It was almost with vague surprise that he found himself stopped at the foot of a small, isolated manor house. It was his own, having come with the land. He had only visited it once before when doing a tour of his lands and the dwelling places of his serfs and tenants, but he had never gone inside. It was in rather poor state. A half wood, half stone construction, the brickwork was moss-ridden and pockmarked, as if someone had taken a large chisel to it and idly chipped away in random places to pass the time. The wood was ancient and weak-looking; most of the windows were shuttered. The chimneys, of which there were many, were stained in the manner of houses that had once been the home of many a burning hearth, but whose time had more than a century been in the passing.