There is an emperor who is buried in secret on the island. There’s an iron fence that surrounds his tomb. Below the hill it sits on there is a small lemon tree orchard. You can smell the fresh fruit and feel the autumn leaves crunch underfoot as a high sun shines down on you. It doesn’t feel like a place where the dead rise.

You’re not supposed to drive around the island at night. Nor are you supposed to visit the shrines once the sun sets. There is no one there to stop you. But that doesn’t mean that nothing won’t. No one will talk about this. If you talk about it, you draw attention to yourself. And the last thing that you want is the attention of whatever moves around the forest at night.

But go back at night I did. For all the day time warmth, as soon as the last ray of sun left the sky, a chill fell over me. Not in the way that you grow cold in winter. But in the way that you grow cold in fear. I don’t know what called me back to the tomb, but death no longer seemed so permanent in the opening moments of the night.

The air no longer smelled of fresh lemons. It smelled of disturbed earth and something sweetly rotten. I stood at the edge of the iron gate and struggled to remember how I got there. I must have driven back— but the memory seemed to fall away like dandelion seeds.

On the other side of the gate stood a tall shadow. It cut the shape of a man out of the night and placed a weighted terror in me. I couldn’t move as it drifted towards me. Each breath brought it closer. My nose ached at the sharp tang of copper and ruined fresh. It breathed out a mist that tracked towards me. It felt like swallowing foul gelatin. He reached out towards me with a wraith’s hand. It clenched my wrist like a vice and brought pain with it.

I woke on the steps of the tomb. A small pool of blood dotted the earth underneath me. But nothing disturbed the peace of an early sun and the chirping of birds. I looked up at the tomb and saw nothing amiss. The long settled stones remained in place.

I stood and made for the trail when I had my first cough. I hacked up sludge the consistency of treacle. The world briefly overlayed in shadows and I saw the long, thin, ruined hand from last night upon my arm. I began to scream— but felt shunted backwards from myself as I strode forwards. The light of day seemed dimmer as I watched my own movements as a passenger. It dimmed further— leaving me with the faint scent of lemons and the distant crunch of leaves as the darkness swallowed me whole.