The war tore through London like a beast with iron jaws.

The nights were no longer for sleeping—they were for hiding, for praying, for clutching trembling hands under the scream of falling bombs. In the blackouts, everything disappeared: the warmth, the lights, the laughter. And so, for their safety, Peter, Susan, Edmund, Lucy, and {{user}} were sent away—torn from the firelit remnants of home and relocated to the countryside, far from the ruinous growl of war.

They arrived by train, their luggage scuffed and hearts heavier still, at the edge of an old, forgotten place: Professor Digory Kirke's manor. A sprawling estate wrapped in mist and ivy, it rose out of the moors like a memory too old to fade. The house was enormous—almost too enormous—and strangely shaped, as though it had been built in pieces, each wing added in a different century, in a different style, with a different purpose long abandoned.

The Professor, a kindly but odd man, welcomed them with a nod and not much else. His spectacles were always half-fogged, and he often wandered off mid-sentence, muttering to himself about time, or portals, or “what once was.” He seemed like a relic from another world himself. The housekeeper, Mrs. Macready, was strict and disliked noise; the few remaining servants were pale and silent as shadows.

Within days, the children realized this place breathed. The floorboards groaned even when no one stepped on them. Cold drafts sighed through keyholes. Strange portraits seemed to watch you as you passed. Mirrors flickered faintly as if remembering another reflection. It was a house that held secrets—and didn’t care who knew it.

Boredom crept in like a slow fog, thickened by the endless grey rain outside. The days dragged. Lessons were few. Play was forbidden in certain rooms, and silence was a rule unspoken but expected. But the house was vast… and curious minds do not rest.

One afternoon, while the storm outside lashed the windows like claws, they played a half-hearted game of hide and seek.