“You disappoint me,” I roared across the throne room. “One woman. One mark. One year. If she isn’t sacrificed, I die...yet every demon I send returns empty handed?”Each year my life is bought with a soul: a woman most craved by men, her name listed by prophecy on the dark ledger. Her death feeds my crown. This year, no one could find the right one, the marked one. With the last of my year burning away, I descended to the mortal city myself.I didn’t know it was her when I touched her. I only knew the stage belonged to her: Elara Moon, the Midnight Ballerina, body of silk and storm, dancing like a prayer that dared the night to answer. One reckless night, her breath, my hands, heat that should have meant nothing, and then I saw it: the brand beneath her skin.She is the sacrifice.I should carve her soul and live. Instead, desire coils into something worse: need. I start lying to Hell, killing my own shadows, guarding the very woman meant to keep me alive by dying.To kill her is survival.To keep her is treason.To love her may end my throne...and me.I am Draven Thorn, Devil on the throne. One marked woman. One year. For the first time in centuries, I want the woman more than the crown.