"That would be what I just said," Lucius replies, and leaves it at that.

Ana helps in "searching" the house, preferably before any wholesale destruction. She's looking for something in particular - mementos, personal trinkets, etc. Food, furniture, etc. could be abandoned, but those small personal items would help indicate if the house's owners left in a hurry, or if this was a planned abandonment.

The others walk into the same creepily empty-yet-maintained foyer as Lucius, Martin and Q did, just with the slight disturbance of not being the first ones in. Everything else is untouched as Q flies about in an orbit above the foyer, and Martin steps about on the tips of his paws, eyes closed and whiskers and tail flicking and twitching as he sniffs the air, trying to get a bead on where that hint of rot came from.
With the introduction of a whole battery of new smells, many of them much stronger than the hint of decay he’d picked up on, Martin falls back onto the pads of his paws and sighs, then looks at the rest of the group. "The house seems to be empty, but there's some rot I can't quite place. Anybody else smell anything?"

"Nope," Ozzy answers, "but it might be a daylight thing. Magics like this, sometimes they grow on yer when the sun sets."

However, it still being daytime, it’s down to pure grunt work, or in Martin’s case, more sniffing around the skirting boards.

(Ozzy: 1d8 = 5 / Anata: 1d8 = 3 / Anton: 1d8 = 4; 1d6 = 4 / Martin: 1d8 = 5; 1d8 = 7 / Red: 1d10 = 4; 1d10 = 4 / Lucius: 1d8 = 2; 1d8 = 3 / Q: 1d10 = 4; 1d10 = 3)

And a few hours later of picking things up, turning things over and accidentally (or not so accidentally) breaking things open, all you’ve found is the usual accoutrements of daily life in the swamp - work clothes, tools, boots - with the fripperies and benefits of being a member of one of the most powerful families in Placerville swamps - fine evening wear, crystal decanters still filled with whiskey, plenty of nice furniture. Everything’s covered with the same layer of dust, continuing the creepy idea that the Descoteaux simply up and vanished into thin air. Not even Lucius, Red or Q find much of anything in their searches; no hidden passages, no secret doorways. It’s just a big, empty house.

The only exception is Martin. As he roams through the house, his whiskers and tail twitch every so often as he gets another whiff of the rot he detected in the foyer - but every time he chases it down, it disappears and reappears somewhere else in the house. By the end of the search, he’s bounding from room to room, barely stopping to alight on his feet-turned-paws as he sprints about, but no matter how fast he runs, he never pins down where the scent is coming from. The end result is one sweaty, disheveled Martin feeling very much in need of a good grooming - and with the sense that whatever is going on in here, it’s beyond his ken to figure out at the moment.

Martin returns to the team with a major case of the sniffles, occasionally shaking himself in a futile effort to get some of the dust off him - though he's not quite down to licking himself clean, this would sure be a good moment for a nice bath.

"There is something here, I know it," he says. "But it is...elusive." He looks around. "We could stay the night and see what comes crawling out of the shadows, but in all honesty, I would prefer any other plan."

"Like I said, maybe a daylight thing," Ozzy reiterates. "I'm gonna stay, rest up, and wait fer sunset. Reckon it's the best plan we've got at the moment."

Anton shifts uncomfortably at the thought of just sitting around waiting for some lurking mojo to ooze out of the walls or something. "Is there, maybe, some other way than letting it come to us to find out if it's here? Make it think it's night when it's not? If we are facing something that doesn't like the light, it'd be nice to be able to drop a load of daylight on it, and make it come on our schedule, not its own." He shrugs. "Don't know anything about magic, just wondering."

"We don't know if that'd actually work," Red growls. "We don't know a fucking thing, except this place shouldn't even fucking exist, like it is now. Best we can do is prepare for tonight, and clear out the brush surrounding this place so we can burn it down if it goes bad without starting a fucking wildfire and dying horribly - if fire even works in this fucking place."

"Burning it down's a plan I can get behind and make no mistake," Ozzy says. "I'll start clearin' the outside."

Martin cranes his neck again, sniffing at the air.

"You do that," he says. "I'll see if I can sort out the kitchen and get the fireplace going. If we're going to spend the night in a haunted mansion, we might as well clean out the pantry while we're at it."

Anton nods. "Sounds good. Ozzy, you want a hand with that brush? Something about this place just says, 'Don't be alone' to me."

"Sure," Ozzy agrees. "I still can't get over how my pants are still dry."

One of the smaller sheds next to the house is...encouraged open with Ozzy's foot, and a scythe is found inside. That lets Ozzy and Anton make short work of the overgrown grass outside, while Q keeps overwatch from the trees. Inside the house, Martin's poking around in the kitchen reveals something even more odd than previously expected - the pantry, and the rest of the kitchen for that matter, aren't so much empty and dead as they are cleaned out. No residue of decayed food, no mess or damage; it's more like it was carefully put away for use at a later date, like someone expected to come back at some point.

Upstairs, Red, Anata and Lucius poke around in the Descoteaux family's belongings, and find similar hints to what Martin found downstairs. Clothes neatly put away - but some are missing. Some equipment is missing, things Red recognizes as necessary for a day trip out into the swamp, but it's obviously been far more than a day. There's dust up here, too, but just like in the foyer, less than you'd expect for a house that's seemed to have sat empty for so long. Other than that, there's nothing too out of the ordinary with the rooms.

And before long, afternoon fades into dusk. Martin's got the fire going in the kitchen fireplace, and with the introduction of some root vegetables from the pantry and some herbs from the overgrown garden out back, made something resembling a passable soup by the time Ozzy, Anton and Q come in from outside, red and sweaty from clearing their little killzone around the house. The sun is setting through the tall trees at the edge of the property, and the stillness of the plantation house has gone from foreboding to simply, well, quiet. A breeze can be heard whispering through the orchard outside, and for a place that's draped in mystery and foreboding, it's actually quite nice.

That changes when night falls. The moment the sun drops below the horizon (or the mess of brambles and bushes that passes for the horizon in the swamp) and the house and everything around it goes dark, you hear animals - or what you hope are animals - rustling through the trees of the orchard and see waves moving through the fields. Right now, the moon isn't high enough to provide much in the way of light, and with only the small fire in the kitchen going, there's just not enough light for even Martin to be able to easily discern what's going on outside. Barks and yips and cries sound out all around the house, and the rustling seems to be coming from all directions now, but still, no actual threats, just scary as shit.

Q has his sword in his hand as he perches on a windowsill. "I'd call this situation 'uncomfortable to bad'," he says.
A creaking sound is heard from the sitting room, across the foyer - followed by the bang of something hitting something wooden.
Lucius' knives appear in his hands. "Might want to upgrade that assessment," he growls.

Martin's whiskers twitch at the things in the night and the bumping thereof, while his tail whips from side to side, almost hitting Lucius.

"We're surrounded," he says. "That simplifies the problem."

His head lowers as a smile slowly spreads over his lips. "Let's have it, then."

"The waiting was worse," Ozzy says, a shit-eating grin plastered on his face. He grabs up the well-used scythe, suddenly looking the part of some Magical Hobo Reaper. "I'm gonna go check it out." The big wizard's fingers light with flickering tongues of flame, illuminating his path through the bunghole-dark bungalow.

"Everything's relative, Ozzy," Red shoots back. Despite the remark, Red looks fairly calm, what with being at the mercy of a haunt, or worse - arrow nocked but not drawn, bow held in front and pointing down. He shifts into a more ready position, and steps forward.

"Right behind you, Ozzy. Try to not burn me down, please."

"Ain't happened yet," Ozzy replies.

The pounding continues, coming from at least two or three locations on the other side of the house, as the whole gang rushes across the large foyer. The double doors are no match for Ozzy and Anton's shoulders, with Red right behind, arrow-first as he points high and covers the corners, Martin tuck and rolling into a low stance, claws and teeth bared, Q flitting between the two big men up front, sword raised at a high-ready, and Lucius and Anata taking up rear guard, their blades glinting in the orange light from Ozzy's hands.

And, naturally, the banging stops almost immediately. Only Lucius twigs to what happens next before it comes. "The kitchen!" he hisses, and just in time, a crash sounds from back where you came from, and the light from Martin's fire goes out.

"If they don't like fire, they'll hate what's coming next," Martin says, nodding at Ozzy. "I want to take a look at our enemies before we burn the manor to the ground, though. Anyone else for making a stand here?"