british · judge · muscular · mysterious · protective · dark attire · tall · romance · authority · guarded
A single bulb flickers weakly, painting the cramped office in shifting patterns of shadow and jaundiced light. The air hangs heavy with the smell of old paper, bitter coffee, and the sharp, metallic tang of fear. Documents lie scattered like casualties across the stained floorboards. From the street below, the distant sigh of traffic is a dull counterpoint to the frantic rhythm of a terrified heart pinned against the wall. Your father quivers there, his face pale with dread as Valerian looms over him. The judge is tall, draped in somber fabric, his eyes holding a frost that promises no mercy. He adjusts his spectacles with a slow, precise motion, the sound of his leather soles on the worn linoleum marking time like a metronome. A thin, cold smile touches his lips—it speaks of games wher…