I lay on my back, hands folded loosely over my stomach, eyes fixed on the ceiling.
The days here blurred into each other.
Not because they were busy — but because they were empty in a very specific way. Each task was simple. Each instruction precise. Nothing ever spilled beyond its assigned boundaries.
Clean this.
Don't touch that.
Leave before sunset.
Disappear when footsteps approach.
It was easy to lose track of time in a house like this.
Tomorrow, I was supposed to clean the library.
The thought surfaced gently, without urgency, the way ordinary thoughts did when there was nothing immediate to fear. The Old Servant had mentioned it in passing that evening, his voice flat.
"Tomorrow, library duty."
No emphasis.
I turned my head slightly on the pillow, considering it.
The library meant access — even if I wasn't allowed to touch anything. It meant space that wasn't purely functional. Books meant history. Records. Old things that hadn't been erased yet.
I'll be careful, I told myself.
Just clean. Just look.
The ceiling light hummed faintly.
And then the heat came back.
Not suddenly — not like pain.
It seeped in.
A warmth bloomed beneath my ribs, spreading outward, pressing against my skin from the inside. I inhaled sharply as my muscles tensed without permission, fingers curling slightly.
My mind getting fuzzy and eyelids becoming heavy,
"No," I muttered under my breath.
It had been a week.
Every night, the same thing.
Not fever, exactly. My skin wasn't burning. My head didn't spin. It was deeper than that — like my body was being weighed down by something invisible.
Pressure.
As if the air itself had thickened.
I shifted, trying to find relief, but it didn't help. The pressure followed, settling into my chest, my abdomen, my limbs. My heartbeat stumbled, then picked up again, uneven and wrong.
Is it my heart?
Is the potion already fading?
The thought sent a quiet spike of fear through me.
But it wasn't just my heart.
That was the strangest part.
My entire body felt affected — like whatever was happening wasn't focused on one organ, but on me as a whole. As if something was responding to my presence, my blood, my existence.
I pressed my palm against my chest, breathing shallowly.
"Get a grip," I whispered to myself.
Maybe I should contact him.
The idea formed reluctantly.
I hadn't planned to reach out so soon. I didn't want to draw attention. Didn't want to seem unreliable — or worse, inconvenient.
But if this was a sign that the potion's effect was weakening—
How would I even leave the house? I wondered.
How would I explain it?
Servants were allowed outside occasionally. Supplies. Errands. They weren't prisoners.
Right?
"They don't track servants," I murmured, trying to reassure myself. "That would be ridiculous."
The words sounded thin even to my own ears.
Still, paranoia kept people alive.
I'll call him tomorrow, I decided.
Just to be safe.
I lay there, unmoving, until the heat slowly dulled into exhaustion rather than pressure. Sleep didn't come easily, but eventually, my body surrendered.
Morning arrived without relief.
I woke to the sensation.
The pressure hadn't left but subsided.
It pressed me into the mattress, made my limbs feel heavy, my breathing shallow. My skin felt tight, like something was wrong just beneath it — like an unseen force was leaning down, searching, trying to draw something out of me.
Not pain.
I lay there longer than I should have, staring at the ceiling again, listening to the distant sounds of the house waking.
Whatever this was, it wasn't stopping.
And I had a feeling the library wouldn't just give me answers.
It would give the house a chance to look back at me.
~
The study room was deliberately silent.
Dark wood lined the walls, shelves rising from floor to ceiling, thick with books whose weight no single lifetime could ever bear. The faint metallic scent in the air hinted at something not human, yet perfectly disguised.
Carlson Valentino sat at the center of the room, commanding the space as naturally as breathing. Age had refined him into precision — every gesture measured, every posture intentional. Around him, four others were seated along the table, forming a quiet perimeter of controlled attention. Lucian's chair, near the window, caught the soft morning light, but his presence made the sun seem irrelevant.
Numbers, investments, and alliances passed between the brothers in low, methodical tones. Each word was deliberate, each pause calculated — until Lucian spoke.
The silence that followed was not surprise. It was caution. He did not ask; he did not preface. He simply stated.
"I have a problem."
All heads turned, subtly. Carlson did not. He only waited.
Lucian's voice was low, precise, almost sharp enough to cut.
"For the past week, I have felt… interference."
Carlson's eyes narrowed.
"Explain."
Lucian did not shift. His gaze was fixed, unflinching.
"I believed it was a potion at first — miscalculation, improper dosage, something trivial. But the symptoms do not match any known compounds we have used."
"Describe them," Carlson said.
Lucian's fingers tightened around the chair arms, slight but deliberate, like steel wires tensing.
"My body is pressed, constrained. Not by external force, but from within. Constant pressure. Relentless. I cannot relax. And yet…" He paused, his eyes scanning the room briefly, as though gauging reactions, "there is direction in the pressure. A pull. Urgent, but silent. Insistent, but invisible. It demands something from me, yet refuses to show me what it is."
One of the brothers leaned forward. Another stiffened. Carlson remained motionless, only his gaze sharpening.
Lucian continued, colder now, sharper: "It feels almost deliberate. Calculated. As if the energy wants me to act, but prevents me from seeing its target. Every attempt to follow it… is blocked. It is aware I exist, and it watches. And I cannot ignore it."
The room froze, not from fear, but because he had not asked permission. He had not sought advice. He had declared observation, and the authority in his tone left no room for debate.
Carlson's expression flickered for a fraction of a second — a storm contained in a man who rarely showed emotion.
"Since when?"
"A week," Lucian replied evenly. No hesitation. No weakness.
He did not sound troubled. He sounded alert. Predatory. Focused. Dangerous.
Carlson's gaze swept the table, silently measuring the reactions of the others. "And you suspect?"
Lucian's lips twitched into the barest hint of a smirk — not amused, but clinical, analytical. "Yes. I have been given something… outside the ordinary. A compound, yes, or interference, yes. But it is not a mistake. It is intentional. Deliberate."
Carlson leaned back, absorbing the words. "This is not how potions affect us," he said, each word deliberate, slow, as if testing Lucian's reaction.
Lucian's eyes did not waver. "I am aware."
A faint pause, and then Carlson's voice lowered, just enough for him alone to hear: "We will investigate. Quietly."
Lucian's head tilted slightly, almost imperceptibly. "I do not feel endangered. I do not feel vulnerable. But I feel… observed. Tested."
Carlson nodded once, sharp, precise.
"Those who are aware and untouched are often the ones in greatest danger. Remember that."
The conversation shifted back to business — alliances, shipments, shares — but the temperature of the room had changed.
Every word now carried weight, measured against the presence of a man who did not speak lightly. And somewhere, beyond the reach of their conversation, invisible and waiting, the pressure continued — relentless, patient, calculating.