Chapter 158: Magic Costs Money [bonus]
Regulus followed behind without forcing small talk.
He'd met Agnes once during last year's property inspection. A brief visit: surveying the herb garden's scale from a distance, listening to the manager's report on yields and gnome infestations. They'd barely exchanged words.
But Agnes clearly remembered him. Her manner was warm without being servile, the kind of calibrated familiarity that came from decades of service to a single family.
The main house was a two-story stone building, its walls swallowed by ivy that covered most of the windows.
Agnes pushed the door open. The entryway was cluttered with clay pots of every size, some holding cuttings in the early stages of rooting, others sitting empty, drainage holes still caked with damp soil.
"Upstairs is clean. Downstairs is a mess. Don't mind it." She was already climbing the stairs.
The top-floor room was small, but the windows had been placed with care.
The east-facing one looked out toward a distant coastline.
Below the south window, the greenhouse complex spread out, glass rooftops stretching in unbroken rows.