I Loaded the Occult Panel

On December 1, after the train crossed the border, the ridges in the fields outside the window ran perfectly straight, and the walls of the cowsheds were painted white.

Every so often along the railway, a sentry stood with a rifle slung over his back and a white cross on his cap.

Past Altdorf and further up lay the Gotthard Line.

Richard had heard about this section for a long time. To let the train climb over a thousand meters in elevation, engineers had carved a series of spiral tunnels right into the belly of the mountain.

The train would plunge in, loop a full circle, and emerge on the exact same slope, only several dozen meters higher.

Further up still, they reached the snow line.

Frost began to form on the windowpanes, while the heating pipes inside the carriage grew hot enough to burn a hand.

Passing through the main Gotthard tunnel, they emerged under a completely different sky.

To the south lay sunlight and stone; to the north, pale gray and clouds.

They arrived in Lucerne at dusk. The Aliens Police Department was located right next to the train station.Mortimer filled in ”University Professor” under the occupation column and ”A Monk” under the column for his intended contact. The police officer looked up at him.

”Which monk?”

”Haven’t decided yet,” Mortimer drawled.

”I’ll figure it out when I get there. They’re all pretty much the same anyway.”

The officer shook his head and stamped the form.

When it was Richard’s turn, he paused at the ”Purpose of Entry” column before finally writing: ”Accompanying, visiting friends and relatives.”

Their hotel was booked by the river. The windows faced the Reuss River, where the water flowing out from Lake Lucerne ran a green so deep it bordered on blue.

Mortimer left bright and early the next morning, heading to the pier to catch a steamboat across the lake.

Standing before the gangplank with his briefcase in hand, the old professor looked back with instructions.

”I’ll be staying over there for at least a few days. Don’t go running off on your own.”

”I know.”

”And no buying any more cursed objects.”

”I won’t.”

Richard stood on the pier until the boat disappeared from sight, then turned and walked into the city.

Lucerne was smaller than he had imagined. Newspapers in four different languages hung side by side on the newsstand racks, each trumpeting its own nation’s victories.

Richard wandered through the city alone. This could be considered a vacation.

Seventeenth-century triangular panel paintings hung along the Chapel Bridge, depicting the city’s history and its patron saints.

A little farther downstream was the Spreuer Bridge, where all sixty-something panel paintings beneath the roof featured the shadowy figures of skeletons.

The medieval Black Death (1347–1353), the Hundred Years’ War (1337–1453), and the Great Famine of the 14th century had all caused massive loss of life, forcing people to confront the impermanence of mortal existence.

Death held the Pope’s hand; Death linked arms with a bride.

Death flicked the beads of a merchant’s abacus; Death sat at the same table as a reading scholar.

Richard stood beneath the painting of the bride, looking at the two lines of verse.

He couldn’t read all of it, recognizing only the one Germanic word that appeared repeatedly: death.

People called this style of painting Totentanz—the Dance of Death. In these paintings, the Grim Reaper was never depicted as ferocious.

It wore garlands, crossed its legs, supported people by the arm, and helped them hold their hats or flick their abacus beads.

In the entire procession, it was the only figure moving with a brisk lightness.

It was dancing, while everyone else was stiff.

The Pope was stiff, the Emperor was stiff, the knight was stiff, and the bride kept her head bowed.

He stood before the final painting for a long time.

The scholar in the painting was turning a page, and Death reached out a skeletal hand to hold the page down for him.

Outside the bridge, the river roared.

The water flowing from the lake maintained the same speed in winter as in summer. It hadn’t changed in hundreds of years.

A woman carrying a vegetable basket walked past him. The wooden planks creaked all the way until the sound abruptly stopped at the other end of the bridge.

Richard had kept his head raised for so long that his neck ached before he finally remembered to move.

Over in Prague, freezing rain had fallen all night. Lillian dragged her small leather suitcase across the New Town.

The Emperor Franz Joseph Station had been completed less than a decade ago. Its vestibule dome was painted with golden vines and several dignified goddesses.

Steam billowed in from the platforms, swirling beneath the dome and slowly dampening the goddesses’ faces.

She sat by the window in a third-class carriage and spread her passport out on her lap.

It had a crimson cover, stamped with a golden crown: Kingdom of Denmark.

Bearer: Lise Hauge.

Occupation: Student.

Date of Birth: April 27, 1897.

When Ms. Holloway had brought her this forged document, she had said:

”Danes aren’t disliked anywhere. They sell butter and porcelain, and they never go to war. Sentries won’t even bother batting an eye at a Danish passport.”

The birthdate on the passport was a randomly chosen day, not December 3.

Looking at the passport, she thought: ’There is probably no one left in this world who would celebrate my birthday with me anymore.’ With a lurch, the train pulled out of the station.

They passed through many mountain tunnels along the way. In the darkness, the train window reflected a very pale girl who didn’t quite look alive.

Lillian looked at her reflection for a moment before looking away. She began counting the rhythmic clatter of the wheels rolling over the rail joints, and as she counted, she fell asleep.

The sanatorium on Mount Rigi was located next to a small chapel named Our Lady of the Snows.

Her mother’s room faced south, overlooking the entirety of Lake Lucerne.

Ms. Holloway hadn’t lied; the air truly was excellent.

Lillian stood by the window and exhaled. The white mist dissipated the moment it left her lips.

She couldn’t feel the cold, only that her taut nerves seemed to relax along with that exhaled breath of white mist.

Her mother sat in a wicker chair by the window, her hair mostly white.

Lillian walked over.

Her mother recognized her, called her by name, and then turned her head to look out the window again.

”Look, that door is still open.” Lillian followed her gaze.

Lake, mountains, snow, and a jackdaw skimming past on tilted wings. There was no door.

Lillian crouched down and held her mother’s hands.

”Why are your hands so cold?” her mother asked, somewhat surprised.

”It’s snowing outside.”

After dinner, laughter drifted out from the nurses’ station.

The three night-shift nurses were all girls from the towns below the mountain.

Vreni was from Gersau, her cheeks rosy from the cold.

Annali spoke in a soft voice and blushed whenever she opened her mouth.

Oona was the tallest, and her laugh could be heard down the entire floor.

Vreni leaned halfway out the door and waved at Lillian in the corridor.

”Miss Lise, come quickly!” An alcohol lamp was lit on the small table in the nurses’ station, with an old spoon resting over its flame.

The small pinch of crushed lead in the spoon had already melted, shimmering brightly.

”Tonight is the eve of St. Andrew’s Day,” Vreni said.

”All the girls have to pour lead to see what their future husband will do for a living.”

She picked up the spoon and flicked her wrist. The molten lead dropped into a bowl of cold water with a hiss, sending up a small plume of white steam.

The nurse reached in, fished out a distorted lump, and held it up to the light.

”It’s a boat!” Oona shouted.

”How does that look like a boat?”

”This is the mast, and this is the hull. You’re going to marry a boatman on the lake.”

”I’m not marrying a boatman. They reek of fish.”

Despite her complaints, Vreni still tucked the piece of lead into her apron pocket.

What Annali poured out was a perfectly round lump that didn’t look like anything. Oona took it, studied it for a long while, and concluded:

”It’s bread. You’re going to marry a baker. You’ll have hot bread to eat every day from now on.”

Blushing, Annali tucked it away as well.

When it was Oona’s turn, the lead congealed into a massive, jagged lump in the water.

The three of them held it to the light and stared at it for a long time until Annali whispered, ”It looks... like a rock.”

”Then you’re marrying the mountain!” Vreni clapped her hands.

”Oona’s going to marry Mount Rigi and spend the rest of her life here emptying bedpans for patients!”

Oona angrily tossed the lump back into the basin, splashing water all over Vreni’s face.

Lillian stood by the door watching, somewhat curious.

Vreni shoved the spoon into her hand. ”Miss Lise, you should try too! You celebrate St. Andrew’s Day in Denmark, right?”

Lillian actually had no idea if Denmark celebrated it, but she was genuinely interested.

She gripped the spoon and held it over the flame, watching the crushed lead slowly melt down. She tilted the spoon.

Hiss! The lead congealed in the water.

The girl reached in to fish it out, the cold water submerging her wrist.

She pulled out a long, slender lead strip—thick at one end, slowly tapering to a point at the other.

There was even a tiny slit at the tip, exactly like the ink channel on a nib.

The three girls leaned in.

”It’s a pen!” Annali said.

”A pen made of lead...”

Oona pondered it for a moment before slapping her hand on the table.

”Then it’s a pencil! Miss Lise is going to marry someone who sharpens pencils all day!”

”A clerk,” Vreni nodded.

”Or a teacher.” ”Maybe a poet! Now that would be a disaster. The newspapers say if a man is in his twenties and hasn’t accomplished anything, he loves calling himself a poet.”

At this, the three young nurses broke into peals of laughter.

Lillian had indeed read a long poem recently. It was about the Eve of St. Agnes.

It said that if young girls went to bed fasting, without looking back or speaking a word, they would see their future husbands in their dreams.

She still remembered the first line of the poem: Ah, bitter chill it was...

The girl looked down at the pencil in her palm, the corners of her lips curling up slightly.

At that table by the window on the second floor of the middle school library, there was someone who would sit there for an entire afternoon, his pen scratching rhythmically across the paper.

On December 3, just as dawn broke, Richard was already standing on the platform at Lucerne train station.

Besides his usual items, his canvas bag also held the birthday present he had prepared.

It was a complete set of specimen tools: a scalpel, bone shears, forceps, a syringe, and a measuring cup for embalming fluid, all wrapped in a leather roll. There was also a piece of honey gingerbread with an arrow piercing an apple drawn on it in white icing.

It was the story of William Tell, the legendary hero of Helvetia, somewhat akin to Robin Hood.

If Evelyn were here, she would probably complain that the apple wasn’t round enough, the icing was squeezed too thick, and the ginger flavor was too weak.

If Grey were here, she probably wouldn’t say anything at all. She would just break off a small corner to taste, then look up and say she could bake a better one for him herself.

As he was thinking, the train started moving, its cogs gnawing steadily up the rack railway.

Lost in a tangle of thoughts, the time passed quickly. In the blink of an eye, he reached his destination.

It was still snowing lightly.

Richard reached the bottom of the slope and noticed someone standing in the doorway of the small chapel.

She wore a gray coat, her back to the slope, one hand grasping the door knocker as she pulled the door inward.

Only after shutting the door did she let go. When she turned around, she saw the young man standing before her.

The girl’s eyes went wide, thinking she hadn’t fully woken up yet.

Richard stopped in his tracks as well. The last time they had been face to face was last summer, in the main hall of the Black Earth River exhibition at the museum.

She had dressed up specially for that occasion, her hair pinned up, wearing a new dress as she stood among a group of ladies viewing the exhibition.

More than a year had passed, and she had changed again.

The last traces of childish roundness had entirely faded from her cheeks. Her eyebrows were still light, but her eyelashes were long and thick. Snowflakes settled on them without melting, each lash dusting up fine white powder.

Her skin was so pale it was almost translucent, and the color of her lips was very faint, like a lake surface in winter.

As she stood in the snow, Richard found himself staring, for a moment unable to distinguish where the snow ended and she began.

Neither of them spoke.

A jackdaw in the bell tower flapped its wings, shaking a small clump of snow loose from the spire. It fell with a rustle at her feet.

She spoke first.

”Why are you here?”

”I came with the professor,” Richard said, taking a few steps forward.

”He’s looking at some books in a monastery across the lake.”

”How did you know I was on this mountain?”

Richard didn’t answer. He took off his canvas bag, pulled out a small, greaseproof paper parcel tied with a red ribbon, and handed it over.

”Happy birthday.”

She took it and looked down at it.

The bow on the ribbon had been flattened slightly when the shopkeeper patted it down. She untied it and saw the gingerbread.

An arrow, shooting straight through an apple.

”How did you know my birthday?”

Richard explained about the application form.

Lillian blinked, and teardrops fell onto the gingerbread icing, blossoming into two small, wet spots.

”Even I had almost forgotten.”

Richard stood in front of her, his right hand clenching tightly in his coat pocket.

The girl lowered her head and wiped her face with the back of her hand. Finding she couldn’t wipe it completely dry, she simply lifted the greaseproof paper to cover her face, exposing only her chin. ”...Don’t look.”

”I’m not looking.”

Richard turned his face toward the bell tower and began studying the jackdaw with intense focus.

From behind the paper came the soft sound of sniffing.

After a while, the paper was slowly lowered, revealing a pair of red, teary eyes, her eyelashes clumped together from the moisture.

Lillian suddenly realized that Richard knowing her birthday wasn’t strange—he had a good memory.

But Richard knowing she was in Helvetia, knowing exactly which mountain the sanatorium was on, and knowing she would be here for these six days...

Those details had only been written in one letter, and the recipient of that letter was the Envoy.

Realizing this, neither of them exposed the secret.

Lillian took him to see her mother.

Standing in the doorway, Richard cast his Condensed Mirror Method outward.

Half of that woman was already on the other side of the veil, no longer in this room. He used the Sphinx Lamp’s ability to take a photograph.

The rope on the back of the photograph was distinct, and there was a line of tiny carvings etched into it.

He searched his memory and concluded it was likely a script from the northern frozen soil.

Richard began to form a hypothesis about how Ms. Holloway was connected to this rope.

He remembered Elena Savolova, the Abyss Major Adept from the northernmost frozen soil of the Rus Empire whom Madam Marie had mentioned.

In the afternoon, Ms. Holloway arrived.

She appeared to be around forty, dressed in a dark gray traveling suit.

Her hair was pinned low. Richard glanced at her several times, but every time he looked away, he found he couldn’t remember her features.

She spoke with a slight accent that was impossible to place, as if she had lived in several different regions for a few years each.

The three of them sat on the terrace drinking tea.

”Mr. Williams,” Ms. Holloway said, setting down the teapot.

”Forgive my curiosity—older people are just like this. Whenever we see young people, we can’t help but ask questions. Which school do you attend?”

”The preparatory program at the Department of Classics at Imperial Capital University. I just graduated early this semester,” Richard replied.

”Graduated early.” Ms. Holloway nodded.

”That’s quite impressive. Who is your mentor?”

”...I’m on a business trip with Professor Mortimer this time.”

”Oh? Mortimer...”

She rolled the name over on her tongue as if savoring her tea.

”I’ve heard of him. A very long-lived old gentleman.”

She picked up her teacup.

Just as the rim touched her lips, a thread of perception brushed over him.

Richard sat motionless, holding his teacup perfectly steady, allowing the probe to wash over him.

After Ms. Holloway finished inspecting him, she set down her teacup and gave him a smile.

”Young man, you should stay up late less often.”

”Yes, ma’am.”

For the next quarter of an hour, she didn’t ask Richard another question.

She chatted with Lillian about what time the post office at the bottom of the mountain closed in winter, remarked that the doctors here weren’t bad men but just loved to preach, and complained that the beds at her Zurich hotel were too soft and gave her a backache.

The entire time she spoke, she never took off her gloves.

At a quarter to three, she stood up and packed her tea tin back into her handbag.

When she reached the door of the sunroom, she turned back to Lillian and said:

”Don’t forget about the night of the winter solstice.”

After Ms. Holloway left, Lillian put her teacup down. She hadn’t taken a single sip.

”She gave me a task.

”On the night of the winter solstice, I’m supposed to follow... the procession in the sky downwards.

”Go all the way into the Spirit Realm and bring back a certain item.”

”What item?” Richard asked.

”She said I would know when the time came.”

After saying this, the girl turned her face toward the lake outside the window.

Only then did Richard fully understand Ms. Holloway’s scheme. She had moved the rope to the foot of Lillian’s mother’s bed to ensure Lillian would be forced to go to Gotthard on the night of the winter solstice.

At dusk, the two of them took a walk along the lake.

Richard told her about the True Word Incantation and the matches. He recounted the story of the damp matchbox and his landlady.

She decided to try it for herself.

The girl pulled out a match and pinched it between her fingers.

”If my name is Lillian Hayward, let this match fail to strike.”

She pressed the match head against the striking strip and struck it. It didn’t light.

She struck it again, scraping off a patch of red phosphorus, but it still didn’t catch.

Richard pulled another match from the box, struck it against the same strip, and with a scrape, a tall flame flared to life.

Lillian held her unlit match. ”For the past few months, I’ve been using other people’s names.”

Richard pressed the whole box of matches into her hands.

”Keep it. Whenever you forget your own name, just strike a match and test it.”

That night, Richard checked into the Angel Inn in town.

The inn was an old wooden building. Every step on the stairs creaked.

Rumor had it that over a century ago, Goethe, the author of Faust, had stayed here for a night.

The innkeeper had painted that room’s doorframe gold and charged an extra two francs a night for it.

Richard was staying in the adjacent room, whose doorframe retained its natural wood color.

He sat at the desk, manuscript paper spread out before him.

He had owed Matthew that story for half a year now. At this point, he didn’t just owe Matthew alone.

In his past life, Mark Twain had written a story about an American mechanic getting knocked out by a blow to the head and waking up in King Arthur’s court.

The exact details of that book had long since blurred in his memory, leaving only the core concept of the earliest historical time-travel novel. Matthew represented a path forward, and writing a story like this was the perfect fit.

Richard picked up his pen and wrote: A Tale of the Wrong Door.

...Chronicling the historical observations of a gentleman who returned from a very distant place.

Chapter One: An Extra Person in Archimedes’ Bathtub

Chapter Two: An Arrow at Hastings

Chapter Three: Caesar’s Assassination, and Someone Selling Umbrellas at the Senate Gates

Chapter Four: Columbus Misreads the Map; Bound for the Subcontinent, He Ends Up on the New Continent

The next morning, Richard took the first train up the mountain and handed the manuscript to Lillian.

She curled up in the sunroom to read it. Whenever she reached a funny part, she would cover her mouth with her hand, her eyes curving into two happy crescents.

Richard sat down next to her. Spotting a typo in the margins, he pulled a pencil out of his pocket to correct it.

The moment the pencil appeared, the girl stopped laughing. Her eyes fixed squarely on the pencil in his hand, and her face gradually turned bright red.

”Why are you blushing?” Richard asked.

Lillian quickly turned her head toward the window.

”N-nothing... The stove is burning too fiercely. I’m just hot.”

Richard glanced at the cast-iron stove in the corner. The fire in the hearth was indeed roaring.

”I thought you never felt cold or heat?”

Lillian refused to utter another word, the tips of her ears glowing so red they seemed translucent.

Richard folded the manuscript and tucked it away.

If he only wrote one piece, Matthew would forget about it as soon as he finished reading.

But if he turned it into a serial and mailed an installment every two months, he could send six a year.

As for the Master’s library card rule stating, ”Each new story completed extends the loan period by one month”—

Whether a short story installment counted as ”one story,” he planned to have a serious discussion with the librarian about that when the time came.

In the afternoon, Lillian’s mother went to sleep.

Richard mentioned he wanted to check out the small chapel at the bottom of the slope, and Lillian went with him. The chapel was empty, containing only about a dozen rows of pews.

The girl sat down in the very last row.

Richard sat next to her and ventured a question.

”Could I ask you for... some knowledge related to the mystical side?”

”About what?”

”About your tradition’s breathing method.”

”Absolutely not!” Her small face, which had still held a trace of a smile, instantly turned freezing cold.

”I’m doing a comparative study on breathing methods.” Richard’s eyes shifted as he quickly organized his words.

”I’ve analyzed the ether circulation of the Golden Path, Tide Shift, and the Condensed Mirror Method.”

Lillian stared at him.

”You said the word ’study’ a bit too quickly.”

Richard opened his mouth. He hadn’t been entirely truthful. [Breathing Lv7] required completing a full cycle of breathing for twenty-four hours in a vacuum without any external aid.

He wanted to know if the Abyss tradition’s breathing method offered a viable path for this, and he was also genuinely curious about it in general.

”...There are indeed other reasons.”

Richard said earnestly, ”I want to know why practicing the Abyss Tradition has given you so many symptoms. If I understand the specific breathing method, I might be able to find a targeted cure for you in the future.”

At this, Lillian averted her gaze.

”I’ll only explain a little bit about the breathing method to you.”

”But Spell Formulas, rituals, and how to deal with evil creatures and wandering spirits—I can’t teach you any of that.”

”Why not?” Richard asked.

Lillian turned to face him, sitting up perfectly straight. ”Don’t speak yet. Just listen to me.”

Her small face was incredibly solemn.

”Once you dive into the Abyss breathing method, the ether in your body will be permanently altered.

”If you ever want to walk the paths of the Sun, the Mirror, or the Scholar later, you won’t be able to turn back. You can only walk this single path into darkness.”

Richard remained silent.

Lillian extended a finger and pointed at his chest through the air.

”I can’t see the ether on you very clearly, but I can tell that you’re still walking an orthodox path.”

She closed her eyes and explained slowly, ”The Golden Path calls the space behind the sternum the Seat of the Sun. When you practice it, you have to envision a sun manifesting on the Seat of the Sun.

”In the Abyss, we don’t envision a sun. We just hollow out the Seat of the Sun entirely.

”And we don’t count the beats. There is no heartbeat down in the deep well.

”First, find a weak point in the veil. Then, exhale with all your might. Push the ether out, push the air out, and keep exhaling until there isn’t a single shred left in your lungs. The emptied space inside will collapse on its own.

”Then, swallow that collapsed emptiness down into your stomach. Once you’ve swallowed it, you wait. Wait for the slightest trickle to bubble up from the deep well behind the veil.”

Finished speaking, Lillian opened her eyes.

”That side is incredibly generous. You can catch your breath wherever you go. You can breathe just fine sealed inside a lead box, and you can breathe just fine buried in the dirt.”

When Richard heard ”breathe just fine buried in the dirt,” his heart skipped a beat, and the self-check mechanism of [Morphostructuring] immediately flared with a warning.

This breathing method was fundamentally unstable from start to finish. A person would collapse first. They would collapse to force out a breath, and after gasping, they would collapse further, trading that collapse for the next breath.

Richard remembered The Enigma of the Abyss that his aunt had given him. The book mentioned that the most obedient children learned to breathe quickly, inhaling all the benefits from the deep well in one gulp. But once everything that could be inhaled was gone, they would start inhaling themselves.

Richard then thought of [Shadow Inversion], which could cast Spell Formulas in reverse.

Breathing methods didn’t count as Spell Formulas. To obtain an Abyss Spell Formula, he would first have to train the breathing method to a certain level, and then thoroughly master the Spell Formula before it could be inverted.

Once he trained in the breathing method, the ether in his body would be permanently transformed with no turning back.

Richard knew in his heart that the Abyss breathing method was a dead end.

As for the ”without external aid” unlock condition for [Breathing].

Whether drawing nourishment from the deep well of the veil counted as external aid was a massive question mark.

”What are you thinking? You are not allowed to practice it!”

Seeing him stay silent with his eyes closed for so long, Lillian grew anxious. She grabbed his hand and shook him to snap him out of it.

Startled by the deathly cold of her grip, Richard shivered and hurriedly opened his eyes. ”I wasn’t practicing it. I was just memorizing it.”

”I don’t trust you.” She pulled the matchbox out of her coat pocket and shoved it into his hands.

”Come on. Use your True Word Incantation. Swear an oath.”

Richard took the matches and pulled one out.

”If I am speaking the truth...

”...that I do not intend to practice the Abyss breathing method right now, let the flame lean toward you.”

He struck the match, and it flared to life.

There was no wind in the chapel. The flame stood straight up at first, then slowly bent toward her.

Lillian stared at the tiny flame until it flickered out.

”Not right now. But what about later?”

”The matches can’t control what happens later.”

She furrowed her brow, glaring at him in sheer dissatisfaction.

”Then every time I see you from now on, I’ll make you strike a match.”

”I’ll have to buy a few more boxes then,” Richard could only agree.

”I’ll buy them,” she huffed.

On the evening of December 5, Lillian followed Richard down the mountain.

Her mother had woken up for a while that afternoon, drank half a bowl of soup, and asked Lillian if that door had been closed.

When Lillian told her it was closed, the woman went back to sleep.

As soon as it got dark, all the townspeople flooded the main street.

He didn’t know what festival was being celebrated today, but hundreds of men marched through the center of town wearing intricately carved paper miter hats that were taller than a person, illuminated by candles inside.

Up front, people cracked long whips, the loud snaps tearing through the air.

In the back, others carried giant cowbells, clanging them the entire way, while some blew into cow horns.

Richard stood in the crowd. An old man leaning on a cane next to him probably noticed his unfamiliar face and took the initiative to explain.

”We’re driving away Türst.”

The old man poked his cane at the sky. ”He’s the legendary old hunter of the mountains. On stormy nights, he charges down the slopes with a pack of hounds. Anyone who runs into him will fall terribly ill.

”The whips lash at him, the bells deafen him, and the lights blind his eyes so he won’t dare come down.”

”Has he come down this year?” Richard asked.

”Not this year,” the old man said proudly.

”We drive him off diligently.”

Richard turned his head. Lillian stood beside him, the warm glow of the paper hats washing over her face.

The girl turned her head too and looked at him.

Two people who had ridden horses in the procession of the Wild Hunt were standing among a crowd trying to drive the Wild Hunt away.

Lillian burst out laughing first and hurriedly slapped a hand over her mouth.

Richard couldn’t hold back either. The old man looked at the two of them in utter bewilderment, shook his head, and shuffled away to the other side.

Before their laughter had fully subsided, Richard noticed that there was one more shadow cast on the wall than there were paper hats in the street.

The shadow moved with the light, slipping from the shadow of one paper hat into the shadow of the next. It had no face, but Richard was extremely familiar with the unique fluctuation of its ether.

Richard recognized it. The shadow was a Sentinel, currently scouting the way.

Once in the Black Trench, and once in Flanders. He had already crossed paths with the Black Earth River Master twice, so he recognized it at a single glance.

Lillian’s shoulder rested lightly against his arm. She was still smiling, completely oblivious.

The Shadow Sentinel turned south. Southward, across the lake and the mountains, was Gotthard.

It quickly slipped into the shadow of the next light and followed the procession toward the end of the street.

Richard stood completely still.

At the very end of the procession was a massive local man wearing a glued-on white beard, a bishop’s miter, and leaning on a golden crosier.

He was accompanied by a black-faced attendant who carried a thin birch switch in his hand and a burlap sack full of nuts and oranges at his waist.

Every so often, the big man would stop, bend down, and ask the children by the roadside if they had been good this year.

When the children puffed out their chests and shouted ”Good!”, the attendant would dig into his sack and shove an orange into their hands.

The big man probably noticed Richard’s youthful face as he stood behind a group of children. He stopped in front of Richard and asked in a booming, muffled voice: ”Young man, have you been a good boy this year?”

Richard opened his mouth, but he simply couldn’t bring himself to say ”good.”

”He hasn’t been a good boy!” Lillian chimed in.

The black-faced attendant drew his birch switch and lightly swatted Richard’s coat.

He didn’t feel a thing through the thick layers, but the light blow knocked a rustling shower of snow off his coat.

The children around them doubled over with laughter.

The big man sized Richard up for a moment, then pulled out an orange and pressed it into his hand.

Even boys who aren’t good get an orange to eat.

”There’s a war this year. None of us have been very good.”

He leaned on his crosier and continued onward.

Richard turned his head and saw Lillian smiling brightly at him.