Johanna slowly opened her eyes, smiling as she thought back on the previous night. She turned over and her face fell upon discovering that Eldrik was gone. She rose and dressed hurriedly, grabbing her shovel and running outside. She shielded her eyes against the rising sun as she scanned the surrounding area.

“Eldrik!” she called, “Eldrik!”

She received no answer. She took a deep breath and chided herself. “He's just gone for a walk. Stop panicking.”

She walked down to the graveyard and over to her cart, pausing in surprise as she heard the sound of approaching hooves. She looked up to see a rider coming towards her from the east, the rising sun positioned like a halo above his head. As he drew up and dismounted, Johanna's eyes widened as she stared at the man's face. Beneath a crown of short black hair was a face so smooth and hard that it looked more like marble than flesh, his blazing eyes matching the light of the sun behind him. He wore a plain white shirt and dark breeches, their simplicity contrasting with the ornate scabbard at his side. Johanna fell to her knees as the Angel walked slowly towards her.

“After all these years,” he said as he stood over her, “you're still here.”

He spoke softly, his baritone voice devoid of emotion.

“Y-yes, my lord,” Johanna stammered, at a loss for words.

Summoning her courage, she cleared her throat and looked up with a proud smile.

“It's been a long road, my lord, and I've been far from perfect. I've had my doubts, I've come close to giving up. There's been times I've found it hard to understand why I'm even here... but today, I don't have a single regret. Thank you for making me a Gravedigger, my lord.”

The Angel looked down at her; his face was stony cold, but the hint of emotion she detected seemed to be a mix of pity and irritation.

“I hoped you'd be able to understand, but perhaps three-hundred years is too short a time to learn what I've learned.”

With that the Angel drew his sword and raised it in both hands above his head. Johanna was too bewildered to make any response besides instinctively raising her shovel to defend herself. The Angel brought his sword down and struck the relic's shaft. With a flash of light the shovel broke in two. The Angel's body burst into a brilliant glow, forcing Johanna to look away.

“What are you doing?!” she screamed.

“Taking back what's mine,” the Angel replied, mounting his horse and riding past her up the hill.

She watched him disappear into Heiligtum Forest and was about to go after him when a familiar voice called out to her.

“Johanna!”

Eldrik emerged from behind her hut and ran down the hill towards her.

“Eldrik!” Johanna cried in relief, “we have to warn the others! The Angel, he...”

She held up the two halves of her broken shovel. Eldrik stared in bewilderment.

“That makes no sense!”

“I know!” Johanna snapped urgently. “He's taken my powers and he'll do the same to Orsalya and Verka.”

Eldrik paused and gazed curiously at the broken shovel, glancing at the graveyard beside them. Johanna sighed impatiently and set off up the hill. She was halfway up when she felt the temperature suddenly drop; the wind picked up, rising to a howling gale in moments. Shivering, she turned to see Eldrik standing by the graveyard with his arms raised, his head thrown back, leaves and debris swirling around him as if he were the eye of the storm.

“What are you doing?!” Johanna screamed over the howling wind.

At the foot of one of the graves, the ground began to shift and crack. A rotten hand burst up in a spray of dirt, followed by a decaying body. The creature stood shakily as walking corpses rose from every one of the graves that Johanna had dug over the years, ranging from recently dead cadavers to ancient skeletons. Johanna stared in horror at the undead horde. Horror slowly changed to anger as she turned her gaze upon Eldrik.

“How could you do this?!” she screamed, her voice breaking at a rage-filled fever pitch, her face contorted in passionate fury. “After everything we've been through, was it all a lie? Tell me, you bastard!”

“You want the truth?” Eldrik asked, his tone cold and quiet. “You're the best person I've ever known and you deserve far more than this.” He gestured at the surrounding countryside with a sweep of his arm. “You've dedicated your life to helping these people, never asking for anything in return. And that,” he pointed at her broken shovel, “is your reward. Clearly the Angel has given up on this world. That means you're free. That means I'm free. Enough of living in some rickety shack, you deserve a castle! We can live together forever, Johanna, as king and queen of this new world.”

Eldrik raised his forearm to his mouth and bit deep into his flesh. He held his arm out to her, vampiric blood trickling from the self-inflicted wound, his face sincere and pleading.

“Isn't that what you want? What you really  want?”

Johanna stepped back, her eyes wide in terror. It was not the vampire or his horde of shambling monsters that terrified her... it was her own desires. The two of them stood frozen, Eldrik with his arm outstretched towards her, Johanna poised to flee; Eldrik waiting patiently for her reply, Johanna wrestling with the greatest decision in her life.

Without a word, Johanna turned and fled into the forest. Eldrik made no move to pursue her, his arm slowly falling to his side. He sank to his knees, clutching the front of his shirt, his nails digging through the cloth into his skin. His body shook before he let out a long scream of agony, pounding his fist into the dirt till it was bloody.