The master chambers of the Black Ridge were nothing like the guest wing. Where the rest of the manor felt like a cold, hollow museum of Silas’s wealth, this room felt like the man himself: dark, imposing, and filled with a restless, predatory energy. The walls were lined with rough-hewn stone and hung with heavy tapestries depicting ancient wars, their colors faded to the shade of dried blood.
I stood in the center of the room, my boots tracking dust from the training grounds onto a rug made of thick, midnight-black fur. Silas was at the heavy mahogany desk across the room, his back to me. He had stripped off his charred leather vest, revealing a sprawling landscape of scars across his shoulders—souvenirs of a decade of war and survival.
"I can't stay here, Silas," I said, my voice barel
