Page 3 of Drawn to the Demon Duke (Sombra Demons)

SUMMONED

HAURES

“ T he ash farmers are behind on their quota of grain this cycle.”

Caim, head of the Dunkel village, is staring down his long nose at Orias, golden eyes blazing at the male with the twisted horn as he accuses him of reneging on a trade deal.

Orias might have a twisted horn, but it’s the mark of a battle against a lesser demon that he won. If a challenge broke out between the two village leaders, I’d lay my coin down that Orias would use his slimmer build to his advantage, barreling into Caim horn-first, then using

After all, that’s what he did when a rogue soldier targeted an unmated demoness in Chaleur.

Orias protected his villager, as any demon in power ought to, and he defeated Yuul.

I’m glad he did. If not, I would’ve had the soldier brought in front of my throne and made an example of to the rest of my realm.

Mates are a sacred thing. The gods grant us forever to find our one true mate, but should we decide to accept any demoness as our lifelong partner, a Sombra demon can—so long as the demoness accepts a male’s essence and offers hers—and the mate promise—in return.

Taking a female because you’ve tired of waiting?

There’s a reason some of my people will walk into the shadows at the edge of Sombra, never to return, when the long wait to discover their mate leads them to choose an end to their existence over continued loneliness.

Allowing the shadows to take them is the only option for an honorable male.

For a dishonorable male? Death is the only outcome.

But a quarrel over a trade between two local villages? Alas, that is one of the many tedious arguments brought to my castle in Mavro, dropped in my lap as I lean back into my throne, legs spread, crystal crown weighting more heavily at times like these than others.

I am Haures. Duke of Sombra, Lord of the Shadows, Rule of the Flames.

And today?

I am Haures, arbitrator of silly little disagreements as I grit my teeth, silently gnashing my tusks as Orias jabs Caim in his unmarked chest.

Ah. That would explain it. Orias’s silvery ink stands out against his solid red form; he has four characters etched into his chest, J-A-H-I , for his bonded mate.

Caim, on the other claw, is without a demon to call his own, and his aggressive posturing has more to do with jealousy than his pristine horns.

I stay silent, letting the other village leader speak.

“That’s only because there is a clan of yillurim that are nesting in the southern fields,” Orias retorts.

“So send a hunter to clear the fields.”

“Our hunters are protecting Chaleur from a huigitz.”

Caim sniffs. “Huigitz are easily tamed. Send a pair of hunters after the beast, and leave the rest to root out the yillurim.”

“We’ve lost three of our best hunters to the shadows and the predator. Relying on a pair would be needless death.”

“Dunkel needs its grain.”

Orias jabs Caim again. “Then Dunkel can tend to the ash fields.”

“In Chaleur?” Caim turns, facing me. “Your grace, please grant us your wisdom. Should my people have to do the work of his farmers? Or should they…”

Though I’ve dealt with far more tiresome meetings than this one during my two thousand years on the throne, Caim’s voice becomes a whisper in my ears as a pounding sound replaces it. My heart… it thrums. Beat beat, beat beat . My pulse thuds. My claws curl.

Snap .

Tug .

Yank .

I rise up to my feet.

Though duke I may be, I am even more powerful for the gift I was born with. As though my mother somehow sacrificed any shadows I was meant to have for a unique gift, I am the only existing bondmaster in all of Sombra.

I can sense bonds. I can recognize them before they exist, and in rare situations, I can sever them.

The latter is how I took the throne after Yelios abandoned it all those years ago.

The demons of that age might’ve been terrified of my colorless appearance, going so far as to throw me to the shadows and hope they would swallow me whole, that was nothing compared to the understanding that I could rip their one true mate from them should I choose to.

So the bondmaster became duke, because even terrified demons would rebel should I proclaim myself king.

I still wear the crown. I still claim the throne.

I still lord over Sombra from the capital I built from scratch in Mavro…

and, despite how hard I’ve worked to ignore the bonds existing around me, there are times when the magic plucks at my shadowless skin.

It does so now, but in a way I’ve never known before. At least, not to this extreme.

Once I followed the doppelseers’ lead and agreed to go for the throne, I developed a thin bond with every one of my people. This? They are echoes compared to the strength of the bond pulling me forward.

Because this bond?

It’s mine .

At last, the one true mate foreseen by the powerful twin seers is calling me to her.

And I must answer.

As a bondmaster, I can travel to any of my subjects in need. Thankfully, the ordinary demon in Sombra has no idea that it is possible to summon their duke to their side. Only Damien and Lucian do it frequently, while a handful of high-ranking clan leaders have that honor.

If I need to travel without relying on a bond, I have Sammael at the ready to use his mage abilities to rip open a portal.

That’s why, as the strange, glowing portal appears in my throne room, Glaine—the head of my guard, and one of two soldiers flanking my throne during my meetings with my subjects—immediately barks at Sammael for disrupting the meet.

But it wasn’t Sammael conjuring the portal.

It was the matefinder spell.

Two thousand years ago, the doppelseers told me that my fate was to bond with a mortal female from the legendary human world. However, that wasn’t the only prophecy they shared with me when they suggested I succeed Yelios…

A child born of two worlds,

belonging in both, belonging to none,

will bring with them rain,

and the fires of Sombra will be forever done.

That day, when I initially learned of Sombra’s fate one day being placed at the feet of a half-demon, half-human spawn, the first law was born.

Once I was Duke Haures, I decreed that there would be no contact with the mortals in their realm.

The only exception, of course, would be if the mortal was a Sombra demon’s mate calling them.

Otherwise, our worlds must be kept separate to save the doppelseers’ prophecy from coming to pass before we were ready.

As ruler of Sombra, I can sense it when any of my people go off-plane; as a bondmaster, I can tell when it’s due to a mate-induced summoning.

The humans wouldn’t be able to summon a demon mate without the matefinder spell, but since Fate said that a mortal female would be mine, I agreed with Lucian that we should eventually send the matefinder spell across the veil.

For two thousand years, we waited. Over the centuries, six different grimoires were bound and passed through a portal into the human world; Damien could sense when another was nothing but dust or ash or debris, leading us to create another so that only one Grimoire du Sombra was on Earth at any given time.

But though we’ve bound six of the books, there has never been a female mortal who has summed a Sombran demon to be her mate.

Is that why the legend of the human female has grown? Perhaps. My demons have been satisfied over the centuries, finding their mates in demonesses from nearby realms such as Brille Rouge and Soleil, but I know that some wonder if the mythical human mate might some day summon him .

I knew my fate was to bond one of the creatures to me. I just never expected that I’d be the first . If Lucian and Damien expected as such, I’d hope they would’ve warned me, but it doesn’t matter.

Leaving the bickering village leaders, my stunned guards, and my curious mage behind, I stepped through the portal in my throne room, exiting out into a world of light, of sweetness, of ice , the complete absence of fire.

A shiver runs through me as I land on a dusty sigil scrawled on a solid floor.

In my castle, I keep crystal tiles beneath our feet to unsettle my visitors.

Sombra is a world of fire and ash, but Mavro itself is much cooler, with shades of blue—the same color as my strange bondmaster eyes—coloring everything, including my colorless skin.

Here? The air is a breeze. Taking a breath is like burning my lungs in a way quite different from the fire pits in Sombra.

I’m used to have mage-powered orbs providing illumination in my castle. Here? The light is harsh and yellow, but it’s easy to see the wee creature looking up at me in… awe. Yes. Smart human. You should be in awe of Duke Haures.

“Are you my female?” I ask her. “My mate? Tilt your chin, human. Let me see you.”

She just gawks.

I am used to that. In my entire existence, I haven’t seen another demon such as I. All of the Sombran demons have red skin and black shadows; I have neither. But as the legend of Duke Haures grew, the gawking became worried glimpses between bowing before their liege.

My human does not bow. She stares at me as though she does not understand a word of Sombra.

But of course she doesn’t. She must only know human—until I make a conscious decision to accept this obvious bond between us. Only then would she learn about her male, just as I’ll know all about my mate.

I have no shadows. I have no true essence, either. I was born an abomination, and only the doppelseers assuring me that my being a bondmaster would overcome all that I lack, allowing me to claim my mate instantly without the gods interference led me to hope that, one day, I should find my female.

And now I have.

She is a queer creature. So small. Put beside me, she would barely reach my unmarked chest. No horns to protect her brow.

Her skin is pale; not so colorless as I am, but at least she has a reddish tint that I am missing.

And her eyes… they are absolutely dim. I might not have any shadows, but this female… she doesn’t have any light.

She is mortal. I don’t think I understood what that meant until this very moment. She is mortal, and easily eliminated.

Unless I take her.

Unless I protect her.

Unless I keep her safe the only way I can until she is ready to also accept her male on the other end of our bond.

And the only way I can do that? Is with a skill that my top mage possesses.

I’ve relied on the first law to keep the prophecy at bay and my subjects out of another needless war like those Queen Alana and King Yelios wages against other realms. As long as I don’t claim the female as my mate straight away, I can use the first law—that no human should know of Sombra without consequences—to banish her right where no demon can threaten my female before she is made immortal.

The way she gawked in surprise… I don’t believe that she is happy to have such a beast as her male.

It will take wooing and time to convince her that she will be my forever mate, and with their being factions of Sombra who would do anything to see Duke Haures relieved of the crystal crown… I can’t risk her.

I won’t risk her.

Promising my female that I will return for her—though she might not be as satisfied as I am with that vow—I use my brand of magic to reopen the summoning portal, placing the other end in my throne room. Stepping inside, I reappear moments after I left.

I’ve always been led to believe that time runs differently between certain realms. A trip to Soleil might not, but Earth is such a different realm from Sombra, it could’ve been mere moments, or it could’ve been entire cycles that passed.

Orias and Caim are still in the throne room, though their petty argument has been forgotten for the moment. Glaine and Sammael are muttering darkly to each other while Firn is pacing anxiously behind my throne as I approach it.

I point a claw at Glaine. “Send a small battalion of soldiers to Chaleur to eliminate the huigitz plaguing their village. Firn? Accompany Caim to Dunkel to assist in clearing out the yillurim. The grains should grow before the next gold moon. The trade bargain will resume then.”

Orias and Caim both bow their heads in the way I had missed from my wee human female.

Firn hurries out from behind the throne, moving toward Caim.

Glaine hesitates, staying by Sammael’s side.

I meet the guard’s green gaze.

He nods solemnly. “Yes, your grace. Right away.”

As I expected.

I turn on Sammael. “My mage. Start conjuring. I require a length of charmed chains.”

“My lord?” He glances around the throne room. It emptied quite quickly once I mentioned the chains, each of the other four turning to shadow and escaping through the cuts in the ceiling that, shadowless as I am, I’ve never used. “Where is the prisoner?”

My lips curve around my tusks, a mockery of an amused smile. “She is in the human realm,” I tell my mage. “And we will both be going to retrieve her.”