Colette woke with a start at dawn.
"Lily, what's wrong?"
Colette saw the concern in Rosella's eyes and gradually relaxed.
"I dreamed about him again..."
"Your father?" Rosella watched Colette nod, then put an arm around her shoulders. "Your father is an archbishop. He'll be all right."
Colette said nothing. She was remembering the dream and its faint warmth.
If only it hadn't been a dream...
“I know a Fortune-Teller here in Flower Capital. She might know how your Uncle is doing. Shall we go see her?”
"All right."
They went to the Mansion's dining room for breakfast first.
With the festival approaching, Flower Capital had begun dressing itself in flowers. Rosella chatted beside her while Colette stirred her hot soup with a silver spoon. Then, for some reason, she looked up.
Beyond the window that reflected her face, a flower cart piled high with vivid blue blooms rolled down the street.
Annan opened his eyes in the dust-covered room.
There was no sunlight, no spotless room, no bustling street outside the window. The room seemed abandoned by time, steeped in decay.
A noise suddenly came from beyond the corridor. Annan turned. It had come from the chapel.
Realizing what had happened, Annan glanced at the empty room, returned to the corridor, and looked down over the railing at the chapel below.
As though a blinding light had just filled the church, the entire chapel was slowly dimming. A pitch-black figure knelt before the statue of the God of Order, head bowed.
Valencia's whisper faded through the church along with the Warden.
"This is the reward I promised you..."
"'My' final wish wasn't to see her. It was to see my god..."
"How tragic..."
A book fell from the Warden's dissolving form.
Annan went down to the chapel and