[center][color=98FB98][h2]Lord Alexander Northam[/h2][/color][/center]
[hr][hr]

At the sudden appearance of Lena, Lord Northam took a tact step out of the way of her sweeping presence. It was always a frightening thing to see with her despite his station he always had felt like he was in her way. Perhaps it was a holdover from his youth when she had been a spinster that the family had hired on to fill out the kitchen staff. All of the sudden the kitchen was feeling rather full. Watching as she poured at the ‘witches brew’ he shot a look at Mary to see her reaction. Lena was many things but tactful was really not one of them. At Least for now the kitchen seemed to hold the same protection it had in his youth. Perhaps that had something to do with Lena’s presence here. It was largely her realm after all. 

With another sweeping move she left the kitchen on a mission to the gardens. It was nice to see that some things never truly changed. A slight grin curled the corner of his mouth as he watched the sweep of her skirts vanish out of the kitchen. 

The banging out the outer door heralded the approach of another and as he turned he started again. It was his Lady wife. Still without any proper english tea he held in the exasperated sigh. It was clear that it was morning in Manor North as she immediately lit into him. He was about to tune her out as being obnoxious and childish as she started in about breakfast and then accused him of leaving some papers in her room. As he drew breath to inform her that there was no reason he would have had to leave such a thing in her room he heard something about his piano being out of tune. 

[color=98FB98]“I don’t play Pi….”[/color]

He trailed off as he stared at her for a long moment. The feeling was back again. It was really starting to irk him that since he had returned it seemed like the thing happened atleast four times a day if not more. 

[color=98FB98]“What Piano-”[/color]

The inquisition was cut short by the appearance of of Walter. The lanky, tall, slightly dapper, and perpetually dour english butler looked down at him from behind is spectacles. It was a rather impressive feat as Lord Northam was not short. It was just that Walter was tall. The man was the product of a welsh and Scottish family, no one was really sure how old the butler was. In all honesty Alexander wasn’t even really sure if he had aged since his childhood. The same lines were on his face and the same frame moved with assurity as it had some decades prior. 

[color=98FB98]“Good morning Walter.”[/color]

The man sniffed gently.

“Good morning m’Lord. If you had rang I would have brought you the tea ma’self.” the brogue was only slightly detectable in his words. Years serving a proper english household had smoothed out the speech patterns. He realized that Walter was asking for an explanation without asking for an explanation as questioning the head of the household was a preposterous thing to do. Alexander silently scrambled for an reason that did not involved being afraid of ghosts and would explain why he was not enjoying what should have been his honeymoon.

[color=98FB98]“aahhh...I was…”[/color] he paused before looking up at Walter who seemed to loom at little closer at the beginning of the sentence. [color=98FB98]“...just going to bring my wife a spot of tea this morning in bed and I thought that perhaps I could retrieve it myself. As there was no one readily here I thought maybe I could…”[/color] he trailed off as he was about to suggest that he was going to circumvent the household staff. For him it was of no consequence as he had been making his own tea for years now but thing were different in this strange microcosm that was Manor North.

[color=98FB98]“You- You know Walter you appeared just in the nick of time I was going to go looking for someone to handle the preparations. Unfortunately the tea in the bedroom will not be happening though as Lady Cora appears to be an equally early riser.”[/color] This seemed to satisfy the old butler who began the process of preparing the tea. Taking up a spot next to one of the engaged ovens Lord Northam watched the butler work and as more kitchen staff came in he watched as the house’s ancient heart began to beat again. Like it was pushing thick sludge through its veins.

Turning to look at his wife he shot her a serious look that seemed to say: We’ll talk later. 



[@GhostMami][@Morwenna][@AtomicNut]