“The alcove was on the third floor of the East Wing, past the music rooms that nobody used after 4 PM and through a door that was supposed to be locked but hadn't been since 2018. It was a strange little pocket of space — a wide windowsill below a stained-glass window that someone had installed in the 1940s and then forgotten about. The window depicted a woman holding a book, which seemed on-brand for a university. The glass turned the afternoon light into patches of amber and blue and blood-red that moved across the floor like slow-motion fireworks.”