Chapter 15 #3
Which… is the sad truth. I’m used to the werewolf magic that transforms my clothes so they reappear once I shift back.
I wasn’t expecting to go fully nude after this traumatizing experience.
I pick up the scraps of clothes to pull out my wallet and phone and pass them to him, deciding he can carry them as well as my ass.
But of course Torin is relentless. “Please? For me? I miss my mount so much and this would make me feel closer to him.”
I gawk at the man who’s guilting me into becoming a four-hooved monstrosity. Yet here I am, shifting back into a goddamn horse for him. He’s all smiles as he pats my cheek, tugs my forelock, and flicks my ear back and forth.
“You should lock this magic in.”
“Why yes, I’m going to just chuck out my super overpowered ice magic and trade it to become a horse,” I say, still not sure how I’m communicating, but Torin seems to be able to hear me.
“Look how sparkly your tail is. Do you sweat sparkles or something?” He’s now behind me swishing my tail back and forth, just when I thought this couldn’t get any more humiliating.
“Just climb on and let’s get this over with.”
“You’ve got some big balls,” he says before squeezing one. “They’re so fuzzy!”
That makes me jump, not having expected a random grope.
“I’m going to kick you and run off, do you understand?”
Torin laughs and scoops up Kit before swinging on with practiced ease.
He’s like a little kid on a pony ride at the fair, and I’m like the pony that just wants to eat grass and buck the little kids off.
Thankfully, walking on all fours is second nature in this form, so I plod along in misery like an overworked nag.
“Surely you can go faster than this. Think about this… the faster you go, the sooner this is all over with.”
I contemplate that and then bolt. A part of me is hoping it gets rid of the pesky man on my back, but I should have expected more from a god of war who’s likely ridden many mounts into battle.
Instead, I can hear him laughing as he holds Kit so I can see where we’re going. Thankfully, the foolish man already carried me about eight miles, so the remaining two won’t take long at this speed.
“Is this really that much fun?” I ask.
“It’s thrilling. Besides the glitter, which I could do without. It’s in my eyes, in my mouth. I’m going to be wearing it for weeks.”
After traveling for another minute, Torin says, “I’ve been thinking, Riley… I know you miss working for the Magical Interference Unit, so I don’t understand why you don’t just tell them what’s going on and go back to work for them. They can put you in lighter jobs. You’re still quite capable.”
I want to ignore the question, but I know he’s a very persistent and stubborn man. So I decide to remind him of what I told him before.
“Because the unit is comprised of the highest-ranking magical agents. They’re quite strict when it comes to who can and can’t work there.
They would never allow me to rejoin with this curse.
” I leave out the fact that without my sight, I feel lost. Kit gives me so much, and yet…
the moment she’s gone or has fallen off my shoulder, I feel incapacitated.
And I hate it. I get frustrated and angry.
But if I give up, if I just work at the library, I don’t have to worry about anything.
“You really think they’d turn you away even though you’re clearly quite talented and have done so much for them?”
“That’s not how they think. Those regulations have been in place since the founding of the unit… it’s not going to change now just for me.”
“They don’t know what talent they’re missing out on. Any man who will turn into a unicorn for me and let me ride him gets my vote.”
“I’m going to stop here and you’re going to give me your clothes,” I say once I see the discount store at the edge of town.
“But I don’t want to lose my elusive unicorn,” Torin protests as I do a full-body shake to get him off.
Of course he stays glued to my back, so I try walking under a low branch.
He grudgingly grabs the branch and swings off my back.
Then he pulls off his pants right then and there while I rush over to block him from the eyes of a preteen who’s walking into the store.
“Let’s hide around the corner.”
He follows me over to a secluded spot where he undresses while I shift before changing into the clothes he hands me.
Then I hurry inside the discount store, feeling like I’m swimming in Torin’s clothes.
I grab a battery charger and a change of clothes which I pay for before leaving.
Once we’re both dressed, I ignore his cries to ride my ass, and head down into the subway instead.
“How dare you do this to me? I brought you to ecstasy and back and still you treat me this way,” Torin grumbles. “I let you fondle me.”
I raise an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, I was the one letting you fondle me. Pity fuck, remember?”
“First one was pity, second one was not so much pity… but the third one? That was me letting you touch my godly cock.”
“Your ‘godly cock’ is only going to know the feel of your own hand if you don’t straighten up.
Now get on the subway. You’re getting good at this,” I say as it pulls up and I cram him on.
There are no open seats, so he clings to the bar with so much crushing strength, I kind of feel like the bar is bending.
All the while, he’s battling sparkles out of his mouth and shimmering.
I pick up Kit and aim her at my face so I can use her as a mirror to look at myself, and I discover that I don’t have a single sparkle on me. Huh.
“I hate this. I hate this. I hate this,” Torin declares while the passengers stare at him.
It’s this odd mix where their expressions go “Damn, he’s fine” with a dash of “Why the hell is he so sparkly?” and a dose of “Why is he crying like that?” His sex appeal is apparently off the charts, and the sparkles are just adding to it.
“Are you hungry?” I ask.
“I sure am.”
“Then this is worth the ride,” I say before we get off at the second stop. He’s pleased it was a short ride, and when we reach the surface, I cross the street and head straight into a buffet.
“What is this place?” he asks as we’re seated.
“It’s called a buffet. So everything you see, you can just go over and pile onto your plate. There are different kinds of food, too. We’ve got different international cuisines, steak, seafood, pizza, and way more. You can have it all.”
Torin nods approvingly. “This was worth the subway and the sparkles.” He rubs a sparkle out of his eye.
“I thought you’d be happy,” I say as I lead him over and hand him a plate to get started.
He follows behind me and proceeds to grab something from every single tray in the first area.
His plate is now a tower of food that he has skillfully stacked so it won’t fall.
And when he reaches the table, I stare in amazement.
“You… know you can have as many plates as you want, right?”
“Yes, but I wanted it all now,” he replies before beginning to feast. He asks what every item is, and when I have no clue, I just make up a name. The more ridiculous, the more he laughs. He has to be aware that I’m just saying shit, but he seems to enjoy it and roll with it.
My phone beeps, telling me it’s been charged back to life, and I notice that Imani has sent me a text that says: Did you make it back or are you still stranded?
Me: No thanks to you.
Imani: I’m kind of surprised you made it back at the speed you must have been going.
Me: What are you talking about?
I see she’s sent me a video from one of the short-form video platforms she enjoys watching. When we were on stakeouts, she’d tell me I was the only one who could properly watch out for us, and I’d then have to listen to her giggle and cackle while she watched shit and I suffered.
I click on the video and proceed to watch a short clip taken from inside a car as it passes two men, one—who is very naked—on all fours, the other on his back.
“What’s that?” Torin asks. “The look on your face tells me I must see it.”
“You know how I explained how videos work? How we can record real-life people and then play it back later?”
“Maybe.”
I aim the phone at him, press play, and watch the god nearly choke to death as he starts laughing.
“I’d put that old nag down if I was that person,” he says.
“I will snip your nuts while you sleep,” I whisper.
Torin grins at me. “I like this thing. Can I have this? I want to see it again. Make it work again. I want to be able to watch it whenever I’m feeling down.”
“Nope. It only plays once and then never again.”
“Then how did you play it for yourself before playing it for me?”
“It’ll only play once per person.”
“Then I want to show this person here,” he says as he waves at an older man sitting at the table next to us. “Good sir—”
I pull the phone away before he can show this atrocity to anyone else.
Me: If you do not get that video taken down, I will raze this earth until I find the person who posted it.
Imani: I really thought you’d be the one riding the god, not the other way around.
Me: I will sacrifice every human to save my dignity.
Imani: I just have to know… why were you naked?
Me: I’m starting with you.
Imani: Did you take your own clothes off or did the god force them off before climbing on board?
Me: No! None of that! I accidentally borrowed a shifter’s magic.
Not knowing what kind of animal she shifted into, I shifted into a…
majestic mount, then shifted back just when this damn god was leaping onto me.
I didn’t expect him to hop on board and he didn’t seem to expect I was going to shift back!
I look up at the “damn god,” and he beams at me before snapping a crab leg in half and looking perplexed when the meat is mangled in both ends of it. The look is still oddly sexy, though.
“Why’s your face scrunching up like that? Are you also disgruntled that it’s impossible for me to eat this damn thing?” He then just gnaws on the end, shell and all.
“Yes, that’s definitely why I was disgruntled,” I say sarcastically. “Don’t you have crustaceans like this?”
“We did, but I had a servant who’d crack them and feed me the meat.” Then he smiles at me and holds the crab leg out.
I sigh, crack the leg with the tools, and set to work. All the while, he watches me with an intent expression on his irritatingly handsome face and a good dose of glitter. If this is how he stared at all of his crab crackers, I doubt any of them wandered off without getting laid first.
I pop the meat into my mouth, and he looks absolutely shocked that I betrayed him. I grin, satisfied that I wiped that look right off his face.
“That was evil.”
“Thank you,” I say, giving him the shredded bits he’d left in the mangled shell he’d broken in half. He grumbles but eats it while I grab another leg and actually give him the meat this time. But then he’s back to all smiles, which is more irritating.
“What do you think that smile is going to get you?” I ask as I hand a piece to Kit, who eats it with much joy.
It’s really easy to eat with her because her attention definitely doesn’t wander when food is involved.
And since she’s a familiar and not a real genet, her dietary needs aren’t quite the same.
Torin just shrugs. “So what’s next?”
“On the menu or in life?”
“Both,” he says as he stares at his empty plate. How he already ate it all, I don’t know.
“Go get another plate of food.”
“I like that plan.” He leaves in search of more food while I clean my fingers off and check my phone. The first thing I see is that Imani has taken a screenshot of the video and sent it to me, as well as making the image into a sticker which she’s blasted all over our text thread.
Me: You will regret this.
Imani: There’s little that could make me happier than this sticker.
Me: Get it removed.
Imani: I already have some people on it. But Riley… it’s such a beautiful image. It hurts to have it taken down.
Me: It’ll hurt more when I toss the god back at you to take care of and ignore you in your times of need.
Imani: Such evil threats. Almost makes me feel guilty that I didn’t know you’d wandered off through the Door and were gone for days. I mean, how the hell was I supposed to know?
Me: Mickey was supposed to tell you!
Imani: Mickey’s main purpose in life is getting out of work. He probably sent an undead to tell me and they died halfway through it or something.
Me: Knowing Mickey, he took a nap and when he woke up, he forgot I was gone.
Torin returns with a heaping plate and takes a bite of a stuffed mushroom before moaning. “Oh, this is good. I want more of this.” And then he picks up the only other one he has on his plate and attempts to feed it to me. “You have to try this.”
“If you like it so much, eat it.”
“No, I want you to try it.”
Giving in, I move to take it, but he insists on feeding it to me as I hope that absolutely no one is watching.
I find that it really is quite delicious, and I do my best not to notice the way he’s looking at me. He’s just so damn cheerful all the time. But if there was anyone else here, he’d probably be staring at them the same way, right? He’s a god of love. Not a god of monogamous romance.
My phone beeps.
Imani: I know I’ve been busy and haven’t been around much… but you seem happier, Riley. I think this god has been really good for you. He might be here to dominate our world and control all of us, but he makes you happy, so that’s all that matters.
Me: He doesn’t make me happy. Look at this face. Can this really make anyone happy?
I snap a picture of Torin with his mountain of food and send it off to Imani, who just sends a sticker of him riding my back to me. I decide the only thing I can do at this point is block her, change my name, and move to a different country.
“We should eat here for every meal,” he says.
“Nah, there’s so many foods out there. How will you know what you like if you don’t try them all?”
“Are you going to try them all with me?” Torin asks.
I watch him for a moment before leaning back in my chair. “I guess that doesn’t sound all that bad.”