Eos appeared inside a small room.
He had anticipated that the being at the top of the Tower would not announce itself with scale, that it would, as all the truly terrible things did, the ones who had graduated beyond theater, meet him in something domestic.
It was perhaps a reflection of the body that he chose to wear as he entered this tower, and he knew that this room was the Painter's reply to this.
However, he could see that this room was not a study or an office; it could be seen as a butcher's back office.
Why would he call it this? Well, it was small, practical, and it was tiled in something dark and smooth that sloped very slightly toward a drain in the corner.
The tiles had been scrubbed, but not recently enough. There were hooks in one of the walls, iron, clean. There was a low counter against another wall with the scarred, deep-grooved surface of a working block.
Many beings had been butchered and taken apart here, most likely the forty-three before him.
