The city didn't sleep.
It just blinked—slow, mechanical, and disinterested—while the rest of us moved through its shadows.
I stepped through the wrought-iron gate of Morrow's End, coat drawn close, boots echoing softly along the gravel path. The garden behind me rustled in the night breeze, its blossoms half-closed like the eyes of dreaming ghosts. The trees leaned in behind the fence, tall and dark and protective.
I locked the gate with a whispered phrase and a flick of my fingers. The latch sealed with a sigh of ancient metal. Nothing flashy. Just enough to keep the curious out—and the dead in.
The mortuary stood silent behind me. Watching.
My destination was the old quarter—where the streets cracked and the alley lights never worked. Where magic bled a little closer to the surface, and you could still buy powdered curses in backrooms that smelled of sulfur and citrus. Most people didn't come here unless they were looking for something.
I wasn't looking.
I was confirming.
The cloak I wore tonight was warded in three layers. Glamoured to shift my face at angles. Subtle, not full disguise—I wasn't hiding, I was observing. Most wouldn't recognize me unless they looked too closely. And the ones who did?
Well.
They tended not to speak first.
It didn't take long.
Two vampires. New bloods—young, twitchy, too skinny for the tailored coats they wore. They slipped out of a side door near an abandoned art gallery. Their eyes scanned the street, and their posture said we're not hunting, which was a lie. I could feel it. Hunger clung to their shoulders like smoke.
I followed them with the ease of a shadow.
Past the broken bakery, past the cracked mural of the Fire Saints, past a trash bin with old ward glyphs still barely visible on its rim.
They didn't hear me.
Didn't sense me.
Amateurs.
I let them wander toward the canal district—too close to human foot traffic, too close to the boundary I'd clearly set with Kaustherion's court.
And then I let them see me.
Just a flicker.
A flash of red lining. A silhouette reflected in puddled rainwater.
They stopped.
Stiffened.
The smaller one turned first.
"You following us?" he asked. He tried for bravado. Failed.
I tilted my head. "Not anymore."
The taller one narrowed his eyes. "You're not supposed to be in this quarter."
"I could say the same for you," I said, stepping into the dull halo of the lamplight. "Especially given what's been showing up on my tables lately."
They didn't answer.
But their posture changed. Coiled.
I smiled. Just enough to make them uncomfortable.
"Relax. I'm not here to scold you. I just have a few questions."
"You a Hunter?" the first one asked, sniffing the air. "Smell like spell ash and formaldehyde."
"Close." I extended a gloved hand. "Veylen Graveblood."
Nothing.
Then the shorter one blinked. "…Graveblood?"
The taller vampire paled further—impressive, really.
"The Blood Keeper?" he whispered.
The silence that followed was lovely.
"I prefer Veylen," I said. "But yes. That one sticks."
They shifted. One step back. Then another.
"I thought you— I mean, you don't come out here," the shorter one said, nervous now. "You run… the—"
"The blood economy?" I offered. "Yes. I regulate it. You drain responsibly, you feed from sources I've approved, you stay out of the alleys."
"We didn't—"
"No?" I cut in, voice dropping an octave. "Then explain to me why I've had four corpses in the last week show up drier than your social skills."
They stared. No response.
"Didn't think so."
I stepped closer. Not fast—just deliberate. The kind of pace a storm might use.
"You two feed from packs. Bought. Regulated. Signed off by my hand. That's the deal Kaustherion made. Break it—"
I paused. Let the weight settle.
"—and you're not just disrespecting me. You're poking holes in the dam holding back a war your kind can't win."
The smaller one swallowed. "Wasn't us," he whispered. "Swear it. We buy from the Red Sigil House on 6th. Check the logbooks."
I studied him. No tremor in the voice. No twitch in the eye.
He was scared. But not lying.
Not these two, then.
Which meant someone else was bleeding bodies in my district.
"And if you find out who it was?" the taller one asked, carefully. "What'll you do?"
I looked at him for a long moment. Then smiled—genuine this time.
"Depends how apologetic they are."
As I turned and walked away, I felt their eyes on my back. Heard one whisper under his breath:
"He shouldn't be out here…"
But I was.
And now?
I was watching.
I didn't return to the mortuary.
Not yet.
The night was still warm, the moon a thin slit above the buildings like a watching eye—and I had the kind of itch that didn't ease with incense or whiskey. It curled low in the spine, under the ribs, behind the eyes. The kind of itch you only got when something unnatural was lying to you.
The vampires had been too nervous. Not enough to be guilty, but enough to be afraid. That told me they'd heard something. Seen something. And they didn't want to be the ones to say it aloud.
So I kept walking.
The old quarter bled into the Weaver's Loop, where the stone gave way to rust and the magic got… tangled. This part of the city had too many ley lines underfoot—fractured, crooked things that made spells go sideways and shadows bend where they shouldn't.
Here, magical creatures moved differently. With less elegance. Less pride.
The fae who ran the perfume den on Crescent Street gave me a nod as I passed—respectful, curious, a little wary. I didn't stop. I didn't want perfume. I wanted whispers.
I dipped into the alley behind the old healer's market. There was a crawlspace there—a tight stairway built of brick and rot that led to a place below street level. You didn't find it unless you were meant to. Or unless you'd bled here once before.
The door at the base of the stair had no handle, just a thin slit carved in the shape of a serpent biting its own tail. I pressed my thumb against the mouth of the serpent and let it bite.
My blood hissed. The door opened.
Inside, it was dark. Always was.
The space below the street was less a room and more a hollow carved from time. Low ceilings. Old candles burning with violet flame. Shelves stacked with bone charms, forgotten names, and spells in paper folded like lilies. The air smelled of rust and wax and the last breath of things that hadn't spoken in centuries.
A demon lounged behind the counter. Thin, androgynous, long-limbed and silver-eyed. Their skin shimmered with traces of inked sigils that shifted like slow fire. They looked up when I entered and smirked.
"Well," they purred. "If it isn't the Blood Keeper himself. Come to ruin someone's night?"
"Eventually," I said. "For now, just shopping."
They arched a brow. "Shopping for what? Ghosts? Gossip? A little soul sugar?"
"Something red," I replied, stepping closer. "Something old. Something taken without permission."
The demon folded their hands, bracelets clinking softly. "Ah. So it's started."
I stopped. "You've heard."
"Whispers only," they said, tone shifting. "But you know how this city breathes. A few bodies found dry. A few familiars refusing to walk down certain alleys. Someone's been feeding without taste or tact."
"No signatures?"
"No scent. No imprint. Just…" Their voice trailed off. "Absence."
That was worse. A bad spell leaves echoes. Even a hungry vamp leaves a trace. But absence? That meant someone was feeding in a way that bypassed the usual channels—or someone who knew how to erase themselves afterward.
"Anything else?"
They hesitated.
Then: "A name. I don't know if it's real. Might just be rumor."
"Let me guess. Pretty woman. White eyes."
They blinked slowly. "So you've seen her."
"Seen her work," I said. "Not her face."
They licked their lower lip. "Then I suggest you don't wait too long to change that."
I left without buying anything.
The air outside hit colder. The ley lines buzzed against the soles of my boots like angry wires.
I slipped into the curve of an alley near the waterway, let the shadows wrap around me, and waited.
Ten minutes passed. Then twenty.
That's when I saw them.
A lone vampire—older than the others. Calm. Deliberate. Dressed in an olive coat with copper buttons and a blade hilt peeking from his side. He moved with discipline. Precision. This one was either a scout, or a message.
I followed.
The vampire in the olive coat moved like a whisper through the alley's curve, head low, steps precise. Not a drunk. Not a drifter.
This one had intention.
I kept my distance, boots barely brushing the cobblestones. My breath came slow, even, drawn through my nose. The glamour still held; my features bent at angles, too indistinct to stick; but if he had any trace of real Sight, he'd feel the weight behind me.
I needed to see where he went.
Who he met.
What his hands touched.
But the city had other plans.
The hair on my neck lifted a half second before I heard the sound.
It wasn't footsteps.
It was absence.
A drop in sound... like the alley had forgotten how to echo.
I pivoted fast, hand already hovering near the charm beneath my coat, and found myself face to face with a figure blocking the alley mouth.
She was tall. Hooded. Her cloak hung in a strange, too-perfect stillness. No visible weapon, no discernible magic. Just a sense of something held very tightly beneath the surface.
"You're far from your garden," she said softly.
I tilted my head. "So are the rats. You don't see me setting traps."
She didn't smile. Her face was pale and clean, like an unfinished painting. Eyes too dark to read.
I didn't reach for a weapon. That was part of the dance.
"Do you want something," I asked, "or are you just here to decorate the alley?"
"I'm here," she said, "because you're walking toward something you may not wish to find."
Now that almost made me laugh.
"Do people usually find things they wish to find?" I asked. "I must be doing magic wrong."
She took a single step forward. Not threatening—just enough to blur the distance.
"You have enemies, Veylen Graveblood."
"And you're what? The welcome committee?"
Another step.
My fingers flexed once inside my coat sleeve, brushing the sigil pin stitched into the lining.
"Turn around," she said. "Tonight, you're meant to be elsewhere."
I narrowed my eyes.
And then...
Her hand flicked. Barely a movement. But the wall to my left rippled. Stone gave way to something slick and wrong, and from the crack slithered a shape—not large, not monstrous, just… off.
A creature made of bone fragments, hair, and red thread. No eyes. It didn't crawl so much as flow—a forgotten child's nightmare stitched together in haste.
"Really?" I said flatly. "You brought me a puppet?"
The hooded woman said nothing.
The creature hissed and leapt.
I moved quickly.
Not panicked. Not loud. Just a side step and a whisper:
"Bleed."
The charm I brushed snapped and flared, and the cobblestone beneath the creature pulsed with red. A burst of pressure sent it scattering into ash, thread, and one very confused thigh bone.
I turned back. The woman was gone.
No trace. No signature. No scent.
But my quarry—the vampire in the olive coat—was gone too.
Damn it.
I exhaled through my teeth and stepped back toward the alley's edge.
The city was quiet again. But not naturally. Not peacefully.
This had been a delay.
A soft hand across the face while someone else stole the blade from the table.
I looked down at the remnants of the creature. A bone, a thread, and the faint smell of cheap perfume.
It hadn't been sent to kill me.
Just to keep me still.
I crouched low, ran two fingers through the ash, and tasted it at the tip of my tongue. Bitter. Salted with regret.
Not fae. Not witch. Not vampire.
Constructed.
I stood again, more irritated than unnerved.
Someone was watching me.
Someone wanted me blind.
That meant I was close.
And close?
Was good.