by Lex Chase
Ringo took flight from the desktop and drifted after Taylor in lazy corkscrews. Taylor didn’t look back at Corentin as he stepped out into the blistering Arizona sun. He shuffled to the truck and tried the handle. The handle snapped out of his grasp. He sighed. Of course, for a total junker, the automatic locks still worked. He lightly bonked his head into the window and sighed.
“Dude,” Ringo said and perched on the roof of the truck. “You are just one big frazzled ball of hormones.”
Taylor narrowed his eyes. “Can we drop that part for now?”
The motel room door slammed, and Taylor startled. Corentin circled the truck with a refreshed grin. Taylor’s stomach wouldn’t stop knotting up. Corentin clicked the lock on the truck, and Taylor immediately tried the door again. Again the handle snapped out of his fingers. Corentin pulled the driver side door open and clicked the interior lock. Taylor ripped the passenger side door open and slipped into the seat. In silence, he and Corentin buckled their seat belts, and Taylor refused to make eye contact. As he reached for the door, Ringo slipped in, assuming his place on the dashboard.
Corentin shifted the truck into drive and smiled at Taylor in a way that made his toes curl.
“You can keep wearing my flannel to bed,” Corentin said with a broad grin.
CHAPTER 14:
CORKSCREW TURN
Somewhere on the Open Road….
June 7
CORENTIN AND Taylor sat in the silence of the truck as Ringo napped in the backseat. Corentin listened to the whisper and muted growl of the changing pavement under the tires. Cautiously, he glanced at the gas gauge. He pressed his lips together in confusion when the needle read they were topped off. After all the driving they had done, the truck seemed good to go. At least Idi threw them a bone on that point. Corentin wasn’t going to mention or challenge it. He was certain Idi could change his mind any second.
Corentin discreetly stole a glance at Taylor and then considered his hand. He had awoken first at the Wigwam Motel with Taylor cozied up to him, and he had been too confused to move. He couldn’t remember Taylor’s face or if they had done anything the night before. The other peculiar part, he thought as he rubbed his fingers, was how uncomfortably warm Taylor had felt against him. Not quite a burning sensation, but like holding his hand over an open flame for almost too long. Taylor had thankfully left for the bathroom at the time, and the cooling sensation of Taylor’s absence had washed over Corentin instantly, like being doused in aloe from head to toe. That’s when things had gotten confusing, scary, and very real, very fast. It was that moment Corentin saw Taylor as a threat rather than a casual fuck for the night he didn’t remember.
If Taylor hadn’t thrown the book at him, literally, Corentin had had every intention of leaving Taylor’s body broken and mangled. His notes in the journal mentioned something about a spell Charles had placed on him, the temptation to kill Taylor at any moment, and he questioned if perhaps that was part of it. Having a physical temptation that would trigger the urge to kill? Corentin vowed not to tell Taylor. He couldn’t bear it being awkward, considering they had just met, and Taylor was cute in that pretty-boy way. But it wasn’t like that.
Corentin shivered at the memory of Taylor wailing his name in the throes of his wet dream. He had absolutely made a point of writing that down, even if it made him feel dirty, but he had to keep track of everything. Ringo and Corentin had stared at each other wide-eyed with their mouths hanging open as Taylor went through his dream, and Corentin and Ringo had made a vow not to say anything. Taylor had been through enough for one day. Corentin didn’t want to make it even more awkward by saying how it turned him on. Only the fact that Ringo was with them and was stuck with them for the foreseeable future stopped Corentin from propositioning Taylor on the spot.
Taylor picked at the hem of his Boymom shirt and occasionally glanced out the window when it shifted to an entirely new terrain of a different state. He propped his elbow on the door’s armrest and rested his chin in his palm. He watched the scenery with a half-lidded, somewhat drowsy expression.
“Where are we now?” Corentin asked. He kept his eyes on the road. If he concentrated on the shifting states every few miles, he’d certainly lose his grip on reality. He already had a feeble enough grip as it was. The truck bobbed with the uneven pavement as they crossed onto a four-lane bridge with a charming network of patina-green beams. A singing hum filled the cabin.
Taylor yawned and rubbed his eyes. He squinted, seeming to drown out the surroundings like Corentin. He watched the river below and then leaned forward at the windshield, scanning above. “Hold on…. Almost see something,” he said. The green-and-white interstate sign drifted closer into view, bolted to the beams. “New Hampshi—” Taylor mumbled before the sign zipped by and the bridge melded into an immense purple mountain range lined with maple trees. They approached another sign, a brown-and-white one, and Taylor tried his luck with that one. “Arbuckle Mountains.” Once again, the scenery changed effortlessly into a twisting country road overlooking pristine harbors and lobster boats. Taylor tossed his hands out in frustration. “Come on!”
“Are we there yet?” Ringo asked from the backseat. He yawned and smacked his lips.
Taylor frowned. “I’ll let Corentin skin you,” he said over his shoulder.
“Pixies are hard to skin,” Corentin said. “They have this layer of glitter between their skin and muscle. Gets everywhere and never comes out, like a kindergartener’s birthday party.”
Neither Taylor nor Ringo responded. The truck rocked with a bump. Corentin glanced away from the road for a second and found Taylor staring at him in horrified silence. Ringo held himself up on the upraised armrest and likewise stared with his disproportionate eyes. Corentin puffed a sigh. “Guys…,” Corentin said. He knew they understood what he meant as his duty as a huntsman.
The silence persisted. The truck rocked again over the uneven pavement. The twisting country road became a straight shot, red clay back road. Cow pastures and farmhouses whisked by.
Corentin tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. He puffed another breath and nodded to Taylor. “Your turn. Tell me something that I don’t know.”
Taylor arched a brow. “You kind of don’t know much right now, you know?”
“I know everything in my journal,” Corentin said. He reached for the radio dial and then pulled back, rethinking it. The radio would probably be a mishmash of sounds from the constantly changing stations.
“How? The thing is twenty pounds of paper!” Taylor asked. There was definite skepticism in his voice.
“The trance… thing,” Corentin said and then thumbed his chin. “It’s a spell that lets me reabsorb all of the information in it. I remember all the way back to when I first started it.”
“When was that?” Taylor asked. He seemed to be genuinely curious. Even Ringo perked up too as he took flight and settled on the passenger headrest.
“In 2010,” Corentin said. “But there’s one particularly troubling note I left myself.”
Taylor leaned closer across the seats. “Yeah?”
Corentin ran a hand through his sandy hair and scratched at his scalp. “There’s a note that says the journal I have now isn’t the only one.”
“You have more of those things? Just… somewhere?” Taylor asked.
“At least one, if the note is true. I seemed pretty freaked out when I wrote it,” Corentin said. He eased onto the brake when the road changed again to an elegant coastal bridge. He smiled to himself; at least the scenery was somewhat pleasant. The sign declared the roadway the Seven Mile Bridge over the Florida Keys.
“And you didn’t try to find it?” Ringo asked.
“Hell yeah, I tried!” Corentin snapped a little too bitterly, his enjoyment of the blue-green ocean gone in a blink.
“Jeez, sorry,” Ringo said, holding his hands up in surrender.
“So, you only remember the last four years,” Taylor said. It seemed he understood Corentin’s
madness after all. Taylor scratched at his chin. “May fifth,” he said.
“May fifth?” Corentin asked. He glanced from the road to Taylor, trying to follow what he was saying.
“My birthday,” Taylor said. “You told me to tell you something you don’t know.”
Corentin smirked.
Ringo settled on top of Taylor’s headrest and sighed. “I’m terrified of my mother-in-law,” Ringo said and shivered.
Corentin chuckled. “I’ll make a note of it.”
“What does this even have to do with me?” Taylor said and pressed a hand to his forehead.
Corentin arched a brow, confused by Taylor’s sudden change of demeanor. “You okay?”
“Just…. What the hell would a witch want with my family? With Atticus. With me. I’m just a Curseless nobody. Why would Charles go through all this trouble to trap us out here”—he spread his arms toward the windshield, seeming to indicate the open road—“with no way out? I mean….” Taylor grunted his frustration and ran a hand through the choppy dark layers of his hair. “What the fuck can I even do? I’m not magical. I’m not special. I’m just… me. Atticus is the amazing one.”
Based on Taylor’s overtired and hunger-fueled rant, Corentin considered his next question carefully. “Do you resent your brother?” he said calmly.
“What kind of fucking question is that?” Taylor snapped. “I love my brother. I’d do anything for him. I’d protect him until my dying breath.”
Corentin wouldn’t look at Taylor, but out of the corner of his eye, he caught Taylor glaring and had his lips pulled back in a furious grimace. Taylor’s pink eyes gleamed like a furious cornered rabbit. Corentin didn’t say anything for a long moment, and thankfully, Ringo didn’t add his two cents. Corentin assumed Ringo knew to stay out of it.
Finally, Corentin asked in the same calm tone, “Are you lying?”
“What the fuck, Corentin!” Taylor roared, clearly withholding the strong urge to reach out and strike.
Corentin again merely watched Taylor out of the corner of his eye and saw how his muscles tensed in warning. “Don’t do something you’ll regret,” Corentin said as if he were commenting on something as ordinary as the weather.
“Why would you even accuse me of that?” Taylor said in a guttural growl. Taylor’s fingers twitched into claws, and Corentin read the intent to scratch at him.
“I think I can get you the answers you want,” Corentin said and never once raised his voice.
“How?” Taylor asked, wiping at his eyes. Corentin kept his expression even as the pang of guilt stung at him that he’d made Taylor tear up.
“Do you want donuts?” Corentin asked and finally turned to Taylor with a bright smile.
The expression Taylor returned was not one of pleasantry or confidence. Instead, his dark brows pressed low and his mouth pulled into an irritated frown. “You know you only make sense half the time, and then I can only understand a quarter of that because of your accent,” Taylor said, dubious but at least settled down.
“I want donuts,” Ringo said as he draped himself over the passenger headrest like a lazy tabby.
Corentin smiled. “Now that’s the answer I want to hear.”
“Where…?” Taylor looked back and forth between Ringo and Corentin. “How are we going to get freaking donuts? Do you have a box of stale Krispy Kremes in with your huntsman death tools?”
“Gah!” Corentin groaned and drummed his palms on the wheel. “Taylor, do me a favor and just trust me, okay? I know it’s hard. But do that ‘thinking happy thoughts’ thing.”
By some miracle, Taylor had been stunned into silence. Corentin mentally congratulated himself.
“You are… so…,” Taylor said and tried to find his thoughts.
Corentin leaned into Taylor’s personal space, and Taylor recoiled against the passenger side door. “Charming?” Corentin purred, then grinned. “Debonair?” Corentin smirked as Taylor’s face turned bright red, making his light pink eyes stand out even more.
“Odd,” Taylor said in a defensive tone. “And keep your eyes on the road.”
Corentin pulled away, satisfied with Taylor’s reaction. He cracked a grin and a chuckle. “That’s what I thought,” he said to the open road.
“Thought what?” Taylor said, clearly flustered. “Thought what?”
“You know, it is really hard to play the Alphabet Game with us being the only vehicle on the road,” Ringo said.
Corentin broke into open laughter at the absurdity of it all. He had been anxious before, but now the situation had devolved into an entertaining farce. At least it alleviated the tense mood of the inevitable confrontation with Idi. That is, if they could defeat the puzzle of the road and reach Idi. Corentin glanced at Taylor again as the princess fumed in silence, his cheeks still as rosy as his tacky Boymom shirt.
It was a sad state of things when Corentin had more knowledge of what lay ahead when this morning he had awoken wrapped in the arms of a beautiful man he didn’t recognize. The urge to snap Taylor’s neck as he slept had raged through him at that moment. He had fought on, silencing the vicious thoughts until Taylor had escaped to the bathroom. It was then his control crumbled.
Corentin wouldn’t do that to Taylor again; he’d be sure of it. The fear in Taylor’s face resonated with him. Now that Corentin had lightened the mood, it was time to place his implicit trust in Taylor.
“Here,” Corentin said, breaking the silence, his own voice carrying a nervous crack. “Take the wheel for me.” Before Taylor could question it, Corentin let go, and the truck hit a pothole. The truck swerved, and Taylor screeched, lashing out for the wheel.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Taylor wailed, leaning far into the driver’s side. He craned his neck to watch the road and shakily guided the truck. “Ringo, he’s going to kill us!”
“You’re not in danger,” Corentin and Ringo snapped in unison.
Taylor grunted his distaste and maintained his duty of trying not to crash the truck. Corentin braced his left foot on the floor while trying to hold his right steady on the gas. He arched his back and lifted his rear off the seat. Taylor yelped when Corentin’s crotch nudged his chin. In the awkward position, Corentin contorted his left arm back into his jeans pocket. The truck continued to swerve over the road in a sharp fishtail. Corentin failed at keeping his right foot steady on the gas and would accidentally accelerate at the wrong moment. He found the familiar contours of his pocketknife, and he gasped a note of victory.
Corentin collapsed back onto the seat, pocketknife in his left hand. Without a pause, he gripped the wheel and steadied the truck into one lane. Completely bewildered and horrified, Taylor jerked back into the passenger seat and watched him. Corentin smirked and twirled the pocketknife between two fingers.
Taylor swallowed down a panting gasp. “And that’s supposed to do what?” he squeaked meekly.
“Get us donuts,” Corentin said and picked the corkscrew option out of the pocketknife.
“Ringo,” Taylor squeaked desperately. Clearly, he had lost the minuscule iota of trust he had in Corentin.
Ringo, however, seemed to keep a cool head. “No-no,” Ringo said softly. “It’s cool. You’re fine.”
“Hold on,” Corentin told the two of them and engaged the automatic locks.
The moment Taylor heard the click of the lock, he screeched incoherently for help. Ringo fluttered at him, trying to get Taylor to stop screaming. Taylor flailed, fearing for his life, and Ringo dodged his thrashing arms.
Corentin adjusted the blade in his left hand so he could hold it upward and hold the top of the wheel. He shook his right hand, rapidly curled it into a fist, then uncurled it. He puffed his cheeks with three large breaths and then slammed the open palm of his right hand onto the corkscrew.
Taylor’s screaming and thrashing ceased instantly. He drew away his arms and appeared mortified at what Corentin had done. “What… are you…?”
Corentin divorced his mind fro
m the pain of the old, dull weapon. He sucked in sharp breaths and exhaled slowly through his nose. He stared at his hand and the two twists of the corkscrew that pierced straight through the back of his palm.
Only the sound of Ringo’s wings slowly beating could be heard in the cabin. Corentin focused on it, letting himself be pulled into it. Letting himself drift away.
The swirling black trails of blood and magic bloomed from the wound like a desperate sprouting of vines. The tendrils slithered over Corentin’s arm, underneath his jacket sleeve, and emerged twisting and scrawling over the right side of his face. The inky vines entangled the steering wheel, and Corentin whispered his command.
“Enelrad.”
The truck wheel wrenched sharply, and the vehicle jackknifed a sharp right into a guardrail. Taylor screamed with the impact and threw his arms over his head. The truck bounced back and fishtailed. Ringo remarkably kept his calm in the presence of dark magic. He hovered in the center of the cabin, swaying easily with the motion of the truck. The truck hit the guardrail again but succeeded in jumping the rail. The truck soared upward, and the guardrail and forested gully became the Golden Gate Bridge. The vast expanse of San Francisco Bay spread out below them. The truck hung in the air, and the weightlessness lifted Corentin and Taylor from their seats.
Then they fell.
The frigid bay rushed to greet them.
Taylor wailed for Ringo to save them.
Ringo did nothing.
Corentin’s heart thumped once.
The world went black.
CHAPTER 15:
TIME TO MAKE THE DONUTS!
Not the Bottom of San Francisco Bay
June 7
TAYLOR CURLED into the fetal position, howling and wailing, waiting to crash into the murky shark-infested depths. He couldn’t hear Ringo screaming, if he was. Taylor cried and gasped for breath, praying it wouldn’t hurt when he died.
The truck bounced gently, and Taylor broke into ugly caterwauling.
“Taylor…,” Ringo said, as if he were calling Taylor from a dream. “Taylor…. Hey….”
