Elora's knees were aching as she knelt in the cold soil. The candles around her flickered in the brisk cold air. The heat from them caressed her fingertips in tiny licks. The wind's cold kiss whispered in her ears as she muttered an old language into the night air. 

"Eorum spiritumm dimittere."  The brunette murmured. The moon disappeared above the trees, casting more dangerous shadows around the young witch. Dark figures growled from beyond the shadows, thirsting for the crimson blood that was smeared over her small altar. 

Elora, not fearing the beasts, raised her calloused hands and commanded the candles to spark. A heat that she had become accustomed to gathered in her chest and spread along her body. A minuscule chuckle escaped her lips as a rush of endorphins rushed through every synapse of her brain. Elora craved this high, bursting with power and control. The candles flared, sending their flames in every direction. The thirsty shadows roared in fear and escaped back to whatever dimension of hell they arrived from.

Elora lowered her hands and the candles' light disappeared along with the heat in her chest. The long white candles smoked, filling her vision with pictures of her own despair and fears. Ignoring the film in front of her, Elora stood and quickly gathered her supplies, not flinching when the hot wax burned her ivory skin. Elora knew that it would only be a matter of time before more beasts arrived to scare her off, bigger and uglier demons that even she couldn't destroy. 

Elora bent down, pressing a kiss to the shared tombstone that her parents shared. She arrived earlier that chilly Maine night to release their spirits into the netherworld. Despite her intention, her fear of the beasts drove her from her task, promising to return another night. She turned and walked away from the gravesite, a cold sense of dread filling her bones.