A Fragment of Favor sounds like an Evolution stone from Pokemon...
Anthony confirms that the original "Christopher" is truly dead, and this new shadow guy posing as him is just a new morph that he manipulated to copy him. Well done to those who put forward the morph theory.
Maryrose and Rosemary aren't on his side based on what he said as well. I still doubt they're already dead, though. We know their fall was cushioned when they fell below the mansion.
Anthony has a plan that's much more suited to open rebellion than the more subtle and diplomatic Kate by trying to amass shadows with powers through brainwashing. He's actually aiming to build an army of pawns with soot powers to overthrow the adults by force. He also made Edward look like a small fry with the scale of his scheming...
Damn, the revelations in this chapter is huge in the grand scheme of things. The head of the Mirrors house survived as well, but he got separated from his Shadow-infected and comatose wife. So Anthony is Kate's (psychopath) younger half-brother...
"Kate, I am your brother."
I did not expect this. Funny how Kate is much more human than the cold-blooded killer Anthony is based on their actions.
Yes, I do remember that Kate was in her mother's womb for years. If that chapter was correct, she's existed for over 50 years already (not aged, since an
unborn fetus technically does not celebrate
birthdays). A very interesting wrinkle between their half-sibling connection - Kate was conceived far earlier, but Anthony seems to have been born earlier and thus biologically older. All this begs the question, just exactly how old is Anthony...? Alfred must have been very old when he sired his son...
The part I'm questioning is how did anybody else know that Kate was Catherine's daughter when the only witness is Emily who raised Kate...? Unless Emily talked about it to someone else or blabbed it to everyone she met, nobody from Alfred's side (or Joseph who seems to know something) should have gotten a clue to who Kate is, much less know of her existence. For all the answers in this chapter there is still this missing piece to the puzzle.
And now this also poses an interesting succession problem for the Mirrors House between Kate and Anthony. Who is the legitimate heir? Kate is considered older and the legitimate daughter of the legal first wife, but she's 1. Born a Shadow hybrid and 2. A girl (a problem if the nobility there follows male line succession only). The things working against Anthony is that 1. He's considered younger and 2. Possibly illegitimate, given I didn't see anything about Alfred divorcing Catherine or legally marrying a new wife, or both.
On paper they could be on the same side (overthrow the Shadows House, but they differ with methods and vision of the desired outcome because Kate is inclusive of the Shadow children unlike Anthony) until it's time to actually restore the Mirrors House. But I don't think Kate will ever side with Anthony after every nasty thing he's done to get this far. It would require Kate to turn her back on her principles to join Anthony's violent subterfuge. I'd like to believe in her, that she'll do this differently, even if she has to start over with a handful of allies after Anthony swooped in and stole the fruits of her labor.