Empire of the Vampire (Empire of the Vampire, #1)

by Jay Kristoff

War doesn’t teach you to be a killer,’ he told me once. ‘It’s just a key that opens our door. There’s a beast in all men’s blood, Gabriel. You can starve him. Cage him. Curse him. But in the end, you pay the beast his due, or he takes his due from you.’

“The graveyards of the world are full of fools who thought of fear as anything but a friend.”

The historian frowned. “What kind of hero are you?” Gabriel laughed, shaking his head. “Who the fuck told you I was a hero?”

“And in sight of God and his Seven Martyrs, I do here vow; Let the dark know my name and despair. So long as it burns, I am the flame. So long as it bleeds, I am the blade. So long as it sins, I am the saint. “And I am silver.

As wealthy as a priest after the collection plate has been passed around, and as strange as the idea that the creator of heaven and earth needs the money in the first place.

What tidings, little lords?’ Greyhand asked. ‘What troubles?’ “The boldest rat, a fat fellow with a missing ear, chittered angrily. Greyhand nodded in sympathy, like an old friend griping over a mug of mulled wine. “‘A sad tale. We shall mend it presently.’

Through all my years in San Michon, all the blood and sweat and darkling roads I walked, I learned one of my greatest lessons sitting in that Library with those girls in the still of the night. “A life without books is a life not lived.

You know what most men don’t do enough of?” “Tell me, Silversaint.” “They don’t shut the fuck up. They don’t just sit and listen. It’s in silence we know ourselves, vampire. It’s in stillness we hear the questions that truly matter,

‘Are the sons of San Michon not faithful servants of the Lord most high?’ “‘Servant?’ I scowled, blood-red. ‘Do I look a man on his fucking knees to you?’

I said not a word. I’d none in me for horror like this.

That’s the horrifying part—the only thing holding some folk back from the worst atrocities they can imagine is the fear they might not get away with it.

There is no God that shall save thee from me,’ she vowed. ‘I am a Prince of Forever, and forever shall I hunt thee. All thou hast, shall I take. All thou art, shall I unmake. And in the end, I shall have thee on thy knees, frailblood. I shall taste thee unto dying.’

Your past is stone, but your future is clay. And you decide the shape of the life you’ll make.’

“There’s no sin so dangerous as the sin that is chosen. “No sin so glorious as the sin that is shared.

And if your God would name my love a sin, then he’s no God I know.’

“And I knew the color of bliss then. And its color was red.

“Your voice will never feel so tiny as when you’re screaming at God,” he whispered.

the only heaven I’ve found in all this hell was in the people I loved. Friends. Famille.

You’re a good man, Gabriel de León.’ “‘I’m a bastard is what I am. I’m just your kind of bastard.’

Tonight you sleep in hell, de León,’ he hissed. “‘This is hell, Danton,’ I smiled. ‘And the devil loves his own.’

“You know, you never answered my question, Chastain.” “And what question was that, de León?” “When your dark mother and pale mistress set you this task … did you think she was locking me in here with you, or you in here with me?”

Gabriel bared his fangs, teardrop scars twisting on his cheek, inhaling deeply of the red smoke rising from the vampire’s skin. “I told you I’d make you fucking scream, leech,” he spat.