“I’m sure you have a lot of questions.” Valerie turned her gaze to the ground. “I promise I’ll answer all of them but-”

Valen pulled his twin sister into a hug before she could finish. He felt her heartbeat quicken behind her breasts before calming. She wrapped her arms around him, finding comfort in the long overdue embrace.

For a few countless seconds they stood there without saying a word. Only the sound of their heartbeats thumped in their ears, and the longer they held each other, the more insync their heartbeats became-the way they were always meant to be.

Twins. Bound from birth and separated by life, now reunited once more.

Valen was the first to break the silence with a whispered phrase he’d been saying to himself for the past fifteen years.

“I missed you.”

“Me too.” Valerie pulled herself away from their embrace and ran her slender fingers down his pale cheeks. “Gods, it’s such bullshit how prettier you are than me.”

Valen chuckled.

“Don’t say that.” He cupped her face in his hands, smiling with his white teeth in full view. “You’re much more beautiful.”

Valerie averted her gaze, but she was smiling this time.

“I bet you say that to all the girls.”

“None of them were you,” Valen replied. “Where have you been?”

“With some kind people who agreed to take me in.” Valerie grinned. “They taught me a few tricks too.”

“You mean like that mist thing?” Valen asked.

“I can do a lot of things now.” Valerie held up her right hand. “Watch this.”

Valen watched as Valerie’s black nails grew into long claws. He supposed it was slightly longer than a normal vampire’s, but it was pretty lame compared to the mist trick from earlier. But before he could politely compliment her, she snapped her hand into a fist that caused the claws to dig into her flesh.

“Valerie!” Valen cried before his sister raised a finger to silence him.

She slowly opened her hand to reveal four bleeding gouges in her pale white palm. To Valen’s surprise, the blood didn’t pour down from her hand. Instead, her blood trickled upward into the air in blatant defiance of gravity. The bloody streams swirled and twisted around each other before uniting into a single pillar of blood that crystallised into the shape of a fractal rose that looked as if it’d been chiselled from a single solid ruby.

“A rose for a fair maiden,” Valerie teased.

Silent with awe, Valen gingerly pinched the stem of the bloody crystalline rose and it snapped from her palm with a sound like breaking glass.

“What is this?” Valen asked.

“Blood solidified into a crystalline form through magic. It’s called blood gems.” She snapped her fingers and the rose in Valen’s hand melted back into blood that poured away between his fingers. But before it could splatter onto the cold white tiles below, it swerved up into the air and flowed back inside the wound on Valerie’s palm. “Neat, innit?”

“What kind of magic is this?” Valen asked.

He’d never heard of magic like this before, though to be fair he didn’t know much about magic in general. While he could sense its presence, without a mana pool to draw power from he couldn’t actually cast spells like Enid does.

Valerie grinned, her white teeth gleaming in the darkness.

“Bloodcraft.” The wound on Valerie’s palm healed up, good as new. “The ancient magic of our people.”

“Vampire magic?” Valen asked.

“Well, yes, but bloodcraft sounds cooler,” said Valerie. “It’s what allowed me to shapeshift into mist earlier, and it’s what’s going to get you out of here.”

“Who’s ‘we’?” Valen asked.

“The people who took me in,” said Valerie. “They’re finally allowing me to bring you to them. I’ve been begging them to let me for years, let me tell ya.”

“Why now?” Valen asked. “Why not when I turned eighteen or before I left for uni?”

“Well, they figured that you must need our help now considering the trouble you’re in.”

“How did you even know I was in custody?”

Valerie tilted her head in an incredulous look.

“You’re kidding, right?” She pulled out a red smartphone from her cape coat, tapped on it a few times, and handed it to him. “Check this shit out.”

Valen took her phone, pushing away the question of how the hell it and her clothes turned into mist during her entrance. It was probably better to not question how magic worked anyways.

The phone screen showed a chirper feed filled with #FreeValen and #PoliceBrutality.

Most of it was people demanding Valen’s release from police custody. Some even included text edited over a zoomed in photo of his bachelor class’s graduation.

“Not to sound ungrateful,” said Valen as he scrolled down the chirper feed, “but why does everyone care so much? Stuff like this happens to people better than me all the time around here.”

“Two reasons,” said Valerie. “One, you’re a good looking chap. You should see some of the thirst chirps for you. Two, check out number one on trending.”

Valen did so and found a video of a pretty drow in a wheelchair, her pale grey face fixed in a stern frown with piercing violet eyes that stared straight into the camera. Her chirper profile had the username ‘DarkDamsel’ and had just shy of twenty million followers-more than enough to qualify her as an ‘influencer’.

“Who’s the lass in the wheelchair?” he asked, curious but hesitant to play the video lest someone in the station heard it.

“Her real name’s Clara Chambers,” said Valerie. “She’s one of Dragon Rest’s top influencers. Definitely the biggest one from the Nocturnal District.”

“Chambers?”

“She’s the stepsister of the bloke you saved.” Valerie took her phone back from him and slid it back into her cape. “What was it, Clarence Chambers?”

“That’s the one,” said Valen. “He mentioned having a sister but I didn’t know it was someone this famous.”

“She’s grateful for you saving her brother,” said Valerie. “Gathered enough of a following that even my benefactors noticed.”

“And who exactly are these benefactors of yours?”

Valerie rubbed the back of her head.

“Sorry, but I can’t tell you that right now,” she insisted. “Just know that I can break you out. After that you can ask Bloodraven all the questions you want.”

“Bloodraven?” Valen asked. The wide-eyed look on his sister’s face told him that she’d just said something she didn’t intend to.

“Bloodraven’s our leader,” she admitted sheepishly. “They allowed me to come break you out.”

“Wait, your leader?” Valen grew suspicious. “What, did you join a cult or something?”

“It’s not a cult!” Valerie insisted, sounding a bit too defensive for his liking. “Look, just be grateful that they let me come here to save your arse, okay?”

“I don’t even know who they are.” Valen’s voice raised alongside his growing caution. “And you expect me to just trust them?”

“Why don’t you trust me then?!” Valerie shouted. “Isn’t my word enough? Or are you going to trust the bloody cops with your life more than your own flesh and blood? You know damn well they don’t give a shit about our kind!”

“You were gone for fourteen years!” Valen retorted and in doing so released a flood of resentment he didn’t realise he’d had bottled up. “Fourteen. Years! I don’t even blame you for going into hiding but you didn’t even say goodbye! Not even a text or a bloody email or anything! Vivian thought you were dead. We mourned you!”

That finally seemed to get to her. She winced at his words but refused to back down.

“I didn’t have much of a choice, okay?!” Valerie raised her voice to match his. “My new friends didn’t want me talking to people who could expose them!”

“What, they wanted you to trust them more than your own family?” said Valen. “That sounds like a bloody cult to me!”

“It’s not a bloody cult!”

Valen had almost forgotten that no matter how close they were, they were still siblings, and it was in the nature of siblings to fight with each other.

He was about to reply with something along the lines of ‘Yuh-uh it’s a cult!’ when the sound of a door creaking open caught both their ears.

“Oh, shit,” Valerie murmured under her breath.

“Quick!” Valen whisper-shouted. “Hide under the bed!”

“I’ll shapeshift!” said Valerie before her body disappeared in a puff of red smoke.

Standing in her place was a tiny black rat with blood red eyes which quickly scurried under the bed.

“Well that’s just weird,” Valen thought to himself.

He willed his hypersensitive hearing into existence and listened for a heartbeat.

Aside from his and Valerie, he heard only one heart beating in the basement under the police station. Which was odd, now that he thought about it. Considering the Nocturnal District’s reputation he would've expected a police station’s cells to be more full.

Footsteps echoed throughout the basement before stopping in front of Valen’s cell, the only occupied cell in the entire station.

Valen eased himself onto the bed, trying his best to not make it creak. His mind raced through scenarios of conversations he might need to have with an officer coming in to check on him. When he heard the door creak open, he looked at it while laid on his bed, pretending to just notice it.

His eyes widened when he recognised the face of Cyril peering into his cell. He felt a cold chill grip the back of his skull and he sat up on the bed, his guard immediately raised to high alert.

“Can I help you-”

A fleshy tentacle shot from Cyril’s outstretched hand, its sharp bony tip flying straight towards Valen’s face.

Valen just barely managed to roll out of the way in time, falling from the bed and hitting the cold tiled floor at the exact moment the monstrous appendage of twisted sinew and jutting bones impaled itself inside the springy mattress.

“Excellent reflexes,” said Cyril in a monotonous voice that sounded both man and beast yet possessed an otherworldly timbre alien to both. The flesh tentacle retracted from the mattress, sending an eruption of foam into the air on its way back to Cyril. The warped flesh knit itself back into the form of a human arm which Cyril allowed to fall at his side. “It’s almost a shame you have to die.”

“You’re working for the Primordial Church, aren’t you?” Valen scrambled onto his feet, resisting the urge to check on Valerie under his bed lest Cyril follow his gaze. “I knew the police were corrupt, but this is a new low.”

Anger flashed in Cyril’s eyes. He swung his arm at Valen and it transformed back into a sinuous tentacle that wrapped around his throat.

“Ack!” Valen clutched the fleshy tentacle strangling him in a fruitless attempt to pry it off.

“You don’t know me.” Cyril raised his tentacle arm and Valen felt his feet being lifted off the ground. “And I don’t know what you did to piss the Unborn One off, but you clearly deserve it. Every single member dreamt of your death. It’s my honour to make it a reality.”

Instinct kicked in to stave off panic. Valen threw his legs up and wrapped it around the tentacle. It would’ve been an great setup for an armbar, except he had no idea how the fuck armbaring a tentacle with no joints to speak of would even work.

Still, it couldn’t hurt to try.

Valen squeezed the tentacle between his thighs hoping to weaken it by cutting off its circulation. It worked, but only barely.

The tentacle’s grip around his neck loosened just enough for him to squeeze a few agonising breaths down his throat. Cyril staggered backwards with a pained look on his face. Magic tentacle arm or not, it must’ve still followed some laws of basic biology.

“Quit struggling, won’t you-”

A puff of red smoke enveloped the cell. Cyril fell into a coughing mid-sentence, his senses no doubt overwhelmed by the metallic stench that now permeated the air.

The tentacle’s grip around Valen’s neck loosened even further, allowing him to pry his fingers under its slimy trunk. He yanked it free from his throat and promptly fell on his arse against the ceramic tiles below.

Valen hurriedly jumped back to his feet ready for a fight but his sister beat him to it.

Valerie’s cloaked figure lunged out of the red smoke like a bat fluttering through a crimson cloud. Her fangs were already beared in a snarl that sounded somewhere between a hiss and a roar. In her hand was a long knife made from a shard of her own crystallised blood.

She plunged it deep into Cyril’s shoulder. Its crystalline edges tore through his flesh, but not cleanly. Muscles ripped apart wherever the sharp but jagged blade touched. When Valerie pulled the knife back out, a jet of blood containing scraps of frayed flesh spurted from the messy wound it made and splattered against the white walls like the first stroke of a demented painting.

The tentacle around Valen’s throat loosened completely before falling limp onto the floor, its strength sapped away by the damage to its shoulder. He fell onto his feet and immediately yanked the tentacle taught with one hand. The black nails on his other hand elongated into sharp claws which he brought down on the tentacle, severing it in two like an axe splitting a tight knot.

“Ack!” What was left of the sinuous tentacle retracted back into Cyril, turning back into half a humanoid arm amputated just below the elbow. He winced in pain and when his green eyes opened again, they were looking straight into Valerie’s angry reds. “Who the hell-”

Valen socked him in the face before he could finish.

The police had taken his bloody gloves away as evidence, so Valen was able to feel every little bit of Cyril’s face contorting to the shape of his fist as he rammed it into his cheek. After all the shit he’d been through with the police that night, punching a man with a badge clipped to his belt felt more satisfying than he would’ve liked to admit.

His knuckles crashed against Cyril’s jawbone through the thin layer of skin and flesh covering it.

The impact sent shockwaves through his head, causing his mushy brain to bounce around the walls of its own skull. Ideally he would be passed out on the ground from brain trauma but whatever power allowed him to shapeshift his own flesh must’ve also made it tougher than most.

Cyril staggered to the one side, stunning. He’d managed to remain on his feet but his jaw was almost certainly dislocated. It was a little difficult to tell through the blonde beard, but one side of his face suddenly looked larger than the other now that it had a dislocated jawbone forcing the skin and muscle to stretch out at an unnatural angle.

Valerie continued the assault and slashed her knife at his throat. Still disoriented from her sudden appearance, Cyril made the mistake of trying to duck instead of dodge. The crystal blade missed his neck but slashed open his face, carving a jagged frown into his flesh from one cheek to the other.

The long gash ripped away at what little flesh kept his dislocated jawbone attached to the rest of his skull.

Cyril’s low jaw nearly fell off his face along with most of his beard. The jawbone dangled from a single hinge in his skull that looked one good yank away from popping off completely. His tongue hung limply in the air without a functioning mouth to keep it hidden, a pathetic strip of useless muscle forced to taste the cold air that stunk of toilet water.

The sight reminded Valen of the flesh scorpion that’d invaded his home, the first mutated child of the Unborn God he ever saw and the one responsible for his first ever trip to the hospital. Images of its skinless face licking up the Unborn God’s blood flashed in his mind and sent shivers of fear and rage throughout his adrenaline-stricken body.

This time, he wouldn’t make the mistake of letting his guard down. He was going to keep on attacking until one of them stopped moving from either death or exhaustion.

Valen shot another punch straight into Cyril’s sternum. He heard a breath forcefully puff out from Cyril’s now permanently open mouth and proceeded to throw his right knee into his side to further damage his airless lungs.

Cyril’s left ribs splintered underneath the bruised muscles and punctured the lung they were meant to protect, their soft crack audible to Valen and his hypersensitive hearing.

Valerie must’ve heard it too because she took it as a cue to target his other lung. She twirled the blood knife between her fingers for no discernable reason but to show off before stabbing into the right side of Cyril’s chest.

The crystalline blade cracked a rib on its way in and skewered his other lung, destroying any chances for him to catch his breath in the most literal way possible.

Valen grabbed Cyril by the ear and pulled it into position for a punch, his black claws nearly tearing it clean off his head.

It barely added to the smell of blood already pervading the air, but feeling the warm blood trickle down his fingers still made Valen clench his fangs tight. It might smell exquisite, but he knew better than trying to drink it. For all he knew, drinking it could very well infect him with the Unborn God again, and he’s had enough of that parasitic prick whispering in his head to last a lifetime.

He slammed his fist into Cyril’s nose. The soft cartilage easily snapped in two upon impact, but just to make sure he punched the exact same spot a couple more times until blood started flowing from the nostrils. Then, he leaned back and pushed his foot for a front kick to the chest in case there was any air left inside.

Cyril stumbles out of the cramped cell and into the marginally more spacious hallway, breathless, on the verge of panic, and with a bloody crystal knife sticking out of his chest.

Valerie launched herself at him. She didn’t bother making another knife. Instead she slashed at him with her black nails, elongated into long hunting claws-the strongest of any predator on the planet.

They ripped through Cyril’s clothes and into his flesh. Blood seeped into the ragged remains of his torn shirt and stained his grey suit. He attempted to fight back, using his one remaining hand to throw a clumsy left hook at Valerie, who ducked and allowed his fist to swing harmlessly over her head.

Seeing another opening, Valen hooked both sets of claws around the back of Cyril’s knee and pulled them back to sever his hamstrings. There was the sound of snapping

A pained bestial scream roared from Cyril’s torn open mouth and he toppled to his knees.

Valen silenced him with a knee to the face that sent him crashing onto the ground entirely.

Remembering his resolve to not make the same mistake twice, Valen proceeded to start stomping on Cyril as he laid on the ground without any intent of stopping. Valerie joined in, her steel toed boot breaking bone with every kick.

At first Valen attempted to aim his attacks. A kick to the kidney here, a stomp to the liver there.

It only took a few seconds for his precise strikes to devolve into him wailing on the poor bastard not caring where he hit as long as it hit hard.

Valerie must’ve felt the same, because she started screaming in incoherent rage as she slammed her foot against Cyril’s body over and over again.

“FUCK! YOU!” she screamed at the top of her lungs to the beat of cracking bones. “FUCKING TENTACLE FREAK FUCKING TRYING KILL MY FUCKING BRO!”

Valen didn’t say anything, but he more than matched her enthusiasm with every ferocious stomp. After fourteen years apart, they each allowed themselves to vent their frustrations at each other’s long absence into a new bruise or broken bone for Cyril.

There really was no sibling bonding activity quite like beating the absolute dogshit out of a motherfucker who deserved it.

Valen only stopped when he felt Cyril’s flesh squirm under one of his stomps. It wasn’t the regular squirming of someone in pain or experiencing a seizure. Even through his shoe’s thick leather soles he could feel Cyril’s muscles shifting under his skin like a million wiggling worms just under the surface.

Alarm bells flared inside his head in the form of an intense chill at the back of his skull-a warning of danger sent straight from his subconscious mind. Maybe it was animal instinct. Or perhaps the warrior blood inside him of his enemy’s killing intent.

Whatever it was, it was telling him to stop attacking and defend himself fast.

“Get back!” Valen cried to his sister as he hopped backwards away from the man they’d been beating.

Valerie must’ve felt the same warning as he did, because she also leapt away at almost the exact same moment as him. It wasn’t a second too soon either.

“ENOUGH!” Cyril screamed, but it wasn’t his voice that emanated from its torn jaw.

Valen felt as though the word had bypassed his ears to shoot straight into his brain. A direct message from the Unborn God.

Valerie slso winced at the sound but Valen couldn’t tell if she was able to understand the words or not.

Sinuous tentacles shot into the air from Cyril’s black and squirmed against each other like a flower of flesh blooming into a thousand hungry snakes. Torn bits of his grey suit and white T-shirt exploded into confetti strips that floated in the air as if to announce the birth of a new monster.

The humanoid abomination that was once Detective Cyril Calnacan rose slowly to its feet, seemingly unburdened by the mass of tentacles sprouting from its back and from the bloody stump its right arm had been.

Although its head still looked like Cyril’s, his eyes had rolled into the back of his head with sclera turned bright crimson red from the blood filling them. It pulled out the crystalline blood knife in its chest and tossed it to the ground, where it disintegrated back into blood.

“YOU HAVE BECOME AN NUISANCE,” said the creature, every word an infectious disease invading Valen’s mind.

The creature’s eyes rolled back into place revealing pure white pupils and irises. They should’ve been the eyes of a blind man, yet Valen could still feel them peering into his soul as the monstrosity cradled his dangling jaw in one hand.

Cyril pushed his dislocated jawbone back into place with a loud, crackling pop. A long sigh escaped his newly fixed mouth, releasing a gust of hot steam into the cold air.

“Pray that Dianne takes you, children of the night,” said Cyril, back to speaking in his own voice. “For now you face a paladin of the Unborn God.”