The Victorian house stood at the end of a quiet, overgrown path, its blackened windows staring out like hollow eyes. Ivy curled around its wrought-iron balcony, and the porch sagged under years of decay. Inside, dust clung to velvet drapes, and the air smelled of aged wood and something faintly sweet, like rotting flowers. The grandfather clock in the foyer had stopped ticking, its hands frozen at midnight. Somewhere deeper in the house, a chair rocked gently, though no one was there to move it.