His head was in turmoil. Pain and regret etched onto the lines on a face that had seen too much. That had done too much.

Staggering, almost falling into the lonely house that had stood abandoned over many centuries. This house had long seen or heard the steps and breathing of human life but here, amplified in both of those actions, came the man. Tears streamed his mud-encrusted cheeks, produced from red, burning eyes that could not close for sleep despite the yearning.

Yet the house seemed at one with him. It called him. One broken body entering a broken house, both of their souls long since removed for reasons best unspoken. Whilst the man had led a tortuous life, the house had witnessed events of untold horror. The walls appeared to whisper the atrocities which resonated so hard, that spoke his language and empowered him. And so it began.