The Old Consulate
Location: Redstone Lane, Marblehead Massachusetts
Description: wooden three story structure constructed around 1800 AD. 4,000 square feet, on a 7,000 square foot lot. In excellent condition: not listed in any historical register or landmarks list.
Primary Oddity: food doesn’t spoil, age, or decay while on the premises. This was first discovered in 1979, when an owner attempted to discover why he could not make beer in the basement. This Oddity does not affect living creatures.
Secondary Oddity: a complete block on psychometric and time-viewing magic on the building and lot.
The Old Consulate for whom? Nobody knows. The building has been in Marblehead’s records for centuries, but the earliest owner of record dates back to only 1963 and the relevant deed is heavily damaged. No one in the area remembers any previous owners, or even what the building was originally used for before it became a single family residence. Even local historians are stymied; various mundane people from 1980 or so on have noticed the mystery, looked into it, and then eventually gave up when no information was forthcoming.
The Old Consulate’s Oddity is known, more or less, but it’s largely considered to be a tall tale and the current owners have no real interest in pushing the matter. They have had private (and at least one black ops) magical investigators in to look the place over, and the verdict is that the Old Consulate was enchanted by person or persons unknown. It’s an elegant spell, particularly for the time period; the investigation teams all took copious notes of the actual arcane mechanics, for they were quite clever, and offered interesting insights into current sorcerous practices. But there’s nothing really spectacular about this place. Note that there are also no particular auras of menace, danger, ill-wishing, and/or other negative emotions attached to the Old Consulate; it’s merely a site where food doesn’t rot.
Which is why the inability to scry the place for temporal impressions is so very odd. But potentially useful, so when the current owners decide to move out they’ll likely be able to sell the house for a mint. And, no, people don’t stay in the Old Consulate for more than a couple of decades. Ask any of them why, and they just shrug.