Twenty-Seven: Finally Got a Title

Lilith pried from Annie the Morris office that handles Black Sun Devouring, but her feet turned back first, like a swallow returning to its eave-shadowed nest.

She ducked her face into her trench collar like behind a storm-gray wing, hand braced on the Broken Sword at her back like a nailed-down mast.

Breath steadied, steel taste on her tongue like cold dawn; going out fully armed put stone under her feet, not sand shifting under a tide.

Next time, she swore to carry every blade and trinket like a hedgehog of steel; a mere Devouring spawn had wrung out too many of her tricks.

Annie moved behind the Little White Dragon like a shadow trailing a pale moon, fear and grief braided tight, answers only coming when her name was tugged.

Head down, she walked as if counting raindrops on cobbles, her thoughts a shuttered room where the candle burned low.

Annie led Lilith to a street a stone’s throw from Hero Street, the alley a narrow river cutting the city’s ribs, and stopped at a plain little house.

The vampire girl knocked, knuckles tapping like pebbles on bark, while the Little White Dragon stepped back, eyeing the weathered door like old bone.

A wooden sign swung like a tired leaf: in Common, Osai Tofu Shop, letters faded as if washed by a long winter rain.

Lilith rolled her eyes like tossing a pebble into a still pond; what a shoddy mask, a paper fan in a gale—what vampire buys tofu in Morris?

Beneath, in dragon-tongue, a longer line coiled like a purple vine: Black Sun Devouring Temporary Response Team Workshop, hidden so only scales could read it.

They didn’t wait long; the door scraped open like a shell parting, a head popped out, saw a girl and a hooded figure, and yanked them in like fish on a line.

Inside, Lilith froze like a hare hearing the bowstring; a familiar figure stood under the lamplight’s white blade—Eliza out of her gown, in crisp white uniform.

A saber rode her hip like a sliver of moon; she planted herself in the room’s heart like a stake and flayed three seated vampires with words like hail.

“You’re useless as soggy straw!” Her voice cracked like thunder over slate. “I sent you to track the spread, and seven go out, four vanish.”

“Twelve bags of blood a month, poured down your throats like river wine, and in a real storm you’re worse than any kid I’d grab off the street!”

“What do I feed you for, kindling? You’re dead weight, dragging like anchors, all appetite and no spine!”

Lilith had never pictured Morris’s princess with fire in her cheeks like ripe peaches; another step and she’d be stomping faces into the floorboards.

The Little White Dragon, angling to watch, stepped on a paper box; crack-pop! it went, like a firecracker under a boot, snapping every eye toward her.

Eliza stopped mid-curse, anger flaring like a struck match, silver hair flashing like frost; then she saw who it was and swallowed the spark like ash.

“Lilith? What are you doing here?” Her words hung sharp as icicles, then dripped softer.

“Uh… did I crash your storm?” Lilith’s smile was crooked, gaze sliding away like a fish darting from a net.

“What happened? You came in like a fire at noon.” Eliza’s eyes cut through coat and cloth like a knife, noting the blood blotched across Lilith’s sweater like a withered rose.

“It’s urgent.” Lilith’s brow tightened like a knot. “I ran into a Devouring spawn in Morris, fresh-tainted, halfway to the next molt, and I put it down.”

“I did the basics, salt on the spill and ash on the ember; there shouldn’t be a leak, but you’d better send eyes to look.”

She told Eliza about the fight with Joe, her voice a low river over stone; she didn’t mention her power of Taint, only a dragon secret holding back Black Sun.

Eliza’s face cooled like iron in snow; she asked Annie for Joe’s address, words trimmed like orders, then snapped the three back into motion.

Those three Vampires grabbed protective suits and kit from the storeroom like firefighters snatching axes, and sprinted toward Hero Street, boots drumming like rain.

Eliza dragged Annie into an inner isolation room like tucking a chick under a wing; close contact is a thin ice, even when the crack looks small.

“You’ve got more you want to ask, don’t you?” Once orders settled like dust, Eliza dropped onto a sofa like a tossed glove and gulped water like a parched wolf.

She looked up at the silent Little White Dragon, gaze steady as a spear, and asked, voice leveled like a calm lake.

“Plenty. Where do I even start?” Lilith’s eyes skimmed her uniform like wind stroking a banner, a smile tugging like a cat at a ribbon.

“One at a time. You think I’m a library?” Eliza rolled her eyes like turning a wheel, then poured more water down like sand in an hourglass.

“What’s with the outfit? Why’re you dressed sharper than me, a traveler?” Lilith tapped the uniform like rain on tin, her own wardrobe a mess of extremes.

Under the trench she wore the bright skirts of a spry girl and a backless sweater so daring even lingerie would blush like dusk on snow.

“I’m not a vase set to collect dust in a palace niche.” Eliza’s voice clipped like marching feet. “Paperwork and I are oil and water, so I toss it.”

“But a princess can’t be driftwood. Royal blood pushes back the Black Sun a little, so I took my blade to the front like a lantern in fog.”

She pointed to a gem at her wrist, the stone glinting like a drop of dawn; Lilith guessed it for an artifact, a Joe-like charm against erosion.

“I don’t recommend living that close to a cliff edge.” Lilith’s tone cooled like shade. “You never know when your trinket decides to crack.”

She remembered Joe’s team wiped out like candles in a gust; on the road over, she’d chewed the thought like gristle—the artifact likely failed.

“What do you mean?” Eliza caught the hook in her words like a hawk catching a glint, eyes flicking toward the Little White Dragon.

“I think the artifact went bad.” Lilith’s answer was a clean cut. “Joe said they entered a room, then infection bloomed like mold after rain.”

“That room wasn’t a typical Udis ruin, yet the power lines were the usual dark-violet veins; that alone shouldn’t sprout Black Sun Devouring.”

“So the simplest blade: the artifact failed. Maybe the room twisted it into frenzy, or it had already lost its tooth.”

“Either way, that charm’s no sure shield.” She tapped Eliza’s temple with a finger like a knuckle on a bell, a little impish spark in her smile.

“If you go down, Morris goes to pieces like a cracked mirror. Walk careful.”

“Thanks for the warning.” Eliza’s teeth clicked like flint; the Vampire Princess rolled her eyes again, lids aching like tired wings.

Maybe the Little White Dragon had some quiet spell; whenever they spoke, Eliza found herself speechless, like a blade blunted by an invisible hand.