An hour and some minutes later.
The living area looked much the same. Gerald Richmond and Abraham sat opposite one another, glasses half-drained, their conversation drifting between money, markets, and names not meant to leave the walls.
Smoke coiled above them from the cigar tray, rising in steady ribbons that blurred into the dim lights overhead.
On the stage, the duo played on. The girl's flute whispered through the room in fluid measures while the boy's violin answered with heavier undertones, their duet shaping a song both fragile and relentless.
Neither looked up. Neither faltered.
The guards kept their posts. Suits along the pillars, rifles steady.
Kasanda stood behind Abraham's sofa, motionless except for the calm breath in his chest. Han leaned against a marble column, eyes half-lidded but scanning with every slow flicker. Even in stillness, his body tingled with awareness.
Time seemed settled inside.
But outside the mansion walls, the forest shifted.
