Kiss of the Vampire
"The Girl With The Sharp Sword Part2"
Mission 14 : Kael
The shock wave hit like a wall of cold iron, flinging Elisia sideways. Her shoulder clipped a pillar, pain blooming hot and bright as she rolled with it, coming up in a crouch with her blade still in hand. Dust and candle wax rained down. The sigils on the floor screamed red, then guttered out.
Cassian—no, whatever was wearing Cassian—stood in the center of the room, untouched. The smile was still there, but it had sharpened into something predatory, the mask slipping just enough to show teeth that didn't quite fit the face.
Ben was already moving, shaking off the hit, blood at the corner of his mouth. Kliev roared and charged, hammer raised. Cymac's hands wove blue fire between his fingers, voice low and furious in old Tagalog.
But Elisia's eyes stayed locked on that face.
The voice in her head was silent now, as if it had pulled back to watch.
Cassian lifted one hand, almost lazy. The air rippled. Kliev flew backward, slamming into the far wall hard enough to crack stone. He slid down, groaning, hammer clattering away. Cymac's spell snapped mid-cast, the magic recoiling into his own chest—he staggered, coughing blood.
Ben didn't stop. He fired twice, center mass. The rounds punched into Cassian's chest, dark blood blooming across the white shirt. Cassian glanced down, annoyed more than hurt, and flicked his wrist. The bullets slid out of the wounds like they were being pushed by invisible fingers, dropping to the floor with wet plinks.
"Predictable," he said, voice layered now—Cassian's velvet underneath something colder, older. "All of you."
Elisia pushed to her feet. Her ribs screamed. Blood dripped from her lip, warm and copper on her tongue. The ache in her chest twisted violently, like the bond itself was trying to crawl back toward him.
She took one step. Then another.
Ben saw it, tried to intercept. "Lis, wait—"
Too late.
She was already inside his reach.
Cassian's hand snapped up, fingers closing around her throat—not crushing, just holding. Cold. Too cold. His thumb brushed the pulse hammering under her jaw, gentle, almost tender.
"You feel it fraying, don't you?" he murmured, eyes searching hers. "The last thread. Let me fix it. Let me finish what we started."
For one heartbeat, the room narrowed to just his face—wrong, borrowed, familiar in a way that made her want to scream. Memories that weren't hers tried to surface: a different voice saying her name, rougher, fond. A hand in her hair that didn't belong to this creature.
She drove the blade up under his ribs.
Not a killing blow. Not yet. Just deep enough to make him feel it.
Cassian's eyes widened, genuine surprise flickering across the stolen features. His grip loosened a fraction.
Elisia twisted the knife, felt the wet grind of steel on bone, and leaned in close.
"You're not him," she whispered, voice raw. "And you never will be."
She ripped the blade free and slammed her forehead into his nose. Cartilage crunched. He staggered back one step—just one—and that was enough.
Ben was there, shoulder-checking Cassian sideways. They crashed into the ornate chair in the center, wood splintering. Ben came up on top, fist driving down once, twice, precise and vicious. Cassian caught the third punch, twisted, and threw Ben across the room like he weighed nothing.
Elisia was already moving again.
She didn't think about the pain. Didn't think about the bond snapping loose inside her chest like a wire pulled too tight. She just moved.
Cassian turned toward her, blood on his teeth now, smile gone.
Good.
She feinted high, dropped low, swept his leg. He didn't fall—vampire balance—but it bought her half a second. She came up inside his guard, blade reversed, and buried it to the hilt just left of his sternum.
His hand clamped around her wrist, crushing. Bones ground together. She didn't let go.
They stood like that, locked, breathing hard.
"You can't kill what's already dead," he said quietly.
"Maybe not," she answered, voice shaking but steady. "But I can make you let go of the face you're wearing."
Something flickered across his expression—uncertainty, maybe even fear.
Behind them, Kliev was back on his feet. Cymac's hands glowed again, weaker but building.
Cassian glanced at them, then back at her. His grip tightened until she felt something in her wrist pop.
"You'll regret this," he said.
"No," she said. "I really won't."
She headbutted him again.
This time he let her go, stepping back, blood pouring from his nose and chest. The mask slipped further—his features blurred at the edges, like bad signal on an old TV. For a split second, she saw someone else underneath. Sharper jaw. Tired eyes. A face that made her chest cave in with grief she didn't understand.
Then it was gone. Cassian again. Smiling like nothing had happened.
The candles flared back to life, brighter than before. The sigils on the floor reignited, pulsing in rhythm with her heartbeat.
Cassian wiped blood from his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Round one to you, hunter," he said softly. "But I've been playing this game a lot longer."
He moved—not a blur this time, but something worse. Like the room folded around him. One moment in front of her. The next behind Ben.
Hand through Ben's chest.
Not piercing. Just resting there, fingers curled, like he was holding something fragile.
Ben froze, eyes wide.
Elisia's heart stopped.
"Let him go," she said. The words came out flat. Empty.
Cassian tilted his head.
"Make me."
The voice in her head finally spoke again, low and furious.
"Don't bargain. Don't hesitate. He's bluffing. He needs Ben alive as much as he needs you confused."
Elisia met Cassian's eyes.
Then she smiled.
Small. Tired. Real.
And lunged.
The shockwave's aftermath hung in the air like smoke from a fired gun, thick and choking. Elisia's lungs burned as she lunged, every muscle screaming from the earlier hits, but she didn't care. Ben was frozen there, Cassian's hand splayed across his chest like a claim staked in blood. She could see the fear flicker in Ben's eyes—not for himself, but for her, for the team, for whatever this mess was unraveling into.
She closed the distance in three ragged strides, blade whipping up in a tight arc aimed at Cassian's exposed side. He twisted, pulling his hand back from Ben just enough to dodge, but she clipped him anyway—a shallow gash across his ribs that tore through suit and skin. Dark blood welled up, soaking the fabric, and for the first time, he grunted in real pain, staggering half a step.
Ben broke free in that split second, gasping, and rolled away, coming up with his gun trained. "Lis—"
But she was already pressing the advantage, her boots scraping stone as she pivoted and drove a knee into Cassian's thigh. He buckled slightly, and she followed with an elbow to his jaw, the impact jarring up her arm like she'd hit concrete. He reeled, blood spraying from his split lip, and for a heartbeat, she thought they had him. Kliev was charging again, hammer swinging in a wide, brutal arc. Cymac's magic crackled back to life, threads of blue light weaving toward Cassian like nets.
Cassian snarled, low and animal, and lashed out blindly. His fist caught Kliev mid-swing, sending the big man flying into Cymac. They crashed together in a heap, the mage's spell fizzling out with a pop like breaking glass. Ben fired—once, twice—the rounds punching into Cassian's shoulder and thigh. He jerked with each hit, but didn't go down. Instead, he blurred forward, slamming Ben against the wall with enough force to crack ribs. Ben slid down, wheezing, but his eyes stayed fierce, locked on her. "Finish it..."
Elisia's heart twisted, rage and terror mixing into something hot and unstoppable. She tackled Cassian from behind, wrapping her arms around his neck in a chokehold, legs locking around his waist. He thrashed, claws raking her forearms, drawing blood that slicked her grip. She held on, squeezing with everything she had, the ache in her chest fracturing into shards as the bond rebelled one last time.
"You're done," she growled into his ear, voice hoarse. "Whatever you are."
He laughed then—a broken, wheezing sound that didn't match the pain twisting his features. "You... have no idea."
With a surge of strength that shouldn't have been possible, he slammed backward into a pillar. The impact rattled her teeth, loosened her hold. She dropped, rolling away as he turned, chest heaving, blood dripping steadily from his wounds. His suit was ruined now, hanging in tatters, and that perfect posture was gone, replaced by something hunched and desperate.
For the first time, he looked like he might lose.
His eyes darted around the room— to the shattered sigils, the groaning team, her standing there defiant and bloody. Something shifted in his gaze, a flicker of resignation, or maybe calculation. He straightened slowly, wincing, and reached behind his back. From the shadows of his coat, he drew a long, slender blade—a katana-like sword, its edge gleaming with an unnatural sheen, as if it drank in the dim light rather than reflected it.
Elisia tensed, blade ready, but he didn't attack. Instead, he held it loosely at his side, staring at it like an old regret.
"This sword," he murmured, voice dropping to a ragged whisper, "is considered a Genesis weapon. Similar to a primordial. Because this sword is transcendent in time. Doesn't abide the laws of this world. An anomaly... just like him."
The words hung there, heavy and cryptic, like a confession pulled from deep water. His free hand came up, fingers hooking under the skin at his jawline—not skin, she realized with a sick lurch, but something thinner, like a veil. He gripped and pulled, ripping it away in one violent motion. Flesh tore with a wet, peeling sound, blood and something darker spilling down his neck.
Elisia's eyes widened, her breath catching sharp in her throat. The face underneath wasn't Cassian's anymore. It was sharper, wearier, with lines etched from pain and something like quiet fury. Familiar in a way that punched her in the gut, stirring echoes from dreams she couldn't place.
Deyviel.
The name hit her like a memory she didn't own, but there he was—Deyviel's face, staring back at her through Cassian's eyes. Or were they his now? The room spun for a second, the ache in her chest exploding into full grief, raw and unfiltered.
Ben pushed himself up against the wall, staring, his face paling. "What the—"
But the thing wearing Deyviel's face didn't give them time to process. His grip tightened on the sword, and the air around him hummed, like reality itself was bending. Flashes came then, unbidden, spilling from him like blood from a fresh wound. Not her memories. His.
It started centuries ago, in the shadowed halls of House Vaeloria. The family wasn't just old blood; they were architects of secrets, weaving persuasion into politics and power since the Spanish galleons first docked in Manila Bay. Lord Darius, Cassian's father, had always been the iron fist in the velvet glove—charming senators, turning rivals into puppets, all while hoarding forbidden rites from Europe's ancient covens. Immortality wasn't enough; they craved dominion over time itself, over souls that slipped through death's fingers.
Cassian had been the outlier, the rebellious son turned too young, always chafing at the family's alliances with humans. But rebellion had a price. In the late 1800s, during the Philippine Revolution, the Vaelorias crossed paths with something rare—a dhampir, one in a billion, a halfbreed human-vampire hybrid born from forbidden unions that almost never survived. His name was Kael, a fighter in a rebel group clawing against Lancer, the vampire king whose iron rule strangled the islands' underbelly.
Kael was fierce, relentless, his hybrid blood giving him strength without the full curse—daylight didn't burn him, silver barely stung. But in a brutal skirmish at the edge of a jagged cliff, he fell. Plunged into the abyss, body broken on the rocks below. The Vaelorias, ever opportunistic, snatched his corpse before the rebels could recover it. In their hidden labs beneath Intramuros, they experimented—stitching wounds with dark magic, infusing the flesh with elixirs to make it pliable, eternal.
Cassian, meanwhile, was dying. A poisoned stake from a rival house had left him rotting from the inside, his vampire essence fraying. Darius wouldn't lose his son. So they fixed Kael's body, reinforced it with runes and blood rites, and transferred Cassian's soul into the dhampir shell. A perfect vessel: stronger, more resilient, with echoes of Kael's anomaly woven in—the sword he'd carried, a Genesis weapon that bent time, now bound to Cassian's will.
But souls don't transfer clean. Kael's essence lingered, a ghost in the machine, and in other timelines, it reborn as Deyviel—a reincarnation sharing the same face, the same unyielding spirit. That's why Ben and Elisia recognized it now, even in this world where Deyviel had never walked: soul-deep bleed, a resonance that crossed realities, pulling at memories that weren't quite theirs.
The flashback shattered as quickly as it came, leaving Elisia reeling. The man before her—Cassian in Kael's body, wearing Deyviel's face—smiled faintly, sword raised now, the blade humming louder.
"You see now?" he said, voice a mix of Cassian's velvet and something rougher, broken. "I'm not just wearing him. I am him. And this ends my way."
Elisia swallowed hard, the grief twisting into resolve. She glanced at Ben, who nodded once, pain etched on his face but fire in his eyes. The team was stirring, battered but not broken.
"Then bring it," she said, voice steady despite the storm inside. "Because I'm not done fighting anomalies."
He lunged, sword slicing the air with a whine that bent light itself.
To be continued.