Drownton Abbey II

io9 has a regular feature they call Concept Art Writing Prompts. They post a piece of art and invite readers to submit stories based upon the illustration. I've started writing short—very, very short—stories as a warm-up to my real writing. 

This is another one based on a piece by Andreas Franke.

Drownton Abbey 

Sir Thomas regarded his glass. True, the merlot tasted a bit off, but no matter how bored Victoria pretended to be, it turned out the extra salt really did add a certain insouciance to the quail's eggs.