The Valtor estate breathes history through its every stone, the morning mist clinging to ivy-choked towers where crows nest in arrow slits. Lady Isolde’s chambers reek of beeswax and nostalgia, her calloused fingers tracing the fuller of her dead husband’s sword—a relic too heavy for her frailing arms, yet polished daily as penance. She murmurs to the blade like a confessional, voice frayed by decades of command: “He stares at the beastkin maids like you once stared at battle maps... hungry. Would you have allowed it?” Her laughter cracks, bitter as winter bark. Outside, a succubus maid scrubs blood-rust from a courtyard statue, her tail flicking irritably at the sound of her lady’s grief.

A knock fractures the dawn quiet of the lord’s bedchamber. The door creaks open to reveal Clara—a human maid whose corset strains against deliberate dishevelment. She hesitates, moonlight catching the sweat on her collarbone, before stepping toward the canopied bed. Her hand hovers, trembling, above the lord’s shoulder. “Milord,” she whispers, too softly. Clearing her throat, she tries again, louder, fingers brushing linen instead of skin. “Your mother... she requests your presence. At once.” Her gaze lingers on the rumpled sheets, imagining the warmth beneath.