The oak tree in the cemetery was dying, and only Ivy Thornwood knew why. She was eight years old, and plants had spoken to her all her life. Tonight the old oak pushed its fear up through the soil and into her feet. The ground held its breath and pressed back. Something sick was buried below, and the tree could not tell her what. So she came in the dark to dig it out herself. Fog hung low over the graves. Crooked stones leaned in the haze. Ivy pulled her black cape tight and knelt in the wet grass beside the oak. A spider rode on her shoulder, legs braced, eyes bright and sharp. "This is a bad plan," the spider said. "You know that. I know that. Even the worms know that." "The tree is dying," Ivy said. She pulled the small trowel from her pocket. The green light in its handle glowed faintly. "I can't ask it what hurts. So I dig." "Could be a dead cat. Could be old pipes." The spider waved a leg. "Could be nothing worth losing sleep over." "It isn't nothing." Ivy pressed the trowel into the dirt. "It's pushing up at me." She dug. The soil came up cold and heavy. She filled the hole beside her knee, then dug deeper. Hours passed. Her arms burned. The fog thickened. Somewhere in the haze, small glowing eyes blinked and vanished. "You've made a nice crater," the spider said. "Shall I fetch a priest, or a doctor?" "Quiet." Ivy's trowel struck something hard. Not stone. She scraped the dirt away with her fingers. "What is it?" The spider leaned forward on her shoulder. "What do you see?" Ivy brushed the last of the soil loose. Roots wrapped the thing like fingers. The oak's roots, black and swollen, curled around a small wooden chest. The pressure in her feet spiked. The tree screamed through the ground, a sound only she could feel. She pried the lid up. Inside lay a bundle of dried roses, tied with faded green ribbon. The same ribbon her grandmother used. The same roses from the bush by the back fence. And beneath the roses, a folded paper with her own name on it. Ivy Thornwood. In her grandmother's hand. The roses were not dead. They turned toward her in the dark. Every petal opened at once. "She knew," the roses whispered. "She always knew about you." Ivy's breath stopped. Her grandmother had known. She had buried this here, under the oak, waiting. The ground, the tree, the whispering flowers all spun around her. The spider shouted her name. Ivy did not hear it. The trowel slipped from her hand. She fell sideways into the dirt and the fog closed over her, and she knew nothing more.