Three Immortals Walk Into A Bar...

Gregor

Clyde seems to have the patience of a saint. Saint Vampire. I mean, he’s clearly annoyed, but he accommodates Levant by making his poor driver sit out here at the shuttle stop, in the rain that has started to fall, to wait for a ride.

It’s a big stretch limo, so I’m able to sit far enough away from them that hopefully I’m not bothering anybody. I really do want to stop irritating Levant if I can. He slouches in the passenger seat, and I can hear him growling from all the way back here. He conspicuously refuses to look back here at me, staring straight ahead at the road as Clyde drives.

I wonder how far away the hotel is, and Wolk takes a moment to read Clyde’s thoughts, then tells me, “Several miles, the ride will probably take about twenty minutes.”

I figure it’ll be a quiet ride, and that Clyde and I will talk after we get Levant settled into a room, but he apparently doesn’t want to wait. “So Gregor,” he says, his hands on the steering wheel but his head slanted sideways towards me, “where are you from?”

Levant snorts in annoyance, and Clyde grins at him, and I am glad Levant isn’t looking back here to see my amused expression. “I live in California,” I tell him. Where I am from is a very complicated question. I’ve lived in a lot of places.

“Oh?” he says conversationally. “Ever been to the South before?”

I smile, remembering. “Yes, actually, I once lived in Mississippi. I loved it there.”

“Really? Where?”

Levant actually covers his face with his hand, realizing that we are going to chat the whole way.

“In Natchez,” I tell him.

“Natchez! What a wonderful place!” We carry on, reminiscing, Levant probably considering leaping straight out of the moving vehicle to get away from us. The rain begins falling in sheets outside the car. Clyde puts the windshield wipers on full blast, but doesn’t seem to slow the car at all, appearing quite confident in his driving abilities. I’m sure he’s correct.

When we arrive at the Adabelle, I look at it with interest as we approach along a long, graceful drive surrounded by rose bushes on each side. It is designed like an old plantation house, a gleaming white mansion with colonnades and wrap-around porches along each of the three levels, looking like a tribute to the antebellum era. I know it certainly can’t be actually from that time, I’m pretty sure any structures in Atlanta this extensive would have been destroyed during the Civil War. But it has the lovely elegance that evokes a time that for some represented the height of civilization and grace. And for others, for the majority of the population who were enslaved and by whose hands were built the lovely homes and lives enjoyed by their masters, this was a time representing the height of human cruelty and depravity. I remember it well.

As Clyde pulls the car along the covered circular driveway the valet staff waits, and as soon as the limousine stops they move forward to open the doors. I see that one of them resembles Fernando, the creased forehead and the blocky facial features, and I realize that this must be a characteristic of their species. How could I have spent such a long time on Earth and never noticed vampires and werewolves among us? I hope that by the time tonight is over I have more insight about the world that I have apparently been blind to all this time.

Levant, of course, seemingly incapable of just resigning himself to anything without a fight, bursts out of the car with his fists raised as soon as he sees the other werewolf. I think that Clyde must be expecting this, because he is already around the car and blocking Levant from punching anybody, before I have even managed to get both of my feet out of the limo and on the ground.

Clyde maintains a tight grip on Levant’s arm for good measure, as he turns to the werewolf and tells him, “Take the limo back to the airport and pick up Fernando. He’s waiting at the shuttle stop.” The big man looks perplexed by this development, but nods and quickly starts the car, pulling away.

Clyde says, in a low voice, “Okay, there aren’t any more working here tonight. Can you please calm yourself down and just come inside? Preferably without destroying anything?”

Levant scowls, and growls, and snarls, and shakes his arm out from under Clyde’s grasp.

Clyde looks to me with a glint of amusement, and leads us inside to the spacious lobby. The furnishings are also reminiscent of the Old South, and it makes me feel right at home. I want to compliment Clyde for the lovely setting, but it seems that now is not the right time to do so. Levant can only take so much.

Clyde turns to us, and says, “Okay, I have a very nice suite up on the top floor, with a couple of bedrooms, and we can all go up there.” Levant is clearly about to object, but Clyde cuts him off. “Or, Levant, you can have a standard room to yourself on the second floor. Or,” he continues, “if you’d rather be someplace completely private and secure, I keep a small chamber inside a bank vault in the basement, which locks only from the inside, and is impervious to attack. No werewolves, room service, vampires, or whatever this guy is,” he says, waving his hand over to me with a grin, “can possibly disturb you in there.”

Levant growls out, “I’ll take the basement.”

Clyde says, “I thought so. Follow me.”

He leads us, with me loitering several steps behind to avoid getting too close, down a back stairway. It ends in a large open space, the length of the entire building, chairs and tables and equipment stacked alongside the walls, and on the far back side is a door. He takes us to the door, and unlocks it with a key he pulls out of his pocket. Across a short alcove is the heavy metallic door characteristic of a bank vault, enormous metal cylindrical bars ready to be engaged to seal off the contents. It is standing open, and I can see that within is a small bed, chair and desk, and another door.

Clyde leans in, and flicks on a lightswitch inside. “There you go. There’s a bed. That door leads to a little bathroom with a shower. After I’m out you can close the door and you will be completely alone. Feel free to sit here by yourself in the dark all night.”

Levant scowls at his flippant attitude, but clearly this looks perfect to him. How interesting that Clyde maintains such a fortresslike safe room.

Levant goes inside, and before he closes and seals off the door he says, “Thanks.” Who knew that word was in his vocabulary? Then he adds, snidely, “Enjoy your slumber party.” The door swings shut, and we can hear the locking mechanism engage.

Wolk says, “He silently added, ‘You fucking weirdos’ to his statement.”

Ha! Clyde sees me laughing, and I can tell that he is terribly eager to understand why, and so much more. “Shall we?” he says, gesturing to the stairway, and I follow along after him, hands in pockets, looking forward to our conversation just as much as he is.

Levant

She is waiting for me in the moonlight, along the cliff behind our castle in Scotland, gazing out over Blackness Bay. The sound of the water gently sloshing up against the rocky shoreline is not enough to cover my footsteps, and she knows that I am here. But she does not turn around.

She is wearing a form-fitting white dress, lacy and alluring, and the strap has slipped down off of her left shoulder, exposing much of her slender back. Her head turns to her left, as though to look back over her shoulder at me, but her eyes remain cast down to the still black water.

I am immediately behind her, the distance evaporating as happens in dreams, and I move my hands into the dark hair flowing down and hiding her neck, and back, and shoulders from my sight. I lift it along the sides of her head, and it obediently stays, formed by my dreaming mind into an uplifted hairstyle, giving me full access to her slender nape.

My hands slip down, across her jawline on both sides, my thumbs stroking in a line across her neck, and I lower my lips to her shoulder, and begin kissing in towards the hollow at the center of her luscious throat.

Even in dreams, her skin always smells of honeysuckle.

One of my hands reaches slowly further, slips inside her dress, and I gently caress her breast, massaging the soft flesh, my hand wonderfully filled.

She softly moans, then takes my other hand in hers, bringing it up to her mouth, and I feel her teeth pierce the fleshy part of my thumb, even as she tilts her head to the right side to give me access and permission.

I bite down on the side of her neck just enough to taste her blood, and as she drinks from me, I drink from her, and the moonlight floods over the scene, and I know the peace that only being together with Maria can bring me.

Even in dreams, her blood always tastes of honey.

A long time later, she finally turns to face me, and wraps her arms around me, and pulls my head down so that we are kissing, and I taste the honeysuckle, and I feel myself being healed and restored through the sleep.

She leans back and gazes up into my eyes. “You’re late,” she says.

I huff out a laugh, and let my hands move down across her back, cupping her ass, bringing her flush against my torso. “Sorry,” I murmur into her ear. “My flight was delayed.”

“Oh? Where are you now?”

“Stuck in Atlanta still. All the flights were canceled due to weather. I’ll have to try again tomorrow.” Then I look around at the scenery. “You’re dreaming of Blackness Castle tonight?”

She shrugs, and I feel her breasts lift against my chest as she moves. “I liked it here,” she tells me.

“We’ll go back again someday,” I whisper. “When Tepes is done with us.”

She chuckles bitterly. “Tepes is older than any of us. I’m not sure he’ll ever be done with us.”

She’s not wrong. I don’t want to talk about Tepes right now, I want to enjoy my time with Maria. My Mariabell. “How was your day?” I ask, the question trite but genuine. I want to know.

“My sisters,” she says, and growls, and it is adorable to hear in her lovely voice, “are going to be the death of me.”

“No they aren’t,” I assure her, nibbling along her earlobe. “I fixed that. You’re going to live forever.”

“Not if I go walking straight out into the sun to get away from them,” she snipes.

I laugh, and start lowering the other strap of her dress. “What did they do now?”

“Clovis has a boyfriend apparently,” she tells me, “and Clover helped her sneak out last night to go visit him without me knowing.”

The straps are off, and the dress is clinging only around her hips, her beautiful breasts gleaming in the moonlight. “Clovis looks like you,” I remind her, “of course she’s going to attract boyfriends. Who’s the boy?”

“I haven’t met him. I think he’s a few years older. All she will tell me is that his name is Van, but it seems that she is completely obsessed with him. She’s lost her appetite for longing over him.”

“Sounds serious,” I say, trailing my hands down across the smooth muscles of her torso. “Let’s have him over for dinner when I get back.”

I’m done talking about her sisters. I lower her to the grass, here on the hillside overlooking the bay, and the moon shines on her lovely face and form, and I kneel over her, and start kissing in a trail down her torso, towards where her dress is still clinging to her hips.

I want the dress gone, and the dream cooperates, and she lies before me in all her glory, exposed to my eyes, and she looks up at me with a smirk. My clothing evaporates as well, and I’m sure that was her doing, and she reaches down for my cock. She is very straightforward, it is one of my favorite things about her. She pulls me to her, and I slip inside her, and her honeysuckle scent swirls around me and I put my mouth to her neck again. I sink my teeth in, and drink her honey, and she wraps her arms and legs around me, and I thrust and thrust and thrust while she moans and sighs.