The Pit of No Return (The King Henry Tapes Book 6)

by Richard Raley

  But the selfish part of me . . . that obsessive part of me, I’ll even admit to it, that part is still raw. The sight of her here after so long apart hurt. For all the hope, it had gnashed its teeth, smashed its fists into walls, it had never given up the booze. It bled, it whined, it hate-fucked Isabel to punish itself and got in a cage with Conan Sapa hoping to die.

  It was terrified by the starless sky.

  Terrified there would never be Try Number Four, live or tape delayed.

  Last six months, ever since this all started really with Annie B showing up in my shop, had all been about growing up. Locking that animal up. Washing its wounds. Hell, maybe it goes as far back as Ceinwyn finding me in Visalia. Took me a decade, but I’ve finally started trusting the people closest to me, the people I choose to be closest to me. Only a few, but those are strings fourteen-year-old-me would’ve itched and dug incessantly at. Get the fuck away from me, think I need you? I’m fine all alone, bitch!

  Whole decade . . . whole decade to learn that the world was too fucked up for even the crazy fruit fly guy to fix it alone. Need a bunch of fruit fly guys and fruit fly gals working together. All my talk and T-Bone is part of this plan. T-Bone, Pocket, Jesus, Eva, the Tsar, Poug, more people . . . had their small parts, their small favors to help towards my goal.

  Whole decade . . . to learn to not be alone.

  Val was part of that. Maybe the biggest part of it. Even the pain of her breaking up with me. What was most wrong about the last six months was that she wasn’t there. Person I trusted most in the world and I couldn’t include her because she was halfway across the world saving this shitshow in her own way. Because Ceinwyn and the Lady had worked so hard to split us up, push our energies down opposite paths for the better future they wanted, not what we wanted or needed.

  “I couldn’t resist the urge to surprise you awake,” Val told me with that teasing smirk of a smile I’d missed so much. That brashness and kind assurance mixing, displayed with two twisted lips. “I suppose I shouldn’t be too shocked that you surprised me back. You always seem to, don’t you?”

  I had a hand next to her head and my two legs spread out so I was inches above her. She was completely prostrate on the glass floor, her sunshine hair bringing more real light to the scene than any of the spectro-crystals above my head. Valentine Ward, inches away . . .

  She saw the look in my eye, knew the look in my eye. “Not being shocked that you surprised me didn’t mean you should try again, King Henry,” she teased me some more.

  “What’s that mean?”

  “You’re about to kiss me.”

  Guilty as fuck. Would’ve given an I-don’t-give-a-crap shrug if I could’ve. “Don’t know what you’re talking about . . .”

  “Are you going to make me knee Prince Henry to get you off of me? We’ve somehow managed to not attract the guards or the golems so far, but I think their prize prisoner screaming would do the trick.”

  “I never scream,” I joked back at her. It felt good. T-Bone was a great straight man to torment, Ceinwyn would call me on my shit, Annie B never stopped tempting me, but Val was the only one who gave as good as she got—sometimes better than she got. “I just grunt and tear up a little bit . . .”

  “Or throw up in the corner.”

  “How many times do I have to apologize for that?”

  “Every day of your life,” she decided after a moment. “Contrite King Henry is best King Henry.”

  “Seem to remember you liking some other versions of me quite a bit more . . .”

  Her knee slowly slid up so it touched the inside of my thigh, right next to snapping up into my boys. “Final warning,” she said with a smile.

  “Might be worth it to take the hit,” I thought aloud.

  For all the aggressiveness of our positions with me barely inches above her, her expression never showed any doubt that I’d do what she wanted. “Checking up on you and helping with this mess you’ve thrown yourself into was not an invitation to make out with me in the middle of the Pit while the other prisoners voyeur.”

  Valentine Ward. Cheekbones that cut, eyes-without-irises, sunshine hair, every tall, leggy inch of her. So nice to see that I had to think of all her features twice in as many minutes. Valentine Fucking Ward! Boomworm! And T-Bone said my plan was too complicated and shit, now who’s the mad fucking genius?

  Val inches away . . . with all those brilliant and naughty thoughts that float around in her head. In the flesh . . . Pit was one of the places I could be sure she wasn’t Isabel. That . . . and also, having recently relived the Isabel Experience and looking at the real Val now, I couldn’t ever imagine being tricked by Soto Crazy again.

  Guess I was even more of a shallow little shit at school than people said I was. That or I finally have a few brain-cells nowadays. Growing up . . . it’s a bitch, but even King Henry Price eventually has to get some wisdom. Enough wisdom to know he needs to steal knowledge. Enough wisdom to know blaming Val for everything that happened after she left was a bad idea. Goes for you too. Drinking and shit throwing was on me. Ouroboros was on me. Done a lot of stupid shit in my time on this planet, more of it still to come.

  Trust me . . .

  Buckets of it.

  Whole Realms of the stuff even.

  Responsibility for your actions, people. Fight the instincts. What makes us human and not beasts. What makes me able to fight the pain and hold in an anima pool. What makes me fight the Paine wants to drag us all to doom.

  With a final reluctant glance at her quirked lips, I forced myself up off the ground. My hand reached down for her to take. Now it was her glance that was reluctant. Finally, she took the help and popped herself up. This was a romance movie you’d have seen sparks where our hands touched, but being as it ain’t . . . we just passed some sweat and oil and whatever germs we’d touched in the last twenty-four hours.

  Reality: it ain’t ever romantic.

  Val released my hand, pausing to take an appraising look of me now that we were standing. Short, rumpled King Henry Price with a few artifacts visible, least he don’t have blood on his knuckles and smell like dirt. Not that Val had ever minded either of those too much.

  I had my own appraising to do. Executive Recruiter Valentine Ward was a bit different from International Recruiter Valentine Ward. Let her hair grow back out all the way, had on a dress you expected on a thousand-dollar-an-hour lawyer. Not made to impress guys, but made to make a point about sincerity and judgment and trustworthiness all the same.

  Hadn’t been a type of Valentine Ward I didn’t like yet, so of course I enjoyed the view. “Who said anything about making out?” I asked her, intentions even more obvious in my dirt eyes.

  She smiled, but her insistence was firm. “No.”

  “I got a whole Richie Rich apartment to myself. Just saying: you want to play the biker mama in for the conjugal visit, it’s very doable.”

  “My, my, with that lovely attempt at sweeping me off my feet, how could I say ‘no’?” she deadpanned.

  A turn around the common floor made the few prisoners who had been watching us hurriedly glance away. One of my golems still stood in the same place I’d left it, unhelpful as fuck. Won’t protect me from someone with a visitor badge, good to know. Straightening out my geomancer’s coat, I sat back down on my bench while motioning for Val to join me. “I’ve been told prison makes a man hard and my heart wasn’t too soft to begin with.”

  She sat down, hands at her skirt hem with her legs crossed. Ain’t Ceinwyn Dale legs but they’re pretty nice legs. She raised a blond eyebrow at my attentions. “Hard in more ways than one, I see.”

  I grinned, still guilty as fuck. “Saying you couldn’t feel it with your knee?”

  She grinned back. “Not a bit. Not even the tip.”

  “Thought we smashed your reluctance to pieces in this area? As often as we could . . . and even when we shouldn’t . . .”

  “That’s not why I’m reluctant. You’re here now, we’re back at i
t, and I’m sure we’d have our usual fun together if we found a bed, but—”

  “Hated that word my whole life,” I grumbled.

  “But, once I save you from the Guild, you’ll go right back to your shop in Fresno and I’ll still be here in London as Assistant Director for International Recruiting. The logic of us staying apart while we’re apart still holds.”

  “Logic . . . another shitty word I don’t like much.”

  “King Henry, promise me right now that while I’m here to help you, you won’t spend the next few days trying to get us back together.”

  I very much did not promise her that. “Had quite a few people tell me you hate that title and the job goes with, that you might even have made a mistake taking it on, Miss Perfect.”

  Some of the joy left her expression as the star in her eyes flared hot. “Christmas mentioned you dropped in to see her a few months ago; she didn’t mention that my life decisions were part of the conversation.”

  “She just worries about her Big Sis,” I very much over-exaggerated Christmas’ feelings for anyone who didn’t have the answer to whatever her current question was.

  Having spent most of Christmas’ youth at the Asylum or not, Val snorted in disbelief. “When did you two become so friendly?”

  “Just the Artificer thing.”

  “The Artificer thing. Yes, you’re so beloved by other Artificers,” she deadpanned some more while running her eyes around the Pit, especially the massive, geo-anima spewing artifact at its center that currently had the both of us as powerless as any mundane.

  “It wasn’t just her. Miranda said the same thing.”

  “Do you and Miranda talk?” Val couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “Not often, but we’re okay with each other when we do.”

  A shocked gasp.

  “Except when she’s making comments about having sex with her ginger bits. That’s just cruel and unusual punishment.”

  “I’m underground and the world is upside down,” Val mumbled to herself.

  “Plus she handled the whole drunk dial thing without making me feel like too much of an asshole.”

  “What drunk dial thing?”

  “She . . . didn’t tell you?”

  “Obviously not,” Val pointed out.

  “Oh.”

  Expecting silence.

  “It was nothing . . . nothing at all,” I tried.

  “Everyone told me how you handled . . . my promotion,” Val paused as she worked on the words.

  “Drunk as a skunk,” I decided it for her. “Throwing shit . . . literally. Getting in brawls with strange mancers. Gambling. Not my best month as a human being, but I got myself out of the tailspin.”

  “Back to normal then,” she said, “making artifacts and having one-night-stands.”

  “Just artifacts really,” I corrected.

  She squinted in disbelief, like I was trying something—I was, just not my typical moves. “I’ve always accepted who you are, no reason to lie about it now that you’re trying to get in my pants again.”

  Dirt eyes met eyes-without-iris. “Ain’t about what’s in your pants, Valentine Ward. And yeah . . . just artifacts. Accept what I did to figure out Isabel was Isabel and you’re in the clear.”

  “Oh,” she whispered. “Not . . . anyone?”

  “Been busy.”

  “My.”

  “Suppose you’ve slept with a hundred guys or something like that.”

  Other women would’ve gotten angry, she just kept teasing me. “Six months . . . a new guy every other day, plus two on the weekends . . . what’s that add up to?”

  “Math ain’t my strong suit,” I reminded her. “Hope you enjoyed yourself. Of course, I also heard you were annoyed with how nice the guys around here are. Not enough foul mouth in them, if you will.”

  “Okay, forget saving you, I’m traveling to the Asylum right now to staple my sister’s mouth shut,” Val finally cracked enough to give a growl.

  “Was she lying?” I asked.

  Val shrugged nervously. “I’ve dated. None have stuck with me for long. You’re not the only one with a career, you know.”

  “Don’t care about the other guys. Was asking if she was wrong about you making a mistake.”

  “King Henry,” Val whispered warningly.

  “Valentine Ward,” I whispered back with some canine grin.

  She smiled at the grin, one of the few people who was fond of it. “Still always pushing to see how long it takes to break whatever’s around you.”

  “Well . . . not when you take over.”

  She rolled her eyes and slapped my shoulder. “Yes, I made a mistake by taking this job. I hate it, okay? It’s boring, it’s stuffy, it’s nothing but paperwork and the bureaucracy of a hundred nations getting in the way of anything you try to accomplish. I miss the traveling, I miss walking around the Asylum, I miss girls’ night with Miranda, I miss holidays with my parents even.”

  “Can’t help but notice I was missing in said missing,” I grumbled.

  She rolled her eyes again. “I miss you. I miss seeing whatever artifact you’ve come up with, I miss the calls from Tyson to get me to talk you down, and I miss whatever hole-in-the-wall you’ve found to go to for the most-unromantic date possible.”

  “Anything else?” I prodded.

  Her smile got mischievous. “Not really . . .”

  “Are you sure?” I prodded some more.

  “A hundred guys will sexually satisfy just about anyone,” she decided.

  I pointed a finger at her. “You never get to complain about me downplaying a moment ever again.”

  She glanced away, at a few of the prisoners who were playing chess. “Of course I do,” she whispered. Whether it was about her getting to complain in the future or the fact that she missed being in bed with me, that was left to debate. “It was the wrong choice. It was the almighty huge Valentine Ward mistake, the one that Miranda loves to always point out my ability to make. But it being a mistake doesn’t change anything. I am where I am. I have responsibilities to Ceinwyn. If I have to be miserable to help her then I’ll be miserable to help her.”

  “That’s the way it is, huh?”

  “That’s the way it is, King Henry. If we tried again it would just . . . my reasoning about that was sound. What would happen, really? I get you out of here in the next few days and then we find a bed and don’t leave it for a week, just like the last time we were in London?”

  “I seem to remember you doing your share of keeping us in the bed,” I reminded her.

  She smirked in satisfaction. “More than my share, I’d say. You couldn’t even stand to get the door for room service a few times.”

  “You did win that week,” I admitted ruefully.

  “It wasn’t a competition.”

  “Says the person who didn’t win most weeks.”

  “It was a wonderful week and it would be a wonderful week again,” she ignored my victory column, just like she was ignoring every other phallus shaped part of me, “but we’d still be right here at the end of it. I don’t think you could settle for that, so it’s better if we keep our minds on the task of beating Massey and not on . . . what our bodies are telling us to do with each other.”

  “Maybe that’s it, or maybe Valentine Ward is worried she won’t be able to settle for just our bodies,” I pointed back at her.

  “Maybe,” she whispered seriously, “maybe, but that’s just another good reason not to.” She changed up the conversation then and tried to distract me and maybe herself too. “I can’t believe you. I should after all these years, but for some reason . . . You’re not in a situation where we should be having this conversation. I came all the way to the Guild, argued with the Guild Master all morning, got a visitor pass to the Pit, and this is what we’re talking about?”

  “It’s what I find most important in life.”

  Her jaw dropped slightly in surprise. “Stop saying things like that! You’re in prison! I
could’ve actually been someone trying to hurt you just now! Even you should be frightened by this and instead I find you sleeping like a log?”

  I nodded towards the golem. “Pepper would’ve stopped anyone without a visitor badge from hurting me.” I covered my mouth to stage whisper, “Pepper’s the badass of the two, but don’t tell Salt I called him a softie.”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t call them Blackie and Whitey.”

  “I thought about it . . .”

  She slapped my shoulder once more, hard enough so it wasn’t playful. “You’re in prison! We have to get you out!”

  Gave my patented I-don’t-give-a-crap shrug. “Massey’s just using me to get himself through the reelection period. Hurt my pride, but my pride is no big deal.”

  “He’s pushing the Lady to take your shop away from you,” Val told me, the first I’d heard of it.

  “That would be bad,” was all I could think to say.

  Tell her you love her; tell her about your plan. Do it. Nike, Shia LaBeouf, and all that shit!

  “Ceinwyn isn’t in your corner to convince her not to.”

  “I’m sure she’ll show up to order me around and repurchase my soul in the next few days.”

  “She’ll be arriving the day the trial starts,” Val confessed.

  “Lucky me,” it was my turn to show off my sarcasm.

  Val ignored it. “Until then she’s ordered me to do everything in my power to help you.”

  “Those exact words?” I liked those words. Pretty similar to what Poug’s orders had been. Just as then, those were words you could wiggle around.

  “She still cares about you, even if you don’t want her help any longer.”

  “I’m over it, Val. She chose the party-line and she wants to be the next Dean, understood. Everyone, including Plutarch, has chewed me out about it. I finally found her limit. I forgive her for not jumping over the precipice with me this time. I’m just not letting her back into my business. Also, I’d like to point out, that business is doing even better without her name attached to it.”