No one spoke at first.The air around the door trembled faintly, as if sound itself were afraid to touch it.Five names, each written in a neat, deliberate script that shimmered faintly whenever the lantern light brushed it.
Evan lifted the lantern higher. "That's… that's us."
Noah nodded, pale. "And if it wrote them—then it knew we were coming."
The fog pressed close again, curling around their ankles, whispering in little gusts of cold breath. The portraits, still hovering in the dark above, had turned away; only the door seemed awake now.
Clara stepped forward. "Don't touch it," she said, though no one had moved. Her voice was flat, certain—like someone remembering a warning given long ago.
Something whispered back her name.
She froze.
The sound came from behind the door, soft as the drag of fingertips on paper. One by one, the others heard it too—the same sound, the same rhythm, but each voice shaped to their own name.
Clara.Evan.Noah.Marcy.
The last name—the fifth—remained unspoken, as if the house were saving its breath.
Evan swallowed hard. "It's—calling us. It wants us to open it."
Marcy shook her head violently. "No. No, we turn around, we find a way back. We can't—"
But the room shifted again, not violently this time, but slowly, almost kindly. The fog peeled away in ribbons. Behind them, where they'd fallen through, the floor had sealed shut—smooth stone, no seam, no ceiling. Only the door remained, waiting.
The lantern sputtered. Clara could smell the faint sweetness of oil burning too fast. "We're not going to find another way," she said. "It's only showing us forward."
Noah looked from the door to his own name, then back. "If it knows us," he said, voice trembling, "maybe it knows what we want."
The door answered him with light.
Soft at first, then stronger—threads of pale gold weaving through the cracks between its panels, outlining its frame. The light spilled onto the floor and shaped itself into something like memory.
A child's bicycle, rusted and half-forgotten.A photograph, still wet with tears.A pocket watch that hadn't ticked in twenty years.
The house was offering them pieces of their own lives.
Evan bent down, hand shaking, reaching toward the photograph. His face went still when he saw it clearly. "That— that's my father. The day before he left. How could it—?"
"It's not him," Clara said sharply. "It's what the house thinks he was."
But the picture changed as she spoke—his father's face turning toward Evan, smiling faintly, lips beginning to move. The whisper that came from the photo sounded far away and close all at once.
"Come home, son."
Evan staggered back, the photo fluttering to the floor like ash.
Marcy pressed her hands to her ears. "Stop it—please stop it—"
The fog answered her in kind voices, hundreds of her own pleas echoing back.
Noah stepped forward now, eyes wide, drawn to the pocket watch. He picked it up; the second hand started to move again, ticking in rhythm with the pulse beneath the stone. The sound filled the room, steady and calm, and for a moment his breathing matched it.
Clara reached for him, but something invisible held her back. The air between her fingers felt thick, like cold syrup. She fought it, but the harder she pushed, the more distant he became—stretching away without moving.
The door's light grew brighter. The names began to fade, one by one, as if being erased from memory.
Evan's vanished first.Then Noah's.Then Marcy's.
Clara's name alone remained, glowing brighter than all the rest.
She stood perfectly still, feeling the weight of the silence that followed.
"Why just mine?" she whispered.
The door creaked.
From within came a single sound—soft, deliberate, unmistakable.
Knock.
Once.Twice.A third time.
And on the fourth, the door unlatched itself.
The light poured outward, flooding the room in a brilliance that was neither warm nor cold. The others turned toward Clara, their faces expressionless, eyes catching the glow like mirrors.
"Clara," Evan said quietly, his voice hollow now. "It's waiting for you."
She could feel it too—the gentle pull, the promise, the gravity of it.
She took a step forward.
Behind her, the house sighed in contentment.