The man she buried is back and knocking…

She opened the door, heart still numb from sleep and silk-draped memory, and there stood her.

Not him.

Not the man who had swept her into his arms three weeks ago—tall, carved from storm clouds and bone, with

eyes like old grief and the voice of a secret. He’d called himself Lucian. And for three nights, he made her feel

wanted, needed—fed her loneliness like it was sacred. Then he was gone and Calla, buried that memory of him

for her.

And she stood there now.

The same eyes. The same pull. But the body had shifted—gorgeous and bare beneath the porch light, soaked in

midnight rain, lips painted red with something between promise and threat.

“Maeve?” Calla asked, voice cracking like a forgotten hymn.

The woman smiled. “You said I could come back.”

Then—

A blur.

An arm shot forward, seizing the naked woman by the throat. Her spine snapped back over the railing, graceful

as a breaking willow.

“Back off, you sick bastard!” a gruff voice barked from the shadows. A man—grey hair, scarred hands—dragged

the body down the porch steps.

Calla screamed. “What the hell are you doing?! That’s—she’s—”

“She’s it,” the man growled. “Not she. Not he. Not anything real. That’s the thing that seduced my wife. And now

it’s playing you.”

Calla stumbled, heat rising behind her eyes.

“What are you talking about?”

The man yanked open a duffel. Silver glinted. Wood. Runes. Salt.

“I’m Will. I’ve hunted that fucker for thirty years. It was a trans woman when it drained my wife. Called itself

Lucille then. Before that? Hector. Raphael. Serah. It changes skin like snakes change scales—but the eyes? Always

the same.”

Calla backed away, knuckles white against the doorframe.

It was Lucian. It was Maeve. It had loved her. Or something like love.

And now it stirred on the gravel.No breath. No blood. No pain. It simply stood, hair dark with rain, body shifting—hips narrowing, chest flatten-

ing, jaw sharpening.

The vampire smiled. “So dramatic, Will. You never age well.”

“Neither do corpses,” Will snapped.

The vampire turned to Calla. “You’re still beautiful.” The voice had changed again—neither male nor female, but

something in between. Fluid. Eternal. “I missed you.”

Calla shook her head. “You lied to me.”

“I was Lucian. I am Maeve. I was what you needed both times.”

“Don’t listen,” Will hissed. “It reflects your wounds. It mimics love. And when you’re raw enough—ripe

enough—it feeds.”

The vampire raised a delicate brow. “She was lonely. Abandoned. Starved for affection. I offered her touch.

Breath. Fire. Can your gods condemn love that transcends gender, body, name?”

“You bit me,” Calla whispered.

“Third night,” Will muttered. “Always the third.”

Calla staggered. Her hip still throbbed from where Maeve had left her mark—gentle at first, then aching, bloom-

ing. The spiral had appeared two days ago. A birthmark of something else.

“I should’ve killed it the first time,” Will said, stepping forward with the blade.

“You tried,” the vampire purred. “You always fail.”

It moved. A blur of beauty and horror. Will slashed—but it danced through time, behind him, then in front.

Smiling. Shifting. A flicker of breasts, then none. Then both.

“Pick a side, demon,” Will spat.

“Why limit the divine?”

The vampire’s voice soothed into Calla’s skin, vibrating through marrow. “You felt it, didn’t you? In Lucian’s arms.

In Maeve’s mouth. In the dark, when you gave in. You felt seen.”

Calla wanted to scream again. Or kiss it. Or kill it.

“What do you want from me?” she choked.

“To finish what we began,” it said, gently. “One more night. One more breath. You’ll wake up changed. Loved.

Free.”

“You’ll wake up dead,” Will cut in. “If you even wake at all.”“Calla,” the vampire said, stepping closer, shifting again—now soft and glowing like moonlit temptation. “You

don’t belong in the world they made. You belong in me.”

The hunger was building inside her. She tasted metal on her tongue. Her fingertips throbbed. The bite mark

pulsed with heat.

“You feel it, don’t you?” it whispered. “The opening. The becoming.”

Will lunged. The vampire dodged, but not in time. The silver blade cut deep into its side. It gasped—not pain, but

pleasure.

Calla’s hands were trembling. Her mind split between fear and ache.

She stepped between them.

Will froze. “Get out of the way!”

She didn’t.

“I don’t want to be human anymore,” she whispered. “I want to be whole.”

The vampire grinned—blood on its teeth, beauty in its bones.

“I didn’t choose you,” Calla said, turning slowly. “I chose this.”

Her fingers reached into the air—into it.

Into them.

Will’s scream was lost to the wind as the vampire and Calla dissolved into the rain—two shadows in one form,

leaving nothing but footprints and the echo of a heartbeat learning to love again.