Story 937: The House That Ate the Dead

The survivors hit the ground hard. Draven groaned, rolling onto his side, his fingers gripping dirt—no, not dirt. The ground was soft, pulsing beneath his hands, as if he were lying on something alive. A rancid, wet smell curled into his lungs, making his stomach twist.

Mira coughed, pushing herself up. “Where… are we?”

The darkness above them had vanished. In its place, a mansion loomed against the blood-red sky, its iron gates hanging open like a hungry mouth. The windows were black voids, and something moved behind them, shapes shifting just out of sight.

Elias dusted himself off, his revolver already drawn. “I’ve been to haunted bars, but this? This is a whole new level of bad.”

Zara pointed toward the gate, its iron bars slick with fresh blood. “We don’t have a choice, do we?”

Draven clenched his jaw. No. They didn’t.