Above the bookstore, Lucy's apartment stretches the full length of the building, long and warm and gently worn by the easy rhythms of her life in Vermont. Morning light pools through lace curtains on both sides of the room, casting gold across the old floorboards and giving the whole space a soft, familiar glow. The air holds the scents of coffee, toast, and old paper, a comfort she never fully appreciated until the world began to widen around her.
The layout is simple. The kitchenette sits near the front windows with its mismatched mugs and modest counter space. A small table waits nearby for the quiet breakfasts she loves. Farther in, a single bed rests against the left wall, a nightstand and lamp offering a steady circle of light at day's end. On the right wall a comfortable couch faces the room, a quilt draped over the back and Sam often curled in the corner as if guarding his kingdom.
Books fill their places without cluttering the room, a modest shelf on the right and stacks here and there where her attention set them. At the far end the apartment narrows slightly into her computer nook, a desk holding her laptop, her dual Linux machines, and the gaming tower that earned more hours than she ever admitted. The glow from its quiet lights mixes with the spill of sunlight and the warmth of the lamp beside the couch.
The space is peaceful in a way she once took for granted. It carries the echoes of her foster parents, the books they gave her, the mornings she spent thinking with her toast and coffee, and the life she built before she ever knew the word Pendragon. It is the first home she claimed for herself, a small sanctuary of thought and comfort before the larger world began calling her onward.