Nothing happened that night, and all was peaceful. After Mia woke him promptly at half past six on Thursday morning, the blonde young lady in her nightgown was still lying beside Shade. Golden hair covered her small ears and delicate profile, and her lashes trembled slightly as her eyes opened. Dorothy Louisa liked such mornings as well.
Miss Sylvia, who was arranging the ritual in Dorothy's room, had opened a Teleportation Gate early in the morning and arrived at Green Lake Inn from the basement. While Shade, Dorothy, and Miss Sylvia were having breakfast, he also learned that Sister Devlin had arrived locally:
"Sister Devlin brought more than a dozen Blind Sisters from the Order of Spiritual Cultivation. They have already met with the Church. The Church plans to rely on the Blind Sisters' powerful intuition to find a way into Another Island if the Seer Association's divinations do not go smoothly. That counts as the second plan."
Grandma Cassandra and her group would probably arrive tomorrow or the day after. As for Miss Aurora, who was coming quietly in a private capacity, she likely would not reach Glass City until the weekend.
However, Shade did not need to seek out Sister Devlin specifically. She would likely come looking for him. His most important task today was still to meet those believers of the Old Gods.
His appointment with Miss Danist was at nine in the morning, so Shade was in no hurry to leave. After breakfast, he went to see Doctor Schneider and Priest Augustus separately.
Doctor Schneider had spent most of the past few days either in his own room or borrowing the basement for alchemy experiments, busy crafting that Alchemy Item for Shade. When Shade entered the doctor's room that morning, the unfinished coin was being calcined