The silence had a sound of its own.
A low hum, like a breath held too long.
The vampire sat still as stone, the first book closed gently before him. Dust hovered in the lamp's dim halo, undisturbed. Outside, the morning remained quiet—too quiet for a village that had seen two unnatural deaths.
He shifted slightly and reached behind him.
Another book—thinner, bound in cracked green leather, sealed with a brass clasp that bore a rusted insignia: a circle pierced by three descending daggers.
His fingers hovered over it.
"Even the damned feared this one…" he whispered.
Click.
The clasp opened with a sharp snap, the sound far too loud for the small room.
He opened the book slowly, carefully, like it might bite.
The air shifted.
"This text is not for mortal eyes," he read aloud in a dialect older than the first. His tongue struggled with the syllables, like they resisted being spoken.
"Thren'al devor keth… Halrun mir'za—ka thal..."
The words rolled from his lips like smoke—slow, heavy, unnatural.
The page beneath his hand warmed.
He ignored it.
"In the year when blood no longer claims its kin,
And graves weep open in defiance,
The gate shall hum,
The air shall still,
And the Binder shall fall."
His mouth froze mid-breath.
His eyes widened.
Binder.
Before the thought could form fully, it hit him.
A sharp pressure—tight, invisible—slammed into his chest like an iron clasp. He gasped. The book slid from his fingers.
His arms failed him.
The floor rushed up.
Thud.
He collapsed sideways, books spilling from the shelf beside him. Ancient pages scattered across the floor like feathers. His breath hitched violently in his throat.
He clawed at the floorboards.
No use.
Something was pressing down on him—choking not just his lungs but his will.
He tried to rise.
Couldn't.
His fangs clenched. His eyes flicked wildly to the book still open in front of him.
A line of black ink—no, not ink, it was moving—began to stretch across the page, curling upward like smoke taking shape.
"Show yourself," he rasped, voice brittle.
No answer.
Only silence, and a slow, creeping cold that slipped under his skin like rot.
Whatever force had marked those villagers… it had now noticed him.
And it was testing his strength.
The book hissed.
Then all went still.
His fingers twitched first.
A numb tremble, like frost melting off stone.
Then his breath returned—but wrong. Thin, ragged, like inhaling through broken glass."
He lay there, spine crooked, the cold still latching onto his chest like unseen claws.
"This… wasn't a spell," he thought, vision blurring at the edges. "This was something else. Older… hungrier."
The pages around him rustled.
Not from the wind.
From inside the book.
He forced his eyes open.
The moving ink had vanished. Only the text remained, dull and lifeless. But something about the room had shifted—like the walls leaned in closer, listening.
A whisper crawled through the silence.
Not a sound. A feeling.
"Words, without voice, pressed into his mind—slow, warm, invasive. Like blood soaking linen under skin."
"You called... We answered."
He clenched his jaw.
"Get out," he growled low, teeth baring. His voice cracked with effort.
No response.
Just the subtle pressure easing. Not disappearing, only… retreating.
He pushed his palm against the floor, muscles groaning as if he'd aged a century. One leg at a time, he gathered himself upright—then sat cross-legged once more, chest rising in shallow, wary rhythm.
The books around him lay open and scattered, ink smudged, some pages darkened as if burnt.
"His hands stayed still.
Some books shouldn't be touched twice."
Instead, he turned inward.
Eyes closed, breath held. He searched the ancient tether within himself—the root of what he was, what the centuries had made of him.
His pulse slowed. Not that he needed it, but the discipline had always helped.
A word circled in his head.
"Binder."
He had read that word before. Once. Long ago.
In a temple buried beneath the old blood fields, carved into stone with no author. A warning, not a name.
"When the Binder falls, the gate stirs."
He opened his eyes again, sweat glistening at his brow.
A single realization echoed through him like a bell toll:
"Something ancient is waking. And I just knocked on its door."
He leaned forward slowly and shut the book.
Clack.
He rose to his feet—unsteady, but whole. Pale fingers smoothed back his hair. Calm returned to his face, but beneath that stillness, a thousand thoughts screamed.
"I need to prepare… and I need to know what exactly I invited into this world."
He glanced once more at the book.
Then, without a word, he lit a match and tossed it into the fireplace. The flames flared, dancing hungrily in the dim room.
But he did not burn the book.
Not yet.
The fire still danced behind him when he stepped outside.
The morning was too quiet.
No birdsong. No bark of the stray dogs that used to race along the hills at this hour. Just the sound of dirt under his boots and wind that didn't feel natural anymore. It carried weight now. Secrets.
He kept his hood low, blending among the early risers of the village as they moved about their simple routines—carrying baskets, fetching water, sweeping dusty thresholds.
But he felt it.
That wrongness under their skin.
A child stared too long into an empty well.
A woman walked in circles before remembering where her door was.
A boy, laughing, suddenly stopped and shivered with no wind at all.
Something was fraying.
And no one knew.
Except him.
He passed the blacksmith's hut and paused. Inside, the apprentice—Matteo—was polishing blades. But the hammering rhythm was off. Sharp… erratic.
The vampire stepped in.
"Morning," he said.
Matteo looked up, startled. Then grinned faintly. "Didn't hear you, sir."
He rarely spoke to anyone unless it was needed. But now, he watched the boy carefully.
"Rough night?" the vampire asked, casual.
Matteo hesitated. "I think so. It's… fuzzy."
"You think so?"
The apprentice scratched his head, eyes drifting. "I dunno. I feel like… I dreamt something. Sort of Loud. Like a scream. But not… out loud. It was just… there."
The vampire's gaze sharpened.
"What kind of scream?" he asked, softer now.
Matteo shook his head. "It's gone. I thought it was the wind."
"No. It wasn't," the vampire murmured.
He left the smithy quietly.
"So it's not just me…"
The presence wasn't just hiding. It was testing—weaving itself into dreams, infecting thought, planting roots where no one noticed.
He walked to the edge of the village. To the old stone well. The one sealed after a child fell in five years ago. Nobody used it now.
But he knelt beside it. Placed his hand on the mossy rim.
Cold.
Not from water.
From the thing beneath.
He whispered the words again from the book.
"Binder… when the Binder falls, the gate stirs…"
He stared into the dark opening.
It stared back.