Pale Door

The house was supposed to be mine—a crumbling estate filled with family heirlooms and faded secrets. I inherited it like an afterthought, a dusty old obligation wrapped up in creaking floorboards and ivy-choked walls. Simple, right? Except "simple" doesn't explain why the air in the garden feels like it's watching me. Or why a man—one with midnight eyes and the kind of presence that makes shadows quiver—has decided to appear out of nowhere, spewing riddles about thresholds and doors best left shut. Doors, I might add, that I've already flung wide open. Go me. But it's not just him—Dorian, as he calls himself. It's the whispers in the walls, the feeling that time has slipped sideways, and the way every answer I uncover only makes the questions darker. I didn't come here to play hero. I came to box up dusty memories and leave. So why do I feel like this house, this place, has been waiting for me? Why do I see her—a woman with my face, locked in portraits, journals, and mirrors that don't reflect me back? I should leave. I want to leave. But the truth is, I can't. Something is waking up in this house, something ancient and hungry, and I've already walked too far into the darkness to turn back. All I wanted was to settle an inheritance. What I got instead was a mystery buried in shadows and a man who says I'm part of the key to stopping it. Of course, he also says I might not survive what comes next. So… cheers to that.