The Heron Prince
The Demon Door Series Book 2
Genre: Fantasy
Tropes: Epic Fantasy, Adventure, Sword & Sorcery, Outcast/Reluctant Hero, Damsel in Distress Turns Warrior, Morally Grey Characters, Slow Burn, Portal, Royal Intrigue, Dark and Ancient Magic, Magic Book
Heat: Open Door, Medium/High Spice
The Demon Door can be opened…but the price is deadly.
Prince Rhuun has found acceptance among the humans on Mistra, something he could never have in the demon realm of Eriis, not even as heir to its throne. What’s more, he has even found love with the prickly, passionate heiress, Lelet va’Everly.
The idyll can’t last. The prince has enemies who are after more than his throne. They are out for his blood…which holds the key to unsealing The Door between the two worlds, and the demons want in. When Rhuun is lured into a trap on Eriis, Lelet has no choice but to turn to a motley group of exiles, children, and madmen to help save him.
Lelet soon discovers that, like all things, rescuing the prince comes with a price. The secrets in Rhuun’s blood may be worth killing for, but are they worth dying for?
Excerpt
RHUUN, THE DEMON prince and heir to the High Seat of Eriis, his world’s lone tourist in the human world of Mistra, was having an exceptionally good day. No one had set any part of him on fire for months, and his human companion (Lover? Friend? Yes, he thought she was his friend) Lelet observed that his scars seemed to be fading.
“Doubt it,” he replied. “I’ve had them so long I’d be surprised if they went away in just a few months.” But he was happy to have her continue her inspection.
“I can tell,” she said. “The, um, handprint? I can barely see it now.”
The handprint she referred to had been seared onto his chest by the companion, friend, and lover previous to Lelet. Aelle had been annoyed with him that afternoon, although, as he recalled, that was hardly unusual. And of course she never knew he could feel the fire she carried in her hands, because he never told her. He wondered if they might have walked different paths if he’d been brave enough to let her know about his simple, fundamental failing—that unlike everyone else, unlike she herself, he could feel pain—or if it wouldn’t have mattered at all. Either way, she left him with a mark he assumed he’d carry forever.
He rarely thought of Aelle since he’d fallen into Mistra, and he found himself thinking less of his home city, family, and friends as the cool green days went by.
He and Lelet started the morning making more sex, and that was unlike his experiences with Aelle as well (Making? Surely not. Doing the sex? Perhaps that was it). There was nothing to guard against; no pain alongside the pleasure they took in each other. He was slowly coming to trust that it could always be that way. He told himself over and over, he’d have to go home, and soon. Even as he and Lelet wandered through their days, he knew that back on Eriis, Ilaan was working on a charm to open The Door and bring him home. But while he had once hoped his friend would hurry, now he found that ‘soon’ was turning into ‘eventually’ and sometimes even ‘never.’
For the moment, at least, he was more than content to drift along, and look at the river, and eat apples and bread, and stop (as often as possible) for sex having.
“We are going to have to talk about protection,” she told him. The sun was just up and she lay with her head on his shoulder, looking up at the bottom of the cart—it had rained the night before and it was his idea to use the cart as a sort of roof. It worked very nicely. But she looked worried and he tried to calm her.
“You know I’ll protect you. I’ve promised you. What are you afraid of?”
She smiled but still looked concerned. “I don’t mean like that, I know you will. I mean we’ve been joining. A lot. And it’ll no longer be safe for me soon—probably taking some chances I shouldn’t right now.”
He loved that she called it joining, as that was what his people called it and it showed she paid attention, but he still had no idea what she meant. “Safe? From me?” Was she worried he might hurt her somehow? She shouldn’t be, he’d been nothing but careful of her fragile human body.
“No, not exactly. It’s just we don’t want something to happen accidentally.” She put a peculiar emphasis on the final word.
So she was afraid of having an accident? While they were joining? She’d never been coy or shy before. “A sex-having accident?”
She made a growling noise. “Are you not understanding me on purpose? I mean we can’t take the chance of me getting pregnant. Hasn’t that crossed your mind?”
“No, of course not.” What did she take him for? He found himself becoming offended. “Do you really think I’d do that to you now? With nothing formal between us? Without even asking?”
Now he could see she was becoming offended. “I was thinking we had something between us.” She paused and rubbed her forehead, then rolled onto her stomach and propped herself onto her elbows. “Let’s make sure we’re talking about the same thing. I’m talking about having a baby. About me accidentally getting pregnant. That word means the same thing over on Eriis?” He agreed that it did. “A human woman can get pregnant about three weeks out of the month. Give or take. No contract required. Now you.”
“An Eriisai woman, a demon woman, can always catch the spark,” he told her. “And she and her partner decide together, and it is considered an important event. So, a couple would make their choice, and he would give her the spark, and she would catch it. It is an occasion to be celebrated.”
“Catch the spark,” she repeated. “So you decide, whenever you are with a woman, whether or not to give her the spark?”
This was becoming uncomfortable, making the process, which was quite formal, sound base. People didn’t talk about things like this. Aelle brought it up every once in a great while when she wanted to provoke him, but never with anything other than the idea it was an event which may or may not happen in some far distant future. And of course, with his deformities and disabilities, he doubted she’d ever agree to it anyway, should he ask. Which, of course, he never would. “I want to say it’s not as simple as that, but I suppose it is. It would be an unforgivable violation for me to give you the spark without your consent.”
“Sweetheart, it’s very different here.” He liked when she called him that. “Men and women have almost no control over the result of sex. We can do some things afterwards to stop it from progressing, and there are things you can do during, but if two people have sex, well, it can result in a child no matter if they want it to or not.”
What People Are Saying
Full Series
Two Worlds. One Love. A Door That Should Never Have Been Opened.
In a universe split by magic and shadow, a hidden Door connects two realms: the war-scorched demon world of Eriis, and the peaceful, myth-drenched lands of Mistra. For centuries, the Door remained sealed—its existence dismissed as legend on one side and guarded with blood and fire on the other.
But when Prince Rhuun, born of both worlds and belonging to neither, is forced through the Door, fate ignites a chain of events that will challenge empires and awaken ancient hungers. On Mistra, Rhuun finds an unlikely ally—and irresistible enemy—in Lelet va’Everly, a sharp-tongued heiress who never believed in demons until one landed on her doorstep.
As forbidden love grows between them, the fragile barrier between worlds begins to crack. Old enemies rise. Secrets burn. And betrayal, both human and demon, may cost them everything.
Magic built the Door.
Love opened it.
But some Doors were never meant to be breached.
