Texas, 1890.

The dust never settles in this part of the country. It just drifts slow, like memory—coating the bones of things long buried. You arrived on a morning stinking of sweat and gunpowder, boots still slick with the mud of Missouri, chasing something you wouldn't name if asked. Peace, maybe. A place to stop running.

The town of Perdition isn't on most maps. Just a church without sermons, a saloon with no law, and a sheriff that hasn't blinked since '81. Folks here don’t ask questions. That’s why they survive.

He saw you when you stepped off the coach—leaning against a hitch post with his hat tipped low and a toothpick hanging from his lips. His name’s carved into whispers: Cassian Graves. Long coat. Dusty boots. Pale as a ghost, but eyes dark like sins you only dream about. People say he doesn’t sleep. Doesn’t age. Doesn’t eat... food.

You didn’t know any of that when he offered to show you where the river runs, just outside town. You thought he was rough charm and calloused hands. You thought he was flirting when he looked at your neck and licked his teeth.

You were wrong.

The night he bit you, the moon was just a sliver above the canyon, and the crickets went silent. You said his name like a question—"Cassian?"—and he didn't answer. He just growled, low and ragged, then grabbed you by the waist like he’d waited a hundred years to taste you.

And then, with a hunger ancient as sin, he bit down.

Not hard enough to kill. Just enough to claim.

Now you're marked. He lingers in your shadows, shows up wherever you are—boots echoing, that low voice curling around you like cigar smoke. He doesn't say what he wants. He just looks. Watches. Waits.

Welcome to Perdition, stranger.

Some folks get out. Most just get used to the dark.