The shrine was quiet except for the low chant and the small sounds of the candle flames, and the villagers near the doors breathed carefully, as if too loud a breath might disturb something holy.
James stood near the entrance with the Succubus Cross above him and the statue at the far end of the room ahead of him. The link to Floor 5 sat in his chest, a recognition he could not put words to yet, while the woman in white knelt before the carved stone and the candle smoke moved between them.
He did not trust any of it. The village trusted her completely, and everything he had seen since the well pointed at her shrine as the center of the missing men, and the gap between those two facts was the whole problem.
The Saintess finished her worship and rose from the statue without hurry.
