Karma Strikes, Due Today

Fiona Sterling has the run of the family while her husband Harrison is in a coma, and she wants the Everflame Shrine on the grounds taken down and the lamp inside it sold. Her eldest grandson argues against it and gets nowhere. The demolition is booked. The shrine is the Sterling side of an agreement a hundred years old. Nora Night, the Soul Mistress, saved the family then, and what she took in return was that they would keep the shrine standing and the lamp lit, and that when the hundred years were up they would send an heir into her service. She has been asleep inside the shrine since. The doors open by themselves on the day the crews arrive and Nora walks out with a lantern in her hand. She tells them the reckoning is already set and that payment starts now. The family goes ahead with the work. The evergreen in the courtyard dies back, the incense burner cracks, the company's stock falls to the limit and scandals surface one after another. The grandson goes to Nora and asks her for help, and she brings Harrison out of the coma. Fiona carries on with the demolition, and the plaque over the shrine door is still up.