Emily Voss came to help her aunt fix a broken house. She did not expect the workers to run. Every morning they filed out of the manor pale and shaking, and every morning they were gone before she could ask why. She moved from the city three weeks ago. She still didn't know what lived in the east wing, but she meant to find out, because something in that wing needed her help. She just didn't have the words for it yet. This morning she stood at the bottom of the steps and blocked the path. A young worker came out first, sawdust on his sleeves, eyes wide. "What did you see up there?" she asked. He looked past her at the manor, then shook his head. "The lady in the wet dress," he whispered. "She cries in the corner. She won't stop." He pushed by Emily and hurried down the drive with the others. None of them looked back. Emily climbed the steps. Peeling paint flaked under her hand on the rail. She had never gone into the east wing. Her aunt kept telling her the floors were unsafe. Her aunt met her in the front hall. Mrs. Vivian Voss wore a spotless gown of blue and gold, though the house around her was dust and cracked plaster. She smiled at Emily, and the smile held too long. She reached out and pressed Emily's hand between both of hers. Her fingers were cold. "You're up early, dear," her aunt said. "The men are jumpy. Old houses make noises." She squeezed once and let go. "A worker said there's a woman crying in the east wing," Emily said. "A woman in a wet dress." Her aunt's smile did not move. "Workers imagine things." She turned toward the parlor. "Leave the east wing to me." Emily did not leave it. She waited until her aunt's heels clicked out of hearing. Then she climbed the back stairs to the east wing. The door stuck, then gave. Moving boxes filled the room, flaps torn, corners crushed. Water stained the floor in a dark ring near the far corner. The air smelled of pond and rot. Emily stepped closer and saw a picture frame propped against the wall. A wedding portrait. The gold edges peeled. Grime blurred the two faces, a bride and a groom, until she could not tell who they were. Cold air moved across her neck. A black moth drifted from behind the frame and settled on the glass. Its wings shimmered blue and purple in the gray light. Emily heard it then, low and near the corner, a woman weeping. Her skin prickled, but she did not run like the others. She knelt by the frame and looked into the ruined faces. "I hear you," she said to the empty corner. "I'm not leaving." The crying stopped. For the first time, something in the east wing was listening back.

The next morning Emily climbed the back stairs again. The east wing door would not give. Someone had fitted a new lock to it. She pushed until her shoulder ached, but the wood held. Behind it, faint and steady, the woman was weeping again. Emily went looking for her aunt. She found her in the front hall, arranging fresh flowers on a cracked table. Mrs. Vivian Voss wore a gown of blue and gold, spotless against the peeling walls. She smiled the moment she saw Emily. "You locked the east wing," Emily said. "For your safety, dear." Her aunt trimmed a stem. "The floors up there could give way." She reached out and pressed Emily's hand between her cold fingers. "You'll leave it alone now." "I heard her crying. She needs help." Her aunt's smile did not move. "There is no one up there." She turned back to the flowers, and Emily saw the truth. Her aunt held the only key, and she would never give it up. Emily walked out to the grounds. Near the old shed she found the groundskeeper, a huge man with a white beard, bent over a rusted mower. Rings of keys hung from his belt. Mortimer kept keys to nearly every building in town. He had greeted her once with a slow wave and a name she barely caught. Now he looked up and read her face. "Locked out of somewhere," he said. It was not a question. "The east wing." She hesitated. "My aunt sealed it. There's a woman inside. Crying." Mortimer's kind eyes went still. He did not tell her she was imagining things. He unclipped a ring from his belt and turned it slowly, thumbing through worn brass and iron. "That wing's older than the rest," he said. "Your aunt's new lock won't matter. Old doors keep old keys." He pulled one free, black with age, and pressed it into her palm. "This opened it before she was born. Doubt she changed the whole door. Just the latch." Emily closed her hand around it. "Why help me? She's your employer." Mortimer wiped his hands on his overalls. "I've heard that crying too. Fifty years now." He turned back to the mower. "Somebody ought to finally answer it." Emily climbed the back stairs a third time. She fit the old key below the shiny new lock, into a keyhole she had not noticed before. It turned with a heavy click. The door swung inward. The boxes stood where she had left them, flaps torn, the wedding portrait propped against the wall. The black moth waited on the glass, wings shimmering. In the far corner, near the water stain, the weeping softened. "I came back," Emily said. "I told you I would." The crying stopped. Cold air moved toward her, gentle now, almost grateful. She had her way in. But footsteps clicked in the hall below, sharp and quick, and her aunt's voice called her name.

Emily climbed from the hollow with the portrait in her hands. The moth lifted from the frame and drifted toward the water. The weeping followed close behind her, patient and low. She could feel the bride waiting for the last step. But when Emily reached the edge of the dark water, she stopped. She did not know what to say. A soul could not cross alone, and she had never sent one over. The words a farewell needed were a mystery to her. Cordelia drifted from the reeds and stood beside her. The tall ghost looked out across the water, her black hair heavy and dripping. "You have brought her far," she said. "Now finish it." "I don't know how," Emily said. "I don't know the words. If I say the wrong thing, will she be stuck here forever?" Cordelia was quiet. Her dark eyes stayed on the water. "No one spoke words for me," she said at last. "I have watched a hundred years and learned only this. A soul does not need the right words. It needs to be told the wrong is over." Emily thought of the certificate, the drowning six days after the wedding. She thought of the ruined portrait in the east wing and the fifty years of crying. The bride had never been told anyone knew. She had wept alone with no one to answer. A hunched shape came through the reeds behind them. Petra, the old woman from the curiosity shop, leaned on a crooked stick. Her moth-eaten shawl dragged in the mud. Emily had not expected her here. Petra had given her the moth and sent her to this crossing. "You followed me," Emily said. "I followed the moth," Petra said. "It knows the path. I wanted to see if you would use it." She fixed Emily with her sharp eyes. "Speak to her like she is a person. Not a ghost. Name what happened. Then let her go." Emily turned to face the empty air where the weeping came from. Her hands shook, but she held the portrait up so the bride could see it. "I know your name," Emily said. "I know you married him. I know he let you drown six days after. It wasn't your fault. Nobody came for you, and I'm sorry. But I came. You don't have to wait anymore. You can go now." The weeping stopped. For a long moment the swamp held still. Then the moth flew low over the water, its ink-black wings steady. A cold weight lifted from the air beside Emily and moved out across the dark surface, following the moth. The presence thinned, faded, and was gone. Emily stood alone at the water's edge. The bride had crossed. She had done it. Beside her, Cordelia had not moved. Her dark eyes stayed fixed on the far shore, on the trail of the man who left her. "One of us is free," she said softly. "Now do the same for me."