29 comments/ 45728 views/ 14 favorites Down the Long Empty Nights By: Colleen Thomas Down through the dark ages of time I have come, the embodiment of Jung's collective memory. Freed long ago of mortal constraints, I have impassively watched civilizations rise and fall. Alexander, Caesar, Cleopatra. Dusty names applied to almost mythical figures, yet to me, living memories. The glory that was Rome, mighty Carthage, mysterious Byzantium, Moorish Spain - not pictures of ruins, but memories of streets I once trod; imperfect memories, but memories nonetheless, all the more ethereal as night crowds upon night. Comedy, tragedy, exultant highs and black, depthless lows. Memories of friends long dead and enemies hoped to be so. Within my hidden vault rest my favorite things. A dress given to me by the German Princess, long before she became Catherine the Great; a necklace of gold and precious stones, the real legacy of Helen of Troy; a treasury of relics, worth more than modern man could ever compute. But most priceless to me, a simple rawhide necklace with a crude stone carving of a long forgotten fertility goddess - all that I wore on the night of my taking. She came to me first in dreams, fleeting images of a strange woman with red hair and pale skin. I took her to be a goddess or a demon, having never seen a white person before or even heard of one. As the nights wore on, the dreams came more often and were longer. She spoke to me, of life eternal and of power beyond even that I possessed as a shaman of my people. One night no dream came and I felt compelled by a force stronger than my will to go to a clearing in the dense jungle. She met me there and defeated my spells and wards with a dismissive wave of her hand. With pain and pleasure she broke me to her will; pain, pleasure and hunger. She released me upon my own family and I slew many in my hungered berserker's rage. North she took me, traveling by night, with only the stars to guide us. We crossed the mighty dessert sleeping beneath the shifting sands each day, until finally we arrived on the shores of an aquamarine sea. From mistress and slave, to friends, then lovers, time carried us. Powerful was my sire, but not invulnerable. In the heat of the day, reavers from the sea fell upon our villa. They slew or carried away the servants. My totem spirit warned me and I rose before they entered our sleeping chamber. Roused in the middle of the day, my sire was weak. We fought them and slew them until the mosaic on our floor was covered in their blood. Even weakened, we might have won, had not a tribesman scored a lucky shot with his atlatl the wooden shaft piercing my sire's heart. I could do nothing to save her as the frenzied men hacked her body to pieces. Alone and outnumbered, I called upon the spirits of the earth. The ground shook and a great chasm opened, scattering the delicate mosaic into tiny bits. With the earth exposed, I sank into it, making good my escape. When night fell I rose and followed them to their camp where I wreaked a bloody vengeance, but all of their deaths could not bring back my lover and the empty feeling would not leave me. Since then I have taken many lovers and sired childer of my own. The last of my gifted lovers perished in Lisbon, when the seas rose up and destroyed that city. The last of my children died in Dresden with her lover, when fire consumed that city. I had long since traveled to the new world, but I felt her passing and grieved. I had thought I was old beyond the call, but tonight, I shall take a new lover and make yet another child. A companion to travel with me through the long lonely nights ahead as this world edges towards its own destruction. Long have I groomed this one, watching her from afar and protecting her as I once loved and protected her mother. My footman calls. The sun is finally down and I may leave this place of safety. Into the warm embrace of the velvety night. Down the Long Empty Nights Erin scanned the crowd, but she saw no one she recognized. The costumes, which had been so cheesy moments earlier now took on sinister edges. Darkened nooks and corners held figures that seemed to be leering at her. Erin closed her eyes and shook her head violently. When she opened her eyes, everything was back to normal. She spotted Darin returning with several drinks and sighed in relief. "Here's your coke," he said, passing it to her. "Thanks. You going to hold the table a while?" "Yeah, I suppose. Not like a cute girl is going to ask me to dance." Erin grabbed her coke, slid out of the booth and made her way across the crowded floor to the stairs leading up to the haunted house. She was going to find Vanessa and get out of here. It was probably just her imagination and she knew Vanessa would be pissed, especially after Erin's promise not to be a stick in the mud, but she was really getting spooked now. The ghostly refill of her drink had been the last straw as far as weirdness went for her. Too much was going on here she didn't understand and had no control over. At the top of the stairs was a black curtain with a sign that said 'haunted house'. Erin slipped through and found herself in a darkened room created with black dividers like they used in offices. She hurried through the room, which had spiders all over the place, made with pipe cleaners for legs and fat fuzzy bodies. The next room had a guy in dinner jacket and cape playing Dracula. The next was splattered in fake blood and an employee with a hockey mask and fake chain saw threatened her. Room after hokey room followed, until she was laughing at herself for being so ill at ease earlier. She knew she was being silly and was smiling when she exited the haunted house. The vaguely discomforting events of earlier now seemed less so as the funny attempts at being scary had rendered them less potent in her mind. On the back side of the maze of dividers was the upstairs bar. Several couples sat around drinking and talking. The noise up here was muted and Erin realized the whole upper level was encased in thick glass. She paused and looked down at the main floor, before she located Vanessa and Josh in a secluded booth. Vanessa was sitting in his lap and by the way she was moving and the look on her face, Erin had no doubt she was getting fucked. Erin blushed, and turned away, heading back down to the main floor via the other floating stair. When she reached the bottom, Erin stopped off at the ladies room and emptied her bladder. When she came out the whole place was dark, with a single spot light illuminating a couple on the dance floor. The crowd was clapping as the man, dressed as Rhett Butler and the woman, as Scarlet, complete with hoop skirts, made a circuit of the floor. As they exited, Freddy Kruger, complete with razor hands entered and snarled as he walked about. Erin was making her way towards the table when a fat man in a pink French maid's outfit got a load of laughs and applause. Erin was passing the edge of the stage, when someone grabbed her arm. She had a fleeting impression of ebony skin, luminous green eyes and sensual lips before she was thrust onto the dance floor. Erin was petrified, especially when the DJ started some music from Can-Can. She glanced nervously back to the edge of the crowd and wanted to bolt, but the dark woman was there. Her eyes seemed as large a headlights and Erin felt an otherworldly calm suffuse her being. Her body seemed to be in tune with the music and she found herself dancing, her upper body in sync to the music's rhythm. With a flourish, she grabbed the hem of her skirt and showed off her legs and petticoats. While Erin loved musicals, she had never learned to do any of the intricate stage dances. Yet she found herself running her favorite dance scene from the Moulin Rouge through her head. As she did so, her body followed the dance steps as she was imagining them. There was a seamless transition from thought to action as she high kicked and pranced, just as the woman she was remembering did. As the music ended, Erin spun, bent over at the waist and flipped her skirts up, giving the audience a good look at her ass. With the end of the music, the surreal calm evaporated and Erin quickly covered herself. When she turned she was surprised to see everyone clapping wildly. The sound came then, as the strange silence that had filtered all but the music from her ears also dissipated. Erin took a quick, uncertain bow and exited the dance floor. She found her table and sat, sliding back into the curve of the booth. "Wow! How long have you been dancing?" Darin asked. "Not long," Erin responded. "Well, you're really good. Might even win a prize," he said. "I doubt it," Erin replied. She was still confused, paying only the absolute minimum of attention to the conversation. She was breathing heavily from the exertion and took a big swallow of her drink without thought. She instantly felt her skin prickle and everything slowed down. The darkness dissipated and she could see more. Rather than fighting it, she took another big swallow. The people slowed even more and the darkness of the club became even less. Erin slammed the rest of the drink in three big gulps. When she put it down she couldn't believe what she saw. Everyone was standing still, like statues. A woman on the dance floor was frozen, with her feet both off the floor, in mid jump. The club seemed well lit, as if someone had brought the house lights up. As Erin was looking around, she saw the woman in black. She was standing in the alcove that wasn't an alcove. With one finger she beckoned, she held a candle in her other. When Erin rose the mysterious woman turned and disappeared. Erin walked across the club in a daze, passed into the alcove and followed the indistinct figure down a concrete stairway. It spiraled downward, far beneath the club and the street. As she went, the brightness dimmed and eventually, she passed into a world of stygian blackness. With the passing of the light, her sudden burst of courage failed her and she shivered. She wanted desperately to return to the top of the stairs, but there was complete darkness behind her. Only the wan glow of the candle the dark woman held provided any light and it was rapidly diminishing. Erin hurried down the stairs, trying to keep within sight of the feeble light. The stairs became rougher, less even and the material changed from concrete to rough hewn stone. The walls went from smooth concrete, to rough cinder blocks, to ancient red bricks. They became rough and slimy and Erin had to cease holding the wall as her fingers made contact with nameless, slimy things that moved under them. This made it more imperative that she keep up with the faint circle of light and she quickened her pace. The stair eventually ended and she saw the back of the dark woman as she glided down a long corridor of rough stone. The corridor was slanted upwards slightly, but Erin had lost all sense of how far beneath the streets she was. Creatures stirred and chittered, just outside the circle of light, some of them sounding like rats, but others like giant insects. Those noises made her skin crawl and she hurried to stay within the dim glow of the candle. She passed through several grills and heavy security doors, each closing behind her with unnaturally loud clangs. The last one was over two feet thick and resembled the blast doors she had seen on the old bomb-shelter that now served as the university's book storage area. She had been there many times, searching for volumes no longer on the main floor of the old building. As the door cycled shut Erin began to doubt her sanity. She was in a high rise apartment and it was broad daylight. She could see the harbor and the New York skyline outside the smoky tinted windows on one wall. Her rational mind was screaming in repudiation of this. This place, this night, this whole thing. She couldn't have been underground long enough for it to be broad daylight, could she? And you didn't enter uptown apartments from creepy underground catacombs. And... She looked again at a skyline subtly wrong. It was when her eyes came to rest on the twin towers for the third time that it suddenly dawned upon her why the skyline was wrong. Curiosity overriding fear, she approached the window. With her nose pressed to it and squatting down, she could see the blank white wall above the painted skyline. The entire scene was a model, rendered in fantastic detail, the tint to the windows serving to make the scene less distinct and thus more realistic. Erin sighed heavily, glad to know she wasn't going insane. She stood and examined the apartment again. It was decorated in very modern furniture, but now that her mind seemed to be working again, she realized it was too perfect. No mail tossed casually on the counter, not coat lying on the sofa, none of the minor things even the most tidy of lived in homes evidenced. It was more like a show room than a living room. Feeling her hairs prickle and her skin go clammy, she approached the only exit from the room. She opened the door slowly, expecting she knew not what. It was dark inside, so dark even the faux sunlight from the outer room left only indistinct shadows. Erin entered hesitantly. When she was far enough away from the door that she couldn't impede its progress it slammed. The darkness was complete and total. No ray of comforting light came through the bottom or top. In fact, she couldn't even locate the door behind her. She was breathing heavily, beginning to panic when a musical laugh sounded from across the room. "Who's there?!" Erin called. Rather than a response, the room was suddenly lit with subtle lighting. Erin gasped. She knew this room. Or more to the point, she knew the main piece of furniture, a large, round bed with black satin sheets. The bed from her erotic visions. Even with the wonder and shock, she couldn't help but feel slightly aroused. The phantasmal woman in black was seated on the bed, and there was no doubt now she was real. She was sitting back against the many colored pillows, reclining like some Roman patrician watching a spectacle. Her skin was ebony and as flawless as a black pearl. Her face was exotic, too wide to be really beautiful, but a strong chin, sharp nose, full lips and high cheek bones blended into a stunningly sensual visage. Her breasts were small and conical, with pointed nipples and rough, asymmetric aureoles. They were disproportionate to her somewhat wide shoulders, but were beautifully formed. Her waist was trim. Her legs were shapely, firm and toned. A wild forest of thick, dark curls concealed her mound, but Erin could see the dark coral coloring of her nether lips. Erin felt strange, her body thrumming with a nameless and restless energy that seemed as much fear and confusion as arousal. Even the arousal only added to her confusion, as she had never considered herself bi or interested in another woman. Yet her aching nipples and throbbing sex left little doubt she was very horny. For a long period the tableau held, but when the woman moved to get off the bed an approach, Erin found her voice as her fear mastered her. "What do you want?" she asked plaintively. She wanted to bolt, to run through the door and escape but her body wouldn't respond to her fervent desire to move. The woman was tall, easily as tall as Erin if not taller. She moved behind the frightened girl and slipped her arms around Erin's waist. Erin could feel the softness of her body as it pressed into her back. The woman's hands were big, but extremely tender as she stroked Erin's tummy and sides through the velvet dress. Erin gasped when those big hands gently cupped her breasts and squeezed. The woman slowly and tenderly fondled her, working her breasts and nipples while kissing and nibbling on Erin's shoulder. Erin didn't want to respond, she just wanted to escape, but the signals from her breasts became more and more insistent. The woman behind her seemed to know a great deal about how to turn someone on as her tongue and lips moved inexorably towards Erin's sensitive ears. "What are you doing?" Erin whined. A soft breath was expelled on her ear, sending a shiver down her spine; when the woman's tongue began to worry the ear lobe Erin moaned. Long, firm fingers began to roll and gently pinch her nipples as the excitement in her body mounted. Her hips bucked and she seemed to be losing her mind as unreal pleasure assaulted her senses. Erin's eyes were closed and she was chewing on her bottom lip, whimpering softly when she felt a strong contraction in her deep muscles. "Please...at least tell me your name?" Erin pleaded. Instead of the reply she hoped for, those magical hands curled into her top and tugged it and her bra down. She felt the cooler air of the room on her hot skin. The fingers returned and now unimpeded by her clothing she felt the first rush of sensation as her lover's silky skin brushed her own. Erin gasped in surprise when she felt how cool those fingers were. She had no time to contemplate as they gently seized her nipples and began to rapidly squeeze and release. Her pussy and anus were both rhythmically contracting as muscles involuntarily reacted to her impending orgasm. "Please," she groaned, no longer sure if she was begging for a response or release. That soft, musical laughter was ringing in Erin's ears when the first contraction of her inner muscles rocked her. A second blast came behind it, seemingly overtaking the first and another followed. A ragged, shuddering moan was torn from her lips as another blast of pure bliss tore at her sanity. Erin's entire body tensed and then she doubled over as the euphoric waves rippled away, leaving her panting and struggling to regain control of her breathing. Muscles twitched as tiny aftershocks continued to shake her. Her legs buckled and those soft hands, which had brought her so much pleasure grabbed her and held her in an iron grip. One arm supported her weight while the other slid down the zipper of her dress. Erin was still recovering from her orgasm and offered no resistance as those hands expertly stripped off the dress and her petticoats. Erin felt a deep sense of shame when her panties were tugged down. Not shame at her nakedness, but shame at how they clung to her damp mound. Erin found herself lying on her back on the bed, her head supported on a thick silk throw pillow, with another under her ass. The black woman was laying on her stomach, between Erin's splayed thighs, her face descending towards the blonde's open and inviting pussy. Erin's hands grasped the satin sheet beneath them and a long, drawn out hiss escaped her lips when she felt the first teasing caress of the woman's tongue. She moaned and tossed her head as that incredibly warm, soft and silky appendage thoroughly explored her pussy. The woman began by tracing the tip of her tongue along Erin's still sensitive lips. Working inward in an unhurried and languid manner, she laved Erin's clitoral hood and the area around her clit, but she refrained from direct contact. She worked down to Erin's entrance, sliding in and slowly fucking her. The woman's tongue seemed abnormally long and extraordinarily agile, almost prehensile as it slowly drove Erin towards another shattering orgasm. Erin's hips were undulating slowly, in rhythm to the woman's tongue and totally beyond her ability to control. When her tongue abandoned Erin's opening and started working back up, the young woman whined. She sighed contentedly when a long, cool finger slid into her and began to saw back and forth, creating a delicious friction. It seemed then the woman's tongue curled around her clit and at the same time feathered the tip of the super sensitive organ. Erin whimpered and then cried out as another orgasm welled up from deep inside her body and inundated her mind in stark, raw pleasure. Orgasms, in Erin's limited experience were always the product of her own hand or her vibe. They were soft and beautiful and left her feeling indolent and relaxed. This was something altogether different. This was violent and heady, totally beyond her control. Her inner muscled clamped down on the intruding finger, squeezing as it continued to slide in and out. Her back arched as that incredible tongue continued to brush over her clit, sending white hot sparks and jolts into her already reeling system. She was moaning, whimpering and gasping as the waves thoroughly rattled her ordered mind. She couldn't think, a slave to the rising tide of euphoria that threatened to take her beyond the limits she had so carefully established for herself. Erin didn't know how long it lasted, or when it ended, her mind was fragmented and she was having a difficult time piecing stimuli together. It was difficult to think or concentrate as ripples of her orgasm still echoed in her head. She was vaguely aware of her new lover moving around and was roused from her semi stupor by the bed sagging as the black woman rejoined her. The woman rolled her over as if she weighed nothing and those strong hands pulled Erin to her knees. "Wha?" she mumbled, having trouble forming words and even more trouble making her mouth work. Erin felt something blunt and cold press against her entrance. She had only seconds to realize what was coming before the fat dildo slipped into her. She was so wet and ready by then, that she felt almost no resistance, just wonderfully full. Her pussy reacted instantly, clamping down on the hard intruder. "Ohmigod!" she bleated. In and out, full and empty, then deliciously full again. Erin couldn't grasp what was happening, couldn't assimilate the delightful sensations, nor could she seem to get her mind in gear. By the time she could even isolate thoughts and begin to form them into coherent ideas, her pussy was spasming. Massive contractions, utter bliss, soul shattering blasts of pleasure drove conscious thought from her mind. She was no longer thinking, she just was. Happily oblivious to anything but the driving rhythm of her lover and the fantastic eruptions of pleasure that started in her center and radiated outward. Pleasure so keen it bordered on unendurable. Sensation lifted to its most pure and undiluted form. Orgasms that left her gasping as they continued to come, one upon the other until she screamed and consciousness deserted her. When Erin came back to reality, she found herself curled up in the black woman's arms. She felt so warm and indolent, but her mind quickly filled in the blanks and she remembered how she came to be here and what they had done. She sat up with a start, but those strong arms pulled her back to the bed. The woman rolled on top of her and smiled, revealing perfect white teeth. Well, perfect except for the two elongated canines. Erin had no time to scream or fight as the woman's head dipped. Fire coursed through Erin's veins. Not a burning fire, but a fire of lust and desire so overwhelming she meekly held onto her lover as her life ebbed away. Erin found herself floating, above the scene again, as she had been in her visions. Her face was serene, calm and seemingly happy. She wanted to feel regret or to see herself fight for her life, but she did neither. Watching as darkness overtook her. When she woke the second time, her lover now sat on the bed, holding Erin's head cradled in her lap. "Am I alive?" she asked, expecting no answer. "Yes and no. You are neither dead nor alive, but in a twilight area between them." "You can talk!" Erin said, sitting up and turning to face the black woman. She was smiling and her intelligent green eyes were alight with amusement. "Yes, I can." "Who are you?" Erin demanded. "You may call me Valerie." Down the Long Empty Nights "What have you done to me?" Erin asked, burying her face in her hands. "I have given you a gift." "But why?" "Because I love you. Time will not mar your beauty, nor steal your vigor, nor rob you at last of breath. I cannot stand such torment again." "You're a vampire! You can't love me. Even if you could you don't even know me!" "I know you. More personally than your first lover, I know you. I know your hopes and fears, your deepest desires. I know how to fulfill you, as a lover, as a friend, as much more." "How?" "Think you that this is our first meeting, Mwana?" "I've never been here before and I would certainly remember you if we had met," Erin said, but even as she asserted it, doubt crept into her voice. The woman's face now seemed hauntingly familiar. Not familiar as someone she remembered, but familiar as if from a dream. "We met for the first time in Bergen, you were riding your new tricycle and ran over my foot. We met again, some years later, when you won first place at the state finals in the four hundred meters. And again, when you were bleeding and alone and afraid to tell your parents because they would know you had lost your virginity. I was there when you graduated and on that long, cold night when you were snowed in at your dorm. This is not the first time you have found ecstasy in my embrace, merely the first one I have suffered you to remember." "I don't believe you," Erin said without conviction. If this upset Valerie, she didn't show it. She seemed amused and tolerant, like a mother with a precocious child. "Your mother was a beautiful woman. Beautiful, but not very intelligent. She was one of my many lovers and she could have received the gift, but on the night I finally decided to bestow it, I felt you already growing within her. To have taken her would have condemned you to an eternity in limbo. Not even for love could I do that. As I waited for you to be born, I discovered how close I had come to making a terrible mistake. I feel love so rarely I had forgotten how it clouds judgment. In the end, I let her go, but I kept an eye on you." "Why?" "I do not know really. Perhaps because I felt I owed you in some strange way. Or perhaps because I hoped you would possess her beauty, but have a personality more suited to an eternity together. You did get her beauty and with it your father's intellect. And over the years of watching you, I grew to love you as I have never loved a mortal, as I have loved only one other." "But I don't love you." "Don't you?" "I don't even know you, how can I love you?" "We shall see. Perhaps you will grow to feel for me as I do for you. If not, you will still have the gift I have given. It comes with no strings attached, save for those that rule all of our un-lives." Erin digested that. Her mind still wanted to deny this was happening. Vampires were simple myths. Yet she knew it was real when she realized she was no longer breathing, but still obviously functioning. "Are all the legends true?" "No. All of them couldn't be true, but some are. We cannot stand the light of day, nor do we operate effectively while the sun shines. We may move with speed so fast humans seem to stand still, we may be able to sleep within the earth or assume other shapes, or use magic or...well, many are true. Different bloodlines have different gifts." "Do we drink blood?" "Yes, that part is true of us all." "I can't kill anyone!" she said in alarm. "You can. In time you will, unless you wish to see your un-life end. But you need not fret. We drink blood, but we do not have to kill. The taking of blood fills humans with contentment and pleasure. So you may take a little from several over the course of an evening and do none of them harm. They will remember only kissing a beautiful woman." "I feel very tired," Erin said. "The morning approaches and like all of us, you must sleep." "Oh shit. I forgot all about Vanessa!" Valerie smiled and picked up a small remote control device. She pressed a button and the bookcase split in the middle and each half slid back into the wall. A bank of monitors was revealed. Valerie hit another button and several flared to life. Erin couldn't believe what she was seeing. Vanessa was lying on a big bed. There were several nude or semi dressed men standing around laughing and drinking. One guy was fucking the hell out of her while she sucked on another guy's cock. "What have you done to her?" Erin demanded. "I? I've done nothing. Well, almost nothing. I did arrange for the room. This is what she wanted Mwana." "It is not!" "A gangbang! Yeah, that would be the wildest ride of 'em all," Valerie said in an uncanny imitation of Vanessa. "But..." "No buts. On this night I made my own dreams come true. I helped her and countless others make theirs come true as well. Men left this building with women they could never have hoped to have in their wildest fantasies. Women left with men who they always wanted to have sex with, but were afraid to approach. Submissives found the dom of their dreams. Doms found the perfect little sub. Women left with women, to try their lifelong fantasy or experiment with a long held curiosity. Men left with men for the same purpose. Married couples will go home and try that variation they have both longed to try but were afraid to voice to their lover. And all will wake on the morrow, blame their sudden adventurousness on drink or the anonymity costumes conferred. On anything but the magical drinks made with a drop of my blood. Thus do I pay my debt to the humans who sustain my life. Thus do I assuage my own guilt." "And me? Did you make my dream come true?" Erin asked defiantly. "Yes. Though you do not realize it yet. Or more precisely, because you refuse to admit it to yourself. I took from you the control you so scrupulously maintain and at the same time so abhor. I gave you pleasure, pleasure so strong you let go and experienced life without control. That is what you truly desire, Mwana. Not control, but to be controlled. That is why your relationships fail. And that is why you will come to love me." Erin didn't know what to say. What she did know was this woman knew her, even better than she knew herself. And when she looked into those green eyes, she saw, not a monster, but infinite tenderness and love. What she knew for certain was that her secret fantasy was a secret no more.