They chant mid-breath, caught in a lift of paper that refuses the floor. Pages peel upward from unseen hands and braid themselves into a burning helix above the nave, light sewing light while wax weeps from every ledge. The cathedral holds its bones steady—arches tense, stone listening—as the spiral tightens and loosens, again and again, a rehearsal of ascent that never finishes. Candles gutter; a few sparks leap. The choir’s ring leans inward, robes bruised blue by the windows, faces upturned as if the air itself asked a question. Down the left stair, someone scrawled it into tallow and dust—Where Vojta?—the words slumping as wax sags and drips, a counter-voice that refuses the hymn. From the rail a watcher counts exits, measuring hope against geometry, while another fingers a folded page that will not rise. The ritual promises guidance, yet the helix sheds leaves it cannot keep. When the song breaks and the papers settle, the circle opens. Vojta does not. He remains unaccounted for, not here.