The Shadow

Chapter 13

When Kai had heard that Harper lived in a manor, he had known that it would be large. In truth, it was enormous—comparable in size to Lord Canmore's castle. Rather than being built as a fortress, however, the Ivory Manor was made for comfort and elegance. Large gardens, rivers and lakes led to a large grassy field upon which the massive building lay. Great pillars of stone met beautiful curved arches, and small towers rested beside massive chimneys, smoke wafting up into the sky. In the center of the manor a dome shot toward the heavens like a beacon, the picture of wealth and intimidation. Everything was colored white as snow.

A boy who couldn't have been any older than fifteen stopped Kai and Harper near the pillared entrance to the manor to collect their horses. Dismounting Breeze, Kai shook his head in awe of the building before him.

"It's beautiful," he said as he and Harper walked toward the manor's massive ivory colored door. "And these doors... I didn't even know ivory could be made into things so large."

Harper laughed as she pushed the doors inward, revealing the large entrance room beyond. "Nothing here is made of ivory. Well, at least not very much of it. A large portion of the house is coated in white—not real ivory. I'm not so sure that this place deserves its name."

"Well," Kai said, gaze turning towards the room in which he stood, "It is beautiful—ivory or otherwise."

Indeed, the inside of the manor was even more magnificent than the outside. White tile floors melded into plush carpets that stretched to massive staircases on each side of the large room, leading toward the second floor. Ivory colored pillars supported an internal balcony that overlooked the sitting room in which he now stood. Dozens of doors and hallways led to other parts of the home, many filled with bustling servants as they prepared to accommodate Kai and Harper.

"My father had the whole place renovated—I'm not sure why he was so obsessed with ivory, but here we are. He also had the city wall extended around this manor. Our home and grounds used to be outside of Aria's boundary."

Kai shook his head in awe. "That must have cost... a lot. And for Lord Canmore to even let him start such a project..."

"He likes me a lot," Harper said. "I'm not quite sure what he finds in me, but at least it's paying off. Of course, my father also had to pay a fortune for the wall—our grounds stretch on for miles. Anyways," she said, gesturing to a young man stationed against a nearby wall, "you must be tired; he will show you to your room and fix you a warm bath and clean clothes."

"Thank you," Kai said as the servant escorted him up the stairs to his room.

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Kai had never slept in a bed so large—or one so comfortable. His room's size was proportional with the rest of the manor—massive. A tiled entrance led towards the suite's carpeted sitting room, where blood-red chairs and a small wooden table lay around a billowing fireplace. To the left of the fireplace, an ivory colored door led to a dining room, which housed a beautiful mahogany table and seats so soft they must have been made of silk. A four poster bed took up a large corner of the room to the other side of the fireplace, draped in silken curtains and covered in velvet pillows and thick blankets. Everything smelled of cinnamon, strangely.

This sort of wealth...He had never imagined himself sleeping in a place like this, even if it wasn't permanent.

And the servants—he still had to get used to the servants. They were always ready to do whatever he pleased, no matter the hour of day. Not that he did ask them to do much of anything—he didn't feel comfortable ordering people around, regardless of their pay. The servant Harper had sent to escort him to his room the night before, however, had insisted on preparing Kai a warm bath, and he had been too tired to refuse.