” he said.

Solene touched her lips, already mourning the loss.

“I’ll be here.”

And as the final bell tolled and the veil thickened, she watched him vanish into the mist—just a flicker of shadow and gold, waiting for another Día de los Muertos.