The hallway floor creaked softly beneath his steps, a long sigh of weary wood bearing the weight of years. Victor slowly closed the front door behind him, as if not to disturb the house's heavy silence. The damp mist of the moor still clung to his clothes, a fine, cold film contrasting with the manor's icy, motionless atmosphere.
He ascended the spiral staircase, his boots barely muffling the groans of the ancient wood. Midway, he passed a servant—a bent old man whose eyes dropped immediately upon meeting his. An indistinct murmur of greeting went unanswered. Victor paid it no mind. The house seemed inhabited by silent shadows. No one sought to speak to him, nor even truly look at him.
As he passed, the heavy kitchen door opened slightly, revealing a yellow light and a warmth unlike the rest of the manor. The acrid smell of cabbage, mingled with stale bread and an indefinable aroma, filled his nostrils. On the worn wooden board, a partially eaten loaf awaited. Without hesitation, he grabbed a knife and cut a slice, wrapping it in a cloth. The dull echo of the door closing resonated in the deserted corridor.
The first floor had the chill of a mausoleum. The narrower hallway seemed to trap dust and time. Victor walked along the gallery with drawn curtains, their darkened folds barely allowing the moonlight to filter through. The old portraits on the walls seemed to follow him with their eyes, silent witnesses to vanished generations. He stopped before a door, hesitated for a moment, then knocked gently.
No response.
He opened it slowly.
His mother was there, motionless in her chair, frozen like a statue. The shawl draped over her shoulders remained in the same place, its delicate fabric appearing almost fragile in the room's darkness. Her eyes, fixed through the window, no longer held the light of life. She lived in a world Victor could no longer reach, even by speaking to her.
On a small table, a plate held a slice of bread that seemed abandoned. He delicately placed the one he had brought on the board, then moved toward the hearth where the fire had nearly died out. A log cracked between his fingers as he placed it to rekindle the embers.
"Mother," he murmured, hesitant.
She blinked slowly, as if perceiving a distant sound. But no response came, no sign of awareness. Just that heavy silence, that absent presence.
He stood there, motionless, hands in his pockets, watching her without knowing what to say or do. He wished to tell her about Dennis, the little boy he had met at the edge of town, or about Emma, the red-haired girl with the bread, lively and spirited. But that would have been futile.
So, without a sound, he turned around and gently closed the door behind him.
Back in his room, he sat on the edge of the unmade bed, contemplating the austere ceiling. The air was thick, saturated with silence. He looked at his hands, where a few bread crumbs still lingered, which he brushed away absentmindedly.
A gust of wind made the shutters rattle, casting dancing shadows on the walls. Outside, the moor stretched under the pale moonlight, still and silent.
---
The evening had thickened with a sharper wind, beating against the windows with an almost aggressive insistence, reminding all that outside, nature never truly slept.
The supper, cold and untouched, rested on Victor's plate. He wasn't hungry.
Lying on his stomach, the geography book, its pages yellowed, lay half-open beneath him. Yet the words slipped by without ever anchoring in his mind. This volume was outdated; the war it referenced had ended nearly a year ago, and the page about the county (his future county, he thought grimly) to which Dunleigh belonged still proudly bore the oak of the Ashcombe family, his mother's house. Nothing about the name Neri, his Italian father's, which had come to replace Ashcombe, disrupting the order of things. That name had become for him a heavy and distant mystery, a fragile heritage he bore without truly knowing why.
Gradually, his eyelids grew heavy. He fell asleep, his face resting against the pages, while shadows danced on the walls.
---
In the dream, the moor was no longer just a backdrop but an invasive presence. It encircled the manor, the mist rising to the columns of the porch, sliding over the stones and infiltrating the dark corridors. Victor walked barefoot, the damp grass clinging to his skin, unable to discern where the interior ended and the exterior began.
The sky was a uniform mass of endless gray, a canvas without depth or light.
A man stood before him, motionless, wrapped in an overly long coat, his face blurred, featureless. A white indistinct blot where his eyes should have been. Yet, in this strange dream, Victor knew that this man knew him, that he had been waiting for him.
He tried to speak, to ask who he was, but no sound emerged. The wind rose, icy and violent, swirling the mist around them. The man took a step toward him, then another.
Panicked, Victor stepped back, but his feet suddenly sank into icy water. He was trapped in a vast, muddy, and murky pond. He stumbled, slipping toward the invisible abyss.
When he looked up, the figure had vanished.
---
Victor awoke with a start, breathing heavily, his heart pounding. The book had slipped off the bed and lay on the cold floor. Outside, the moor stretched under the pale moonlight, motionless and silent.
He sat up slowly, his muscles tense from the dream's strain. His fingers found the worn leather of the volume, which he closed with a sharp gesture. He placed the book back on the shelf, between two others, before returning to his bed.
Gently, he removed the Neri signet ring from his ring finger. The cold metal left a pale imprint on his skin, a silent trace of this bond he bore without truly understanding. The lion on the crest seemed mocking, derisive. At times, he felt it taunted him. He placed the ring on the nightstand, near the extinguished candle, with a soft metallic clink.
He remained seated for a long moment, elbows on his knees, both hands in his hair. His thoughts circled endlessly, without resolution.
Then he lay back down. The warm sheets enveloped him, and he closed his eyes, leaving the moor and the house to their misty slumber.
Tomorrow, he would return to town.