Plot Twists Vampire Short Stories & Vampire Novels

Three days before my blood oath ceremony, someone planted a silver crucifix in the bridal shop and set it ablaze while I was inside trying on my ceremonial gown. My fiancé — Vampire Lord Damien — had the arsonist thrown into the silver prison, sentencing them to the harshest punishment our laws allowed. I lay in the healing chamber, my body covered in severe burns, refusing to wake fully as the reality of my disfigurement sank in. In my semi-conscious state, I heard Damien speaking with the coven's apothecary. "My Lord, we can still heal her completely with the ancient blood rites. If we wait any longer, Serena will bear these scars for life! You just want Miss Vivienne to be your Consort at the blood oath ceremony. This is cruel beyond measure!" "Let her keep the scars. I'll provide for her for the rest of her life, but if she's healed, she'll definitely cause trouble at the ceremony." "I promised Vivienne that her child would be welcomed into the coven with full honors. Only when Serena is completely disfigured will she be grateful enough to raise Vivienne's child as her own. The scars are necessary - at least this way, she won't dare mistreat the boy." In the corner of the room, where no one was watching, a tear slid down my burned cheek. So this was the truth. The blood oath ceremony I'd dreamed of was nothing but a lie. The blood bond I longed for would be my death sentence. If that's how it had to be, I would give him what he wanted.

Moments before my Mating Ceremony, the guards shoved me from the altar. I watched, paralyzed, as another she-wolf in a pristine white gown took my place. My mate, Beta Seth, didn't even flinch. He took her hand—the hand of his childhood sweetheart, Brielle. And in that silence, his voice echoed in my head through the mind link. "Brielle is pregnant with a rogue's pup. She's mateless. I have to claim her, give her a home in the pack. It's to protect the child. I won't actually mark her. When this is all over, you'll still be my only one." I almost believed his bullshit. Until I saw Seth's hand stroking Brielle's waist after the ceremony. And Brielle, pulling him in for a kiss. In that moment, my eyes burned, and I was rooted to the spot. Seth thought I'd wait. Everyone who watched me pine for him thought I'd come crawling back, begging him to complete our bond. After all, we were fated mates. I'd been waiting for this ceremony for five years. But they had no idea. I turned my back on the pack and left. The moment that failed ceremony ended, I bonded with Lucian. The most powerful Vampire Prince. Three years later, I came back. Lucian called for a truce with the werewolves—all for me. As his mate, I returned to my former pack lands to witness the treaty. But the first thing my arrogant ex-fated mate did was rip the huge moonstone pendant off my neck. "That's the Vampire Prince's moonstone. He bought it for his blood-bonded mate years ago. Where did you get that cheap knock-off? A street stall?" "Enough with the tantrum. Come back. Brielle's kid is three. You can have a cot in the utility closet and clean up after him. Now take that cheap thing off your neck. Don't screw up the peace treaty." I just stood there, rubbing the sore spot on my neck where the chain had scraped, and let out a quiet sigh. He didn’t know that the moment anyone tried to rip this pendant from my throat, Lucian would feel it. And the only thing that would greet them… was his world-ending fury.

“You don't deserve to be a daughter of this House,” my mother hissed, her eyes burning crimson in the firelight. “If you can't support your sister as our heir, get out.” I should have seen it coming. In House Ashenveil, family came first—unless you were me. Vera Darkthorn. The disappointment. My perfect younger sister, Iris, got the love, the title, even Kane, the man I was supposed to bind myself to. I got an empty chapel on the night of my blood-binding. Even the man who had sworn himself to me never showed. So I left. Now I'd built a life among Berlin's underground vampire courts, where power was the only currency that mattered. I'd learned to fight. To lead. To make vampires twice my size lower their eyes with a look. Then word came that Iris was dying, and suddenly my family wanted me back. “Come home, Vera.” My father's voice rasped through the phone. “Your sister needs you.” I almost laughed. After everything? But I wasn't the helpless daughter they'd discarded anymore. This time, I knew how to use my fangs. And when your own blood comes hunting for you, you don't run. You go for the throat.

I was the only human at the vampire banquet, and the fiancée of the Prince's heir, Lucien. As a child, I once saved Lucien from vampire hunters, and the Prince and his wife chose me for him, sealing our engagement. Everyone envied me. I was merely the daughter of a human nobleman, yet I had the fortune to marry above my station into the Prince's family. To be worthy of him, I worked to make everything perfect. But among vampires, I always seemed slow and clumsy. They moved faster than me, heard far more than I could, and even the simplest vampire customs took me longer to memorize. Every time I reacted a step too slow, Lucien would remind me with a frown. "How are you ever going to be a proper wife like this?" He always said that compared to the girl he grew up with, his former fiancée, I still fell far short. Every single time, I was laughed at without mercy. Lucien would never let anyone hurt me, but he never once defended my dignity. Eventually, I broke off the engagement and decided to marry someone else. Lucien's face darkened. "You're really going to marry this human?" "Yes. Because he has never once called me stupid." Lucien scoffed. "That's your reason?" I nodded. "That's my reason."

I married my vampire husband ten years ago and gave him a half-blood heir, abandoning my career as a painter to become a full-time mother. Fortunately, my son inherited my talent. At just six years old, he held his first solo art exhibition, inspired by the theme "My Mother." But he never let me attend, and he never let me see his paintings. My husband said my presence would make Luke nervous---that I should stay home and do the housework as a good wife and mother, and wait for them to come back. I told myself he was just young and didn't know better, that he was only pushing back against my discipline, not truly rejecting me. Until the day I snuck into the gallery wearing a surgical mask pulled low. In the center of the crowd, my husband held our son's hand while tenderly pulling a woman in a red dress into his arms. He turned to the guests and announced: "This is Luke's mother---my wife." The three of them stood together, beaming with perfect happiness. And I---the one who'd stayed up all night setting up this exhibition---stood before the paintings while not a single person recognized me. That was when I finally understood. My seemingly gentle, caring vampire husband had long ago given our son a replacement mother. And I was nothing more than the human nanny who'd served her purpose by producing an heir.

My sister and I were chosen by the Blood Ledger on the same night. In our first life, Lydia chose beauty. I chose genius. She became the most desired girl in the vampire courts, but the Glamour Gift came with one condition. She had to win true devotion before the deadline. She failed. Men wanted her face. They wanted her body. They wanted to show her off like a rare jewel. But none of them loved her. When the Blood Ledger took her beauty back, Lydia lost everything. I became the youngest scholar in the Night Academy, solved forbidden blood theories, and caught the eye of Adrian Blackthorne, heir to the oldest vampire house. So Lydia killed me. She trapped me beneath the sunrise and smiled as I burned. When I opened my eyes again, we were sixteen, standing before the Blood Ledger once more. This time, Lydia stole the Scholar Gift before I could speak. “Now I’ll be the genius everyone worships,” she said. “You can have beauty this time.” Poor Lydia. She thought she had stolen my future. What she didn’t understand was that every blessing in this world had already been marked with a price.

Before the wedding began, Rosien Valmont, the vampire prince, chained me to the blood altar. A dagger carved with a blood curse was pressed against my heart. "Give Bertha your blood one more time and I'll honor the blood pact. Otherwise the wedding is off." Rosien and I had loved each other for 200 years. He swore in front of the whole clan that he would make me his princess. Then, three years ago, everything changed when he brought Bertha Bell, a dying human, home. Whenever her illness flared, Rosien cut open my chest to draw my blood. On every full moon, pain ripped through my body as though my flesh were being torn apart. Bertha Bell lay pale in his arms. "Rosien, let it go! Katherine has waited a long time for this wedding. If she doesn't want to, I don't mind dying." When he looked at me again, there was nothing in his eyes but impatience. "Bertha saved my life. You're only giving up a few drops of blood." He pushed the dagger in another inch. "You begged for this wedding in the first place. I can call it off whenever I want. But if you're willing to give Bertha your blood, I'll still make you my princess." I looked down at the ring on my finger and laughed softly. "One last time." Rosien had no idea that this was the 99th time he had taken my blood. In three days, when the blood moon rose, the Founder bloodline sealed within me would fully awaken. I would take control of the clan.

As the only daughter of the Hawthorne family, I entered an arranged marriage with Adrian, the heir to the vampire ancient clan. Adrian was attentive, gentle, and deeply devoted to me. Until that day. His childhood sweetheart, Elara, became pregnant after getting involved with a lower-class vampire and turned to him for help. To protect her baby from being rejected by the ruthless vampire families, Adrian publicly claimed that Elara’s baby was his. As for me and the child I was carrying, Adrian told us to wait. At least until Elara could give birth safely, he said, he couldn’t acknowledge me or our child. His parents accused me of infidelity, saying I had disgraced the vampire bloodline and dishonored the Hawthorne name. They forced me to terminate my pregnancy. Meanwhile, Adrian was on the other side of the world, caring for Elara. By the time he finally returned, I had already disappeared from his world.

The vampire town had one sacred custom. On the night before a Blood Oath Ceremony, the groom had to climb the abandoned church's bell tower alone. There, he tied a blood oath sash bearing his bride's name to the feet of the Goddess’s statue, calling on the ancient bloodlines to witness their vow: they would share the endless night and never let dawn tear them apart. I had spent seven years at Silas's side in that vampire town. At last, through driving rain and circling crows, he had climbed the tower for me. He came home wrapped in the night's damp chill. I had warm blood wine waiting for him, but outside the manor gates, I overheard him talking to another vampire. "You've lost your mind! If Evelyn sees Vera's name on the blood oath sash, don't you think she'll tear the whole ceremony apart?" "She wouldn't dare." Silas pulled off his black leather gloves with an air of complete indifference. "She's a human orphan her own family cast out. Who else can she marry in Ravenmist but me?" "If Evelyn hadn't been so reckless back then, Vera would never have lost the use of her legs in the Holy Silver Chapel. This sash is my way of making it up to her." "As for Evelyn... I'm marrying her anyway. Giving her a Blood Oath Ceremony should be more than enough." He thought that was more than generous enough. Those four words struck me with the cold mist of the rainy night, each one a silver needle piercing flesh. All the hopes I'd kept secret before the wedding amounted to nothing more than his attempt to make amends to another woman. I turned and sent a message to my family back in Harbor City. "I give up." "I'll come home and go through with my engagement to Theodore Blackthorn."

Half an hour before I was to seal a blood bond, my vampire fiance's steward stopped me outside my own bedchamber. "I'm sorry, Your Grace, but your key doesn't fit this lock." His words made my stomach drop. "That's impossible. Crowley Ashbourne handed it to me himself." "According to our records, the bedchamber is currently occupied by Lady Elsa Ashbourne, Lord Crowley's adopted sister. She set a ward over it, and only Lord Crowley's blood seal can open the door." My lady's maid, Marta Bell, went white at the steward's answer. The bonding gown, the moonstone ring, every single thing the ceremony required, all of it was still inside that room. In half an hour, vampire nobles from every territory would be seated in the great hall. And I, the bride, could not even get to my own ceremonial dress. I sent Crowley a blood message at once. He came quickly, but his gaze went first to the closed door. Only after he had sensed that Elsa's aura was steady did he turn to me. "Elsa has spent every day helping us prepare this ceremony. She has only just managed to lie down. Go and get ready in my room. Don't wake her." I looked straight at him as he blocked the doorway. "Crowley, everything we need for the bond is in that room!" "What's the rush? When she wakes up, I'll get everything for you." I didn't argue with him any further. I looked at the clock on the wall and gave him an ultimatum. "You have three more minutes to open this door. Otherwise, there will be no blood bond."

I was born a half-blood vampire, the daughter of a vampire father and a human mother. I inherited a vampire's power, yet I could walk in sunlight without harm. On the day it happened, my beloved fiancé Adrian had been gravely wounded by hunters and lay collapsed in the burning light. I was the one who ran to him, and I was the one who took the bullet. But when he came to, he was certain the person who'd saved him was my stepsister, Sophia — because her arm bore the mark of a sunlight burn. I tried to explain. I wept and begged him to believe me. Adrian only looked at me with cold, distant eyes. "Elena, stop trying to steal Sophia's credit." Sophia was cherished in his hands, while I was trampled repeatedly. Adrian sealed my bloodline power, stripping me from half-blood to nothing. Our engagement was annulled, and he watched, cold and unmoved, as I was sent in Sophia's place to marry the noble vampire everyone whispered about: that ancient, monstrous lord. Then came the day of his and Sophia's betrothal ceremony. The vampire hunters struck again. Stripped of my power, I threw myself in front of a young girl to shield her. Sophia, meanwhile, abandoned Adrian's side and fled behind the elders. Only then did Adrian understand: the one who had saved him in the sunlight had always been me. He went mad with it. He blocked my carriage, desperate to stop me from leaving, from marrying another man. But I reached out and took another man's hand. "Adrian," I said. "I don't love you anymore."

In the fifth year of loving Gabriel, he inherited his late brother’s title as Vampire Lord— along with his brother’s widow, Chloe, the former Blood Queen, and, by blood and law, my kin-by-covenant. Every time he returned from her chambers, Gabriel would hold me gently and whisper, “Isabella, Chloe is only my Chosen Consort. Once she carries and delivers the Scion of the Blazetooth Coven, I will bind myself to you through a Blood Bond.” He said it was the only condition his family demanded for him to ascend as Vampire Lord. During the six months after we returned to Blazetooth Coven, he answer her summons a hundred times. At first, once a month. Then once a week. And eventually, every single night. On the hundredth night I stayed awake waiting for him, Chloe finally conceived. The news arrived together with another announcement— Gabriel and Chloe would soon be bound by Blood. My son looked up at me, confused and innocent. “Mom… didn’t they say Dad would form a Blood Bond with the Blood Queen he loves? Why hasn’t he come to take us home yet?” “Because,” I said softly, brushing my hand through his hair, “the Blood Queen he loves was never your mother.” “But that’s all right,” I added. “I’ll take you home. Our own home.” What Gabriel never realized was this— as the only daughter of a reigning Vampire King, I had never cared for the title of Blood Queen of Blazetooth Coven at all.

I was born with a gift: the rare ability to bear powerful hybrid children for a vampire. I should have been cherished for it. Instead, my mother died young, her inheritance seized by my stepmother, my father's affection stolen by my stepsister. Only Ryan, heir to the vampire King, treated me with gentleness. When I was young, he fell for me at first sight and was secretly in love with me for two years. Later, at a gala, someone pushed me into a frozen lake. He was the one who pulled me out. He bent close, his eyes soft. “Marry me. Let me protect you.” I said yes without hesitation. Because no one had ever stood beside me so surely. I loved him with everything I had. When assassins struck at our wedding, I even stepped in front of the bullet meant for his heart. But after I dragged my weakened body through childbirth and gave him his child, he appeared before me with my stepsister Vicky in his arms. “You have no use to me anymore.” Ryan's eyes were cold and foreign. “The person I love has always been Vicky.” He had chosen me only for my bloodline, purer, better suited to produce an heir. Vicky smiled and drove the knife into my chest. Ryan stood to one side and watched me die. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the night Ryan proposed. Vicky was crying, begging to take my place and marry him instead. This time, I closed my eyes. “All right. I agree to the exchange.”

On the day of our wedding, my vampire husband confessed that he had a severe emotional disorder. He could barely understand other people's feelings and had no idea how to respond to them. Because I had already fallen in love with him, I chose to accept it. I believed that if I gave him enough time, he would eventually learn how to love me. The day the vampire hunters attacked, I threw myself in front of a bullet meant for him. A bullet struck my arm, and the pain nearly brought me to my knees. Adrian Blackwood only glanced down at the carpet. "Go get that wound taken care of." He frowned. "Don't get blood everywhere." Every vampire in our circles knew my husband didn't love me. I had become the punchline everyone whispered about. But I never blamed him. I truly believed he simply wasn't capable of loving anyone. Until I finally got pregnant and went to surprise him with the news, only to hear his human blood servant laughing on the other side of his office door. "She actually believes you have an emotional disorder?" To my shock, Adrian laughed too. His voice was so gentle I hardly recognized it. "She loves me that much. Of course she believes it." "If it weren't for an heir, I never would have married her." I stood outside the door and looked down at my arm. The scar from the silver bullet was still there, jagged and ugly. There was no point in sharing this surprise anymore. I would take my baby and disappear from his world for good.

"Evelyn Vane. You conspired with the Fallen. You tried to murder Tania Swann, future Lady of the Nightfall Court. Today, your blood wakes the Blood Mirror. We will rip out your memories. We will seal your fate." In the ancient catacombs, the Blood Mirror cast a dark red halo in the candlelight. My former fated mate lounged on his black velvet throne. He was Valerius Cross, the noble Lord of the Nightfall Court. Those eyes used to look at me with love. Now, they held only disgust. "The Blood Mirror will show every betrayal you've committed against this Court. Our entire kind will see the monster hiding under that pretty skin!" Tania clung softly to Valerius's broad chest. She traced lazy circles on his skin. A sweet, smug smile played on her lips. She was so sure the mirror would condemn me tonight. She was so sure I'd burn to ashes. The rune-carved silver chains bit deep into my flesh. Black smoke hissed from my burns. Even so, I spoke. My voice was broken. "Valerius, are you sure about this? Do you really want my blood to show you my memories? Once it starts... none of you can turn back."

The Blood Moon Feast was over. I was delivering the synthetic blood supplement I'd developed for the vampire lord, Evander, when he suddenly threw me to the ground. "Give it to me... I want you..." His crimson eyes burned with desperate hunger. My face flushed. I thought he finally understood the love I held for him. So I let him sink his fangs into my neck. I let him form a blood bond with me—a human. I wanted eternity with him. But when I woke up, Evander's eyes were filled with shock and regret. It wasn't love. Just an uncontrollable frenzy from his once-a-century bloodlust curse. And now it was too late. A human bonded to an ancient vampire suffers excruciating, soul-tearing pain. To forcibly break the bond? A death sentence. Evander chose to honor it. He owed me—I'd saved his life once in the human world. But everything changed when Odette died. His true love, waiting centuries to bond with him. When she learned of our union, she shattered—left the City of Eternal Night alone and walked into an ambush by rogue hunters. They burned her to ash. When his family brought back the only thing left—a moonstone pendant—Evander's hands closed around my throat. "This was your plan all along, wasn't it? You trapped me in this bond. Then you conspired with hunters to kill Odette. Go to hell and apologize to her yourself!" He ripped the bond from me, tearing away the very blood that kept me alive. A day and a night of agony as my organs ruptured. Then I died. When I opened my eyes again, I was back. Back to the night his curse erupted.

My sister, Cecilia, discovered by chance that she shared an uncanny resemblance to the Vampire Prince’s human wife, Isabella. She had been crushing on Alistair since forever. She was eager to take Isabella’s place. It was no secret that Alistair only saved Cecilia back then because she looked so much like Isabella. I tried to talk some sense into Isabella. It was bad enough that she refused to take my advice, but she came up with a plan to lure Isabella out and hire men as vampire hunters to ambush her. She would play the heroine, swooping in to save Isabella and catching Alistair’s attention. Catching on to her scheme, I knocked her unconscious and stopped her before her mission was set in motion. I implored her, desperate to get through to her. Alistair wasn’t some fictional hero from the romance novels on her shelf. He was the Vampire Prince who had lived for half a millennium. Her little antics wouldn’t escape his eye. Once Alistair discovered what she had done, she and the rest of our family would pay dearly. Cecilia, her head down and her eyes teary, told me she understood. That night, she drugged me and threw me into a dungeon filled with feral blood servants before locking the door. These creatures that failed to turn swarmed me. Their fangs tore into my throat, draining every last drop of my blood. Before I breathed my last, I looked through the bars and saw the resentment burning in Cecilia’s eyes. “Since you destroyed my dream, don’t blame me for ruining you, Nora.” When I opened my eyes, I was back to the day Cecilia hired men to abduct Isabella. This time, I wasn’t going to get in her way.

The blood-infused elixir I crafted won the top honor at the Nocturne's Gala, but my adopted sister stole it and claimed the credit. She thought she'd won glory, not realizing it was a vampire betrothal contract to the Prince Kaelan—rumored to be impotent, barbaric, and monstrous. When the proposal arrived, my archmage fiancé, to "protect" her, hastily bound himself to her with a blood-mark and took her to his bed. She returned, the fresh mark on her neck a badge of triumph. "Sister, your man is mine now. You turn twenty-five in three days. If no one claims you, the Matchmaking Registry will toss you to some aging, wife-beating rogue mercenary..." She was wrong. I always had a choice. I walked to my parents, who were scrambling to clean up her mess, and declared calmly. "If she refuses to marry Kaelan Nocturne, then I will."

I was Vampire Lord Bastian’s exclusive blood thrall. My blood was an addiction he just couldn't kick. But six years ago, an accidental blood pact left me pregnant. Yet, he never once allowed our half-blood son, Liam, to call him "Dad." After he blew off Liam’s birthday—again—for his pureblood companion Ophelia, I severed the pact. I took my son and walked out of his immortal life for good. The ever-so-elegant ancient vampire finally snapped. He tore into my empty lab, roaring, demanding to know where Liam and I had gone. But this time, neither Liam nor I would ever look back.

When my Prince shattered our Eternal Blood Vow for the ninety-ninth time, I dragged my drained, broken body to the Tribunal of Vows. "I am here to request the dissolution of my Eternal Blood Vow with the Prince of the Kindred." Ten minutes later, Damien stormed in with Isabella in tow. The Prince of the Kindred strode toward me, his hand shooting out to clamp around my neck before he slammed me against a cold marble pillar. "You'd go so far as to dissolve our vow just because you're jealous of Isabella's promotion? Has the bloodlust driven you completely insane?" My mother Eleanor's voice echoed icily through our bond. "Forging lab results to play the victim, all for his attention. You've always been so deceitful." Tears of blood welled in Isabella's eyes as she tugged on Damien's arm. "I'm so sorry, Seraphina. I never should have accepted this position. Please, stop putting yourself—and the Prince—through this!" I wiped away the tears of blood seeping from my eyes and faced the tribunal official once more. "I no longer have the protection of a clan. So that I may turn to ash in three days, please help me complete the dissolution ceremony."