Page 27 of The Misfit Mage and His Dashing Devil

“Hmm? Oh, a glamour.” Bez’s clean musk wafted close, too close. Even with my eyes closed, I could feel the heat of his body near mine, warm and radiant. Almost inviting. I ground my teeth. He invaded my space in the same way he had last time in some attempt to annoy and frustrate me. I ignored it. “What can I say? I love Halloween.”

“Diabolics can also glamour things?” I raised a brow, keeping my eyes firmly closed. None of that had been recorded in anything I’d read. Not that the Nexus Grimoire had much on Diabolics or their realms, aside from the differences between devils and demons.

“Those inside the right host body can. If a bit of the Mythic residue still resides inside the former tenant.”

Not that I cared much for the former host, the man responsible for cutting Carl’s throat and pummeling me half to death, but guilt still crept up. “Did you have to kill him when possessing him?”

“Yes. I’m an only child so I hate sharing.”

“You prefer stealing.”

The room grew silent as Bez ignored my comment, which pretty much summed up the entirety of our exchanges over the last three years. I sat silently, bouncing my knee and agitated by the quiet. I wanted to ask something. Open my eyes. But I didn’t want a full view of Bez. My ears burned. I didn’t want to want it.

“There. Better?” A snap, like from a waistband, followed Bez’s question.

I ignored him.

“Open your eyes, you prude.”

Having finished air drying, he strutted back into the living room wearing very small, form-fitting powder blue boxer briefs which left little to the imagination. Especially since my imagination had seen the entire beast tucked inside those silk undies.

Drawing my gaze up his firmly sculpted body, I met his eyes. The irises remained red, the whites fully pink, but they’d gotten bigger and were slightly further apart than before. Everything about his face had changed. The black veins had lessened, faded, and no longer bulged across his face. He had higher, more prominent cheekbones, a larger nose with a bit of a bump, and fuller lips. Even his forehead had become further arched. The only thing resembling the face of the former host was the sharp jawline. It was like looking at an entirely different person.

Had he changed his appearance because it left me unsettled? How? And why?

I leaned forward. “How’d you change your face?”

“I didn’t, weirdo.” Bez strolled toward the kitchen and opened the fridge.

“It’s different. Very different. Did you change everything? Is it another glamour? It’s so intricate.” I found myself standing, eyeing hisassets as he bent over to search the contents of the refrigerator. I gulped. There’d be no way to know if he’d changed the entire body from head to toe.

“Huh?” He stood, a pickle stuffed in his mouth and a hand deep in the jar. He crunched down, swallowing half in a single bite. “Oh, you mean the composite.”

“What?”

“Yeah, it’s something Diabolics do when possessing mortals.” Bez ate three more pickles, swallowing them whole, then guzzled half the juice down and belched. I widened my eyes. Once he had his fill, he returned to the fridge for more…food? “Right now, my form is all kinds of jacked up, but it’s settling in here, shaping to the constraints of this mortal mold. Some of my features will end up reshaping the host to better fit my body. Right now, I’ve changed about—I don’t know—eighty percent. Well, those changes a mortal body can contain.”

“Meaning?”

Bez held a spray can of cheese whiz and whip cream to his mouth, releasing both simultaneously. I gagged. Oh, gods.

“What?” he asked, mouth stuffed with a mushy mash of fluffy white and goopy yellow. My stomach churned. “It comes from the same cow. Well, not thesamecow. Though, everything here tastes so much of carbon, I’m not sure any of it came from an animal.”

“What do you mean what the mortal body can contain?” I snapped because I had to know. Wanted to. Desperately. And his disgusting cravings made me nauseous.

“Chill out, Walter.” He chucked the empty cans back into the fridge and pulled out a box of pizza.

“Are you seriously still eating?”

He lifted the lid and sniffed with a sour expression. “No. It’s got pineapple on it. Gross.”

“Well?” I slammed the fridge closed, ignoring the tightening of Bez’s biceps, shoulders, chest, and abdomen, which could’ve been a defensive beat-the-crap-out of me instinct or simply his way of bragging. Who needed that many well-defined muscles?

“It’s the way we conform. We pick a body, preferably one with a physique we want, but y’all have such limited forms. It’s quite boring.” Bez shoulder bumped me as he sauntered out of the kitchen toward the bedroom. I followed. “Point is, it’s my body now. So, I’m making a few renovations to update the accommodations. Obviously, I can’t adapt all my features without risking ripping this balloon apart, though. Horns, claws, tails, wings, extra appendages.”

“What extra appendages?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” He winked.

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