FANGS OF FLESH AND SINS

The taste of copper was the first thing that hit him. It coated his tongue, thick and metallic. Then came the pain. It was a living thing, a white-hot iron brand searing through his chest and clawing up his spine. Clifford tried to breathe, but his lungs felt filled with wet cement. He opened his eyes. Darkness. Not the gentle dark of a closed room, but the absolute, suffocating blackness of the deep earth. The air was cold, reeking of sulfur, rot, and ancient, stagnant blood. The Catacombs. The memories hit him like a physical blow. The Blood Moon hanging heavy and red in the sky. The smell of ozone and betrayal. The sight of his father’s head rolling across the obsidian floor of the Crimson Keep. The Usurper’s cold, smiling face as he drove a silver blade through Clifford’s chest. They had executed his family. They had wiped out the Crimson Dynasty, the most powerful vampire syndicate in Nocturne. And they had thrown the heir into the gutter to rot with the rats. Clifford groaned, forcing his battered body to move. He pushed against the slick stone floor, his fingers digging into the grime. His tailored suit—once a mark of his status—was in tatters, soaked in his own drying blood. He reached for the well of power inside him. The ancient blood magic that had flowed through his veins since birth. He reached for the Sanguine Sovereignty. Nothing. Where his magic should have been, there was only a cold, dead void. A sealed lock. The Usurper hadn’t just tried to kill him; he had severed his connection to his own bloodline. A low, wet snarl echoed from the shadows to his left. Clifford froze. His instincts, honed by years of mafia politics and bloodshed, screamed at him. He wasn't alone. He squinted into the dark. Two glowing, sickly-yellow eyes stared back at him. As the creature stepped closer, the faint bioluminescence of the toxic sludge on the tunnel floor illuminated it. It was a Ghoul. A bottom-feeder of the Catacombs. The thing was vaguely humanoid, its skin gray and mottled, its jaw unhinged to reveal rows of jagged, rotting teeth. It smelled him. It smelled the blood. The Ghoul lunged. Clifford rolled, the jagged claws slicing through the stone where his head had just been. Adrenaline flooded his system, overriding the agony in his chest. He couldn't use magic. He didn't have a weapon. He was weak, starving, and half-dead. But he was still a prince of the Crimson Dynasty. As the Ghoul lunged again, Clifford grabbed it by the throat. The creature was strong, snapping its teeth inches from Clifford’s face, its breath like a toxic waste dump. Clifford gritted his teeth, his muscles screaming, holding the monster back. He was going to die down here. Alone, in the dark, like a dog. No. The rage didn't build. It detonated. A raw, primal fury, born of a stolen throne and a slaughtered family, surged through Clifford’s veins. It hit the cold, dead seal inside him like a sledgehammer. Crack. The Ghoul froze. It let out a high-pitched, gurgling squeal. Its sickly yellow eyes went wide with terror. Clifford felt it. The blood flowing inside the Ghoul’s veins. It was thin, toxic, and foul, but it was there. And it was his to command. The forbidden magic of Sanguine Sovereignty ignited. Clifford didn't just push the creature away. He reached into its chest with his mind and grabbed the blood in its heart. He squeezed. The Ghoul’s chest cavity caved inward with a sickening crunch. Black, tar-like blood erupted from its mouth, nose, and eyes. It convulsed violently, its bones snapping under the pressure of its own boiling blood, before collapsing into a dead, crumpled heap at Clifford’s feet. Clifford gasped, his vision swimming. The magic faded, leaving him hollowed out and shaking. He had done it. The seal wasn't broken, but he had cracked it. The monster was dead. He looked down at the corpse. The hunger hit him, sharper than any blade. He hadn't fed in days. He was a vampire, and he was starving. With a grim, animalistic determination, Clifford knelt. He didn't care about the filth or the toxicity. He needed to survive. He sank his fangs into the Ghoul's neck and drank deep. It was disgusting. It tasted like rot and poison, but the blood gave him strength. It flowed into his system, jumpstarting his heart, knitting the torn flesh of his chest, and chasing away the cold. He drank until the corpse was dry, then he stood up. He wiped the black blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. He looked up, past the ceiling of the Catacombs, toward the distant, floating spires of Nocturne. The city above was vast, glittering with enchanted lights and dripping with wealth and corruption. It belonged to the syndicates now. It belonged to the Usurper. Clifford flexed his fists. The seal on his magic was still there, a heavy lock around his heart, but it was cracked now. And he could feel the hunger for more. More power. More blood. He was the last Crimson Heir. They had tried to erase him, to bury him in the dark. They had wanted dead silence. Clifford smiled, a cold, cruel expression that didn't reach his eyes. He turned his back on the shadows of the Catacombs and began to walk toward the surface. The silence was over. He was going to give them a bloodbath.