The Path of No Return

"I'm not late, am I?" Mattheus smiled disarmingly. A bit nervously.

He stepped into the house, immediately recognizing the slight gaudiness of the decor and color choice from Marinell House. Either Baldroy Harloch had a hand in selecting some of the particular interior design choices at the Cambell estate or had taken after the same tastelessness from the late Earl Marcell.

Mattheus followed the other baron into the parlor, pausing a moment when he saw the large painting across from the fireplace. Just from the style of the painting and its contents, the twenty-year-old knew that this house Harloch had under a pseudonym was separate from his persona as a nobleman.

It was a depiction of bedraggled naked men pushing large boulders and getting crushed. A peculiarity was that all the men had black filling where their eyes would be, and there was a pattern of three intersecting circles half-hidden in the background, top-center.