"There are many flavors of divination, Mistress. You’ll need to be a touch more specific about what you’re asking.”

As if I knew the first thing about divination magic. For starters, I didn’t have the right pathway. Second, I didn’t even have the right element for it. Sure, I’d poked around enough to learn what traps to avoid—nuggets of wisdom I might one day toss back at those who practiced it—but let’s be honest, that was more curiosity than preparation. To no one’s surprise, I got nowhere. Divination pathways are secretive for a reason.

But now, finally, I had someone who could actually perform it. And damn if I wasn’t just a little too eager to see how the magic sausage was made.

I paused mid-thought, eyeing my peculiar companion. Calling her “the doll” was getting exhausting, not to mention rude. She needed a name. Everyone deserved a name! “Before we get into that, though—do you have a name?”

It wasn’t like I was about to slap one on her willy-nilly. She clearly had a mind of her own, a past too, judging by her behavior. Enough sentience to warrant some respect, at least.

Her voice wavered. “I-I do have a name, Mistress.”

“And that is?”

“It’s not important, Mistress. If you wish to name me anew, I’ll accept it humbly.”

I arched a brow. “Not up to me, is it? If you have a name, I’ll use it—unless you hate it for some reason?”

She hesitated, fidgeting like she was wrestling with a ghost of her past. “It’s not that I hate it… I was called The Pravodov Family Doll. Never cared for that title, didn’t even know where it came from. But I gave myself a name—Alice—to remember myself.”

I nodded, the name settling nicely in my thoughts. “Alice. That’s a good name.”

Her little voice perked up, tentative but hopeful. “D-do you like it, Mistress?”

What was with this doll and her bizarre priorities? I sighed, shaking my head at her quirks. “Yes, I do. And I’ll happily call you that from now on.” Calling something so self-aware “doll” just felt… wrong.

“Anyway, Alice!” I said, watching her flinch and cover her face with her tiny hands like I’d just thrown a fireball. Was she flustered? Again? What in the magical hells had Lotte done to this thing? Whatever. I brushed it off. “About divination—here’s the thing. No clue how it works. If I had to ask for something, it’d be about that golden thread Lotte mentioned.”

I scratched my chin, trying to piece together my request. Seeing Alice still looking dazed, I added, “She said some kind of ‘golden opportunity’ was going to find me today. I’m assuming it’s a person. But can we, I don’t know, figure out who or what it is?”

Alice rested her tiny hands on her knees, her face still serene. “Divination isn’t as straightforward as that, Mistress. If your question’s too fuzzy or muddled, it’ll spit out riddles that make even less sense. You might want to rephrase it.”

Of course, it couldn’t be easy. Nothing ever was.

I tried phrasing the question a few different ways, each attempt a fresh exercise in futility. “Find out who—or what—this ‘golden opportunity’ is?” Too vague—Divination doesn’t know squat about clichés. “Any golden opportunity in the future?” Too broad—there’s probably a hundred, and most wouldn’t even be worth chasing. “When will this golden opportunity show up?” Nope—too process-focused, and Divination’s not a calendar. Each version felt like trying to staple jelly to a wall.

Alice let me flounder for a while before gently telling me to stop. “Mistress, Divination isn’t a map with a little red X marking treasure. It’s a snapshot of potential outcomes—a glimpse of where things could go. For example, if your revelation says an alchemical potion will make you rich, that might mean in thirty years, after it crashes and burns a dozen times. It’s not a step-by-step guide, and sometimes it’s too murky to quantify. Divination isn’t all-powerful.”

I sighed, rubbing my temples like that’d somehow juice my brain into functioning better. High Intelligence stat? My arse. Why’s wisdom not a stat?

Alice’s explanation, though, shed some much-needed light. Divination wasn’t some god-tier cheat code for life. It was more like getting the punchline to a joke without hearing the setup, and sometimes, not even in the right language. Impatience? That just added static to the signal.

I found myself grudgingly respecting divinators more and more. Even the one I’d sent packing in a dungeon. Poor guy. May Thalador be kind to his probably very confused soul.

Still, I wasn’t ready to throw in the towel just yet. “So, what you’re saying is… it can’t just hand me a clean answer,” I said, half to Alice, half to myself. “If I’m too vague, it’ll give me gibberish. If I go too broad, I’ll end up chasing my tail for decades—or miss the point entirely. Is that about right?”

Alice tilted her head, her expression calm but with a faint flicker of what might’ve been amusement. “Exactly, Mistress. The problem isn’t just the question but also the way fate spins its web. Divination shows fragments of truth, filtered through the cracks of time. If your intent isn’t sharp, the result won’t be either. Precision is everything.”

Precision. Okay, I could work with that. Maybe.

“Alright,” I muttered, pushing myself to my feet and pacing in front of her like that would jar a genius idea loose. “What if I focused on something actionable? Instead of asking about a ‘golden opportunity,’ I could try, hmm… ‘What person will I encounter today whose actions will change my path?’ Wait, no. Too reliant on ‘change.’ What if it just throws out someone who drops a coin I pick up?”

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Alice, ever-patient, nodded and let me keep tangling myself in my own logic knots. It was a skill, really—watching someone crash and burn with grace.

“Okay, maybe… ‘Who will play a pivotal role in today’s events?’” I stopped mid-pace, shaking my head. “Still too vague. What counts as pivotal? You see the problem, don’t you? It’s like I’m trying to shoot an arrow at a bullseye that keeps moving.”

“Exactly,” Alice chimed in. “And divination doesn’t recognize your priorities, Mistress. What you think is important might not align with what fate considers worthy of revealing. A revelation may answer a question you didn’t even think to ask—or focus on details you find irrelevant.”

I stared at her. “So it’s not just about asking the right question but also understanding that the answer might be sideways to what I want.”

She nodded, folding her small hands neatly in her lap. “That’s correct. And remember, divination rarely illuminates the ‘how’, it speaks to the ‘what’ or ‘when,’ leaving the process entirely in your hands. If you’re unprepared to navigate its subtleties, you risk making poor choices based on partial truths.”

Hmm. Something about what she said clung to my thoughts. Hmm… If I wanted divination to work for me, I’d have to approach it like an interrogation, not a conversation. Specific. Targeted. Unambiguous. I couldn’t afford to leave room for fate to interpret my intentions in ways that would trip me up later.

“Alright,” I said finally, stopping in front of Alice. “Let’s try this. What person will I meet today who embodies—or is tied to—a critical turning point in my journey? No vague ‘opportunities,’ no fluffy phrasing. It’s specific enough to rule out random bystanders but still open-ended enough to catch anyone important. How’s that?”

Alice tilted her head. “That is… better, Mistress. A far cry from your earlier attempts. But even with such a question, you must be prepared for an answer that is incomplete or challenging to interpret. Divination may tell you who but not why—or it may point to someone whose significance only becomes apparent much later.”

Alright, here we go, time to roll the dice and tango with the unknown. After all, a sliver of knowledge beats a fistful of ignorance any day!! Who’s behind door number one today, hmm? Oh, but let's not kid ourselves, this could flop spectacularly.

“Is this the question you want to ask?”

I gave a curt nod. “Yes, it is.”

Alice nodded back. She hopped off the bed, bee-lining for my desk with purpose. With hands too nimble for someone her size, she plucked a quill and started scrawling my query onto a piece of parchment, each letter precise, deliberate. Task complete, she set the paper down between us.

“Do you have any mana crystals, mistress?” she asked, and oh, did I ever. A quick rummage through my drawer yielded the glittering stones. Following her instructions, I placed them at the corners of my room, their facets catching the dim light like miniature stars.

“To divine properly, you’ve got to cleanse the area first—unless you’re some high-core diviner.” Alice’s blindfold, woven with intricate golden runes, began to shimmer faintly. The mana crystals lit up in tandem, their glow birthing runic symbols eerily similar to the one Lotte once whispered to me in dream. I could feel it. A shift, a lightening. The room seemed to exhale, shedding a weight I hadn’t realized it carried.

“The next step,” Alice intoned, “is to establish a spiritual connection to the question.” No sooner had she spoken than the parchment between us floated into the air, as if buoyed by unseen currents.

“Step three is to call upon a guide. I’ll use one my creator installed in my psyche.” Her blindfold flared even brighter, like molten gold catching the sun. “O Mother of Silence, she who guides the lost and unveils hidden truths through her veil, grant me clarity.”

The air thickened, charged with a presence I couldn’t deny. My breath hitched as I remembered Lotte’s murmured prayer—Mother of Silence. It was no coincidence. I’d seen priests toss around divine titles, their hollow rituals devoid of true weight. But this? This was different. The invocation hung in the room like a melody, and for the second time that day, I stood witness to something profoundly, undeniably real.

I closed my eyes. The pressure was intense yet… strangely calming, like a lullaby sung by the sea.

“And now, the final stage,” Alice said softly, “is to weave through the unseen—the waters of dreams, the Reflecting Depths, the endless sea of the collective consciousness.”

Her tiny fingers clasped mine, and I felt a strange heat as her blindfold dissolved into nothingness. Two eyes, fathomless and dark as starless skies, locked onto mine. In that instant, I felt an expanding pull, a vortex unfurling deep inside me. Her gaze was an inkdrop blooming in water, spreading, spilling into my mind. The air twisted, space itself bending, until reality felt like a distant echo.

Feathers. Black as shadows, endless as night. Crows. A whole murder of them perched on a ceiling. No—these were no ordinary crows. Three eyes. One leg. They watched. They whispered. Secrets unfurled from them like steam from a kettle—the scent of knowing. Of gathering. Of Whispering.

Of Whispering.

Of Whispering.

Of Whispering.

Then came footsteps, soft on gravel, a predator’s tread meant not to be heard, only felt. Three tails slinked behind the figure—vixen-like. And a mask, ornate. Humming with secrecy. The air reeked of hidden truths. Of Whispering.

My lungs heaved, dragging in a sharp, involuntary breath. The world snapped back like a taut rubber band, dragging me with it. I staggered, suddenly aware of the bed beneath me, my chest rising and falling as if I’d been sucker-punched by reality itself.

“Hah...” My mouth hung open as the sensation faded, leaving behind a strange clarity. Alice, now as composed as ever, sat with her golden-white blindfold neatly restored. The alien presence that had wrapped itself around the room was gone. But instead of the dazed confusion I should’ve felt, a grin spread across my face.

I had a hunch—a pretty damn good one—about who might be reaching out to me.

That was until I glanced at the clock. 9:30?! HOLY THALADOR! HOW THE BLOODY HELL HAD HALF AN HOUR VANISHED?!

Panic shot through me. “Oh gods, Vasilisa is going to kill me!” I scrambled off the bed, flinging my gratitude over my shoulder. “Thanks, Alice! Gotta run!”

Alice turned her head sharply at my thanks, her porcelain face tilted with what could only be described as flustered doll energy. She was trying to regain composure as I saluted Belle, the badger who had faithfully taken to her little broom and tiny cloth to tidy the room. She chirped a “squee” in reply, and I turned to leave.

But Alice’s voice stopped me in my tracks.

“Wait a moment, mistress!” Her small frame shifted to stand. “Take me with you!”

I blinked, halfway to the door. “What? Alice, no offense, but dragging a magical artifact through public spaces is not exactly low-profile. Especially a doll like you. Trained eyes will be crawling all over the place.”

She tilted her head, her expression serene. “You don’t need to worry about eyes when it comes to me, mistress.”

I narrowed my gaze. “Huh?”