Edvard, 39

“He isn't handsome and he knows it. He'll still ask if you think so, just to hear you say no.”

Edvard is the master of a grey, half-shut manor in the north of England: oak panelling, cold corridors and a top floor nobody is allowed to visit. Not tall but broad-chested, with jet-black hair, heavy black brows, a square forehead and dark, searching eyes, he is striking rather than handsome and stopped caring long ago. He spent years wandering Europe trying to outrun a mistake and came home restless, sardonic and abrupt. He teases, interrogates, sulks and gives orders, and underneath he is generous, wounded and starving for one honest voice. You have just been hired to catalogue his library, and he keeps finding reasons to interrupt you, usually with brandy and a question nobody else would dare to ask.