The night would bleed him dry. 

Long grueling hours at the station would be the death of Detective Percy Ashmidia.  He took a leisure sip of fresh blood from his bat-shaped mug as he examined the case file spread out across his desk of their latest victim. An accountant vamp, one who lived in a penthouse on Caldron Court, was discovered dead in his coffin with his throat slit and a white rose, sprinkled with droplets of his own blood, placed ever so meticulously over his corpse.  

The leaves from his snake plant fluttered enough to catch his eye, but he knew it didn’t require any watering yet.  How peculiar.  With the wave of his hand, gentle forest green embers washed over the plant to calm it.  Ever since Percy had awakened his magic as a child, the plants around him had always had a special calling to him.  More than the average earth magic spellcaster. 

Those abilities only heightened tenfold after he was sired. Unfortunately, not even vampirism cured the magical malady deep within his veins, cursing his own powers.  Plant magic was his goddess-given power, but with it came an ungodly allergy to soil.  Just the mere touch of it broke his skin out in painful, itchy blisters and turned his complexion a sickly pale green shade.

Only enchanted gloves worked to prevent such rashes, but they weakened his magic to wear them.  Even his precious desk plant, if he dared to touch the soil, it would sicken him.  As a child, his mother had considered removing all the plants in their home because he was too curious for his own good.  Could one really blame him for wanting to tap into his powers like any other child, only to find their magic might sicken them?

“Ashmidia.” Captain Delacroix’s authoritative voice carried across the stationhouse, and curious colleagues poked their heads up to stare at him seated at his desk. His stern gaze settled on Percy like he was prepared to rip him a new one, but he’d known the vampire long enough to gauge his expression through the crinkle in his crimson eyes and downturned lips that curved in a slight grimace. Even his bushy mustache seemed to frown at him.  “I need you over on Fangcrest Street. There’s been another murder.”

“Yes, sir.” Percy rose from his desk, and with a quick snap of his fingers, magicked his files all neatly into its black folder.  

Although Captain Delacroix had fully turned in his late twenties, his age had really started to show.  Most prevalent in his face, where the slightest wrinkles had formed across his forehead and how the color of his crimson eyes had dulled. He’d tied his black hair back in a way to hide the gray poking through, but Percy still noticed it.  Honestly, it worried him to think that perhaps in a decade or so, he would start to age like that himself.  

Vampires were immortal, so to speak.  They lived far beyond witch years, but they were not immune to death.