The mansion had a way of holding its silence that felt almost alive, as though the quiet itself was a promise it had been keeping for generations.
The wards along its walls didn't hum or glow like the new ones people build nowadays; instead, they waited, steady as old trees, the kind that seem to breathe in time with the wind.
In the heart of Nocturne mansion, behind doors that opened without handles or locks because the stone knew who belonged, a study kept itself dim and comfortable, as if it had learned long ago that light didn't need to shout to be useful.
The shelves along the walls weren't crammed or cluttered. They held books in neat rows, not as decoration but as evidence of someone who actually read them, who wore the corners down and turned the pages more than once.
A low table sat at the center, a pot on top of it keeping its heat without smoke or steam, the way good things sometimes do when they've been shaped to last.
