I respect Jason even if I don’t respect his friend. We’ve thrown down a lot over the years . . . got to respect a guy that can take an iron fist and still be standing there pissed off at you. Plus, he could’ve stuck with Welf after he graduated, became a guard or servant or whatever Welf saw in him. But Jason joined the Recruiters with Val and Ronaldo and a few others I’ve gone to school with over the years.
He was okay in San Francisco too.
Calmed Peter and Ronnie Ward down a lot.
Did a better job of it than dumbass Estefan Ramirez did.
“No fighting!” Vicky yelled at me and her brother.
“What’s this now?” Jason teased.
“Except when Jason kicks some werebull ass tomorrow,” she amended, giving him a high five and a fit of laughter.
“What was that about?” Veronica asked after the others went back to watching the bird races. “What happened in San Francisco?”
I showed her my SDR. “Ain’t as pretty, but it’s got a bigger kick. And ain’t that what you want? Something get the job done good and fast?”
Welf’s face gave another twitch as Veronica laughed at me. “They stole it from you?” he said in disbelief.
A don’t-give-a-crap shrug. Even if I really, really gave a massive shit about this one. Gonna get you back one day, Guild. “Sure it won’t be the last.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out a SAD. “Want to see one of my Magic Little Balls?” I asked Veronica.
“Darker than I took you to be,” she commented on them being black as night. “And only the one?”
“The others are too dangerous to play with,” I warned her.
“More than two? Seems like you have a problem in the opposite direction then.”
I clicked the button on the SAD and instantly sunlight flooded out of it, filling the room.
“Oooooh!” Vicky commented from across the box.
Push the switch, another click, and sunlight was replaced by pure black shadow so thick it blinded you.
“Ewwww!” Vicky commented from across the box.
A third click and everything returned to normal. “It’s a lot flashier when I use the one that shoots fire.”
“Please don’t!” Veronica laughed. She turned to face Welf and gave him some fluffing. “Wasn’t that amazing, sweetie?”
“Yes,” Welf grunted. “The Foul Mouth has always had more talent than he has sense.”
“Shit . . . I’d say the same for you, Welf,” I told him. “Especially since you got one of them monsters of your own now.”
Welf’s self-satisfied smirk returned. “Art, Price, she’s a piece of art, not a monster.”
‘Price’ now, after I proved I wasn’t a total fuck-up as an Artificer, was it?
“Had some of them try to kill me a few months back,” I pointed out. Fact I seemed to be doing shit while Welf was picking his own nose seemed to annoy Welf, so why not keep bringing things up? “I know exactly what they can do. You might keep this one pretty without all the spears and spikes and steel popping out of it, but I know what it’s waiting to do if you need it to do it. Like civilization that way: all nice until it’s three days without a shower.”
“I always ask him who she was, but he’ll never tell me,” Veronica said, hand still playing with Welf’s ring.
Hey, buddy! Can she play with me like that? Pretty please?
I told you to shut it!
Welf smiled for once. As always, it was a terrifying sight since he was so unpracticed at it. “It’s disrespectful to tell. That life is over. Now she’s only a tool of necro-anima. Unlike the vampires, we do not lust after the person who was, but make a clean break between that life and the Construct.”
“You Bonegrinders kind of got some religion going on with all your rules and shit, don’t you?” I commented.
He nodded at me. “A motto at least: Death respects life and all sacrifices must be honored for the greater good.”
Greater good.
Hate that bullshit.
Greater good is why me and Ceinwyn are fighting.
Greater good is why Val is in London.
Greater good is why I’m stuck in Fresno.
Greater good . . . what’s wrong with some normal good?
“Well . . . don’t make it attack me and we won’t have a problem.”
The Construct moved.
I flinched.
It pulled a phone out of its pocket and handed it to Welf. He checked it, gave it back. The self satisfied smirk returned. “Thought I heard a text.”
Fucking asshole.
What really pissed me off about it was . . . well, it was the kind of shit I usually did to him, but he’s too stick-up-the-ass to ever do to me.
But he did it this time.
He just punked my bitch ass.
“Mommy hasn’t gotten her two hour check in call is it?” I scowled at him, trying to regain some points in our infinite war.
The smirk disappeared, but he said nothing.
His mother was always a sore point. Same with me. One of the few ways we were alike. We both knew if we really wanted to attack that was the best opening in the armor.
“Figured you’d go work with daddy since he’s got all the money, but you went . . . into whatever it is you do exactly.”
His mask stayed in place, carefully neutral, even if a crack or two appeared at the edges. “When I graduated, when the real choice of what to do with my life was before me . . . I realized what a fool my father was. He took a piece of our fortune and made it as common as an investment bank. Needed perhaps for special mancer projects, but so very crass, something a Daniels would do. I don’t remember much of my grandfather, but I do remember the expression on his face every time father would talk about his quarterly profits. ‘What does a mancer of renown care for a job? he would ask. What does a Welf care for counting money?’”
“You always seemed to really fucking care about it, Welf.”
Again that quick glance at me and even a grudging nod. “My father equates wealth with status. It did infect me some growing up. Made me make . . . ill-considered comments. But when I crafted my first Construct in Root’s laboratory . . .”
Welf’s face was a sight to see. That remembrance, that joy in discovery and in finding your place in the Mancy. It was the same expression I wore when I made an experimental artifact.
He smiled again, this one a little less horrifying than the one before. “I am a Welf. What is money to me? I simply am one with the Mancy . . . so of course I asked my mother to continue my training as a Bonegrinder. As you should have done with the Guild, Price.”
Veronica reached over and gave him another kiss. “My sweetheart,” she joked, “he’s passionate about me . . . and dead people.”
He smiled into her lips. “I assure you that I don’t kiss them.”
Heinrich Welf being romantic.
I’m gonna throw up.
[CLICK]
After the bird races but before the cat obstacle course, a beep sounded at the door of the Welf private box.
The door itself was a creation of either paranoia or caution. Depending on how often people try to kill you, I suppose. So for me it was somewhere in-between. Thick, steel-reinforced, it had a computer display next to it with a video view out into the hallway. The display showed Maya, the Ouroboros employee, in her golden and black pant-suit and two other people just out of view behind her.
“Mrs. Vega requests entry into your box, Mr. Welf,” Maya said electronically, her actual voice completely silent due to the barrier.
T-Bone and Pocket both raised their eyebrows at me.
The other people in the luxury box not so much. It’s always been interesting to me just what facts and gossip happen to carry along the Asylum grapevine and apparently the fact that I was Horatio Vega’s brother-in-law almost never did.
Welf stood up, all puffed up over his important guest.
Jason squinted, maybe remembering me mentioning talking to Vega during the
whole Christmas-Ward-getting-kidnapped fiasco. Or maybe he had to fart. Hard to tell.
“I heard that Vega was married,” Welf muttered aloud. “He must be sending his wife to greet the mancer dignitaries so as to not unbalance the political situation. The other Were Nations might become nervous if he uses this event to strengthen Coyote ties with the Learning Council.”
“Or she’s being nice and playing hostess, brother,” Vicky reminded him. “Not everything is a political situation.”
I tried to imagine JoJo being either political or acting as a hostess.
What do you mean she fucked a Twinkie?!?!?
Welf straightened his suit, making sure that everyone stood up respectfully. He also double-checked that his Construct had a free and clear line to the door if action was required. I’m not the only one with a little paranoia in my life.
“Um—” T-Bone started, but Pocket shook his head at him, grinning over the reaction we were about to get from Welf once he found out who Mrs. Vega really wanted to speak with. “Too good to stop, man.”
She’s going to punch me in the chest. She’s going to call me an idiot.
Not sure why she’ll do it, but she’ll still do it.
She always does it.
Welf clicked the release valve on our bridge bulkhead door. It swung open.
JoJo stepped inside.
She was . . . different than I remembered.
From our childhood or from when I happened across her in Fresno a year back. No pink for one. No overdone makeup. She looked . . . presentable. Not often a word you use to describe a Price. The piercings and tattoos were still there, just covered by an expensive evening dress. She’d dyed her hair a soft honey blond, not the usual mash of rocker pink or blue or green or whatever she felt like. Her eyes were the same as always. Dirt eyes just like mine. Still short and small, but in heels to be equal in height with me for once.
For the first time in life I think I saw her as a woman and not some punk girl in too much trouble to ever get herself out of it. My phone calls with her and our sporadic short get-togethers had all been with an older JoJo Price, but still with JoJo Price. This guise wasn’t JoJo Price. This was a woman who was beginning to accept herself as Josephine Vega.
Who had accepted her husband, her Nation, and given up on escape.
Who leaned sadly against the bars of her golden cage and then forced herself to smile and tell herself that all was well.
Who whispered under her breath where no one but her could hear, “Maybe one day . . .”
Then she talked.
“You’re Welf then?” she said, head tilted so she could study my school rival.
“A pleasure, Mrs. Vega,” Welf greeted, giving her a small bow. The bow would be measured to his station and her station and the depth based on whatever complex political formula decided such things. “You honor my family with your presence.”
“It’s like King Henry with tits in a dress,” I heard Pocket whisper to T-Bone.
“It’s so weird,” T-Bone whispered back.
“Jesus will be so jealous he missed this!”
“I’ll take a picture!”
“I’ve heard you’re a douchebag,” JoJo informed Welf. “And a Nazi too I think.”
Welf was speechless in terror.
Not quite all Josephine Vega yet, but I’m losing her slowly.
I smiled at her like I’d done nothing wrong.
She scowled at me like she very much remembered the time I set her Barbie dolls on fire.
Ah, crap. She’s going to punch me.
Vicky worked overtime trying to take everything in. She glanced between us, back and forth. After the third glance her arms crossed and she got a satisfied smile on her face. She elbowed Pocket in the gut. “You should’ve told me!” she whispered accusingly at him.
“I don’t know where you heard that or who you . . .” Welf stopped, tombstone eyes finding me and glaring. “Do you . . . do you know the Foul Mouth?”
JoJo entered farther into the luxury box, barely not tripping over the hem of her own dress, which was much too long even with those heels. The façade cracked not just in speech, but under movement. “Regrettably,” she said.
“I assure you he’s not a friend,” Welf assured . . . most vigorously.
JoJo stomped towards me, glaring at me eye to eye.
Damn heels. They’re unfair.
“You are a complete moron,” she decided.
“Talking to me or Welf?” I asked.
She punched me in the stomach.
It wasn’t hard, but . . . Mom, she’s hitting me again!
In front of my friends too!
And my assuredly not friends also!
“You’re a moron!” JoJo said again.
I stepped back. “Don’t you dare!”
She kicked at my shin, but missed. “Moron! I’m so mad at you right now!”
Vicky, Pocket, and T-Bone were all grinning like fools.
Welf was very confused.
“What have I done to piss you off so much?” I complained, again backstepping out of the way of another shin kick. “We’ve been getting along so good! You even said ‘love you’ when you called me two weeks ago. I thought I might die of shock!”
“What are you doing here?” JoJo yelled at me. “Don’t you think if I wanted you here or if Horatio wanted you here that we would’ve invited you here?”
“Oh, so the King of the fucking Coyotes don’t want me here. Why I give a shit?” I turned to the other person who had entered with her. It happened to be Vega’s personal guard and asskicker, who I’d always called Sharp. Guy looked deadly as hell, always did. The kind of guy that shot a bunch of nuns in the evening and didn’t even think about naming it as a sin to the priest when he went to confession the next morning. “No offense meant.”
Sharp made no comment.
He only stood at the door, guarding his charge.
Apparently, JoJo’s golden cage had gotten some thorns since I’d last seen her.
“The King of the fucking Coyotes,” JoJo snapped at me, “would’ve loved to invite his honored brother-in-law to this showcase of grandeur, but unfortunately the King of the fucking Coyotes is actually worried about your safety and decided it would be best if you didn’t put yourself in a situation where any of the other Weres present who knew Hector Vega might want to kill you in revenge! You moron!”
“Brother-in-law,” Welf grunted like the words stabbed him as they escaped his mouth. “She’s your sister.”
I gave a flippant little bow to mock the one he’d given to her. “Royalty abounds on all sides. Not that you’d know it given the way my little sis’ ain’t exactly acting like a queen at the moment.”
“I’m not your little sis’!” she growled. “I’m older than you! We’ve covered this!”
“Also,” I told her, “it wasn’t my idea to come here. But now that I am here, so what? Ain’t no one tried to kill me yet, have they?”
“Yet,” she snapped. “But Horatio has had to explain to three different Nation heads why he hasn’t killed you himself and that no he’s not interested in their offers to do the task for him since killing a family member for killing a family member is such a nasty business he shouldn’t dirty his hands with it.”
“Well . . . that’s kind of worrying. If they weren’t Weres . . . or what I call them: total fuck-ups.” I glanced back at Sharp. “No offense. Why the hell you got the badass with you anyway?”
“His sister is the Queen of the Coyotes,” Welf muttered some more, falling down to sit in a chair like the world had lost all sense. Veronica sat down half in his lap, giving him a pat on his shoulder like he was some three-year-old who had just discovered Santa was fake.
JoJo ignored my question. “Horatio gave you a free suite with a ten-thousand dollar tab just in the hopes you’d be smart enough to stay inside the room as drunk as you were when you arrived. Which was embarrassing and I can’t believe Valentine would approve—”
/>
“Who gives a shit what she thinks about my drinking?”
“What?”
“We fucking broke up! That’s why I was drunk! I only got sober out of necessity when I found out Vega ran this place . . . figured he would take the opportunity to get revenge and I should be ready for it.”
JoJo’s expression was the same it was when I broke my arm once during a fight. Or like when I got the chickenpox when I was four. Or . . . “Don’t you DARE!” I warned her.
But, damn it, she hugged me anyway. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“They are so brother and sister!” Pocket whispered to Vicky.
“It’s! So! Amazing!” Vicky whispered back.
“Got shitfaced,” I grumbled into an overly perfumed neck. “Didn’t feel like talking.”
JoJo pulled back some. “I thought she might actually be the one to civilize you a little bit.”
“Me too.”
“I mean . . . his sister is a werecoyote and that’s nothing to be proud of,” Welf was saying to Veronica. “But . . . Horatio Vega’s brother-in-law. The man who tamed the untamable, that forged peace with the mancers, who showed a way forward for every Nation on the planet . . . and he married a woman that shares a resemblance with King Henry Price.”
“He actually is a douchebag,” JoJo whispered into my ear.
“I told ya.”
She smiled at me as she fussed over my hair. Good luck fixing that disaster.
“Sorry I didn’t call . . . probably should’ve. T-Bone and Pocket snapped me out of it and brought me here to distract me from it all. Didn’t even know what was happening until we arrived. Called ‘em dumbasses when I did.”
She punched me in the stomach again, remembering she was mad with me. “Then, do you stay in your hotel room with a wall full of booze? No! Do you stay inconspicuous and gamble the money we gave to you? No! You waltz right into the event like we don’t want you to! You shouldn’t even have tickets for it!”
I glared right back at her for once. “Igor gave Pocket four free tickets.”
She hissed in a breath. “He didn’t!”
“Oh yes . . . can’t imagine what he’s up to, can you?”
“Yes, I need to go and cut his glittery balls off for playing games where he shouldn’t, that doesn’t forgive you being a moron!” she told me.
The Foul Mouth and the Mancy Martial Artist (The King Henry Tapes Book 5) Page 20