The Salvation: A Dark Vampire Fantasy Romance, page 1
THE SALVATION
A DARK VAMPIRE FANTASY ROMANCE
EMILY SHORE
Contents
Also By Emily Shore
Author’s Note
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1. Who was Merikh Howle?
2. I will bring death to her as I have all others.
3. I made a vampire, a king, a god tremble...and breathe heavier.
4. The stakes are highest. I have everything to lose.
5. "Don't be such a baby. I didn't hit you that hard..."
6. She will never love my scars, nor all my sadistic monsters.
7. I have no choice but to place my faith, my trust, and all my hopes in the vampire I love.
8. I said I won't play fair, and I mean it...
9. “Are you ready, my little dove?”
10. I’d rather embrace death than watch the life bleed out of Kyan’s eyes.
11. "You don't speak to her. You never speak to her..."
12. I am the only living soul in this realm.
13. "The spy's head does bear the sigil..."
14. “Apart from Merikh alone, no vampire may bite you.”
15. "You knew what you were getting into. Break me, you said."
16. “Give me back my child now,” I demand, stepping toward the invader.
17. "I'll take her lovely blood this time..."
18. I will be the mortal who brought back Malachor.
19. "I had it crafted especially for you, my Merry Howle..."
20. "If you didn't want to contend with a monster, you shouldn't have given her claws..."
21. More blood. More punishment. More souls snuffed from existence by my hand.
22. “It was the first night Shadow emerged.”
23. Through death, through the God of Souls, I live.
24. "Don't trust whatever you see, little dove..."
25. “If the weaver catches you, it will be your end.”
26. “You failed, child of scars.”
27. “I’m the storm of your soul, Merikh.”
28. “Why? Why didn’t you tell me?”
29. "I'm quite fond of screams."
30. “It seems I’ve caught a little bird trying to fly away...”
31. " I'll look forward to hunting her presently."
32. “So help me God of Blood, beat—your—damn—heart—out!”
33. Our quadrumvirate becomes a quintessence. The Quintessence.
Epilogue
Other popular Emily Shore Books
Acknowledgments
About the Author
THE SALVATION: A Dark Vampire Fantasy Romance
Book Four of the Her Monstrous Boys Series
Copyright © 2024 Emily Shore
emilybethshore.info
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living, dead or otherwise, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Also By Emily Shore
POST 2020 AUTHOR JOURNEY:
Kidnapped by the Krampus (#1 Amazon Bestseller/Top 100) – Roars and Romances Series Standalone
Captured by the Cupid (Top New Release) – Roars and Romances Series Standalone
The DEATH AND DESTRUCTION SERIES
Courting Death and Destruction – (Kindle Vella Bestseller/Trending on KU)
Tempting Death and Destruction – (Trending on KU)
Hunting Death and Destruction (Coming May/2024)
HELL’S ANGEL SERIES
Bride of Lucifer: Hell on Earth – Book One (Kindle Vella Bestseller – Now on KU)
Bride of Lucifer: The Bride Trials – Book Two (Kindle Vella Bestseller – Now on KU)
Bride of Lucifer: Mate of Destruction – Book Three (Kindle Vella Bestseller – Now on KU))
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The Surrender (Kindle Vella Bestseller/Trending on KU/Kindle Top 100 New Release/Dragons)
The Submission (Kindle Vella Bestseller/Trending on KU)
KINDLE VELLA ORIGINALS
Bride of the Shifter King – (Kindle Vella Bestseller)
The Grymm Beauty (Kindle Vella Bestseller)
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PRE 2020 AUTHOR JOURNEY:
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The Aviary – Book One, The Garden – Book Two, The Temple – Book Three, The Temple Twins – Book Four, The Aquarium – Book Five
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To all you vampire lovers who preferred Blade, Underworld, Queen of the Damned, True Blood or any other vampire franchise to Twilight
Author’s Note
If you’re like me, maybe you use trigger warnings as a shopping list. If so, you’re gonna love mine. Please see The Sacrifice page on my website for more info. There will be dark themes, grit, major exhibitionism, BDSM, punishments, battles, and much more…
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1
Who was Merikh Howle?
QUINTESSA
My body is weak, but my spirit feels weaker as Merikh licks the final wound closed.
He’s sealed every scar wrought by his fangs. But it’s not the last time he’s stabbed me. A weary moan breaks free from my mouth as I feel every cold kiss of his piercings from the magic crosses and the recent ladder addition as he thrusts, pounding me with his fully restored self. All due to the bond I share with him and his Curse-brothers simply because they stole my half-soul from Kronos and did a four-way split a snack.
High on my blood, the vampire pumps into me with his wings beating in time with each thrust. Those wings are not simply havens to shelter me. They are my prison. The strongest wings of time overshadow me, eclipsing my whole form upon this coffin.
A prison, both possessive and protective. His energy is like tendrils of cold woe and affliction feathering the air.
The air of the crypt is icy and hollow, stone walls dank and weathered by must and the rain-dense air of the swamp outside. But Merikh stokes my blood, commanding it to warm and flow with his power. Even if all the elements worked against me, I could never freeze.
I gave him everything. My heart on the silver platter of his coffin—like a sacrificial lamb of an offering. He will do with it what he wants, and I will trust we will find the beauty through the pain and ashes and rise together.
There is so much I still don’t know about the vampire God of Blood. So much I want. So much I need.
In the darkness of the crypt, as Merikh jerks to slam as hard as possible until he finds his release, something changes in his expression. It’s beyond the shuddering of his muscles, how his wings grow harder and tighter than a warrior’s new bowstrings, or how he comes without a breath breaking the surface of his mouth.
A wave of raw vulnerability crashes over me—as if his soul itself brushes past mine, like a ghost ship in the night, tempting me, seducing me. Leave the safety of land and lighthouses. Follow the ghost light wherever it leads...and trust he will save me when the depths swallow my soul to drown me.
That brush of soul energy triggers a stronger orgasm that follows his. I screech through our bonded climaxes. He throws his head back and unleashes himself, pumping ropes of warm seed into me while I tremble, my cracked and bleeding heart on the verge of seizing.
I memorize his scent, buryi ng my face in the cold marble of his chest, where nothing exists but a hollow, un-beating heart. Breathing deeply, I touch my lips to his scars—this pale and weathered roadmap—every mark testifies to a history I do not know.
Who was Merikh Howle?
One silken growl warns me not to touch his scars. Or to ask about them. He won’t be sharing while I’m spread upon his coffin. And I’m too weak from blood loss. All my limbs have liquefied, and I can’t possibly stand.
For some reason, his words return to me from the time he took the thorns from my back and healed me with snow. The time he fucked me upon the frozen banks with my hair falling into the icy water.
“I could have instantly clotted the blood, eliminated all inflammation and swelling. Closed the flesh.”
So, why isn’t he healing me now?
When Merikh unsheathes himself from me, I moan from the loss while my pussy gushes our combined fluids, weeping them onto the coffin. But he doesn’t seem concerned about the act of desecration as he shoves into his breeches, into his shirt, and vest. Not the jacket. Every inch of my center throbs from his ministrations. My eyelids are so heavy, so weary, tombstones must weigh upon them.
The moment I try to rise, my vision swirls—lost to the half-remembered dream of our time here. Bittersweet ecstasy still lingers in my veins. Something deep within me understands I hung upon the precipice of death. And Merikh kept me from falling.
Now, he raises me up. The darkness spins like I’m caught in a storm at sea—weaker than a toy boat in a tempest.
At first, I think he’s going to tug the white dress over my head to cover my skin with all his fang marks, still raw and red. But he captures my face in his hands, mirroring the delicate moments of his control when we first entered.
For the first time, no scarlet tides in his black irises gaze back at me. Instead, his eyes are silver. Like the moon herself melted for him and transformed into two lustrous pools.
“Savage mercies, did I do tha—”
He kisses me. A velvet tongue that takes no prisoners as it twirls tenderly along the inside of my mouth, rendering me speechless. I press my fragile body against his strong one, clinging to him like an anchor in the whirling waves that want to take me under.
The next thing I know, Merikh is draping his leather jacket over my shoulders, pushing my ragged arms through the sleeves, and lifting me. Not honeymoon style—he hoists me by my backside, positioning my legs on each side of his waist.
I don’t hesitate to wrap my arms around his neck and play with his long dark strands, smiling at how he sucks a sharp breath through his teeth. Other than this slight confession, he is calm. His beauty is no less violent, his eyes no less predatory. But the brutal lines of his face have softened. The tension is gone from his neck and shoulders—faded more than any other time he’s fucked me.
“You’ve done everything, Quintessa,” he says, his voice so dark and breath-stealing. “Now, lay your head upon my shoulder, little dove. And trust me to carry you where you need to be.”
Like a current I can’t overcome. So, I’ll let him sweep me away with his tide. I’ve tasted Merikh’s blood, taken it deep into myself. Now, I will become the blood that writes the story of the soul. And trust him to transfuse the secrets, demons, and monsters of his past into me.
The leather jacket covers much of my back, but I must press my chest to his if I don’t want the side of my body exposed. My breasts brush his open vest and shirt as I lean my head onto his shoulder as he’s directed.
More fog drifts into the crypt—long-lost spirits seeking life. For, what is blood but essence and life?
Merikh pays them no mind. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice when he lowers his hand to a decorative fleur de lis carved into the coffin. One touch. The ground shudders. I flinch, gripping his vest as the coffin shifts to one side, revealing an aged stone staircase descending into darkness, black as death’s ink.
Inhaling deeply, I hold my breath, trusting the vampire as he bears me into the all-consuming darkness that closes over my head—trusting him to keep my head above water.
Not as all-consuming as I believed. Merikh captures me with his eyes through the descent. More radiant than diamonds caught in a sudden flame. They warm my chest, even if the chill of the darkness drags goosebumps to the surface of my skin. But I’m so weak, no adrenaline could possibly spark my blood to quicken. My nerve endings have shriveled. All my energy has withered.
“You could restore my blood...” My voice cracks, and I hope Merikh doesn’t take offense to my statement, which is nothing but a pronounced truth. Not an accusation.
“I’m saving my strength,” he returns, his hands stationed beneath my thighs, maintaining graceful equilibrium as he carries me down, down, down.
“For what?”
“You’ll see.”
I clamp my lips shut, battling the army of voices in my head. They clamor with questions. Merikh has bided his time, waited and watched his brothers bond with me for months. He waited centuries before that. I can wait a little while longer.
No sooner do I make peace with that and heave a deep sigh than the wind rushes all around me, flinging my hair all around my eyes. The inertia makes my stomach bottom out, but the vampire maintains a strong hold on me with one hand anchored at the back of my neck.
When his next step is not a descent, I register he crossed into vampire speed, leaving the staircase behind us.
“Welcome to my Court of Hollows, Quintessa,” Merikh whispers in my ear, a hush of a breath that has all my hairs standing on end.
Both eager and terrified of what I will see, I lift my head from his chest. A bone-deep tremor shudders my body. Spine-tingling energy from the essence of thousands, if not millions, of ghosts overwhelms my surroundings.
Hewn into the rock, bones serve as pillars and balustrades, crested by skulls. Dark passages hide behind them. It’s like an eerie but beautiful. Despite how far underground we are, spectral flickers like candle flames cast an otherworldly glow upon the area. As Merikh travels upon an ascending staircase to the entryway of those dark passages, I’m close enough to register they’re not candle flames at all.
I shiver from the deathly orbs gazing back at me from those skeletal eye sockets. Ghost lights, thousands of them, shed their glow. These phantasmal spirit lights remind me of the eyes in the Veil of Souls.
As if sensing my inner thoughts, Merikh traces one cold knuckle down my cheek in a subtle summons. “Those souls are damned, cursed by Kronos. These, little dove, are the spirits of fallen vampires who choose to linger in my hollow court. They are not yet ready for the Unseen.”
Needle ice travels up my spine, chilling my nerves at the name.
“What’s the Unseen?”
Merikh doesn’t respond. I don’t press for more as he arrives at the top of the first staircase. I’m glad he’s still bearing my weight because my leg muscles might as well be cooked noodles. I flick my eyes up but can’t make out how many staircases ascend—or where they end. Instead of moving to the next one, Merikh bears left, carrying me down a dark passage of vaulted rock ceilings.
Iron torches, freshly lit, line the passage. They cast a heated but somber glow, forming shadows to dance along the walls. A near-full wall of skulls lies to our left, those ghostly eyes seeming to follow us.
“Is everyone here a ghost?” I wonder softly.
Nothing. Not so much as a vein throbbing or his jaw hardening.
“Bo is awake, I see,” Merikh remarks, and it’s the first time I’ve seen his lips press into a smile. A subtle one. Not a smile of mockery, contempt, or ego. This is a genuine smile, warm and approving. Oh, savage mercies, what would it take for him to smile at me like that?
Most of the time, Merikh reserves a gaze full of hunger, carnal need, and possession. I’ve always known his emotions run deep, and he unleashes them for hate, punishment, vengeance, or...pain. Our time in the crypt already seems a far-off dream. I’ll never forget the vulnerability and emotion and intimacy he showed me. I don’t want him to change. I simply want him to grow. I smile to myself, considering how vampires never grow.
