Run: 2026-02-20-01KHY8N0BJ6HRY9QE5TGAPBCYA

The old Victorian mansion loomed under a moonless sky, its peeling paint whispering secrets to the wind. A single candle flickered weakly on the grand piano, casting long, dancing shadows across the marble floor. Detective Mara Voss adjusted her coat as she stepped inside, her boots crunching on frost-covered stone. The air smelled of damp wood and something metallic, like blood left too long in the rain. A half-empty glass sat on the side table, its rim still glistening with a dark, viscous liquid. The butler’s stiff posture suggested he’d seen far too much, his knuckles whitening around a silver tray. Mara’s gloved fingers brushed a loose page from a book, revealing a name scrawled in frantic handwriting. Outside, the distant wail of a police siren cut through the silence, like a knife through still air. The front door creaked shut behind her, sealing her into a house where someone had died. Her pulse quickened as she noticed the time—midnight, when the dead often speak their loudest. The only sound now was her own breath, ragged and uneven, in the suffocating, silent hall. A single black feather lay on the floor, as if plucked from a bird never meant to fly. Mara knelt slowly, her mind racing ahead like a train hurtling toward an unseen crash. The feather’s delicate curve seemed to mock her, as if daring her to look closer at the truth. Her flashlight beam trembled as she swept it over the floorboards, revealing cracks hiding darker secrets. The house itself seemed to exhale, its walls breathing in the tension now thick enough to cut with a knife. A faint whisper slithered through the air, just beyond the edge of her hearing, just beyond her reach. Mara’s fingers tightened around her revolver, its weight a grim reminder of the violence waiting inside. The candle guttered out, plunging her into darkness—except for the faintest glow from a distant, unseen source. She could feel eyes upon her, watching, judging, as if the house itself had turned against her. The air grew colder, her breath curling in front of her like a ghostly warning from the dead. Mara took a step forward, her boots sinking slightly into something soft beneath the floorboards. The scent of roses—fresh and artificial—suddenly filled her nose, cloying and suffocating like a lie. A floorboard groaned beneath her weight, and she froze, listening for the sound of footsteps retreating. The silence that followed was worse than any scream, a hollow void where answers should have been. Mara’s hand hovered over her revolver, her finger curling around the trigger with deliberate, deadly intent. The mansion’s grand staircase yawned before her, its steps leading down into a darkness older than the house itself. She knew, with a certainty that chilled her to the bone, that the killer was still here—waiting.