Chapter 1—The Demon

Xorgor

Two naked succubi danced against each other on the table in front of me, their hands gliding around the other’s ass and breasts, groping, biting, teasing. I stared at them emptily with a couple of other demons who were at The Inferno for royal duties.

These demons sure as hell didn’t know what the fuck that meant. They hadn’t been able to take their gazes off the succubi all night. We hadn’t even spoken a sentence about what would happen when the current demon queen, Queen Agool, stepped down from her throne.

I sipped from a glass of wine and sat back on the maroon velvet couch. I didn’t even know why I had come. I would never inherit the throne, and I had better things to do than watch some girls touch each other. Plus, I’d had plans at the Dead Candle Tavern forty minutes ago.

“Relax,” my brother, Erthrol, said to me. He sat on the couch next to me, gaze glazed over with lust and a smirk on his pretty-boy face.

“Live a little, Xorgor,” some demon kid who supposedly had royal blood, Jaroth, said. Apparently, he was dating this human from a couple of towns over, but he couldn’t keep his hands off these girls tonight. “We got all these beautiful women here for us.”

“No,” I growled.

“Bella!” Erthrol beckoned one of the succubi to come forward. 

She sauntered over to us, swaying her hips back and forth, then sat with her bare ass on the table and her legs spread to give him a view. 

Erthrol stared longingly at her dripping pussy, then nodded to me. “Help my brother relax.”

For a brief moment, Bella tensed. Then, as if she hadn’t reacted at all, she stood back up and walked around the back of the couch. She dragged her manicured fingers across my brother’s chest, leaned down, and whispered something along the lines of, “But I want you,” into his ear.

His eyes darkened with lust, and Erthrol grabbed the woman’s chin and tugged her into a long kiss. He looked over at me and chuckled. “We can share her, Xorgor. Hmm?” 

So much for a caring brother. He didn’t give a damn.

I averted my gaze and glared at the wall to my left. I didn’t know why the fuck I came here to these unimportant meetings. We never talked about our duties, and it wasn’t like anyone expected me—the oldest son—to inherit any throne. An ugly bastard like me could never rule.

Nobody would take an incubus who didn’t get any seriously.

Deciding that this wasn’t worth my time anymore, I stood. When nobody even spared a glance at me, I walked to the exit of this club and stepped out into the darkness of Durnbone. After using magic to cloak myself, I headed toward the Dead Candle Tavern without being noticed. I didn’t want to deal with the staring, the gawking, the looks of disgust on everyone’s face when they saw how ugly I was, especially for an incubus.

When a group of werewolves opened the door to the Dead Candle Tavern, I slipped into the building, glanced toward the bar, and spotted a human barkeep with huge blue eyes and light-brown hair that fell just past her shoulders.

She was here.

I walked to the bar and took my usual empty seat at the far end. Dishes were stacked in front of me, piles of silverware next to them. I glided my thumb across my black, red, and gold family ring, watching her pour drinks for a group of succubi.

Unlike the other bartenders, she had tied the strings of her blouse tightly together, completely concealing her chest. Matter of fact, most of her body was clothed, to the point where I doubted she made any tips from the rowdy animals who came here.

She tucked some hair behind her ear and smiled at a fae couple. With my body invisible, I sat there all night, watching her pour drinks and talk innocently with the crowd. She didn’t know who I was, nor would she ever find out.

No fucking way would I ever let her see me as the monster I was.

A grotesque devil lurking in the shadows.

An unwanted spawn of Satan.

An ugly, evil, disgusting man who wanted the most beautiful woman in Durnbone.

What would she think of me?

A vampire at the end of the bar leaned forward and curled his finger around a strand of her hair, tugging on it. She tensed and lightly pulled away, but kept that tight smile on her face. He beckoned her to come closer.

After nervously furrowing her brow, she shook her head. But he grabbed her wrist and pulled her closer anyway, whispering something into her ear. She gulped and smiled tensely again, as if she didn’t want to piss him off.

“We’d like another!” one of the fae called to her.

As if she hadn’t liked the attention from the vampire, she hurried over to the couple. The vampire stood up and walked to the restrooms in the back. I shot up from my seat and followed after him, fury rushing through me.

In the restroom, the vampire stood with his cock in his hand, pissing into a urinal. I slammed the door and locked it behind me, uncloaking my body. After shaking the last bit of piss out of his dick, he stuffed himself back into his pants. 

“Listen, buddy, you don’t want to fuck with me—” When he glanced over at me, his eyes widened. “Fucking hell.”

I took a step toward him, hands balled into fists by my sides.

“Y-you’re him,” he muttered, moving backward and pressing his ass against the urinal. “You’re the demon everyone talks about in D-Durnbone. Look, I don’t know what I did to you, but I don’t want trouble. I’ll get the fuck out of here. I’ll leave town. I’ll do—”

Before he could finish his sentence, I snatched his wrists with a tentacle-like black appendage that extended from the muscles in my back whenever I was aroused—emotionally, physically, or sexually—pulled him into the air so we were face-to-face, and held his wrists against the wall. He breathed raggedly, his chest rising and falling quickly.

“Do you have fun, making women uncomfortable?” I asked, clutching his jaw in my hand.

“N-no,” he stuttered. “Of course n-not.”

“And the barkeep?” I asked, gripping his chin harder and harder by the second. My talons sank into his cheek, becoming drenched in his vampire blood. “You sure liked making her uncomfortable.”

“I-I just wanted her to loosen up a bit,” he said. “She’s so uptight.”

“What’s it with people like you wanting others to loosen up?” I growled.

“I won’t do it again.” A bead of sweat dripped down his forehead. “I-I promise.”

“No, you won’t.” I extended another black appendage from my back and aimed it at this vampire’s chest.

He shook his head and begged—pleaded—with me to let him down, set him free, and promised me that he wouldn’t do any shit like that. But I didn’t trust a man like him not to flirt with the woman I liked again.

I thrust my appendage straight into his chest, wrapped it around his cold heart, and tore it out of his body. Blood rolled down my appendage as his heart beat weakly against it. I tightened myself around it and watched as it burst in an explosion of blood and guts.

The vampire’s corpse became dead weight, so I let him drop onto the urinal. I crouched in front of him and looked into his empty eyes. “You won’t get a chance to touch her again. She’s mine.”