Another quiet laugh blows from his nose, and his fingers curl around the waist of my pants as he jerks me forward with a playful yank, forcing our bodies flush. “What do you think, angel?” His lips make another feather-light pass over my skin as I fight back a moan.
My entire body is on fire, burning alive, and I can’t even form words as he releases me and takes a step backward.“Alright then,” he purrs as a filthy smile crosses his lips. “A deal’s a deal. Let’s get this show on the road.” It takes a few moments for the clouds in my mind to settle as I remember we’re here for a reason. I clear my throat, fighting to stave off my body’s reaction to his touch.
“Glamour first,” I remind him, my heart still pounding as I try to regain my composure. My magic disguises us to appear human, although there’s nothing to be done about our size. We’re going into this knowing we will attract attention.
My wings vanish as I dismiss them, leaving me with a foreign sense of vulnerability. Wings are a status symbol in the Angel community, and their span correlates with status. The larger the wings, the more powerful the being. Keeping mine exposed is a power play—one that forces others to recognize my authority without ever speaking to them.
But now, with their weight missing from my back, I’m off balance.
My magic surges, a tingling wave that shifts my opalescent skin to a sun-kissed tan and my white hair to a bright golden blonde. The harsher angles of my face soften until I appear as human as possible, despite my size. A faint hint of vanilla and sandalwood fills the air as the magic works, and Xalreth takes a deep inhale as I step closer.
“Your magic smells like you,” he mutters as I place a hand on his shoulder, preparing to apply his disguise. He curls into me, pressing his nose into my neck. “So good... so sweet.”
“Oh, um… thank you,” I whisper, cringing at how formal I sound as he chuckles. This playful, affectionate side of him is new, and I don’t know how to handle it. A spark flares in my gut at the heat of his skin against mine, and I focus on applying his glamour so I don’t get stuck in my head. My magic makes quick work of his appearance, brightening his gray skin to a rich brown. His solid black eyes morph into their humancounterparts, with bright whites and mahogany irises. Even his teeth appear straight, no longer the razored points he loves to use with his meaningless threats.
When I pull my hand away, he walks to the mirror and stares at his reflection, running his fingers over his cheekbones and the bridge of his nose that’s more defined with the glamour. “That’s crazy. I can feel that my bone structure hasn’t changed if I concentrate, but my brain is telling me it has.” He opens his mouth and pokes a tooth, a bead of blood on his fingertip despite them appearing mundane and flat. “So fucking weird.”
Thankful for the distraction, I remove a sage green sweater from a hanger and pull it over my head, instantly hating the scratch of the material against my skin. “Dear God, do they really wear such atrocious fabrics?”
“Afraid so,” he says as he dons his own shirt. “In a particularly cruel corner of Hell, they’re forced to endure days of wearing coarse, scratchy wool without an undershirt.”
“Ghastly,” I mutter, and a grin spreads over his mouth. It’s strange seeing him this way, and I find I miss the points of his teeth and smokey hue of his skin. “Are you ready?”
He loops his arm through mine, and startles as I subconsciously place my hand over his. There’s a curious glint in his eye as he cocks his head, and I force myself not to look at him and acknowledge the fact that I’m touching him again.
Willingly, and beyond what's necessary.
Before either of us can overthink it, I teleport us to our next destination.
The hallway is a nightmare of shuffling feet and murmuring voices where no one is walking fast enough. A thick, cloyingsmell of unwashed bodies hangs in a dense cloud of… what is it that humans call it? Funk. It isfunkyin here, so much so that my eyes sting.
People stare as we walk through the crowd, and I peer inside the glass doorways and floor-to-ceiling windows that line the walls. “What sort of place is this again?” Xalreth asks, sneering at a human man who examines him too closely. The man yelps and quickly looks away from Xalreth’s self-satisfied smirk.
“Amall,” I answer with a sniff, wrinkling my nose. “It’s quite common, is it not?”
“God, you’re such a snob,” he snorts with a derisive puff of air.
I give his shoulder a shove, just hard enough to throw him off balance. “Is that not the case? You have someone’s grandmother selling pretzels across from where a teenage girl is trying to encourage children to let her punch holes in their ears.”
He wrinkles his nose as he stares at the giant cookies arranged in a glass display. “It is strange that even with all this food, it smells like sweat and piss.”
“See? Don’t act like you’re not looking down on them, too.”
Humans part out of our way as we approach our first stop, and I grab his elbow to steer him towards it. A young blonde woman does a double take as we walk in, a flicker of surprise in her expression as she scans our large frames. “H-Hi, can I help you?”
“Yes, we have inquiries about… chocolate.”
“Well,” she says, a nervous giggle escaping her lips before she clears her throat, and her hand sweeps across the shelves. “It’s safe to say you’ve come to the right place. What questions do you have?”
“Could you explain the lore of chocolate and how it ties to Easter?”
Her brows snap together, and she scratches her nose. “Oh, uh, well… there are so many types of eggs… different sizes and fillings. Dark, milk, and white, hollow or solid. And, of course, chocolate bunnies.”
Xalreth hesitates for a moment before he shakes his head. “And huma—” He stops abruptly and clears his throat at my glare. “People enjoy this? These chocolate eggs?”
“Well, yes.” She has a light, tinkling laugh, but Xalreth looks unconvinced.
“It just sounds… weird.”