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

by Richard Raley

  When I went to Plutarch did I give him my account numbers?

  No.

  Gave him my artifact design documents.

  Gave him papers about some Anima Madness stuff I figured out, drop in the ocean to curing the condition that it might be.

  So, yeah. Wouldn’t look like a bank vault, not at all.

  Museum, there’s the ticket.

  Museum of some king or tycoon who stopped caring about wealth a long time ago. Only this wasn’t singular, ain’t negated down to a single life. This went back . . . collection started with the Guild itself back in the 1600s. Before that even. Not vault but storehouse, of some of the greatest artifacts ever crafted, scrolls and parchments from before Gutenberg printed up his first bibles.

  Even as immaculately cleaned as the enormous vault was . . . it smelled like dust and age and yesteryear; of myth and legend and A Long Time Ago. “I feel like I’m robbing the Vatican.”

  Valentine gave me a wink as she approached the first display. “Good thing neither of us are Catholic.”

  “Nope, just the geomancer pope,” I joked as I stepped up beside her.

  The Vault had a main floor dotted with glass displays, inside of them expertly labeled and cataloged artifacts. Along the walls were more displays, those holding scrolls and parchments pressed flat and covered by thick glass. Never have been to the Capitol in Washington D.C, but the way I imagine they store the Declaration of Independence was the connection I made.

  Only without all the high tech diode shit, cuz it’s the Guild. No sensors, no cameras, no lasers to trip extra alarms. No guards, be they mundane, Guild, or golem. Every bit of security in this place was the two feet of geo-laced steel that surrounded it and the massive door we’d bypassed by entering through the Geo Realm. The Vault lock had never been picked, only accessible if five Artificers worked together to manipulate the artifact and then only if one of those Artificers knew the combination.

  Above our heads sat a second and a third floor, accessible by stairs on either side of the Vault. They weren’t full floors, but ended in a balcony railing where the stairs reached them, giving you a clear view of the Guild’s wealth as you entered, all the way to the top. Books and cataloged items up there, maybe even more modern information they’ve tucked away where no one can find it.

  “So why haven’t you made a sword?” Val asked curiously.

  “I did. T-Bone almost stabbed himself, so I took it away from him.”

  “Was it as pretty as this one? It doesn’t seem to be labeled . . .”

  “Mine retracted so it was just a pommel you could walk around with and no . . . it was pretty ugly even if it would cut a bitch nice and neat.”

  Val cocked her head as she studied the weapon in question. It wasn’t a sword so much as an imitation of a sword, created by an Artificer who knew nothing about blacksmithing. No need with tongs or hammers when you can melt and manipulate the metal with geo-anima. Geo-laced and strengthened of course, I could just barely sense the weaves and designs inside of it. No nick on the edge, no rust, no wear at all.

  Perfect.

  The steel was bright, the cross-guard and hilt plain, but shining from the light above. Only the scabbard, sitting beneath on another part of the display, gave a hint of glitter and only common gold. No maker’s mark on either that mundane eyes could see, but if you were an Artificer it was unmistakable when you noticed the letters of geo-anima wrapped up along the blade, hidden in the rest of the work. A sword that’s not a sword . . . geo-anima folded in upon itself along the edge, an eternal blade unending.

  “What’s it do?” Val whispered, smiling over my interest in something so fantasy-like.

  “It’s made to go through armor like butter. Or a really, really big stone . . .”

  “Funny that it’s at the front but they haven’t cataloged it,” she muttered, disappointed.

  “No Artificer would need a label to know ,” I told her.

  She glanced back to roll her eyes in my direction. “Be mysterious then.”

  She’s gonna pee her pants once she figures it out. Fishing my Anima Detection Lenses out of a coat pocket, I handed them over. “Look for yourself.”

  Now the Lenses held her attention. “Since when do you have those?”

  “Since I made them.”

  “Nicer than your monocle. I suppose this is part of what Massey meant when he pointed out how reasonable he was by letting you keep some of your artifacts on you.”

  “Yup, that’s Massey, the most reasonable cocksucker on the planet.”

  Val’s smile twitched as she slid the glasses on, but only a second later she was struck silent, eyes wide, jaw dropped. “King Henry . . . it’s so . . . it’s so beautiful. It’s like . . . woven silk.” Eyes-without-irises shifted, not only over the sword but the whole room. A gasp escaped her. “Dear Mancy . . .”

  “Yeah, in the old days before the Guild, we Artificers made some good shit.” Without the glasses I couldn’t see all of the anima in the room, only feel and guess at what wasn’t there. But I could imagine. Thirteen colors threaded all about, mixed and matched, glowing bright. Made me think of my own workshop. “Still do on occasion . . . just need a kick in the ass to get us moving.”

  Val’s dark eyes dropped back to the sword. “Are those letters?”

  “N-I-M-U-E. In mancer legend, Nimue was an Artificer. She made Merlin’s staff and—”

  “Excalibur,” Val gave an excited little whine. “Excalibur. That’s impossible! This is Excalibur? No, it can’t be Excalibur! Oh my god, this is Excalibur . . . I’m standing in front of Excalibur . . .”

  “Could be.” I made her give the Lenses back to me before she went so far she did a fan-girl squee, not sure even our friendship would survive that. Bad enough I have to put up with that shit from T-Bone. “Or it could be a fake. Replica or not, this will still cut through anything made from the earth and half of it that ain’t. Sharpened geo-anima . . . there’s a scary thought. Still . . . no label, just the name. Make people assume what you did. Guild flopping its Artificer dick in your eye moment you step through the door. We have Excalibur and we put it where no one gets to see it or use it ever again.”

  Of course, if you were a talented young Artificer and you saw the design with some Lenses . . . you might be able to copy it.

  Val couldn’t take her eyes off the sword, even without the Lenses. “This is so much better than the dates you usually take me on.”

  “Date, huh?”

  She blushed, fan-girl vanishing just a bit. “Just . . . a word . . . that escaped my stupid mouth.”

  I let her out of the trap she’d thrown herself into, playing the gentleman for once in my life. “I figured on having six hours a night to search, but with convincing you to come and our little talk, we’re down to less than four for tonight. I’ll take the artifacts, why don’t you go to the second floor and look through the books up there?”

  Her hands went up to signal for me to slow down. “What?”

  “Did I just have a stroke or something? Am I only making grunting noises?”

  Those hands formed into fists. “Of course . . . why am I not surprised? You spent six months figuring out how to break into the Guild Vault, but you don’t have any clue what’s actually inside of it, do you?”

  Well when you say it like that of course I sound like a fucktard. “They have to have something useful.”

  “Good thing expectations have never caused you any problems before, at all . . . ever.”

  “Keywords: Maximus, Divine Vampires or any of their names, Meteyos, Realms, World-Breaker. Shout if you find anything or you know . . . you feel like sharing any feelings you have for me. We’re all alone, no reason to be shy.”

  Val just stared, too guarded to not be feeling something deep.

  “You were always in the Library as a student,” I joked to steer away from the tension. “Are you or are you not the legendary Boomworm still?”

  “You gave me that nickname; you k
now very well that it has nothing to do with my love of books.”

  “Good point, make sure you don’t light anything on fire in here too,” I was the one doing the teasing for once.

  With a shake of her head, she turned towards the first flight of stairs. “Next time bring Miranda or Raj if you want speed searching done. I just read the books, I never organized them.”

  “Judging by how messy you kept your bed in the common room, you never organized anything,” I muttered under my breath.

  “I heard that!”

  “If I tell you how nice that skirt makes your ass look will that get me some Boomworm points back?” I called after her. “Or will it get me into more trouble?”

  “Like I could ever hate him for even a moment,” she was the one to mumble to herself this time, “the brilliant moron that he is. Oh Mancy, are they even running a Dewey Decimal system?”

  [CLICK]

  Artifacts.

  My thing.

  My field.

  My life.

  I’ve seen classmates who are natural writers talk about some classical book like reading it was an out-of-body experience gave them an orgasm every other paragraph. Other classmates were artists and I can still remember the time Miranda went to the Louvre during Christmas break and how the art kids treated her like she’d been touched by the Holy Spirit itself. Then there’s the way other Bonegrinders argue about Mordecai Root or Moira von Welf. Function and the number of Constructs controlled or the beauty of the individual art piece?

  Never really got that feeling while being an Artificer.

  Always a rebel, always spitting in the face of those who came before me. Part of it was how strong I was . . . hard to be reverent when you’re the only geomancer on the planet who can manipulate glass. Meeting Ceinwyn for the first time worked as a mancer stiffy, but not as an Artificer one.

  Facing Paine maybe.

  So outclassed, so bested.

  Plutarch has skill, but skill that’s too different from mine. Golem crafter, fairy wrangler, not into artifacts. Good enough to know how to do it all, good enough to teach you, boxes of standard and simplified designs for you to mimic, but no greatness. No art. No eternity.

  Paine . . . we were the same kind of geomancer. Metal and artifacts and . . . the need to know. So seeing him in Seattle, seeing that display of what was possible when the full knowledge of being a geomancer met a complex arsenal of artifacts. My greatest revelation as an artist, of what my art could be.

  Walking through the rows of artifacts in their glass displays, all nice and cataloged, inventors noted, named, with a small biography—that was my second revelation. It wasn’t like with the World-Breaker. The World-Breaker was still beyond me, was light years beyond me the first time I saw the room that held it in San Francisco. Some apes staring up at the black monolith banging stones together.

  This, though . . . these little pieces of genius, these timeless epiphanies, I could understand the process of how they were forged and crafted. As complex and downright beautiful as they were, I thought I could pull off the same miracle one day. Maybe even one day in the near future. Now that all the giants were on display before me, it was easy to stand on their shoulders. Easy to believe.

  I guess I shouldn’t be surprised how many of the artifacts were weapons, given the amount of penises collectively responsible for maintaining the Guild Vault. Never was a knife guy, so I never was a sword guy either, or a bow and arrow guy. Or a spear guy . . . fists are my weapon of choice; it’s been established more than once.

  Just ask Conan Sapa.

  Ain’t using fists, then I like using anima. Be it geo-anima or a crafty use of another discipline in the form of an artifact. So the weapons . . . they were just weapons, same as ol’ Excalibur back there. Pretty as can be and useful in their day, but I have a feeling if Arthur or Merlin magically manifested next to me they’d be asking for a nice semi-auto over that old sword that wasn’t a sword.

  Technology, it even takes the fun out of magic.

  But it can also work hand-in-hand to make both spheres more useful.

  Take King Henry Price with his camera and Anima Detection Lenses, taking both a mental picture and a digital one of each artifact in turn. See, I ain’t totally unprepared for what I’d find in here . . . just mostly.

  Valentine Ward.

  Surrounded by legendary artifacts and all I could think about was the woman on the floor above me. Way she fell back into being part of my life, way she accepted what I told her as truth because I might hide from her, but I’d never lie to her. Then that act of humanity I don’t think I’m capable of, even on my best days. You have to tell Ceinwyn, but we’ll do it together. Easy to trust a person enough to save their life or dodge some gunfire, whole lot more to put yourself between them and harmful emotional damage.

  Oh look, Tonbogiri, the Dragonfly Cutting Spear, how fucking amazing that is, I sarcastically slapped myself around.

  No, no, ignore the fact that it has even better workmanship than fucking Excalibur, put all your thoughts on the girl nearby like you’re in some high school drama club shit.

  I had come so far in the last six months, getting rid of all those secrets. Thought telling Val what she didn’t know would near the end of it, but it wasn’t. Just a new level of gurgling torment in my stomach. Weren’t no secrets to hide behind now, only one thing left to tell her. Three little words.

  Wanting to burst out of my mouth.

  Held in by almost twenty years of repression.

  She hasn’t told me and she’s repressing some feelings too, I can tell with the way she looked at me earlier. Barely pushed and she looked like she might pop. Wait, wait, high school on hold, there’s the Fragarach, the Sword of Air, and sure enough, got it some aero-fan like filaments along the length of the blade lets it blast a gust of wind in your opponent’s face.

  Pinaka, Bow of Shiva, which legend claimed could shoot arrows impossible to intercept. Some kind of ancient electro-anima gauss rifle for arrows in reality.

  Caduceus, the Healing Staff, thick with woven hydro-anima designs.

  Aphrodite’s Magic Girdle, menti-anima, hydro-anima, and corpus-anima. Wasn’t just about getting some poor fucker to fall for you, was about making sure their seed hit a homerun on that first try as well.

  Gleipnir, a magical chain that had held the wolf Fenrir, lightweight, unbreakable, and everlasting. Basically woven aero-anima and geo-anima with such a small amount of metal it barely counted as corporeal.

  Olivant, Roland’s Horn, able to drive away whole armies and communicate over long distances. Aero-anima and menti-anima. Scare a bitch running one way or the other.

  The Seal of Solomon, said to be able to hold demons inside of it, actually able to imprison corporeal anima concentrations. Interesting. Thirteen anima types all woven together, not as thick as the Jinshin Ken, but woven tight enough that it was difficult to make it all out. Some kind of hybrid between an actual artifact and a housing statue, or a golem. Very interesting.

  Wait, ain’t I supposed to be doing some emo shit about my ex-girlfriend? I lost the strand somewhere in suddenly giving a fuck about what I’m looking at . . .

  Distractions.

  Had six whole months of them. Maybe not the self inflicted punishments I’d come up with for myself at the Ouroboros, but it was always one goal or another after it. No stop, no rest, no thought. Hades missions, dealing with the Tsar, Advanced Anima classes with T-Bone, Pocket, and Jesus so we could all use the higher skills I’d figured out. Vick counts too, I suppose, even if T-Bone won’t let her get more involved.

  Not me.

  Ex-girlfriend is fucking involved.

  Could still hear her giggle of delight as we geo-surfed through the valley.

  Made me crack a thin smile as I snapped a picture of Hades’ Helm of Darkness. Now there’s some Artificer might on display. Should put that at the front of the Vault. Way scio-anima and spectro-anima are worked against each other. Way it has dispenser
s along the rim to coat the user’s body. Make you a walking anima waterfall, but it just might make you invisible too.

  Suppose I could start experimenting on something like that, being as I ain’t lucky like that Harry Potter fuck, just has his daddy’s invisibility cloak dropped off first day of school as a gift. Don’t think I have a single thing that belongs to my parents . . . other than some genetics. Dad’s knuckles and Mom’s sense of humor . . . when she was sane enough to still have one.

  Val had a bracelet that belonged to her great grandmother. Only wore it during hardcore family events. Seen it on her wrist a few times, mostly against my will, since King Henry Price doesn’t do hardcore family events if they can be avoided, even if his beautiful pyromancer girlfriend promises . . . things . . . that even I shouldn’t repeat aloud, much less to a tape recorder.

  She’s scared of losing the bracelet, so it stays in a jewelry box for months at a time. Unused. Safe. Good to no one. Like all the shit in here. Good to no one. Vamps could declare war on mancer-kind and the Guild still wouldn’t whip out all these artifacts. What a waste . . . not like any of this was included in the one-hundred designs you needed to become a Guild member neither. Even the knowledge was hidden away.

  Made it worse somehow.

  The fourteen-year-old who stole cigs and girly magazines for Sally Hendrickson wanted to swipe a few of them.

  The Wings of Icarus. Holy shit. Golden angel wings with finer use of aero-anima filaments than I’d ever seen. More work in the base of the wings. What the fuck does it use spectro-anima for?

  Always had wanted to fly . . .

  I’ll even ignore how that myth ends for a single use of this baby.

  Swipe it.

  Be easy.

  Take Excalibur too.

  Just cuz.

  Use it as a doorstop and forget you even have it; would still be more useful than it is now.

  Had me a mental image of Massey in here alone, preening over all the artifacts. Mine, all mine! He started pulling at his robes and then suddenly he’s got his tiny little dick out and it’s so small he can’t even use his whole hand, just his thumb and his forefinger and—