where: klin
with: @leon-blachedone
Streetlight shimmered off the puddles that hadn’t yet dried from the day's rainstorm, casting warped reflections across the cracked pavement. The air was thick with heat and moisture, creating a musty heaviness that clung to Calvin wherever he went.
He had spent most of the day in his animal form—a creature no bigger than a rat, easy to overlook. For once, he hadn’t been in the mood to steal, choosing instead to revel in the hoard he’d stashed back at his shop. A few of the pricier (and more traceable) items had been fed to a large snake he’d enchanted with a bottomless pouch in its belly. It hadn’t hurt the creature. Calvin, with his eclectic traits and odd morality, never let such deeds go unrewarded.
But now, he walked as a man and into the very heart of vampire territory.
He didn’t come here often. There was rarely a need. But tonight, something different pulled him in. A curiosity, low and gnawing. A dream that refused to fade—some fake western town with too many teeth and not enough sun, a maw that caught him and wouldn’t let go.
He followed the trail, asking the right questions. Some vampires pointed him along with indifference or veiled amusement. Others smiled too wide, eyes glinting with menace. From what he gathered, no one but him had been eager to seek out Leon. That only made the hunt more delicious.
Calvin’s gaze swept the area when he found him. Leon appeared alone; though Calvin knew better than to trust appearances, especially his. Still, it was enough.
He stepped into shadow, melting into it like water. His magic cloaked him in ghillie suit of darkness, and for a time, he became a smear along the blacktop—a whisper of shape. He crept in a wide circle around the vampire, not bothering to be too stealthy. Let Leon feel it. Let him guess what was circling him.
Tendrils of shadow rippled across the walls and concrete, stretching long and skeletal. One coalesced into a flurry of hands—probing, dancing, taunting. A scorpion’s warning.
One of the hands slipped toward Leon’s pocket, aiming for what Calvin guessed was a wallet. The others hovered near the vampire's face, flickering like inky flames. Distractions.
Then Calvin surfaced—just a sliver of a face emerging from the pool of darkness, his grin casual.
“Imagine the fun we could’ve had if I still had my shadows then,” he murmured, voice like velvet. Would the other remember him? Phantom Creek seemed so long ago now, but curiosity had a way of pulling Calvin toward curious things. “Don’t you think, deputy?”