“Wouldn’t hurt to be careful,” she told me.
“Careful? Me?”
“I’d like to see you live past thirty so I can finally tell you all the secrets I’ve been saving up.”
“We both know neither of those are ever gonna happen. Can I wipe this off now?”
“Five more minutes.”
“But mommmm!”
Her smile twitched. “Stay away from volcanoes, any rain forest, large rivers and lakes, the north pole, electrical power stations, deep caves, sports stadiums, zoos—”
“Just about anywhere then,” I added.
“I don’t think it’s a surprise if I tell you that you’re very strong in the Mancy, King Henry.” She pulled out a bag of potato chips from a drawer and handed it to me, it was about the only food that we both craved. “It’s not all fun and games and making big pieces of metal crack. Part of it is responsibility. Part of it is listening to what the Mancy has to say.”
I ate a few chips. It made me feel better. I pooled some anima. It made me feel better too.
Ceinwyn nodded at me like I’d done the correct thing. “Want to talk about it?”
“Don’t really have a choice.” I never liked situations where I didn’t have a choice. Where everyone else knew all the moves I could make. Where my hand was forced or I was told how things would be.
Seemed like adult life was filled with those situations too.
“You could ignore it. Not all concentrations are sane. Or on your side.”
“Can’t disagree with that . . . but this one seemed okay. More okay than the last one, really. Never felt like she wanted to crush me into little bits just for being a mancer, for one.”
“Water is much more forgiving than stone,” she reminded me.
“But not as forgiving as the wind?”
Another twitch of her smile. “Depends on how hard it’s blowing, I suppose.”
Truth in that. Try walking in a tornado some time. Or swimming in riptide. Nature always has two halves. “She said her name was Sipponnii . . .”
[CLICK]
A mancer was in danger of being left to madness. All on the words of a thinking piece of anima, but the warning was enough for Ceinwyn. She took any tip seriously. “How do you think I found you?” she said when I couldn’t believe the quick reaction.
“I don’t know . . . I assumed it was all the shit I was breaking.”
“Yes, but a tip, from a corpusmancer who saw you breaking all that shit.”
“Who?” I asked.
But she only winked. “Maybe one day I’ll tell you.”
“Another secret to add to all the rest? Don’t you get tired of them all?”
“At times,” she admitted simply.
She quickly filled Alfred Pemberton in—Pemberton being a scientific guy, he was more skeptical than Ceinwyn—and the three of us set up camp in his data center down on the first floor of the Heartland Office. Pemberton pulled up his laptop, using it to access a list of known recruits in both the Illinois and Missouri portions bordering the Mississippi River. “Five confirmed Intras in next year’s class, three potentials for Class 2014 after that—including a boy we think might be an Ultra, only rumors for Class 2015. Not a single mention of a hydromancer in the bunch.”
Ceinwyn smiled over the pronouncement. “That only confirms what we have, not what we’ve missed.”
“We haven’t missed anyone,” Pemberton said testily.
“I’m not blaming you if you have, Alf.”
Pemberton took a deep breath to keep his nerves in check. The centipede on his wrist gave a shake in agitation, mirroring its master. “My system is—”
“Your system is new,” I interrupted, “and it probably has some bugs in it. Given who made it . . .”
“Recruiting visits for a successful admission are down at the percentage I predicted they would be,” Pemberton reminded us. “Furthermore, the discovery of recruits is up the exact percentage I predicted it would be as well. No one is missed, I guarantee you. I’ll also ignore your snide remark about my affinity.”
“Just saying if you gave up the bugs and went in for bunny rabbits that a chick might actually touch your balls,” I shot back at him.
Pemberton blushed, very much not looking at Ceinwyn. “Rabbits are useless . . . all mammals are useless . . .” he mumbled. “It’s about companionship for many of the others, but for me it’s about being effective.” The moth on his ear detached and flapped away to another room as if to prove his point.
“Effective at not getting your balls—”
“That’s enough torture, King Henry,” Ceinwyn reprimanded me.
“I told you what the fairy said and he’s acting like an—”
“Pay-per-cut,” she singsonged.
Pemberton and me both sulked, studying the ground in silent frustration.
Ceinwyn took charge, like always. “Have the analysts work up a list of all the fourteen-year-olds and thirteen-year-olds with any connection at all to water. Father’s a sailor, fishing trophy, anything. Have it ready for me tomorrow morning.”
Pemberton was disgusted by this idea. “The Mancy is an equation to be studied and exploited, Ceinwyn. Numbers, not hunches and affinities. You’re going against everything I’m trying to do! You agreed!” he whined.
Ceinwyn nodded to calm him down. “I do agree. But numbers have failed us, haven’t they?”
“Only failed if we believe the word of a fairy addled graduate student!”
Ceinwyn glanced fondly at me. “King Henry has many bad habits and vices, but he’s strangely honest about this kind of thing. List tomorrow, Alf, I’ll be doing the visits myself.”
I frowned, working out if I should be insulted or not. “Thanks, I think?”
[CLICK]
I’ve never spent a busier day accomplishing nothing.
I could tell you about the twenty or so kids Ceinwyn and me visited, but ya know what?
Fuck that shit.
Fuck it right in its greasy, curly-haired asshole.
Ain’t important, is it?
Small failures are like that.
Long as you have the huge memorable win, no one points out how many times you fucked up.
At least, I hope so.
It’s a funny thing, since humans remember the bad in their own life first and foremost, but history only remembers the epic about it all. Don’t matter if it’s bad or good, just that it matters. So us looking into those twenty kids and coming up with squat? Don’t matter, do it?
Wasn’t even one of those awkward moments that sticks with you until you’re in your seventies, having a flashback about some fourteen-year-old girl—whose name you can’t even remember cuz of the dementia—catching you with your fly unzipped and one ball hanging out.
Just one ball.
Little pink marble.
All we got for our efforts was a door in our faces.
Twenty doors in our faces.
Easily forgotten, or else how would Jehovah Witnesses live with the shame?
Pemberton was a smug cocksucker when we returned to the office empty-handed. Even his tarantula strutted along his shoulders. “Just as I predicted then?”
Ceinwyn only smiled at him. “Care to up the stakes, Alf?”
“I have a no betting rule in this office,” Pemberton weaseled his way out.
Ceinwyn seemed surprised. “And the field agents haven’t murdered you in your sleep yet?”
While they kept on chatting, I sulked some more, pulling up the three-year list of students they used to track down recruits. At first I’d been pissed that the fairy cock-blocked me, but now it was a game and there were sides and I wanted to prove myself. Four years of constant class rankings and Winter Wars had made me competitive. I might not need to be on top to know how good I was, not like Welf, but I didn’t like being wrong. Didn’t like Pemberton and his little formula for success.
The Mancy might have a structure, but it was still magic. It could still surpri
se you, still turn a hard-six right into your face when you least expected it. I went down the lists on the computer. Every click on a name brought up a secondary file with more information on the student. Click on the information and it broke down further. Right on the edge of the screen was a number percentage for each kid on the likelihood they were a mancer.
You just hit a brick wall, Price, I told myself, time to find another way, even if you have to break the rules.
So let’s look at the situation.
If Sipponnii is wrong, or screwing with me, or whatever . . . then there is no kid out there. But if she’s right, then the numbers have to be wrong. I thought about that. It was something most would just accept. Two-sided argument. So easy to pick a side. But when has my life ever been a two-sided argument? It’s always been complicated and fucked up and . . . what if both Sipponnii and Pemberton could be right?
What if numbers and the formulas and Pemberton’s rules all worked inside themselves . . . but maybe he made a mistake so some kids were still outside of the numbers. Some basic assumption that let this hydromancer kid slip through the cracks.
“This includes private schools, right?” I asked.
Pemberton squinted at me, his moth fluttering in agitation. He turned to Ceinwyn like she was forcing him to babysit.
“This is also a learning opportunity for King Henry,” she reminded him.
“Of course we include private schools,” Pemberton finally said, his tone telling me it was an insulting question.
“And home schooled kids?”
“One of the harder areas to supply, but we manage it,” Pemberton answered in the same tone.
“And kids that skip grades?”
His mouth stopped halfway open. “What?”
I grinned some canines at him. Chomp, motherfucker. “Can’t say the rebel in me approves, but if they’re smart enough, don’t some kids skip grades? Wouldn’t be many, but . . . they could be in high school already, right?”
Ceinwyn smiled at me as Pemberton’s face turned pure red in embarrassment. “This is why mathematicians have peer review. King Henry found the hole, now we plug it. No harm, Alf.”
“But . . .” Pemberton became the opposite of smug. “What if I missed . . . what if . . . I think I might throw up . . .”
Ceinwyn gave him a pat on the shoulder. “Let’s hope this hydromancer is the first.”
“But what if he’s not!”
Her ageless eyes gave no comfort. “A good reminder to you that it’s not numbers we’re playing with.”
Pemberton’s gaze found the floor. “I’ll get you the high school lists . . . and . . . I’ll start editing the formulas right away . . . to plug the hole.”
[CLICK]
There were only three in the area. One was a twelve-year-old freshman, one a fourteen-year-old junior and third a fifteen-year-old senior. We checked on the senior first, even though he was too old to recruit. It was weird looking at the kid. This brilliant girl who was going to college at sixteen to become some kind of scientist I can’t even pronounce. If she was a mancer, that brilliant life wouldn’t last long. I felt like some mail-man handing out telegraphs from the war department during WW2.
Here, lady, kid got his balls blown off by a tank, no big deal.
Hey, miss, hubby died from twenty cases of gonorrhea from all the whores he banged; first known case, be sure to put it on his tombstone!
There was no way to know for sure without bringing the girl to the Asylum for a spin of Quilt’s wheel, but after snooping and spying and even studying the girl herself, Ceinwyn decided we dodged the bullet. The girl was normal . . . well, as normal as that kind of smart can be. I mean, she had a wall of academic decathlon ribbons . . . that can’t be healthy.
Back in the car, we both let out a little exhausted breath. “Thinking of your mother?” she asked.
“Always,” I admitted.
“One day, King Henry, we’ll get it right.”
“If you have someone around to point out to the smart guys that they’re not as smart as they think they are.”
“Haven’t you chastised Alf enough? We’re all on the same team.”
“He’s okay . . . he’s trying, I guess. Just like everyone else. You know, I’ve never understood, why the four hundred number? Why only fourteen-years-old? It’s stupid.”
She nodded in agreement, but only said sadly, “Politics and economics.”
“How is training mancer kids political?”
Ceinwyn’s ever present smile disappeared. “When you’re older, when I think you’re ready, I’ll tell you everything.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I do . . . and I will.”
Still hasn’t told me to this day.
Guess I ain’t ready yet.
I wonder: will I ever be ready enough for Ceinwyn Dale?
Session 141
Annie B fed on Tatterdemalion before she dragged him back to me.
He was still alive, just woozy.
Probably emotionally scarred.
Had himself an Adventure Time band-aid.
“What did you do?” he gurgled when he saw all the dead bodies.
It smelled. Like blood and shit.
They ever eventually do have smells in theaters then no one will go to historical epics again.
Trust me.
Blood and shit.
“You fucking killed him!” Tatter screamed when he saw Hector’s body. “You fucking killed him!”
Annie B raised an eyebrow at me. Her blood spikes were gone, virgin skin healed across the bullet holes in her dress and her knuckles having reformed themselves. That’s about as virgin as Annie B ever gets.
“You fucking killed him!” Tatter whined like an animal, only half conscious. “You’re fucking dead now, puta. Vega gonna hunt you to the ends of the Earth.”
“I didn’t kill him,” Annie B declared a moment before raising Tatter with one hand and throwing him down on the auction stage Choke Slam-style. “I wanted him alive to question. Care to explain, King Henry?”
Tatter snarled at me. “You?”
“He Shifted plus I iron fisted equals dead werecoyote,” I said. Lamely adding, “It was an accident.”
By all rights, Annie B should have been pissed off at the lost source of information, but surprisingly she seemed happy with the news that I’d crossed on through to the monster side of the party. “Still think they’re threatening?”
“Suppose not,” I admitted, “least not Shifted.”
“They’re a mistake of creation,” Annie B whispered into Tatter’s ear a lot like she enjoyed doing with me, only this was crueler—less seductress and more inquisitor. “A tool of a forgotten age, destroyed by germs and steel. Cuauhtli? Ocelotl? Only a pale imitation remains behind. Yet you don’t have the honor to fade into oblivion, do you? You keep rising up to torment us with your putrid blood. Coyote, Otter, Gator, Hyena, Weasel? You keep spreading and spreading like the disease you are and you forget your place. You steal from a Divine!”
“Vega gonna kill you, Price, gonna skin you,” Tatter whined some more.
Annie B threw a hammer-fist at his face that broke his nose, blood spraying. “You aren’t dealing with him. You’re dealing with me.”
“Puta,” Tatter gurgled through the blood.
She grabbed his nose and squeezed. “Where are the other shells?”
Predictably, all she got as an answer was a scream.
Fuck this. I walked off back stage, leaving behind me more screams and unanswered questions.
A look around revealed only more dead Weres, ripped apart or with broken necks. She hadn’t even bothered with using her knives or her gun. Just her blood formed into spikes and blades and raw strength that was beyond even Were limits to fight against.
Think you can take her now?
Probably . . . but it wouldn’t be easy. Even with all the new conjurations Paine accidentally taught me.
I found what I was looking for.
I picked up a canister and walked back to Annie B and Tatter. It had only been a handful of minutes, but he was a lot more bloody. Lot more delirious in his answers too, talking nothing but Mexican now.
“Where are the other shells?” Annie B repeated for who knows what time.
Babbling I couldn’t understand.
“Tell me where they are and I’ll kill you, it will stop hurting,” she tried to reason with him.
Fuck me, am I really going to stand up for this prick? “You ain’t killing shit,” I told her.
She glared at me, expression saying all it needed to about what she thought of my opinion on the matter. A hand rose up to wave at the carnage surrounding us. “One more does not matter.”
“Kinda does,” I said with a shrug. Another difference between Vamps and humans. Only the one matters with them, but one more matters to us. “How ‘bout you let me take over?”
“Need I remind you that if he lives he’ll tell Vega what you did to Hector?” she pointed out.
“I hope he does. Better Vega knowing than Vega guessing about it.”
She relaxed in an instant, coming to some conclusion, or at least finding another button to press when it came to my emotions. “Five minutes. If you can’t convince him in five minutes, I bring out my silver knife.”
“You already did.”
“Yes, I did. Like all his kind, he’s repulsive, but more blood was necessary to repair my shell,” she admitted, adding, “it’s like gargling urine.”
“Do that often, do you?”
“One can never be sure how depraved a man’s kinks will run if you let him run wild.”
Freaky ass motherfuckers, what’s wrong with good plain wonderful pussy? “Five minutes,” I finally agreed.
“Five minutes, then the knife.”
“Still won’t know where the shells are.”
“We will.”
I stared at her. “How?” I reluctantly asked, knowing I’d regret it.
“Barons are trained to consume memories if the situation requires it.”
Yup, I regretted it.
Pushing her away from Tatter, I upended the canister I brought with me over his face. Hydro-Slush splattered all over him. It didn’t heal instantly, but it was good enough quality shit to speed up the process and return the guy to his senses. Return him to his senses so he could try to strangle me.
The Foul Mouth and the Headless Hunny (The King Henry Tapes) Page 28