The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes (The King Henry Tapes) (24 page)

“See,
T-Bone over there made a mistake.  Saw a piece of property owned by H. Vega on Van Ness . . . who else it going to be?  Then I made the same mistake reading it on a list of your
uncle’s
  properties.  Had to be him.  Makes sense.  But it wasn’t the big man; it was you, the little screw-up nephew.”

That
hit a nerve.  “Fuck you!  Screw-up?  I’m in his inner fucking circle!  Untie me and I’ll show you screw-up, mancer-bitch!”

My quick jab caught him in the face so hard the chair almost felt over backwards.  “Only I get to curse like that, Hector.”

“Fucking coward!”

“Guy who used machineguns in the middle of the night calling me a coward,
T-Bone.”

T-Bone
didn’t have anything to say.  His eyes told me to hurry it up already.  I’m just getting to know the guy really, guessing he’s not much of a gambler either, unless it’s card-counting.

T-Bone
. . . likes a sure thing.

Me
. . .

“If you’re in the
inner fucking circle
, then how ‘bout you tell me where the boss man really lives, Hector?”

All that bet won me
was more laughter.

“Come on, Hector
. . . making it real easy on me to kill you.”

“Kill me?” Suit said, offended even as
T-Bone gasped, “
Kill him?
”

My own
grin said its favorite words.  “Make a statement to King Vega, won’t it?  Kill his own nephew . . . kill one of his
inner fucking circle
.”

Suit’s bravado shattered just a bit.  Saw it in my eyes.  Wasn’t no bluffing here.  Damn right I was ready to do it.  There are days when I wake up in the morning and I just want to kill someone
. . . and today looked like my lucky day.

“You wouldn’t even last twenty-four hours,” Suit stammered.

“Maybe . . . but I think I would.  Start a war . . . lot of Coyotes die, lot of mancers die, maybe even lot of vampires die since I know of few of them that owe me a favor.  Maybe I die in the fighting . . . maybe not.”

“You have no fucking clue what you’re dealing with, Price.  No fucking clue how many of us there are.
  Day by day we only get stronger!”

I shrugged.  “Don’t matter h
ow many of you there are if they’re all big empty nutflaps like you lot, does it?”

Nutflaps
, T-Bone mouthed.

“Unless you ain’t as
inner fucking circle
as you pretending to be,” I continued, “Less . . . you don’t have a clue where the big house really is.”

“I know,” Suit spat, “I know but I tell and I’m dead anyway, so no reason for me to snitch is there?”

I reached out to touch his knee.  “Wrong . . .” I whispered a second before I activated my SDR and fried his ass.

[CLICK]

“Look at that, already awake.  How ‘bout that Coyote stamina,
T-Bone?  No wonder his lady has to chain him down.”

“Don’t do this, King Henry.”

“Why not?  Tried to kill us, remember?”

“He didn’t.”

“Tried . . . machineguns, shop, his uncle using my sister as a wifely fuck-toy, ring a bell?”

“You
’ve beat him.  Look at him!”

“
Him?
  Fuck him!  I don’t want imitation tofu Vega, I want the real thing.”

“So everything you’re doing with your shop can fall apart?”

“What do you know about my shop?”

“Ceinwyn told me
. . . about what your goal really is . . .”

“That woman
. . .”

“All that dies if you kill him.  You can joke about war
. . . but that’s what this would be.  Mancers versus Coyotes . . . you might know how to split pools, but what about Intras?  What happens when they start getting gunned down in the street all because you couldn’t let this slide?”

“Hector here gives up the goods and the war will be over as soon as I get to
Vega, no matter how many Coyotes are with him.”

“Now you’re just being a child who wants his way.”

“Doubt me, T-Bone?”

“A child who wants his way even if he knows it ends wrong for everyone but him.”

I slapped Suit awake, pattering his face with the back of my hand.  Maybe T-Bone was
right
in some kind of moral sense.  Starting wars:  bad.  But I knew fighting.  Knew that if Vega got away with trying to kill me he’d eventually try again.  Best just blow it all up now, when I knew it was coming, instead of later.

If I waited
. . . what did I gain by going Cold War Coyote?

“You awake?  Earth to Hector
Vega.”

“Fucker.”

Start war now:  kill Vega sooner.  Do some shock and awe with the Shaky Stick, make sure no one looks sideways at King Henry Price ever again.  Free JoJo, get her a divorce at least . . . okay so she’d keep being a Coyote . . . nothing I could do about that.  Lady would probably lock me up.  Shop would close down.  Ceinwyn would get fired for saying I could be trusted.  Mancers like Mom would keep dying.  When I was unlocked . . . Guild Bitch Number 62523.  If I was ever unlocked.

“That’s a
yes
.  Did you like the joke, Hector? 
Earth
. . . get it?”

“Fucking kill you.”

“See, T-Bone . . . not giving me a lot of options.”

Don’t start the war
:  live in fear that some Coyote is going to shoot at me all the time.  Let it get out that you can push around King Henry Price.  JoJo keeps on bending over for Vega . . . keeps Shifting once a month.  But . . .

Learn more about splitting pools.  Learn more about large pools.  Teach it to my friends.  Show Ceinwyn I can be reasonable to a point.  Keep the Shop open.  Save the world
. . .

“Fucking
going to tell my uncle about your bitch sister having a mancer for a brother.  Hope he guts her, it’s what the cunt deserves.”

I punched Suit so hard it did knock him over this time.  My hand pulsed, not with anima but just with pain.

“King Henry!” T-Bone yelled behind me, getting up off the couch to stop my beatdown.  “Try anymore and I’ll . . . I’ll stop you.”

I
frowned at him.  “How?”

“I have a pool up
. . .”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“You’d lightning bolt me over this guy?”

“I’d lightning bolt you to keep you from becoming a killer.”

Didn’t matter one way or the other.  N
o more beatdown came, but not from T-Bone standing up to me.  In the seconds the conversation lasted I actually listened to what Suit had said.

It all clicked.

Damn.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

“Huh?”

I looked up at the ceiling
. . . to the Mancy or God or even Ceiling Cat . . . no idea.  “We are such huge fucktards.”

“Huh?”
T-Bone repeated.

Getting to my feet myself, I rolled Suit over with a toe.  Man
. . . remind me never to jump naked into a bunch of glass.  “Vega don’t know about you attacking my shop, does he?” I asked in a growl.

“Fuck
. . . you . . .” Suit spit, blood coming out with the words.

“Tell the truth or I shock you again, asshole.  Did your uncle know about it or was that all you and your stupid boys?”

“Fucking couldn’t tell him you kicked my ass . . . had to make it right.  Fucking Princess Josephine wouldn’t tell about any of it and I couldn’t tell on her without . . . but if I could get payback, then my uncle wouldn’t care if I got beat the first time.  He’d just use it in his own games with you mancers and the vamps.”

T-Bone
’s face went green over yet another possible fuck-up on our part.  “It was these idiots the whole time.”

My face went pissed off more than usual.  “Yeah.  Except
. . . Ceinwyn probably called Vega and asked him to explain.”

“
No way we messed up this badly . . .”

“Yeah, think we did.
”

“So
. . .”

“
Out in the open now.”

“But he didn’t try to kill us.”

“Look at you with that optimism while you’re covered in six feet of coyote shit.”

“It could be worse.”

“How could it be worse?”

“
You could have killed Hector.”

“Still thinking about it
. . .”

“
Lightning bolt, King Henry!”

“Okay
. . . but . . . damn.  ‘
My bad
’ ain’t going to put this back in the bottle.”

Suit spit some more.  “What you fuckers talking about?  Why it matter? 
Vega still going to kill you for doing this to me.  Blood is blood. 
Sangre
.”

T-Bone
grabbed my shoulder, held me back from throwing another punch into Suit’s face.  “There’s nothing to win now.  Just one mistake after another . . . we can walk away, no war, now or later.”

No war ever
. . . assumptions just keep thrashing my life.

I was right all along.

The fucking teachers
were screwing with us.  Jethro Smith and his hard liquor, I’d know that voice anywhere, even buried under dirt.  I didn’t know how they’d managed the howls and the blood, but it couldn’t be that hard.  It’s not like any of us had ever
seen
the
werewolves
, not until we were good and caught.  For all my city-boy ass knew those were dogs howling.

Or a tape recorder
over some speaker
, I thought, getting myself extra pissed off.

Sleeping was out the window.  Not that I’d ever been good at it.  Even with the stolen lock I’d set up in my old room, you’d always be worried, always keep one eye and one ear at the ready.  JoJo had caused most of those problems, always sneaking in late, smelling of cigs, beer, and older guys.  Dad’s yells used to rattle the whole house.

In the cave, I couldn’t move at all.  Each of the girls outweighed me by probably twenty pounds.  It wasn’t exactly comfortable.  Drowning in girl is still drowning.  Miranda—fucking Miranda!—had her head on my shoulder, her glasses drooping to rub against my neck.  On the other side, Isabel drowned me with her boney elbow stabbing into my ribs like a knife.

Sleeping was out the window.  Even the nights when it was quiet back home, when JoJo came home on time, when Susan wou
ld be typing away at the family laptop—piece of shit like all the rest but it could steal WiFi from the neighbor’s house—getting good grades, when Mom and Dad had a ‘Good Night’ . . . I still had trouble sleeping.

I’d get pissed over something that day.  It would stay with me for hours.  Thinking it over, thinking how to solve my problem.  Thinking how to protect what’s mine.

In the cave, I was ready to ruin some bitches.  Some bitches with ‘
Mr
’ and ‘
Mrs
’ in front of their names.

Faking
Samson’s death, I get that.  Seeing how we react to stress?  Okay, I’ll give you the one test.  Maybe Miranda’s right, maybe you want to make sure we’re ready to get taught the Mancy, so you put us in the Octagon, make us fight.  See if we have us accidental discharges.  See if we’ve learned the required amount of control.

But the
second
attack?  Making us run through the woods like this?  Backpacks left behind?  No food.  No water.  Making me huddle in a cave?  Make me be nice to Miranda ‘
I know better than you do
’ Daniels?  Make me have to keep Isabel from dry humping me all night?

That’s a total dick move, Asylum,
total dick move
.

Then there’s my fairy dreams
. . . they were really starting to freak me out. 
What the fuck is happening to me?
  The Mancy, breaking a table or a child-lock, sure.  But dreaming I’m standing on a mountainside?  Dreaming I’m swimming through the earth, hearing conversations happening miles away?  Ceinwyn Dale didn’t mention this . . . it wasn’t on the brochure, assholes!

Plus
. . . had myself a suspicion I needed an answer to.

“You
real or you just a teacher screwing with me too?” I asked the cave floor, making sure all those vibrations were angled right.

It took awhile this time, the words forming slowly.  MORE REAL THAN YOU, LITTLE MANCER.

“That last dream . . . that was real.  That wasn’t in my head; it was in the real world.”

No change.  I looked at the REAL though, nodding.

“If it is real, if this is just teachers testing us . . . then why are you helping so much?  Why would you care about thirty kids walking through the woods?”

Again, it came
very slow.  I read each letter as it formed.  I CARE ABOUT YOUR FUTURE VERY MUCH, KING HENRY PRICE.

“That’s freaky, man.  You weren’t a priest in another life, were you?”

Slowest yet.  Took a few minutes.  Letters and words were missing.  SAD I MUST END MY ASSSTNCE, THE WATR AND WIND WAR ME TOO GREAT.

“The storm?”

WID, WATER, LIGHTNIG, NOT FRIEND, LITTE MANCE.

“Kind of liking wind at the moment.  She’s warm.”

MOMENT SHE NO LONER NEED YOU SHE WLL URN ON YU, THAT IS THE WAY O WIND.

Thank the Mancy my generation grew up reading text messages.  “Probably, but for now?  She ain’t so bad when she’s sleeping and her mouth is shut.”

IF YO EVR TIR OF YOUR PRISN, COM TO ME, I WILL TEACH YOU MOR TAN THEY EVE CULD.

“Oh look, a Dark Side offer, wasn’t expecting that
. . .”

1 DAY, LITLE MACER, EARTH ALWAYS OUTLASTS.

[CLICK]

My doubts and fears were gone.  Yeah, yeah, I have fears.  Not like big ones, but some.  I’d been kind of worried for Pocket.  He’s my friend, what if the wolves used him as a chew-toy?  Plus, Valentine was the first to disappear and I liked her too.  She laughed at my jokes.

Now
. . . the images of Pocket and Valentine being stabbed with knives or shot in the back of the head or tied with rope or trapped in cages were all gone.  I heard Smith’s voice over and over. 
Go back to the buses
.  Suddenly . . . Pocket sipped hot cocoa and Valentine sat by herself, those sharp cheeks hollow as she worried about Miranda out in the rain.

Miranda
. . . Isabel . . .

If I told them
, they’d give up.  They might even start walking toward the teachers instead of away from them.

But if I didn’
t tell them . . . that was pretty messed, even for fourteen-year-old-me.

Why do I need them?
I thought.

I could run off on my own, wouldn’t matter.  Make the teachers chase me.  I would probably be faster without Miranda around.  Isabel
. . . she could keep up, but if I didn’t have to look at that face it would be a plus.

Back off me
. . . I was being nice enough by letting her touch me and cuddle against my side without throwing up on her.

Outside
, the storm had stopped, or moved on I suppose.  The rain and humidity still hung in the air.  It smelled like wet tree and wet dirt.  I liked half that formula.  Still cold.  Forties?  Thirties?  Just a step above snow I guess.  Back then I didn’t know a thing about snow.  Visalia had been about hot summers and nasty ugly winters, not four seasons.

The cave felt warmer.  There was actually a breeze of heat, weird as that seems, boiling up from the depths of the cave, however deep it went. 
Deep enough for Meteyos to reach out a finger and piddle us
.  It was a disturbing thought.

The storm was gone, but there were still noises.  The hush of breeze against rock.  The drip of water from leaves.  Isabel sifting in her sleep.  Miranda’s soft snoring at my ear.  All that talk of how much I disgusted her and there she was pressed right against me.

With her body type, she kept reminding me of Sally, of the home I’d thrown away.  Sally used to feel the same after our grunting and humping sessions.  Chin on my shoulder near my neck, breasts pressed against my elbow, hip scrunched against my scrawny ass.

When we knew her mom had the late shift she’d ask me to just lie on the bed with her, naked as can be.  I wasn’t into it, but seeing as how I liked the grunting and humping I did it.  Other times, when her mom
was
home and we couldn’t do the fun stuff, we’d lie on the bed but clothed, Sally would talk away about books and celebrities and girls she didn’t like at school and I’d listen, occasionally getting up to smoke out her window.

Hadn’t been any grunting and humping or even talking and listening at the Asylum.  B
ut I did have a friend . . .   Pocket’s in the bed next to mine and some nights we’d confiscate a board-game from the common room, shut our curtains, and play checkers or
Monopoly
for hours, goofing off and joking as loud as we dared to whisper.

No one to joke with or whisper with tonight.

Not that there’s much night left.  Along with the storm, the moon faded away as well.  The stars weakened. 
What do you do, Little Mancer?
I asked myself.  Even my thoughts sounded like Meteyos now.  I could just sit in the cave and wait for the teachers to find us.  Flip them off when I saw their faces.

Just like I should have that first day after Samson’s fake death.

Only that was two nights gone.  Shit had happened since then.  The teachers sent me running through the woods.  Payback . . . it had to be payback.

“Do you see anyone?” It was faint, a female voice.

My head snapped up, ears perked.

No answer.

But . . . I know I heard it.  Had the teachers already found us? 
Trackers
, I remembered from the last dream.  Three of them going missing. 
Meteyos helping again.
  Only he was gone now.  Trackers, where would they be? 
Idiot!  Worry about that after you figure out what’s going on outside the cave!

I did
n’t so much as power my way from Miranda and Isabel as I went out the back door.  Sliding down the rock wall my coat got scratched up, but my body slithered away from the weight, pushing with elbows and crab-shuffling to get away.  Miranda and Isabel didn’t wake a bit, leaning on each other.

No voice but I heard movement.  Coming up on the cave from the right.

Shit
.

Just like that I’m getting screwed again?  Don’t even get to fuck with the teachers and return the favor?

It wasn’t fair.  I had to do something.  My feet paced back and forth, my hands making fists. 
Pool, damn it!
  I could
iron fist
the cocksucker in the gut.  That would be some payback.  Smith, Samson; hell, even Dingle, I didn’t care.

But I couldn’t pool.

Cuz they still haven’t taught us anything!

My fists went white. 
I’m pissed!  Pool!
 
Pool, you fucker!  Do it!

Nothing
. . . always nothing . . .

“Is that a cave?” the woman again, still a ways off.

There was a grunt in answer, barely any noise at all.

Feet coming closer.

Behind me, Miranda stirred in her sleep.  Isabel was lost to the world.

It never works when I try
.  I would have screamed if I didn’t need to be silent. 
Fuck, iron fist, I’ll just gut shot them,
I thought savagely.  Pushing against the lip of the cave’s entrance I waited for whoever was coming.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Meteyos’ last words:  EARTH ALWAYS OUTLASTS.

My fists uncurled.  Those words clicked in my head.  Outlast.  Not burning the world down.  Not little papercuts.  Not the course of least resistance.  Not current, not hiding, not beaming, not stasis . . .

Defiance
.

Throw everything at me and I’ll still be standing, asshole.

I don’t kneel, shithead.

Beat me now but I’ll beat you in the end, fucktard.

Earth . . . the ultimate defiant
.

I found the defiance in me and for the first time in my life
. . . I pooled on purpose.

My hand curled up yet again into a fist.

Down on the dirt floor, Miranda’s green eyes opened up, staring at me in shock.  She could feel the pool forming.  I grinned at her, finger up to my lips, nodding outside.  I didn’t think she could look more scared than the night before, but she did.  So scared she couldn’t move, her whole body shaking.

“Are you pooling?” the woman asked, voice close.  I thought I recognized it but wasn’t sure.  The problem with the last month was there were so many new voices I got them confused.  It wasn’t Dingle.  Maybe Mrs. Ambrose or Miss Slaton.

The feet got closer, right on the edge of the cave, maybe a yard away.  The pool inside me was just the right size for
iron fist
.  
You’ve done this before
, I told myself. 
Probably a hundred times over the last few years
. 
You know exactly what it feels like.

The feet came even with me.  The gray of morning still an hour in coming, I could see two shapes.  “Hey, asshole!” I shouted to get them
turning towards me, already throwing my punch.

Iron fist
went off perfect. Anima flowing down my arm, ended up in my fingers and knuckles.  The punch went off perfect too.  It slammed into the bigger shape’s gut, pushing him over my fist and back almost two whole feet from the impact.

I pulled back for another punch with the
same hand, turning towards the
woman
shape.  Only she screamed . . . a just plain scared scream, straight out of a horror movie. 
The shit?
I thought.