Lately, I’ve been thinking about Demon!Nikolai.
The age old trope of being part of a village that owes its peace and prosperity to a deal made with the demons of the mountain hundreds of years ago, every decade or two one of them will come down and pluck up a little spouse to take home with them. Some will stay in the village for years to scout and gather information before making their choice. Others throw the first pretty thing they see over their shoulder and whistle their way back to the mountain.
Nikolai has visited many times, always disguised, to watch and judge the lambs of the village. And you’re perfect. A red leather cord laced around your neck in a bow, showing that you’re ripe for the taking. Layered, practical cotton dress that professes your innocence. You are not favored by your peers— instead spending much of your time alone with the livestock. Your Sundays are spent sitting under a tree, scribbling in a little book, a chicken or a goat kid snoozing away with its head rested on your thigh.
It’s a surprise to everyone, most of all you, when Nikolai appears before the village, towering, and selects you for his bride. You’re knock kneed and shaking as he guides you away with a hand at the nape of your neck, clawed fingers fiddling with the little leather cord— switched out for black in the wake of your engagement.
He has to add a bell to you, you live so quietly in his temple on the mountain, a little ribbon in your ankle with the tinkling piece of pewter on display. He goes around the place, coming to the courtyard and often hearing the little jingling grow further as you slip away. He enjoys the coyness of the chase, but he worries you may actually fear him.
But when he asks your village elder about you, she excitedly opens a chest— she has many trinkets and gifts from her community, alongside them are the drawings of the village children. She cards through the parchment until she finds what she wants— explaining that at a young age, all of the children are taught about the demons of the mountain, and the traditional marriage between them and the villagers. She proudly produces your drawing from back in your school days, a crude little figure in a dress representing you holding hands with a two-horned beast with tusks, surrounded by hearts, flowers, and scribbly animals.