by C. L. Quinn
Day Into Night
C.L.Quinn
Blak Kat Publishing
May 2017
All rights reserved
One
The road before him looked endless, stretching into the distance and the unknowable future. He loved it, and always had. Thwump, thwump, thwump…ah, nothing like the sound of his tires striking the ancient asphalt.
The long road. Poets had written about journeys on lonely highways for centuries as metaphors for the journey of life. Yes, Will thought, it could be, but, for him, the road was never quiet or lonely. It was an old friend he knew well, happy to be traveling it once again. To him, this was home.
And this time, it may lead him to where he needed to be…he’d learned recently that destiny was true and it might have a plan for him. At moments, it pissed him off that there seemed to be a guiding force that had already designed his path, and at other moments, he’d found serenity in surrendering to inevitability. In his purest moments of honesty, Will could admit that somewhere in his mind he’d always known that his life wasn’t entirely his own.
He breathed easier with the wind in his face and hair. It was as natural as the grass and sky to him. Will caressed the long curved handlebars as he glanced to his right to watch the setting sun.
Time to find food and shelter soon. Riding through the darkness wasn’t as safe as it had been when he’d started his riding career twenty years ago. Changing transportation modes left little room for throwbacks like him. Lift-cars filled the skies in busier places, but out here on these isolated roads that stretched between North and South America, only an occasional flying car whipped past him on air currents just slightly above his head. Most people preferred to keep the lift-cars low and that posed a danger to old ground-based vehicles like his Harley-Davidson motorcycle.
Moving his eyes back to the darkening pavement, Will smiled. Even if he slid and went down against the ground, the Mother would protect him. She’d keep a layer of compressed air between his fragile human body and the hard surface between him. They’d come to an understanding, he and the living planet. He took care of her and she reciprocated. There were times it all still felt surreal. Now, moving close to her, was not one of those times.
Increasing lights ahead indicated a village where he could stop to rest and get something to eat. Maybe treat himself to a fine whisky if such a thing were available. Food and spirits could be a crapshoot south of the border. Unless he was in one of the larger cities, the fare was specific to the region, which suited him well. It was part of the charm of traveling. Almost anything was welcome after a day of dust and wind.
Breezing into the village, his speed slow, he appreciated the decades old classic architecture, stucco in bright colors lined the two lane road that fed past it. His bike’s roar had dropped to a soft purr as he noted a bright yellow building in the center of the village sporting flashing red lettering in the windows; a cantina advertising local food and drink. Perfect.
Sliding the bike into a slot just right for its size, Will leaned against it to appreciate bright green double doors that bore a hand-carved wooden sign that said, in Portuguese, Welcome. The narrow slot that fit his bike well told him that he wasn’t the only visitor here who rode in on a motorcycle, although the others were likely jet-bikes. Still, there was a commonality shared in the experience of the open road.
After securing his travel pack, Will pitched his fone into his pocket and pulled one of the green doors open. Whoever had designed this cantina had created the tropical vibe common for many clubs in South America, every corner filled with lush tropical plants and dwarf trees bred for darkened indoor spaces. Festive multi-colored lights made the small spaces glow with warmth, appreciated after the cool night air. He was the only one in the cantina at the moment.
“Welcome, sir. Did you wish to dine?”
Accented, the soft female voice drew Will to his left to watch a flamboyantly dressed woman approach. She twisted a brightly colored towel in her hands, every finger circled with silver and bejeweled rings. Smile welcoming and genuine, her beautiful eyes twinkled. Will couldn’t help but respond to her overt sensuality, his own smile matching hers.
“Dinner, yes, please.” He paused. “I’m very hungry.”
The statement hung there as she nodded her head to show she understood him perfectly. A twist in her hips as she moved closer to curl a hand around his thick forearm told him that she was possibly interested in helping him with his hunger.
“Sir, I never let a man leave…” Now she paused for effect. “...unsatisfied.”
Her fingers caressing his bare skin, she drew him to a table in the back of the room. “You are new here? Passing through or plan to stick around for a while?”
“Passing through.”
“Ah. You have somewhere you need to be.”
“I do. Where that is, I don’t know, but we’ll see how it turns out.”
Her dark eyes regarded him quietly for a few moments before she nodded. “Yes, I can see that. You have a wandering spirit. An earthly spirit, I think.”
Her comment startled him. How could she know? Did she know? Only supernatuals would and she didn’t read as supernatural.
Suddenly she laughed. “Don’t try to figure me out. Many have tried and all have failed.”
“Well you are a lovely enigma.”
“What a charmer. Here, let me bring you our traveler’s special. It is guaranteed to fill up a big man like you.”
“Thank you, uh…”
“Cochita. Most call me Chita.”
“I’m not most. I like Cochita. It’s barely big enough for the vibrant personality I see here.”
“Be careful, stranger. I might fall in love with you and weave my spell so tight you could never leave.”
“Fate worse than death?”
“Ah, sir, you would die a little each day. Happily. I will return with your meal.”
Will dropped into a carved seat at the table she’d led him to, pleased with his prospects for the evening. What an intriguing woman. A nice meal, perhaps this senorita’s company, would make the end of his third day on the road a real pleasure. He had a long way to go and he’d learned that you take your joys where you could find them.
While he’d been assured that his lifespan was longer than normal humans, Will wasn’t sure he believed it, and even if he did, life still came and went in a flash. After the past few months, he’d come to understand how beautiful that gift could be. Years of self-torture for an accident he’d thought was his fault had finally given way to accepting a new truth…that what he was was vastly more complicated and beyond his experience than anything he could have imagined. Lost in thought, he was surprised when Cochita placed a bottle of tequila on his table. “I believe you need a night devoid of stress. May I join you?”
“Please.”
Lifting a curved whisky glass, she carefully poured tequila into one and then a second glass until each was nearly full. With an artistic flair, she whipped her full skirt aside and sat in the chair across from Will.
“You’re a dancer,” he commented, because he knew instinctively by her movements and grace that she was.
“Yes, I am. So, Mr. Traveler, I wait anxiously for your story. This is the most fascinating part of my job.”
Will lowered his eyes to his glass as he picked it up and killed a long swallow.
“Everybody’s got a story,” he finally responded.
“They do. Tell me yours.”
“Nothing much to tell.” Like hell there wasn’t!
“You wouldn’t believe half of what I’ve experienced in the past six months.”
“And you would be surprised.” Her gaze was measured as she matched his deep sip of tequila.
Silent again,
staring at the glass of clear liquid, he shifted his gaze back to Cochita’s. “I’m a human supernatural with bizarre abilities that helped avert a global disaster last year. Now, I’m blowing in the wind because, somehow, I know I’m not where I’m supposed to be and I’m not sure how to find out where that is. How’s that for a story?”
Cochita didn’t lose his gaze as she lifted her glass and one, two, three sips later, slid closer. “Riveting.” She pulled both of Will’s hands into hers and closed her eyes.
Without moving, both sat speechless for several long seconds before she lifted her eyelids. “You will find your place.”
She stood abruptly and walked a few steps from the table before she looked back. “But not tonight. Tonight, you eat the best of what we offer and then you and I…we fuck like rabbits the rest of the night.”
His breath hitched, Will watched the lovely temptress disappear behind a swinging door and dropped back against his seat, the glass in his hand, as he recovered his breathing.
“Damn,” he whispered, now taking only small sips of the tequila before he reached for the bottle to refill the glass. The night had just gotten much more promising. It seemed that lately the people who came and went in his life were far more than they appeared. His mind went to the gorgeous vampire he’d rescued just days ago and returned to her friends in Vegas. Even now he almost wanted to turn around and go back to find her and learn more about her story. Then tonight, this woman, human as far as he could tell, who seemed to understand things she probably couldn’t about him, and made it clear that she wanted, and would, be with him in his bed after he ate.
“Bring it on,” he said out loud as he started on the second glass of alcohol, on his way to being thoroughly drunk so he could tamp down his tiresome inhibitions and just enjoy this beautiful woman’s company tonight.
Dinner over, and the entire bottle of tequila now empty, Will’s eyes locked on Cochita, who stood to grab a second bottle and plopped it in the center of his table. She moved around behind him, her hands rubbing his shoulders moved down his back and curved forward to outline the tight muscles that formed the masculine V shape of a well-muscled back.
“You are strong.” Her voice purred into his ear, her lips close enough to brush it as she spoke.
As Will pushed up from his seat, he turned to lift her chin and capture huge dark eyes lined in black. “When do you finish your shift here?”
“When I wish.” Moving away, she snatched his hand and pulled. “Which is now.”
In rapid Spanish, she called out to an unseen person behind the door that led to the kitchen, then tugged Will to a stairwell behind a huge potted plant. The stairwell ended into another that took them back outside to cobbled steps which led around behind the cantina. A two-story building painted in teal and brown bordered by elaborate tile work faced the stone trail.
“This is beautiful.” Will let his hand slide along an old-fashioned iron fence.
She stopped to survey his face. “I like beautiful things.”
Her smile electric, she bounded up stairs lined with the same iron rails and pushed open the second door. “It is time to play. Mr. Traveler, this is my sandbox.”
Once she disappeared inside, Will followed even faster, closing the door to the hot, dark room illuminated with a single flickering flame as she lit other candles. He lifted the bottle she’d placed on a table near the door and popped the cap.
Finishing with the final candle, Cochita faced him, lifted a fat rolled paper, lit it, and took a long puff before she held it out to him. “This is peyote, but not like you’ve ever known it. There are magical spirits in the world, Will. All is not as it seems.”
Oh, he knew about magic and spirits and the unseen world. He hesitated only a moment before he took a healthy swig from the bottle, reached for the roll and drew hard on it.
Smiling, Cochita led him to a mattress in the corner covered by bedding that looked like an artist’s palette had spilled over it again and again. “We’d better get down here and naked before it hits, my friend.”
It was already hitting. Will watched brightly colored wall hangings that covered all four walls of the room begin to dance and swirl.
“Kicky,” he said, then dropped his eyes to watch Cochita slide her dress off, and on her knees, crawl to him across the mattress layered with heavily-patterned bedding. Naked, she reached for his jacket, popped the release snaps, pitched it away, then his shirt and pants were gone too. Now, naked too, Will stood on his knees and pulled her slick warm body against his. “You think what we just smoked was magic? Watch this.”
While he knew he shouldn’t show off his earth magic, Will’s compromised judgment controlled him and he brought his own magic up from the ground, wrapping them both in cool air. Giggling in delight, Cochita groaned and fell backward, pulling him with her. Fueling their sexual frenzy, she opened her legs to cradle his body as Will buried himself in her, and for the next twenty minutes, neither had any interest in anything other than the pounding of skin on skin and eventual release that left them both gasping, collapsed against the bed.
They didn’t move again until the sun blazed into the smaller windows at the back of the room.
Awareness arrived slowly for both of them. Her hair tousled, Cochita shook her head. “Aye, yi, yi.”
She stopped to stare at Will. “I know we…”
“Yeah,” he added as he sat up. “It’s all a bit…fuzzy.”
“Too much peyote…and spirits, eh?”
Falling back to hug a pillow, Will yawned. “Yes, too much.”
Suddenly, she pushed off the mattress. “But I’m sure we had an amazing time.” Her eyes moved over Will’s naked back and ass. “Yes, I am sure.” Although she wished she could remember.
“It will come back. Nothing important is ever really lost. Get up, traveler. You told me you need to get back on the road early. You have somewhere you need to be.”
Squinting, he looked up at her. “Not yet.”
“Aye, you do. Something is waiting for you. Or someone. You do not know until you find.”
Nodding, because he didn’t know what to say to her, Will rolled upright and stood, his head pounding. Pulling on his clothes quickly, he let Cochita lead him from the room to face a warm morning and the rising sun. A light mist covered bountiful blooms all around the landing, sparkling with moisture in the nascent light.
“Magic does live here,” he whispered, and followed his lovely companion down the stairs to the front of the club.
She kissed him softly and ran a hand around his jacket to straighten the collar. “Do not doubt, your destiny is waiting for you to come to it. You will find it. And her.”
Back on the road, the miles pushing his night behind him, Will thought about Cochita’s last two words and the woman from a year ago with a cloud of dark hair surrounding a face he knew he would never forget.
It all felt too improbable, and too big a concept after a night of chemistry-accented sex.
Revving the engine, Will slipped the bike onto the pavement and continued to the main road again, the miles pushing his night behind him quickly. Yet his mind went back to the idea of destiny and fate. Was there something waiting for him, designed by the universe? His connection to the living planet had proven there was. Whatever that destiny might be was unknown, or unrevealed as yet. How do you search for the unknown?
Although it seemed cryptic, he thought he knew the answer.
“It’s in the search that you find the hope,” Chione had told him before he left Colorado last year. Even she had seen something in him that let her know that something waited.
“Perhaps it’s true,” he whispered into the wind.
Memory led him back to the first moment he saw her. Olivia, smiling as he walked toward her through the hot desert air, naked, fascinated. He’d felt she was something special, something wild, someone outrageous, someone he wanted, even at first glance. Events had never allowed them to pursue those feelings. Was it too lat
e?
Olivia was unfinished business, hope suspended, possibilities unexplored, pleasure untouched. No, it wasn’t a surprise that it was her face that came to his mind as he confronted the accusation that he was on a quest.
All right, universe, he thought, let’s see how this plays out.
Five days later in Brazil
Road weary, wearing the dust of the long journey, Will brought his bike to a stop in front of an uninspiring building nestled into about an acre of cleared space. Varieties of small trees had surrounded him for the past ten minutes of his ride. He scanned what looked like a large warehouse clad in metal siding, spacey but utilitarian. This was where Ife had Vtex’d him to come to join her and her Amazon basin restoration team. Not the usual dwelling of vampires, but he’d been surprised before.
Leaning against the seatback, he closed his eyes and drew in fresh air tinged with moisture. Even his breathing had changed…in, out, fuller, deeper. Resting comfortably, he lifted his eyelids to scan the horizon, where the sun hovered. Scarlet and golden light spread across the dying blue and tangled with clouds set aglow by the brilliant colors. The departing sun’s rays highlighted a newly planted forest where sturdy trunks stood tall against the sky.
Swinging his leg over the seat, he stood for the first time in six hours. After lifting one knee, then the other, flexing his muscles, Will placed both feet on the earth, the connection here, so close to her heart, Mother Earth’s magic reached through the ground to touch him. Here was life and love and hope, the very basis of earth-based magic. Uninhibited joy infused Will as his gaze moved right and left in sweeping glances to take in the wide panorama of a once stunning rain forest now burgeoning with life again. Could there be anything more beautiful than seeing life endure?
He’d always appreciated the beauty of the world, but now, with his tentacled connection to the planet beneath his feet and the sky above her, moments like this left him awestruck.
“Mesmerizing, isn’t it?”
