When not using the Sight—and, apparently, the Hearing—the vestiges are a lot more realistic. Not that Sadde can check that right now.

Shortly after he says it Johannes appears. "Welcome back." Blink. "Did you get more magical since the other day?"

"Kiiinda, yeah," he admits.

"How? I might not notice if I hadn't seen you before, but it stands out."

"...I performed the implement ritual."

Johannes looks again, and cracks up.

Mid-laugh, "And it worked? That is brilliant."

"Nnnnot so brilliant, I kinda have the Sight stuck on now."

"OK, that's a problem. Not necessarily not brilliant, but a problem.

How long has it been?"

"Since Saturday."

"Not life and death yet, then.

This is maybe the worst place for you; near enough everything's magic. Emphasizing ties to the spirit world over the material one isn't going to help."

"Probably true—have a better place in mind? Also, Nicole Duchamp offered to make me a pair of glasses that will emphasise the material world."

"Anywhere you spent a lot of time before Saturday. If there's somewhere personally significant, even better.

Glasses...I could imagine that working. Not a very elegant solution, you'd still have the problem and it would just make it matter less, but that still counts." His pipes hover near his nonfunctional arm.

"If you have a better solution I'm all ears. As for personally significant... Not really a lot of those places, my place is out of the question, and I pretty much always walk the city, there isn't any one place. The library, maybe?"

"If you'd normally be there for non-magical reasons it'll work. Ideally act as if that's why you're there. That's just buying time, though, not solving it.

It is a solvable problem. Goblins, perhaps. The one that got the use of my eye probably got something from it. And it's possible to hear at a distance using a severed goblin ear, but supposedly it only lasts a few uses per ear and anyway it sounds messy.

I don't know of any genuine solution but there almost definitely is one."

He starts leading the way to the library.

"And other than the fact that the price I'm paying for the glasses seems to be to remember that the Duchamps saved my life should a conflict between them and the Behaims occur, do you see a reason for me not to accept them and use them as a temporary solution while I seek a more permanent one?"

"The deal was remembering they saved your life? I guess that's mostly true. You'd very likely survive anyway but their escape route will have been the one that actually happened.

What they probably think you don't know is, that could bring a lot of karmic debt with it. And they definitely know how to leverage that. It's not as trivial a request as it sounds. But since I don't have a solution and my main lead involves serial dismemberment, it's probably worth it."

"I would prefer not dismembering sapient beings, yes."

"Yeah. Enchantment is probably better equipped to help here than most disciplines are, especially while avoiding the really distasteful.

If the Duchamps have to do any working on you yourself, and not just on whatever item they give you, make sure it does only what they say it does. Enchantment can be subtle."

"They said it was only the glasses..."

"Good. Makes it more likely their only plan is trying to turn having helped you out into having saved your life and then into some major favor."

Sigh. "Well, I promised no such thing. Could they spin enough of an ungratefulness narrative that the spirits would side with them if they decided to call in a favour I don't owe them?"

"Depends on degree. Yes if it's in the ballpark of glasses, no if it's on the scale of life and death.

The worst that happens if you just refuse is bad karma. It won't be in debilitating quantities; you could have outright stolen a magic item and the universe wouldn't hate you that much. If it comes up, the best response is that you've considered exactly how much they did for you and how much danger you were in, and you're deciding to act against them anyway because of whatever the reasons are. If it's weighty enough for you to act in the first place, the spirits won't just think it's ungratefulness."

"Yeah, that was how I'd figured it'd work but I don't know nearly as much as you do about these spirits."

Presently they've arrived at the library.

"Do practitioners frequent this library? If someone checks that you've really awakened, they might notice I have too."

"They might? I mean I didn't know about the whole practice thing until last week and when I go to libraries I don't tend to pay attention to the other people who are around."

"Well, I'm not here for long anyway. I'm on the wrong side of the divide for buying you time."