Eldhollow was a city cloaked in mist and mystery. It's cobbled street winding like forgotten secrets through age stone buildings with black- iron balconies and ivy- covered walls. Nestled along the jagged cliffs where the sea met land with unrelenting ferocity, Eldhollow had always been haunted by whispers of things both ancient and unnatural.
Tonight, the city groaned under the weight of a sea- born storm.
Rain lashed on the rooftop like lashes on bare skin, and the wind screamed through alleyways with voices that didn't sound quite human. The sky churned violently, as though stirred by something more than weather- something old, sacred, and watching. The storm had come in fast, and with it, the sense of something awakening.
It was said, in hushed legends, that such storms arrived only when a royal- blooded mermaid turned one year older and resided within the city's boundary. The sea knew it's children. It mourned and warned.
Far from the crumbling theatre district and toward the quieter edge of the Rosebury Lands, a man stood beneath the archway of a crumbling mausoleum, his silhouette outlined in the flickers of lightning.
Lord Julian Ravenshade was beautiful in the most unsettling way- aristocratic cheekbones, eyes the color of obsidian glass, hair tousled like a storm himself. Tall, perfectly dressed, and completely still, except from the blood dripping from his gloved hand.
At his feet lay the twisted body of a trader- jaw shattered, neck snapped in a single movement.
He had dared sell him the blood of a siren.
Sirens were not mermaids.
Sirens, twisted and wild, possessed a diluted strain of power- deceptive song but no healing light. Their blood was corrosive to most pureblood vampires. Mermaids, however- true mermaids- carried blood as potent as moonlight, healing. Strengthening. Royal mermaids were the rarest of all and their blood granted temporary immortality.
Lord Ravenshade hated fraud.
"Dispose of him," he said calmly, turning his back as if the man were no more than a sack of grain.
Behind him, a figure in long grey coat approached, dragging the body with a quiet obedience. Tomas, his butler- a half vampire, mute, cruel by nature- nodded once and vanished into the northern graves with the corpse in tow.
Lord Ravenshade remained still.
He recalled the day before, still irritated. The case had been simple: locate a mermaid hidden among the middle- class brothels. But instead, that imbecile- Dorian Hale- a pureblood desperate to impress- led the crew to a siren chained beneath a stone cellar, black blood stains on it's scales, baring it's ugly fangs at them, and grinning like a child with a bone."A female is a female," Dorian had said smugly.
Julian's eyes had glowed faintly then. "Then I suppose if you lose your tongue, any voice will do?"
No one had laughed.
They all retreated from the scene slowly, allowing the fool to clean up his mess.
Now, as the storm screamed above, Julian's gift stirred.
His vision, enhanced by bloodline and rage, stretched beyond the graveyard's boundaries, soaring over rooftops, streets, and gas- lamps…
… and found someone.
A slip of a girl, soaked in rain, clutching her cloak tightly as she hurried along the road leading from the backdoor of the cracked theater. Her dress was modest, worn at the hem. Her curls stuck to her face, and her skin shimmered faintly, like moonlight on water.
She's not from Eldhollow, he noted.
She paused beneath a lantern, glancing around as though lost, before taking off towards the park. Her route will take her near the graveyard gates.But it will take minutes to get to the graveyard.
Elowen.
Unaware of eyes watching from the shadows, she kept running, the storm flattening her skirts against her legs. Her little cottage was still a half- hour away in the outskirts between Greystone and the marshy fringe of Eldhollow.
She had joined a travelling circus carriage from Greydock earlier this morning, hoping for a small role in the local play. Instead, the theatre master had paid her nothing and told her to "try again next week, dove."
She was drenched, exhausted and furious.
Near the graveyard's gate, a carriage stood- dark, noble, heavy.
She spotted a figure beside the carriage, tall and still' watching the ground.
"Sir?" she called out through the storm, running closer.
Julian tilted his head without turning.
"I need a ride please" she said breathlessly. "To Greydock. Do you go that way?"
He didn't respond.
She stepped closer, peering through the rain. He looked like a driver by his stance, and the way he leaned against the carriage.
"I'II pay," she added, not really having much.
"A silver coin," he said lazily.
She hesitated. Her fingers clutched the lining of her coat. "I don't have that."
"I know," he said simply.
She frowned, tilting her head. "Then why ask?"
He smirked, just faintly. "Because it amuses me."
Her eyes narrowed- not in fear, but in irritation. "Is that what you do? Stand in the rain and charge prices you know people can't afford just to hear them say no?"
Julian blinked. That tone- sarcastic, dry, laced with defiance- had not been directed at him in decades.
Then, she turned, muttering something he didn't bother to catch and walked away in the storm.
For a moment, Julian did not move.
He observed her walking away in the rain, she would be utterly drenched before she gets to the local carriage park for it was miles away.
Tomas returned, his coat wet from the grave soil. He glanced once at Julian, then at the retreating figure of the girl as she disappeared into the rain.
"Do you need me to assist with anything?" Tomas asked.
"Never mind," Julian said, still staring at the retreating figure with a smirk.
But Tomas didn't miss it- that twitch of his master's lips.
It wasn't quite a smile.
But it was something.
He hadn't seen that in decades. He was also used to the cold, expressionless gestures.