The memory always started the same way. Blood on concrete. His mother's hand, pale and trembling, reaching for his father's. The Vampire King's silhouette against the burning skyline of Lagos—a crown of shadows, eyes like dying embers. Kojo was seven years old, hiding behind a rusted generator, watching his entire world end in a single, brutal moment. "Run, Kojo. Don't look back. Don't ever—" His mother's voice cracked. She never finished the sentence. The King laughed. It sounded like breaking glass. Then the memory dissolved into static, and the static became a voice. Low at first. Then louder. "Kojo. Kojo. KOJO!" A palm smacked the back of his head. Hard. Kojo jerked upright, nearly falling off his rickety wooden desk. His elbow knocked over a half-empty bottle of Fanta, which rolled across the floor with an embarrassingly loud clatter. Thirty heads turned. Thirty pairs of eyes locked onto him like he'd just set himself on fire. "Ha far guy, wake up your sleeping in the middle of history class you know Mr. Kolin behavior is he will fail you—" Kojo blinked, his vision swimming. A boy with a fresh low cut and a mischievous grin loomed over him—Chidi, his only friend in this entire miserable school. The only person who knew about the nightmares. The only person who'd ever seen him wake up screaming at 3 AM and didn't run. "S-sorry my bad," Kojo stammered, scrubbing his face with both hands. His cheeks burned. "I didn't get much sleep last night." "Again?" Chidi whispered, dropping his voice. "The dreams?" Kojo didn't answer. He just nodded, eyes fixed on the cracked floor tiles. At the front of the classroom, Mr. Kolin—a gaunt man with spectacles that seemed to magnify his disappointment—glared over his podium. "Ah, Kojo. Nice of you to join us. Perhaps you'd like to share with the class what's so fascinating about the ceiling?" A few students snickered. Kojo shrank into his chair, wishing the floor would open up and swallow him. "No, sir. Sorry, sir." "Sorry, sir," Mr. Kolin mimicked in a high-pitched voice. "That's all you ever say. Sorry, sir. Sorry, I failed the test. Sorry, I fell asleep again. One day, Kojo, sorry won't be enough." Kojo's fingers curled into his palms, nails biting skin. If you knew what I was, you'd be the one saying sorry. But he kept his mouth shut. He always did. The bell rang like a mercy. Students flooded into the corridors, chaos erupting as uniforms mixed with street clothes, laughter mixing with shouts. Kojo shuffled through the crowd, keeping his head down, Chidi walking beside him like a bodyguard against invisible threats. "You need to eat something," Chidi said, shoving a wrapped piece of suya into Kojo's hands. "You look like death. Wait—bad phrasing." Kojo almost smiled. "Thanks." They passed the courtyard, where the afternoon sun blazed over the makeshift basketball court. And there she was. Lizzy. Kojo's feet stopped moving without his permission. His heart did something stupid—a lurch, a stumble, a full cardiac betrayal. She was standing by the rusted goalpost, arguing with some guy about the last exam. Her braids were pulled back in a messy ponytail, her uniform slightly wrinkled, and she was gesturing with a pen like it was a weapon. She looked furious and beautiful and completely, utterly untouchable. "C'mon, man, don't stare," Chidi muttered, tugging his sleeve. "You know she hates that." "I'm not staring." "You're drooling." Kojo wiped his mouth. He wasn't. Chidi laughed anyway. The worst part? He knew exactly why Lizzy hated him. She'd never said it outright, but he'd heard the whispers. The rumors. Kojo's weird. Kojo's creepy. Kojo's always lurking in the shadows like he's watching you. She was right. He did watch her. But not because he wanted to hurt her. Because when he looked at Lizzy, the bloodlust quieted. The hunger faded. She made him feel like a normal boy, even though he'd never been normal a day in his life. "Dude, focus," Chidi snapped, snapping his fingers in front of Kojo's face. "We've got two hours before the streets get dangerous. You need to—" "I know." Kojo tore his gaze away. "I know." They started walking again, leaving the courtyard behind. But Kojo couldn't shake the feeling that someone was watching him. Someone else. The sun was setting by the time Kojo and Chidi reached the edge of the slums. The sky bled orange and red, painting the shantytown in hues of fire. Kojo felt the familiar shift beneath his skin—that creeping, prickling sensation that meant the change was coming. His heartbeat slowed. His pupils dilated. The hunger stirred in his chest like a sleeping beast. "Go home," Kojo said quietly. "Lock the door. Don't open it for anyone." Chidi frowned. "I can help—" "No." Kojo's voice was sharper than he intended. "Please. I can't—I won't risk you." Chidi studied him for a long moment, then nodded. "Same time tomorrow?" "Same time tomorrow." They parted ways. Chidi disappeared into the maze of corrugated iron and laundry lines. Kojo turned toward the darker alleys, where the neon lights of the rich districts flickered in the distance like false promises. He walked until the shadows swallowed him whole. The scream came from the abandoned warehouse district. Kojo's head snapped up, nostrils flaring. Blood. Fresh. His fangs ached beneath his gums. The hunger pulsed. No. Not tonight. Focus. But the scream came again—higher this time, desperate and terrified—and Kojo recognized the voice. Lizzy. He ran. The warehouse was a crumbling skeleton of rusted beams and shattered windows. Inside, the air was thick with dust and the metallic tang of fear. Kojo burst through the side entrance just in time to see him—a tall, impossibly handsome vampire with sharp cheekbones and a predatory smile, his hand wrapped around Lizzy's throat. "Please," Lizzy gasped, tears streaming down her face. "Please, I don't—" "Shh, shh," the vampire crooned, his voice like honey laced with poison. "You're going to be so delicious. I've been watching you for weeks, you know. All that fire. All that fight. I love a girl with a little—" "Get your hands off her." The words came out cold. Steady. Nothing like the shy, stammering boy from history class. The vampire turned, amusement flickering in his crimson eyes. "Oh? And what do we have here? A little puppy come to play?" Kojo stepped into the dim light. The change was already happening—his eyes darkening, his veins beginning to glow faintly beneath his skin. But it wasn't midnight yet. He wasn't strong enough. "I said," Kojo repeated, "get. Your. Hands. Off. Her." The vampire laughed. Then he moved. Kojo barely blocked the first strike. The vampire was fast—too fast—and Kojo's body hadn't fully transitioned yet. He took a blow to the ribs, then another to the jaw. Blood filled his mouth. His own blood. Human blood. Why didn't I stay human? Why can't I just be normal? "Kojo?" Lizzy's voice was small, confused. "What are you—" "Run," he gasped, spitting blood. "Lizzy, run!" She didn't move. She was frozen, staring at the fight with wide, terrified eyes. The vampire grabbed Kojo by the throat, lifting him off the ground like he weighed nothing. "You know, I thought there was something off about you. The way you smell... half-breed, aren't you? Mama was a vampire, Papa was a snack?" Kojo's vision swam. His lungs burned. The clock on the warehouse wall read 11:57 PM. Three minutes. "Too bad," the vampire mused, leaning in close. "Your mom probably tasted just as sweet as this one will." Something inside Kojo snapped. 11:59 PM. The tattoos began to glow. They appeared on his skin like liquid fire—ancient symbols that neither Kojo nor his mother had ever fully explained. They spread from his chest down his arms, pulsing with a rhythm that matched the beating of his heart. The vampire stumbled back, his smug expression cracking. "What—what are you—" Kojo's eyes were no longer brown. They burned like molten gold, like twin suns descending into darkness. His voice didn't sound like his own anymore. It was deeper, colder, layered with something ancient and terrifying. "You shouldn't have touched her." 12:00 AM. The clock struck midnight. And Kojo became something else. The vampire lunged—a desperate, foolish move. Kojo caught him by the wrist without even looking, his grip like iron. The tattoos on his arm blazed brighter, casting dancing shadows across the warehouse walls. "I've spent every night of my life running from this," Kojo said, his voice impossibly calm. "Hiding. Cowering. Pretending I'm human so I don't hurt anyone." The vampire struggled, but Kojo's grip held firm. "But you—" Kojo's lips curled into something that wasn't quite a smile. "You hurt her. You threatened her. You made her cry." "I—I didn't know—" "Didn't know what?" Kojo tilted his head, a predator examining prey. "Didn't know that a half-breed could still be dangerous? That a monster could still protect what's his?" The vampire's eyes widened. "Wait—please—" Kojo reached down and picked up a broken wooden beam from the rubble—a splintered piece of bench, jagged and sharp. His tattoos flared once, twice, a pulse of pure power that made the vampire whimper. "This," Kojo said softly, "is for my mother." He drove the wood straight through the vampire's heart. The body crumpled to the ground. Dust settled. Silence. Kojo stood over the corpse, breathing hard, his tattoos slowly fading back into his skin. The fire in his eyes dimmed to amber, then brown, then nothing at all. 1:00 AM. He collapsed to his knees. The hunger was gone. The power was gone. He was just Kojo again—clumsy, shy, terrified Kojo—kneeling in a pool of blood with a dead vampire at his feet. Lizzy was still there. She hadn't run. She was staring at him like she was seeing him for the first time. "Kojo?" Her voice was barely a whisper. "What... what are you?" He opened his mouth to answer, but the words wouldn't come. He looked at her—at the terror in her eyes, the tears on her cheeks—and felt something break inside him. "You should go," he said hoarsely. "You should—you should forget you ever saw this." "Kojo—" "Go." She hesitated. For one desperate, impossible moment, she stepped toward him. Then she stopped. Turned. Ran. Kojo watched her disappear into the darkness. When he was alone, he looked down at his hands. They were shaking. Covered in blood that wasn't his. And somewhere, in the shadows, he could have sworn he heard his mother's voice. Don't look back, Kojo. Don't ever look back. But he did. He always did. END OF CHAPTER ONE --- Next Chapter Preview: Kojo's childhood friend Chidi finds the body. Kojo's crush Lizzy starts asking dangerous questions. And somewhere in Lagos, the Vampire King hears that a half-breed killed one of his own. The war begins.

Midnight's