The following morning, the estate felt less like a monument to cold power and more like a recovery ward. Mild had spent the early hours moving through the library, a room that mirrored Arm's once-meticulous mind. He found Arm sitting on the floor in a shaft of sunlight, surrounded by rolls of drafting paper and sticks of charcoal.
Mild watched from the doorway, his breath catching. Arm's hands were moving with a frantic, hypnotic grace. He wasn't drawing people or faces; he was sketching intricate, impossible geometries—vaulted ceilings that looked like ribcages and bridges that seemed to defy gravity.
Arm didn't look up. He was hunched over the paper, his charcoal snapping under the pressure of his grip. He looked frustrated, his brow furrowed in a deep, agonizing concentration.
