Writheblood Ruins Novels & Stories

Back in my room, I pulled a folded piece of parchment from my dress. It was the exploration permit I’d just secured for the Aethel Ruins. The Aethel Ruins—the legendary burial grounds of the ancient vampire dynasties. Countless crystals of power lay buried there, and it was my only chance to find the strength to restore the Vance family name on my own. In my last life, I’d pinned all my hopes on Mortlock, never thinking to rely on myself. How foolish I was. I unfolded the permit. The date was clear: in seven days, I would be free of this prison.

work. I tried to pivot, to shield Rita with my back, but the butt of a tactical rifle connected with the base of my skull. The world didn't go black immediately; it dissolved into a sickening, swirling gray. I felt Rita being torn from my grip, her scream the last thing I heard before the floor rose up to meet me. I woke up to the smell of ozone and rust. I tried to stretch, but my knuckles hit cold, unforgiving metal. My knees hit the same. I was upright, pinned in a space so narrow I couldn't even draw a full breath. It was a vertical metal box, a coffin for the living, standing on end.

“Be warned.” This doesn’t just seduce you. It ruins you. For anyone else. For any future. For the life you thought you wanted. And once you’re ruined… there’s no going back.

Silver flames burned along the walls without heat, casting eerie light across hundreds of kneeling figures below. Hollows. Thousands of them. Their heads bowed in absolute silence. And at the center of it all. me. No. Her. The first Queen of Ruin sat upon a throne of obsidian, draped in dark armor lined with glowing cracks. A silver crown rested upon her head like it belonged there. Like it had never belonged anywhere else. Her face slowly lifted. And I was staring at myself. Same eyes. Same face. Only colder. Older. Broken in ways I couldn’t understand.

Fresh blood streaks downward in slow rivers, threading itself into the old runes like veins unwilling to die. The vent above gapes like a wound ripped too wide, and the ruined hinge hangs by a single twisted shard of metal. The shard, the same blood-slick blade I pried free from my own hand, stays tucked at my ribs, warm and humming against my cracked skin. I can feel it pulse in time with my heart, or maybe it’s the other way around. The walls don’t just crack; they bleed. Tiny trickles of black-red sludge seep from the mortar between stones, trailing like tears. It’s almost as if the Pit knows something worse than it is coming, and it’s afraid.

A CROWN OF FIRE Temple Ruins—Morning After the Ambush The dawn after the ambush rose blood-red, painting the temple ruins in streaks of gold and crimson. No smoke coiled from broken braziers. The snow beneath the ancient arches had turned pink with battle. The wind whispered through the stone like a voice retelling what had happened here.

When I woke up again, I was lying in a hospital. The smell of dirt and blood that lingered before I passed out was gone. It was replaced by the familiar and comforting scent of disinfectant. My body was wrapped in bandages, especially my right hand. It was completely bundled up from my upper arm right down to my fingertips. I resembled a mummy. I had no idea how long I'd been trapped under that cupboard. I only felt an inexplicable sense of fear creeping over me. I was terrified of the aftermath should my hand be permanently damaged.

The hollow became their crucible. Mist clung to the broken stone like breath held too long, and the air was thick with the scent of damp roots and the faint metallic tang of spent magic. Morning light filtered in through jagged holes in the collapsed ceiling, falling in pale shafts across the mossy floor. The ruin seemed to watch them—an ancient place, old enough to remember witchfire, wolf blood, and vampire shadow. Old enough to know they were remaking the world inside it.

I muttered the words under my breath as I touched my face with a hand. It'd been over seven years since I was involved in that fire accident, however the burn had scarred my face. I tilted my face to the side to get a better look at the scar. It made my skin appear like a crumpled piece of paper. I'd tried to hide the scar by wearing a make-up, but it was still visible as though I did nothing. “Argh!” I yelled, and smashed the mirror on the tiled floor. It shattered. I leaned my back against the wall and buried my face in my palms as I began to sob. Before long, my mother stormed into my room.

"I'm so sorry." Because I'd failed already, and I had no idea how to fix this. No idea how to survive this. I just knew that Damien Cross had broken me. And I didn't know if I'd ever be whole again. Morgan POV Matured Audience The world had narrowed to the space between his sheets, to the scent of his skin and the crushing weight of a need so profound I felt like dying. I was on all fours, my body bowed and trembling. The air was cold on my heated skin, but the fire he stoked within me was an inferno.