Autumn in Transylvania is breathtaking. Golden forests spread across the Carpathians, mist curls through the mountains and settles around medieval towers, and the markets fill with apples, walnuts, mushrooms, and the abundance of the season. It is the kind of beauty I dreamed about before moving here, and there are moments when it still catches me completely by surprise. Yet, as the air cools and the leaves begin to fall, I find myself aching for another kind of autumn—the on

There is something strange about the way we celebrate harvest now. We decorate our homes with wheat and apples and pumpkins. We put little ceramic mushrooms on our shelves, light candles that smell vaguely of orchards and woodsmoke, and welcome the arrival of autumn as though it were primarily a change in atmosphere. There is nothing wrong with loving the beauty of the season—I most certainly do—but underneath all of those familiar autumn symbols is something much older and d

When autumn arrives in Transylvania, the air grows sharp and metallic, and the forests shed their color until the bones of the mountains begin to show through. Smoke rises from the first hearth fires, curling above tiled roofs and lingering in the cold. The villages seem to draw inward. Gardens empty, wood is stacked, evenings come earlier, and the mountains that felt green and generous in summer become darker around their edges. I came to this season carrying Halloween with

In Romania, as November dies and winter gathers on the hills, there comes a night when the old stories stir again. On the eve of Saint Andrew’s feast, November 29 into November 30, Romanian folk tradition imagines the ordinary boundaries of the world becoming less certain. Wolves gather and may be given the power of speech. Strigoi leave their graves and wander among the living. The future becomes briefly readable, and a house that has not been properly protected with garlic