Monstertober day 12: devilish charm
Male cambion/tiefling x female human | Regency era | SFW
“How glad I am that you did not come to Bath with your parents,” the captain told his dance partner as he took her hand and moved in a circle around her.
“Why should you be glad of that?” she asked.
“Because not many human parents would approve of their pretty little daughter dancing with a cambion male,” he replied, a slow smile stretching across his face to reveal the tips of his sharp teeth.
“Oh!” She glanced back over to where her friend and chaperone stood, who had brought her on this trip, but the woman was looking away. Surely it wasn’t improper for her to be dancing with a cambion if her chaperone had not objected when he asked for her hand.
Even though cambion were wicked in the frightening novels she liked to read, she was fairly certain the authors had invented their darkest qualities. “But aren’t those simply myths that cambion are descended from demons and drink blood and whatnot?” she asked him. (She would not admit to herself that she would not terribly mind if the myths were actually true.)
Rich laughter rolled from his lips at her having the confidence to come right out and ask him such a thing! He found her candor amusing, but more than that, it was refreshing and quite charming.
But she colored, so he checked his laughter. “Yes, those are myths. I am no demon,” he told her sincerely, with no mockery in his voice.
He leaned his head down close to hers as their bodies came together on the next step of the dance. “But I am devilishly charming, don’t you think?” he murmured with an arch smile.
His boast made her forget her embarrassment over what she had asked him, and a delighted smile bloomed on her face unbidden. She couldn’t deny that he was. It was precisely because he was a monster that she had been excited to first meet him, but once she had started to speak to him, she’d found she quite enjoyed his playfulness that skirted the edge of being improper but never quite crossed it.
His physical attractiveness added to his charm for her. She had always been partial to a smart red coat on an officer, and this officer not only had the coat but the dusky red skin, dark red horns, and rich red-black hair to match. And oh! he was so much taller than her! She had to tilt her head back quite far to be able to look into his violet eyes when they stood chest to chest, as they were now, in the dance. Something about him towering over her was very alluring.
She suddenly remembered he had called her “little.” And “pretty.” She’d forgotten it in her momentary distress over whether it was improper for her to dance with him. Now, recalling the compliment made her blush.
He noticed it. Oh, he did so like seeing that pale pink flush on her cheeks. “Mm, should I be impertinent and ask what it is that is making you blush?” he mused. The pink deepened and spread at that, and he smiled broadly at her.
He couldn’t help but think of what he could do to provoke an even deeper blush on even more of her skin.
“Don’t be afraid,” he assured her. “I’ll let you keep your secrets. It allows me to imagine the most pleasing option of what may be going through your mind, no matter how unlikely it is to be true—and I have a very good imagination.”
“That sounds like a trick to get me to correct your assumptions and reveal what I was actually thinking of,” she countered.
He laughed again. “Aren’t you a clever one! But I did not actually mean it as a trick. I’d much rather you not tell me, so I may keep the incorrect but pleasing thought in my head.”
“What if the truth is even better than whatever you are imagining?”
He gave her a wolfish smile. “I think it’s impossible that you’re thinking of something more pleasing than what I’m imagining right now.”
“You might be surprised. I read very shocking novels,” she admitted.
He arched an eyebrow at her. “Do you?” She was indeed proving to be a surprising girl, even more intriguing than he’d originally presumed. Yes, he was very glad to have taken this opportunity to dance with her, and he hoped to have the pleasure repeated.
His violet eyes gleamed, and he fixed her with a look dripping with his devilish charm. “Then I think we will have many interesting things to converse about, you and I.”
~ 😈🎩 ~
Inspired by Northanger Abbey, of course! I’ll be posting more Regency monster ficlets and snippets like this with the tag “my writing.”
