In the Shadow Realm, beings of the Light and the Darkness alike walk the marble-paved streets of Echelon, a city hidden from human eyes and ears where Mystics of every class are free to unmask and live as they please. 

The city's heart beats like a heavy metal drum line and debauchery flows through its veins like blood. Music, sex, and drugs overflow from the numerous clubs and into the streets at most hours. 

Malfizan, the powerful son of a desire demon and a minor goddess, serves both the court and Echelon's shady underbelly as the not-so-secret head of the city's most famous crime syndicate. Malfizan commands a hoard of demons and demi-gods who assist him in terrorizing human kind in the name of punishing them for evil done unto the Mystics. 

He finds his thrilling life halted, suddenly, when Alchimia Nethi moves into the Palace and begins training to take over the city when her mother's reign ends in a few short decades. As fledgling Mystics centuries before, the pair had been class rivals. 

Now, faced with the burden of befriending his least favorite enchantress in order to gain her trust and earn permission to resume normal activities, Mal struggles to hide the call he feels deep within his soul to reveal to Chimi that the Gods have declared her to be his soul bond and are pressing him to push for a marriage. 

The Demon God's Choice

I was *so close* to allowing Nero's capable hands to whisk me away to an imaginary land where I was just a girl in a dress dancing at a ball.
But just as the illusion was about to encircle me and give me a moment of peace, the fox demon spun me around and I saw Mal. For a second, I wanted to go to ...

One: Mal

Two: Chimia

Three: Mal

Four: Chimia

Five: Mal

Six: Chimia

Seven: Mal

Eight: Chimia

Nine: Mal

Ten: Chimia

Eleven: Mal

Twelve: Chimia

Thirteen: Mal

Fourteen: Chimia

Fifteen: Mal

Sixteen: Chimia

Seventeen: Mal

Eighteen: Chimia

Nineteen: Mal

Twenty: Chimia

Twenty-One: Mal

Twenty-Two: Chimia

Twenty-Three: Mal

Twenty-Four: Chimia

Twenty-Five: Mal

Twenty-Six: Chimia

Twenty-Seven: Mal

Twenty-Eight: Chimia

Twenty-Nine: Mal

Thirty: Chimia

Thirty-One: Mal

Thirty-Two: Chimia

Thirty-Three: Mal

Thirty-Four: Chimia