King Maker: The Knights of Breton Court, Volume 1 (29 page)

  "You sound like you were there," King said.

  "To you, the arrow of time points in one direction," Merle said.

  The rest of the table exchanged sideways glances with one another, not knowing what to make of Merle and Tavon. Bullshit artists of the first degree, probably, like griots of African tribes telling stories for their keep. Lott and King, however, paid extra attention.

  "Thing is, Green could and should be running Night's crew," Tavon continued, smacking his mouth loudly as he ate while talking. "He has the name, he has the muscle. He even had the real estate. But he lets Night run things."

  "Green prefers the shadows. That's irony," Merle said.

  "Green's eternal."

  "That's one story. Another goes that for every spring there must be a winter."

  "I'm about sick of your riddles," Wayne said.

  "We all have our roles to play. I'm only a guide. He's the hero." Merle pointed his dirty-nailed thumb toward King.

  "I'm no hero," King said.

  "That's why we're here. Heroes, love, and spiritual quests. The story's still the same."

  "Any of you know a light-skinned sister, braids, pointy ears?" King asked.

  "Thus enter the fey," Merle said.

  "You mean Omarosa? What you want with her?" Tavon picked at his remaining fries.

  "Seen her around. She fit into any of this?" King asked. The heat of Lady G's body made him all too self-conscious. She continued to eat her fries in silence, making no claim on him. Or any man.

  "She's strictly independent far as I know."

  "Never accept a gift from her kind," Merle said. "And don't raise the terror of their anger."

 

No one believed in fairies anymore. With no belief to sustain them, most faded away to the land of Nod, the wellspring of ideas, there to remain forgotten and unmourned. When most folks thought of fairies, the image of gay sprites and winsome pixies sprang to mind. There was the whispered caution to never accept a gift from one, but for the most part, people thought of them as prancing merry-makers. Because few survived to tell the tale of the fey once angered.

  On rare occasion, a rogue fairy roamed the land of mortals, engaged in a tryst of some sort, and continued their wanderings heedless of the consequences.

  Omarosa was such a consequence.

  The Marion County Juvenile Detention Center had grown accustomed to scandal over the years. From their issues with overcrowding to the allegations of sexual abuse (many of those charges were later dropped, but the stain remained). In the wake of the ensuing reforms, guards, inmates, and visitors wore arm bands which could even alert staff when rival gang members were in proximity to one another. Certain events caused minor cracks in the system, such as the general scoops of kids in the wake of the Breton Court shooting. With public pressure for an arrest, many kids were detained overnight as the mess sorted itself out. Parker's luck never was too good. He was merely "spectating" as he explained to the cracker-ass po-lice who questioned him. As the detective explained, "spectating" did not explain the vials he was caught with. Personal use became his mantra, a charge to be all but dismissed by over-worked judges and a crowded system, and recognized that this was little more than a charge used to remind him of his place in the greater criminal justice scheme of things. The hillbilly cop tried to half-sweat him about Dred and Night's operations ("who?") with any further questions ready to trigger his Miranda-given rights ("Law. Yer."). So he was put in a cell to give him time to think about things. A peaceful night's sleep not worrying about getting got on a corner. That was the game then.

  In the game now, Omarosa stood over the sleeping Parker, letting an arm of her set of handcuffs ratchet through the main body.

  
Click. Click. Click.

  Parker didn't stir. Asleep, he was still very much a child, a man-boy, not quite the hardened killer he wished to be. Asleep, he was someone who could be loved, who'd let someone love him. Asleep, the possibility of dreams, of a better future remained.

  Omarosa knelt down and whispered in his ear.

  "Parker, your destiny calls you."

  He smiled upon hearing the feminine voice, the sound of rose petals against naked flesh; a tease of promise in the night and his dick hardened. A few moments later, his eyes fluttered – he required several moments to be convinced that he wasn't dreaming – not quite making out the form, enough to register that he wasn't alone. Before he could react, Omarosa grabbed him from his bed. She had him in a choke-hold, but adrenaline-fueled panic soon flooded him. He had nothing to flail against besides her as she drew him to the middle of the cell. Her height advantage on him meant little compared to the blood and strength of the fey in her veins. His eyes bulged, his face reddened with his last gasps and dawning realization that he had reached his life's endgame. His arm shot out, grasping at nothing in particular, his other fist slamming weakly into Omarosa's side. Consciousness fled him and his body fell limp into her arms.

  Tearing his bedsheets, she fastened a noose and propped him against the bed to let the body fall. The investigation – such as it would be since no one would look too closely for fear of the phrase "dereliction of duty" entering their job performance jackets; and with suicides being more common than anyone wanted to believe – would conclude suicide. Still, she wanted folks to know that she could reach them anywhere. She placed a black rose on the shelf above the sink. It would be a note in a file somewhere, but it would find its way into Parker's personal effects. And people would know. The fey were not to be trifled with.

  You let them go about their business unless you want their terror to rain down upon you.

 

"Wait," Wayne said, still putting pieces together. "ESG was independent."

  "Not that independent. There are a few dozen gangs here and everyone has their ties somewhere. ESG's loyalty was to Night," Tavon said. "I hear the trolls got into them."

  "We were there." Wayne shifted in his seat. Lady G and Rhianna studied the napkins in their laps. Wayne told the tale of the trolls' attack on Rhianna's friends.

  "And the police didn't do anything?" King asked Tavon.

  "Oh, it's hot out there, for sure. Po-po out in force. But what they gonna do? Can't investigate with no body. And the trolls eat their prey. So Prez's boy is just another missing nigga. They wouldn't be looking too hard no ways."

  "You know Junie? Him and some young dude he's been rollin' with," King said.

  "Junie and Parker?" Tavon asked. "Yeah, I know them."

  "I saw them trying to muscle Green."

  "Once a fuck-up… Junie and Parker were replaced by the trolls. I hear they been demoted. Out slinging where ESG used to."

 

Smoke layered the air around him as Junie got blunted up, tripping high on his weed as he took swigs from his forty ounce. When he was up like this, his simple thoughts and false courage turned dark and focused, a cold, sick churning in his head. In the corner of the hovel he called home, sweat trickled down the burnt marshmallow flesh of his grayish face. The life he envied when he saw the likes of Dred or Night roll through the neighborhood in their Escalades with their rims, their stereos, their bling, had come to this. His body ached and he stank of overripe fruit fermenting in a dark, moist place. His scraped knuckles were red and swollen from punching the plaster from his walls. Rumor had hit the wire that Parker was dead. That he'd done himself. Not that the word of junkies and prostitutes was to be trusted, however, Junie knew down deep in his soul that the story had the stink of truth about it.

  A bout of sudden nausea sent him scrambling to the bathroom. The sink looked like someone tried to wash their abortion down it. Junie reached into his waistband and fished out the grip of his auto. Stainless steel, it was the most expensive gun they had. He flipped the safety then tucked it in his waist, the tail of his shirt covering it. He'd been punked, and that didn't sit well with him. He needed to come back on Green. He had built the corner down off McCarty Street into a real spot, had carried his demotion by proving himself. He had earned his way back up to Breton Court. But he still needed to step up, let his name ring out for real by taking out Green.

  He had to correct a situation.

 

"Sounds to me like everything keeps coming back to Breton Court and the Phoenix," King said.

  "How you figure?" Lott asked.

  "Breton Court seems to be the flash point, but everything seems to come from the Phoenix."

  "Like it's at the heart of the web." Lott followed King's thought.

  "The dragon's lair," Merle said.

  "But what about the fiends?" Wayne asked Tavon.

  "They fell out. Sick or somethin'."

  "Who?"

  "My people them, down in Li'l Nam. We rode the Black Zombie blast. Knocked everyone right the fuck out."

  "Except you?"

  "I… got watered." Tavon studied his plate, not meeting anyone's eyes. Even fiends knew shame when they got played at their own game. Things didn't get much lower than that.

  "They out for real? You call for an ambo or something?"

  "Nah, I–"

  "So let me get this straight: you got all worked up cause some fiends got knocked on they asses? Shit, I thought you had a real problem."

  "I'm telling you, this was different."

  "Look, here's my card." Wayne slipped his card across the table. "Outreach has a 1-888 number. Where they stay at?"

  "Penn and 24th."

  "Tell you what then. You go back there in the morning and see what's what. You got a problem, call 911. Either way, call the number and check in with me. The person on call will get me the message. I'll come out. I don't hear from you, I'm still coming out, but I'll be pissed."

  "You smell that, Sir Rupert? He reeks of the dragon's breath."

  "What's with the dragon shit?"

  "The dragon… he's wide awake now."

 
 

Green was on it. There was no getting inside Green's mind. His was the primal thoughts of nature unbound. Elemental. A force of nature. The ways of a dragon were easier to understand. Most people assumed him to be a soldier, a corner boy, a thug in clean vines. Those things they understood. Those things – however violent, however toxic, however shallow and dehumanizing – wouldn't leave them screaming in the night. Green was Green. And Green was eternal. So when the bug-ridden girl – with too-thin arms but whose body wasn't too far removed from the voluptuous beauty she'd once been – ambled towards him, he was unmoved. To the casual observer, it might have seemed that pussy was pussy, easy to get, and thus none especially swayed Green. She could display her wares in the sauntering suggestion of seduction in order to mooch a vial, but it would do her no good. On a good day, he would ignore her with a glare of casual disdain which would freeze the blood in her veins. On a bad day, well, the streets ran rampant with tales of Green on a bad day. He was on it. If ambitious fiends tried to run game on him, if daring street thieves raided his stashes, or simply if fools just came up short, miscounting money or just losing shit cause they were careless, Green was on them. Eyes on point, never faltering.

  There was a time when he enjoyed this time of the morning. The world was still fairly dark, but with the hint of sunrise, the day was still full of promise and imminent hope. Dew, an equal-opportunity shroud, blanketed windshields and grass. His blood afire against the cool of the fading night, he used to be at his most creative, his most alive. Now the mornings drained him. So much work left undone and yet to be done. Those fleeing the dawn's light still left a mess in their wake, and the day served only to remind him that night would once again return.

  "Fellas, time to tool up," Green said to the latest bunch of workers he supervised. His was an ancient and dark voice, the sound of twigs snapping like brittle bones. Somehow he'd been relegated to middle management, too far separated from the pulse of the streets, too far from the thrill and experience of life; but he had found ways to make up for it. Supervising from street level, for one thing.

  "What's up?" a young, rock-faced soldier asked because he was ready to call it a night.

  "Just some business I have to settle. Make sure we have no other surprises."

 

• • •

 

The gray sky lightened with the rising sun. The street lights hadn't turned off, obstinately clinging to the embers of night. The Durham Brothers pulled into a side street on the other side of the bridge that crossed the creek that separated Breton Court from the rest of housing addition. Their long and ample limbs jutted ridiculously from the Ford Focus which creaked noisily when they exited. Pressing smooth their outfits, one last primp before their engagement, they shambled along the sidewalk, then veered off as they got to the bridge, careful to remain out of the direct line of sight from Green. They cut through the yard of the house they parked in front of, whose backyard opened onto a sloping hillside that terminated at the creek. The bridge wasn't the largest by any stretch, little more than a culvert, but it would suffice.

  "He out there," Marshall said.

  "I didn't see anyone, but, yeah, I can feel him." Michaela closed her eyes, double-checking the odd stirring in the core of her being.

  "You think he can feel us?"

  "He Green, ain't he?"

  "Yeah, but we're in our–" Marshall started.

  "Place of power. True." The bridge became an echo chamber whenever a car rumbled along it. The murky creek water lapped at the edges of the embankment, riffles of current thinned by the lack of rain. Overgrown with weeds, overturned grocery carts divided the channel. The yellow and brown of fallen leaves blanketed much of the embankment, blown under and trapped by the mild breeze. Michaela shuddered with her own chill. "But Green's outside. It's all his place of power."