Years Earlier…
Ebonhaven suffocated beneath its nightly shroud of mist... Everyone knew it was a curse, drawn to the city like a moth to flame. No one dared question it.
Named after its people and stained by their deeds, the city rose like jagged teeth towering spires cutting into a starless sky. Rain slithered down rusted pipes, pooling into the uneven, cracked pavement.
In the distance, dying neon signs flickered, their faded glow struggling against the fog. Ebonhaven looked like a dream once grasped and long since rotted… what remained was a husk.
Who could live in such a place? Who could bear the weight of its curse? Was it the city, or the people?
And yet, through it all, a lone figure drifted like a ghost.
His gray coat billowed behind him, his boots moved soundlessly through the puddles, slicing through his reflections.
Lucian Graves.
His senses were honed razor-sharp… every heartbeat, every breath, every whisper in the dark he noticed. Even the scent of fresh blood lingered… close. He didn't need to look, he already knew.
He exhaled slowly. Despite everything around, he was calm. Ebonhaven never slept, but they knew, when to relax.
He adjusted his coat, ignoring the dull ache in his ribs. Despite healed, the wound still ached… This reminder of a past he couldn't forget. He can't, he wasn't supposed to be alive. But here he was…
The alley ahead had a familiar scent?
Lucian stepped beneath a flickering streetlamp, rain trailing through his hair, turning it a darker shade. His fingers curled briefly, before his eyes drifted to the narrow passage ahead.
A group of men in black hovered over a smaller, trembling figure? His gaze flickered, his expression showed nothing. As he didn't need to get involved.
Not anymore…
This city's rotting from the inside… death, crime, lies. And the worst part? The real monsters here… they're not even human.
He had seen worse. Endured worse. And sympathy? That had been carved out of him long ago… if it ever existed at all.
"Evil is nothing but the echo of their own consequences, brought back through the lives of those who dare do evil. They brought it upon themselves, and I don't waste my time feeling for them… In this world, survival isn't about mercy, it's about accepting the cost of your choices. And they chose this." He whispered to himself.
As he passed a shallow puddle, a reflection caught his eye.
The "innocent" man lay motionless, blood flowering from a wound in his chest, red spilling into cracked pavement.
Lucian didn't flinch, worst had been done to him... Sympathy was a foreign language now…
He looked away… But why does it bother him?
Later…
Lucian's nose twitched beneath his mask… an unfamiliar scent crawling through the damp air. Intoxicating, nauseating, enough to make a normal man dizzy.
He stepped out from a forgotten alley, its entrance had crumbling stone and ivy creeping to it's rusted iron bars. Gargoyles flanked overhead, their cold stone eyes tracking his every move.
"Move it, you drunk bastard! You're pissing off the rest of the bar!"
His gaze snapped to a tall man shoving a stumbling figure out the door… a drunkard he'd seen night after night. Drowning his pain in bottles, trying… and failing to forget the darkness that devoured his family, only worsen it.
Lucian's eyes closed briefly. "How does he afford this much booze? Secret gold mine?"
He sighed, watching the man wobble, then he caught something strange at his feet.
Slender. Split at the tips.
Hooves. A deer person.
One of Ebonhaven's many non-human inhabitants. In a city of horrors, this was nothing new.
No wonder the grief weighed heavy on him. That kind of loss was normal for their kind.
Lucian exhaled and slipped past the pair toward the bar. The bouncer, a hulking figure himself, barely glanced up before stepping aside with a slight bow.
Without a word, Lucian descended some winding stairs to the back rooms.
He stopped before a cracked mirror. But it wasn't his reflection that met his eyes.
There was nothing but shifting shadows… a black, gray void, an invisible force pushing against him from the other side. Not him…not anymore. It made him feel desolate.
That part of me... I will never let it return.
Still, a flicker of doubt stirred. Why didn't it speak this time? It had before… warning, tempting, threatening. Even now, when his reflection vanished, it was never silent without reason.
Standing tall at 6'2", Lucian took off his coat, gloves, and mask, revealing a lean, scarred frame. Ashen skin, black damp hair, tousled from the rain. Sharp aristocratic features… high cheekbones, chiseled jaw, lips that rarely curved. But his eyes… hollow, dark. Empty.
He then wore fresh clothes… a simple white shirt, brown trousers held by suspenders. Running his fingers through his hair, he tucked strands over pointed ears… a small concealment, but enough to keep the questions at bay.
With a final glance at the mirror, Lucian left and stepped into the main bar.
The atmosphere shifted immediately.
The Defeated Star Bar was a haven for the strange and the damned. Masked figures drank in some corners. Humanoid creatures hovered in booths. Others blurred the line between the real and the supernatural. Conversations slithered between tables, heavy some even had threats and secret deals.
Occasionally, a loud voice rose… a drunk or just someone born loud.
The interior of the bar is covered, bad dim, flickering candlelight that casted long shadows across the dark, polished wooden floor. The ceilings are higharched, adorned with iron chandeliers filled off cobwebs.
Lucian moved behind the counter, his fingers brushed against the worn familiar wood.
Above the bar hung a cracked wooden sign:
"Defeated Star. Where Secrets Are Bottled, and Shadows Drink."
From across the room, Randall his boss gave him a nod. He was grizzled built like a man who'd been through a dozen wars… some of them physical, most of them psychological. Six feet tall, broad-shouldered, his beard was streaked with gray, matching the wear in his tired, dark eyes. A worn flat cap shadowed his brow. He wore a dark vest over a rolled-up linen shirt, suspenders holding up time-worn trousers.
He was one of the few in Ebonhaven who didn't fear at the darkness… he had survived by dealing with it head-on.
"Thud!"
A drunk slammed his fist on the counter, stumbling into Lucian's space.
"Gimme a Shadow!"
Lucian's cold gaze flicked to the man's trembling, callused hand. The kind of hand life had broken more than once. Still, he felt bitter to treat the ones serving them.
Respect used to mean something. Now it's just another thing people've forgotten.
Still, he mechanically, moved to make the drink. He poured a thick, black liquid into a curved glass. He spun it as it settled, a purple mist coiling across the surface like breath from a dying man.
The man grabbed it and downed it in one go. His face twisted instantly, contorting from the cold bitterness.
Lucian gazed followed, him staggered out the door.
He muttered beneath his breath, "He won't like what he sees tonight."
The Shadow was infamous in Ebonhaven. A drink that peeled back the veils. Ghosts. Spirits. Sigils. Hidden truths. Things best left unseen. It opened the eye behind the eye… but only those with a strong sense of self survived the revelation.
Minutes passed the bar relative quiet until the door burst open.
Everyone looked up.
A pack of werewolves entered… massive, broad, fur-covered beasts that looked like they could tear steel apart. Rowdy. Aggressive. The kind of pack that fed off fear.
Their leader, a hulking brute with shaggy gray fur and a jagged scar slicing across his snout, swaggered to the counter.
"Oi, bartender!" he barked. "Ghost's Kiss. Strongest you got."
Lucian didn't flinch. He casually polished a glass.
"Coin?"
The leader snarled, his lips curled back, as he tossed a handful of crumpled bills onto the counter.
Without a word, Lucian moved. He poured a pale, bone-white liquid into a skull-shaped glass… the Ghost's Kiss. Cold as death and just as merciless.
He had dealt with enough punks like these in his time. Know their type idiots drunk on their own strength, thinking the world bent for them.
The wolves grabbed their drinks, chugging and laughing. Their growling voices echoed through the bar.
"Dumb bastard thought they could outrun us! Should've seen their face!"
Lucian's ears twitched. Something about that tone…
"Hah! Just like the old days. He ran this place once."
The leader downed his drink in one gulp and slammed the glass on the counter.
"Ain't been the same since he disappeared."
Lucian froze mid-pour. His jaw clenched, heart kicking once in his chest.
"Back in the day," one of the wolves added, "no one even breathed wrong unless he allowed it."
Lucian's hand trembled slightly. He was skeptical at first, now he was sure, they talked about someone he thought was long gone.
"Damn right. Piss off the wrong person back then, and you didn't get a warning. You just… vanished."
The wolves roared in laughter, knocking back their drinks.
"You remember that guy from the east docks? Ran a smuggling ring. One day he's there. Next? Nothing. No body. No trace. Gone."
Lucian's frown deepened. Not from rhe care about the man, he remembered that story, he even knew one person that ran this city.
"Hah! That's how he worked. No mess. Just silence."
Lucian set the bottle down slowly. His eyes lifted… He stared past the wolf pack, something tightening behind his hollow gaze.
It can't be he's far gone... Or worse... someone's pretending he's back.
The pack leader took another swig, then slammed the glass down, grinning. "People still don't say his name, you know? Like he's still watching. Like he's still got eyes everywhere."
Lucian exchanged a look with Randall, who stopped mid-pour. The tension in the room thickened. He knew exactly who they were talking about… and judging by Lucian's stiff posture, so did he.
Lucian held back, resisting the urge to press the Pack Leader for more. He remained cautious. But before he could speak, the wolves caused trouble.
A drunken patron… a burly miner rat who'd been sitting nearby gave them the wrong look. Or maybe he just breathed too loudly. Either way, one of the wolves snapped.
"What the hell you looking at, plague carrier?"
"I-I wasn't looking at nothing," the rat stammered, his tail trembling.
"That so?" The pack leader grabbed the rat's collar, yanking him off his stool. "Then maybe you should keep your damn eyes to yourself."
The bar tensed, everyone glasses froze mid-air. Laughter stopped, even the music began to fade.
Lucian sighed and set down his wine glass, the liquid inside stilling.
"Put him down." he said calmly.
The pack leader turned, caught off-guard by Lucian's voice. His grin widened, eyes gleaming with a faint amber light. "And what if I don't?"
"Ch-ch!"
Suddenly, a sharp click of a shotgun racking split the silence like a guillotine's fall.
Randall, without hesitation, had pulled a sawed-off double-barrel from under the counter. "Then get the hell out," he growled. "Take your dogs and your trash with you… before I make you."
The pack hesitated, eyes flickered at the shotgun. Even werewolves didn't like staring down both barrels of a loaded twelve-gauge.
Also, Randall might've been human, but he wasn't just some barkeep. He'd seen more than enough trouble on this side of the city… and survived it.
The pack leader sneered, slowly letting go of the rat, who scrambled away into the corner.
"Tch. Fine."
He stepped in close to Lucian, close enough for the him to smell the Ghost's Kiss on his breath. "You better pray we don't find him alone, bartender," the leader whispered. "If he's still breathing... you won't be."
Lucian remained still. He met the leader gaze, his expression unreadable. But inside... resentment churned… for the man they mentioned.
The wolves laughed, sauntering toward the exit, their boots heavy on the floorboards. The pack leader was the last to go. He paused at the doorway, a shadow covered by moonlight.
"We'll be back."
Randall cocked his shotgun again. "And I'll be the last thing you see."
The door slammed behind them.
A tense silence lingered, the scent of sweat, cheap whiskey... and something darker hung in the air?
Lucian exhaled slowly. He felt... ambivalent.
I should have killed them right there, but that will bring more trouble than I need.
"…You good, man?" Randall asked, glancing over.
Lucian nodded, though his mind was miles away.
Damn it… if he's here, then everything's about to go to hell.
His fingers unconsciously drummed the counter as a few patrons filtered out, and others slowly returned to their drinks. The intimidation hadn't rattled him. He'd faced worse than werewolves.
However, they won't want to experience his fears...
This is a big world. Far bigger than most realized. And in his thirty-something years of life, Lucian had seen things no one should.
He'd encountered all kinds… arrogant fools, predators, tyrants. Across all species. Across all continents.
In the past, he would've dealt with them differently. Swiftly. Permanently.
But now? He let them walk.
Because something worse was always coming… And it was almost here.