Night Howls on the Hudson

Chapter 1: Painting under the Influence

"A dog howled. Weird became the night."
— Langston Hughes

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Neal lifted his brush from the canvas and stood back to study the painting.

A damp wind seeped through the cracks in the stone walls of the chamber, causing the wax tapers to flicker. His eyes burned from painting at night, but the Marquesa had a luminous radiance that he could capture only by candlelight.

Her boudoir was decorated in the latest style. Neal doubted Napoleon had bestowed more luxurious appointments upon Josephine. The daybed was tented with dark maroon velvet hangings which were suspended from a gold gilt crown. The silk sheets were tinted a soft mauve that turned chestnut in the unilluminated shadows.

The Marquesa wore an empire gown of white diaphanous silk, designed to enhance rather than conceal. Her smile invited him to lounge beside her. He'd posed her with a lyre, which she occasionally strummed while he painted. When her graceful fingers plucked the strings, he yearned to take the place of the lyre. He resisted the urge. The painting must be finished tonight. Resolutely, he focused on the canvas ...

"You've toiled long enough, mi amor," she remarked, twirling a long strand of flaxen blond hair that hung in a loose curl between her breasts. "Come sit beside me." By now the tapers were mere stubs. Soon he'd need to replace them.

"Only a few more minutes," he pleaded, pausing to stretch his paint-smudged fingers. A drop of ocher paint had fallen on the white ruffle of his shirt sleeve. He glanced down at his wine-red doublet. No smears on it, fortunately. She'd urged him to strip off his shirt. But if he stood in front of her, clad only in his silk breeches, he knew what the result would be. It had already happened far too often.

A scrabbling sound interrupted his musings. He glanced up to see a shadow dart behind the bed hangings in the corner. Too large to be a cat, what was it?

"Neal, answer me!"

He felt his shoulder being shaken. Neal turned from the canvas to see Mozzie in front of him. The boudoir was dissolving into mist. The Marquesa had already vanished.

Neal looked down, shocked. Gone were his silk doublet and breeches. He was clad only in sleep pants. The easel was real enough. And there was his portrait of the Marquesa, mocking him. He must have been painting for hours. He couldn't stop now. If only he closed his eyes, she'd return to him.

Mozzie shoved him into a chair. "Don't move. I'll get you a glass of wine."

"When did you get here?" Neal raked his hair off his forehead. His dinette table was littered with paint tubes. That portrait he'd made ... It looked like a painting he'd seen by Goya.

"A few minutes ago. I stopped by on the way to the Emporium. How long have you been painting?"

Neal had no memory of when he started, but bright sunshine was now pouring through the skylight. According to the clock in the bookcase, it was already ten o'clock.

"Forget the wine, I need coffee." He stood up to fill the kettle.

"Stay where you are. I can make it. You still haven't answered me." Mozzie retreated to the kitchenette and reached into the cabinet for a bag of coffee beans. He measured out a scoop for the grinder. "It's Astrena, isn't it?"

Neal nodded glumly. He was once more fully in the present reality, no longer in some Spanish palace. Just his luck to be on first-name terms with a Greek goddess. And if it had to be a goddess, why couldn't it be Aphrodite? Instead, he was bound to Astrena, goddess of witches and vampires.