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

by Richard Raley

  Shocked silence, no one more shocked than me.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?!?” Welf downright yelled this time.

  For once in my life I was pretty sure I was in complete agreement with him.

  “No outbursts, Heinrich,” his mother scolded.

  “And what do you think you’ve been having for the last ten minutes?” Vicky got in a nice hook to her mother’s gut.

  “Victoria—”

  “Everyone else you scare or bully or threaten to get your way, but you can’t with anyone in this room,” Vicky kept going. “We are either family, friends of family, or people who have known you since you were a child yourself.”

  That seemed to hurt Mama Welf more than anything else that had been said. “I have never wanted you to be scared of me, sweetheart. I have just wanted you safe and to keep the family an upstanding pillar of our community. To do so, we cannot always succumb to our desires or to what makes us happy. You are not one for desires, but you do fall victim to the latter.”

  Vicky lifted her chin. “Well, this isn’t about me being happy. This is about helping my friends. About doing what’s right. If we don’t do that then the Welf name is worse than dirt.”

  “The Welf name and the Welf blood is the only reason you have had the life of privilege you are accustomed to, sister.” Welf reached out towards her, hand on her elbow. “But that privilege does come with responsibilities, Mother. I believe aiding the Foul Mouth in whatever he plans is just such a responsibility.”

  “What do you mean I’m on the fucking Learning Council?” I finally found a way to scream through the shock. I wasn’t even this shocked when I walked in on T-Bone and Vicky fucking that first time. Pretty sure the object just went up my ass is bigger than Tyrannosaurus Bone too!

  Ceinwyn just smiled my way.

  I glared. How I glared. “This is why we still got trust problems, Auntie Badass.”

  “The Welfs aren’t the only ones with responsibilities, King Henry. So does a Maximus stand up for his or her entire discipline,” she explained seriously, but cracking into a joke at my expense, “You did want the truth . . . you did say you would pay the price . . .”

  “She tell you?” I asked Val.

  Her expression was as frustrated as mine. “Only just before I tried to get her to recognize me too.”

  “Valentine is a Maximus as well?” Welf asked, looking at her with the kind of lustful longing only aristocrats thinking about breeding an heir get.

  “You can’t say that, Heinrich,” Ceinwyn explained some incredibly archaic law no doubt, “neither can Valentine. Or she’ll be in the same place King Henry has just found himself.”

  “Well, didn’t you fuck me but good?” I growled. “Didn’t find it nearly as enjoyable as all the fantasies I had as a kid alluded I would . . .”

  Ceinwyn’s ageless eyes narrowed. “Only witnesses are saving you right now.”

  “Always good to have friends, ain’t it? Hey, bright side, just got me some more leverage, didn’t’ I? Can I even be a Learning Council Member and be an escaped convict at the same time?”

  “Speaking of which,” Moira finally took us all the way back to her original question, “the escaped convict threatening my daughter, we never did clear that up, did we?”

  “Didn’t we?” I hedged.

  “No, not at all,” Mama Welf threw her thorny smile at me this time. “Well, equal of mine? Care to explain why I shouldn’t turn you over to ESLED?”

  “Mother . . .” Welf tried to help, “Responsibility?”

  “Yes, son of mine, you are hiding behind yours like you do when desire gets the best of you and admitting to feelings is far too much to manage,” she rolled right on over him. “Responsibility? How? Going after some Wilder? Why all of you? Why all of sudden?”

  “I have something he wants. He has something I want. He put forth a trade I couldn’t refuse. Odds are the swap is gonna get bloody,” I told her just the facts, ma’am, “So I called in backup. Not about killing him, not about beating him. About tricking him and getting out alive. But . . . if anything happens that might please you while we escape, then have fun, by all means.”

  “And as has been said, Mother,” Welf tried again, “I did tell him to include me if this opportunity arose. I do not support Victoria’s place in it and concern for her forced my hand in informing you, but . . . I want to be here. I need to be here. This man killed my friend. I will look him in the eye. I will spite him in any way I can.”

  “A trade?” Mama Welf seized upon, ignoring Welf’s dramatics.

  “He has King Henry’s sister,” Val stood up for me. “Even if I didn’t love him, I’d still owe him for what he did for my own sister.”

  You could easily see the disgust in Mama Welf’s face. “The werecoyote?”

  “No. His older sister. Susan,” Val explained. “She’s . . . a mancer. A Bonegrinder. Pa . . . the Curator uses—”

  “I know what he does,” Moira whispered tightly, like talking about it was an affront to everyone in the room. Turning to Ceinwyn, she said, “The sister will be half Anima Mad.”

  Even knowing the truth of it, every time I heard it, it hurt.

  Ceinwyn only nodded. “Still.”

  “Why not ESLED?”

  “I don’t trust ESLED.”

  “Rivalry—”

  “He walked into the Pit, assaulted King Henry, and walked out of the Pit. Untouched,” Val added context again. “He has spies everywhere. ESLED. The Council. Even the Recruiters.”

  Yeah, not all the context. We all knew something Moira still didn’t. Just like you do. Saved it. Waiting to use it at the right moment. Leverage, a prologue on the larger political battle to be waged at the end of this mess. Was Ceinwyn’s truth to tell to her rival, not mine. Not Val’s. Whether we were equals or not. Whether she was an adult or we were the kids or . . . fucking magic unicorns for all it matters.

  “If it was a mission to kill him, I could at least appreciate the effort, but—”

  “You ain’t the only one with family,” I reminded her.

  “Why the children?” Mama Welf fell back on.

  “Because they involved themselves,” Ceinwyn told her, “as they’ve been trying to get through to you since your arrival. We are just lending what aid we can and taking their plans in our hands to keep them as safe as possible.”

  “Your son was right, you know,” I added. “Is about responsibly too.”

  Mama Welf gave a bark of her own. “Maximus for three days and he thinks—”

  “Not that,” I told her. “You ain’t perfect. Ain’t none of us perfect. What I try to tell everyone all the time, laughing and cursing as I do it. Made mistakes. Learning Council as a whole with the Anima Quota getting out of control, of course . . . that’s on all of us. Oh yeah, know about that shit. But more than that . . . Curator is on the people in this room. Isabel Soto? On the people in this room. Catherine Hayes . . . mostly on you. She’s gonna be there. Standing beside him. Trying to kill your kids, again. All this talk about protecting them but you never even told them why.”

  “Shut up!” Moira screamed at me. “Don’t you dare!”

  “Um . . .” T-Bone finally spoke, turning around a tablet so I could see the security feed outside the shop as four Constructs exited an SUV that the Welfs had pulled up in.

  “You know?” Welf whispered in shock. “The Foul Mouth knows?”

  “Heinrich . . . please, it was before you were even born really—”

  “Catherine had Victoria beaten. She tried to get me expelled. She was as responsible for the deaths during our fifth year as Soto was. Who, yes, as King Henry points out . . . will also be at this exchange. Who needs to be put down like the wild beast she is. Who used me, who kidnapped the real Veronica Lee. But Catherine . . . Catherine doesn’t have that type of overwhelming Anima Madness, not yet. She’s always had a reason to do what she’s done. A reason you have apparently kept from us. What did we do? Was it like Leo Sard
ucci? Call in a loan, destroy her family? Or worse than that?”

  Seeing Moira Welf poleaxed over me being a Maximus was fun. Seeing her crushed over how inescapable this particular revelation was . . . wasn’t. “What a way to get me to help you, Ceinwyn. Stab me in the back and I’ll know less pain . . .”

  Ceinwyn’s face frowned over that last word. “I don’t know if it would hurt less, but I do know exactly what you’re feeling.”

  “I don’t care how many you’ve recruited, you can’t possibly—”

  Ceinwyn finally played her trump card. She played it raw. “Obadiah’s the Curator.”

  Pain faded into terror on Moira von Welf’s face. “You killed him!”

  “I tried very hard. I apparently didn’t try hard enough. King Henry told me . . . more of a tsunami than a wave, I think even the Lady would admit to that. It’s him. Now that I know it, I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner. Who else could do what the Curator has but Obadiah?”

  Val started whispering into Welf’s ear to explain, I was too busy focused on the main event. “Obadiah Paine is the Curator,” Moira Welf still couldn’t accept it. “The weird boy that stuttered his way through asking me out to our first Winter Ball is the Curator? The egotistical asshole who only ever called me Jenkins, even after I was married to a Welf, is the Curator? The man that . . .”

  “Killed Amis,” Ceinwyn finished. “My best friend, who killed the love of my life. Is the monster of madness. So, yes, Moira, responsibility . . . all around.”

  Rivalry don’t allow hugs, even between women. But they did share a look that was worth more. That said more. “Not Victoria,” she eventually pleaded.

  “Gave her a bulletproof coat,” I tried to help for once. “Ain’t letting her but ten feet from the cars either.”

  “You’ll lose her if you don’t let her go,” Ceinwyn whispered to not distract whatever conversation Val, Welf, and Vick were having about Obadiah Paine.

  “She’s my little girl . . .”

  “Welfs aren’t allowed to be little girls, just like Dales,” Ceinwyn rebutted.

  “She’s only a spectromancer.”

  “A spectromancer so talented with anima sensing that she can tell us at a look what every mancer with Obadiah is capable of.” Each rebuttal crushed Mama Welf more and more. Way I had been crushed all week. Way Ceinwyn had been crushed when I uttered Paine’s name. One more to the party. Ain’t we Maximi just lucky? “You’ve hoped she would be spared, focused all your efforts on training her brother to survive. She hasn’t been spared. None of them will be. I’m sorry, Moira. I know how it feels. They might not be my blood, but I’ve recruited every single one of them.”

  A nasty sneer grew up on Moira’s face. “Every single one. The Wilders . . . that’s a mistake. People slip through cracks. But the others? That’s failure, Ceinwyn. If you had let me handle Catherine Hayes then she’d be dead by now.”

  Discussion on the other side of the room stopped on a dime. Vicky blanched at the revelation her mother had just given, Welf’s face only went hard. “What did you do?” he asked with the emotional depth of a stone.

  “What I had to,” Mama Welf still refused to back down from her conduct in this particular tragedy, “for you . . . and your father. Mostly for you, son.”

  “Oh Mancy,” Vicky gasped out, blanched face gaining color, but only green.

  “What? What’s wrong?” Welf turned to her.

  A whine escaped Vick, who only shook her head in denial.

  “Catherine Hayes is adopted,” I found as little joy in springing this secret as most of the rest of them. Wasn’t mine and it was a bloody one. “Found out when we did the shrine to the Three Queens during Pent. Her real mom was a model . . . died when Catherine was still little. Drug overdose. No father on record, so she went through the system for awhile, until she landed with the Hayes family. Story got better then. Until she started searching for her real father.”

  Moira’s sneer almost engulfed her face. “Little blond, brilliant know-it-all of an adolescent. Eyes already flickering to watch anima she couldn’t yet see. Took a train and two buses to reach the Manor. Miracle you were both off with your father on some educational trip, I can’t even remember where it was.”

  Vicky whined again, head in her hands.

  Welf’s tombstone eyes never left his mother’s face.

  “I practically kidnapped her,” Moira admitted. “Tested her blood, her DNA, brought in an independent anima tester from Europe, unleashed a slew of private detectives. Each time I hoped . . . each time it was only confirmed. I tried to be kind at first. When I found out she was a Winddancer I even considered . . . but, no, those eyes kept flickering. I knew it wasn’t always doom to act as such, but it was a warning sign. A Welf by-blow could be survived, but a Welf by-blow that eventually turned Anima Mad in her twenties? I would never allow that.”

  “Catherine Hayes . . . is my sister,” Welf gulped.

  Pretty sure Vicky started crying. T-Bone bent over her, whispering in her ear.

  Pocket and Jesus both kept quiet, although they were clearly as rocked as anyone else.

  Val just nodded like a lot suddenly made sense that hadn’t before.

  “Your mother threatened Catherine,” Ceinwyn finished that fucked up bit of history. “Bribed a recruiter. Her plan was to keep Catherine from the Institution and let the girl live as long as she could last. Only I took an interest. I uncovered the crime. We all kept the secret, Catherine included, allowing her to go to school and letting her get away with much more than other students would have . . . until that last year.”

  “And now she’s joined the Curator,” Mama Welf snapped. “An Institution trained Winddancer . . . and a Welf. Responsibility indeed. You should have listened to me, Ceinwyn. All those years ago when I pleaded with you . . . you saw it too . . . we all saw it!”

  “What if you took her in?” Vicky finally whispered. “What if she met her sister and her brother? What if she learned to ride horses, to paint, to speak French and Italian, to dance? What if you had just embraced her? What if she was standing in this room with us instead of trying to kill us?”

  “Maybe, or maybe she still hates you,” I said with a shrug. “Recruiter finds my mom maybe I grow up at the Asylum. What If is fun for dreaming and for sunsets, Vick, but not for the shit we’re about to go through. Pushed your mom to tell you because you deserved to know the truth. But you start playing What If while we all have our lives on the line and you ain’t going tomorrow.”

  “The fuck I’m not!” Vick yelled at me, finally rising up from her half bent posture like she might puke on the floor. Vicky Welf cursing. Guess it was that kind of conversation. “My sister will be there too now and you are not keeping me away, King Henry!”

  “Catherine Hayes will kill you dead,” I told her.

  “She has cause!”

  “No she don’t. You never did anything to her. If Kitty Cat told you the truth at any time during school, what would’ve happened?”

  Vicky didn’t answer, silent because she knew I had a good point.

  “Would’ve hugged her. Would’ve loved her. Right?” I called it like I saw it. “All she needed to do. Instead she had you beaten. Maybe nurture is a powerful thing . . . maybe Catherine Hayes is just wrong. Can’t doubt tomorrow. None of us can doubt tomorrow. Pushed for this to get it out of the way. So Catherine didn’t spring it at the meeting. So Paine didn’t blow Ceinwyn a kiss and shock her to death with being alive. Told all of you the secrets I got, secrets I’ve stolen this week . . . few still hanging around I’ll admit, cuz Ceinwyn Dale might have my love, but she don’t have my trust yet.”

  Glancing back at her, I found her smiling and her ageless eyes as all knowing as they’d ever been.

  “Good speech,” Jesus declared. “You like, Boomworm? Make you get all randy down below with your panocha trembling?”

  “Stop it,” Pocket told him, “Vicky’s almost crying.”

  “Should be Boom
worm crying, trembling panocha is something to be concerned about,” Jesus kept on going.

  I tried to get us back on track, “We fake the trade. We get Susan. We get out while we take our shots, bloody his nose as much as we can. After that . . . I don’t really fucking know or care. Gonna have to focus on getting the Guild out of my ass. ESLED can take over the Curator hunt and raid Paine’s hideout with as many people as they want.”

  Mama Welf snorted, thinking I was making a joke apparently.

  Pocket and Jesus couldn’t keep from grinning.

  “She don’t think we know,” Jesus said.

  “But we do know.”

  “Want a medal.”

  “Medals,” Pocket correct.

  “Big, shiny ones.”

  “Maybe a statue.”

  “And whatever El Rey wants too, of course. Since the only reason we haven’t told you is all this bullshit political leverage to help keep him out of jail.”

  “Big enough medals, maybe we’d let him go back to jail,” Pocket pondered.

  “New RV be good too, so you can stop borrowing that one from your dad.”

  “Leave my dad out of this, dude.”

  “He treats me like I’m your gardener.”

  “Cuz he thinks I’m a gardener.”

  “You ain’t a Welf, mi amor, shouldn’t have this complicated of a family life.”

  “Jesus apologizes for stomping on the still sore wound, by the way,” Pocket tried to smooth things over, just like he started doing back when he befriended me all those years ago. Jesus is slightly more house broken, but not much.

  “Oh yeah, big, muy alto blond, crazy puta being a Welf, we are rightly shocked,” Jesus deadpanned. “No one saw it coming at all.”

  “As another big, muy alto blond, crazy puta, I take offense at that,” Val joked with him, trying to lighten the mood a little bit.

  “Are you telling me that your little band of misfits managed to track down where the Curator is based . . . something even the Divine Court hasn’t accomplished?” Mama Welf asked in shock.