King Henry and the Three Little Trips (The King Henry Tapes)

by Richard Raley

  *

  An idling Jeep Grand Cherokee waited for them, preemptively turned around to head into the compound proper and away from the gatehouse. Also turned away from any chance at freedom. Tyson glanced at Vicky. “Last chance to run for it.”

  “After all we just learned?” she rebuked him. “Vega very likely has secret entrances to this Ranch, but did he offer us one? No. We are here on the guest list. We are in the open. Pretty pictures or not, this is a political move. We have to make a good first impression now . . . and many good secondary ones as well.”

  Tyson let loose a sigh as he watched the three security guards exit their trailer and get about checking his car for nonexistent bombs. “I suppose it’s the correct and the polite thing to do.”

  “It is,” Vicky agreed.

  Plus, King Henry would never let him hear the end of it if Tyson ran away. What the fuck is your problem, T-Bone? Scared they’ll find all that midget clown porn in your hard drives? I mean, that ain’t even so bad . . . yesterday I saw a pregnant woman fuck a horse dildo, you believe that shit?

  Another Coyote security man had the wheel, while a Coyote woman sat in the passenger seat, so Vicky and Tyson were relegated to the back like a pair of dignitaries—or two children, depending on how you wanted to look on things. “Now this spot I’m used to,” Vicky whispered to him.

  The woman in the passenger seat turned towards them. She was about Tyson’s age in her upper twenties, a Latina of the lighter complexion, middling height, and had a pleasant, welcoming face. She had a wide, practiced smile that reminded him of Horatio Vega and seeing it Tyson seemed to recall King Henry mentioning a pair of Vega nieces. This must be one of them.

  “Victoria von Welf and Tyson Bonnie,” she said, her tone as welcoming as her face and as practiced as her smile, “my name is Esme Castro, it’s my honor to greet both of you to the First Lie Ranch on behalf of King Vega and the whole of the Coyote Nation.”

  Vicky returned the gesture. “Thank you for your hospitality, both of us are also honored to be given this opportunity of visiting your home. I’ve been excited ever since Mrs. Vega extended the invitation and have many ideas about how we can go about creating the portrait she has commissioned.”

  The driver didn’t bother with waiting for the pleasantries to end, but instead shifted into gear and hit the gas pedal to send them forward. Man after my own heart, T-Bone, the King Henry in Tyson’s head said, couldn’t stand the way Esme and Vicky were sixty-nining each other and just went into action instead sitting around watching. Really, you should put a stop to that shit, cuz if your chick is sixty-nining another woman and you’re cock ain’t in one of the multitude of available fun holes, something is really fucked with that situation.

  Mancy, Tyson thought next, even when he’s miles away he never leaves me completely any more . . .

  “Stormcaller Bonnie,” Esme Castro had turned to him after some more missed platitudes between her and Vicky, “we’re very happy to greet you as well and thank you for assisting Beaconkeeper Welf on arriving at our doorstep.”

  “It was my pleasure,” he said, trying to form his own platitude but ended up with, “this is hardly the first time I’ve dealt with your Nation.”

  Esme Castro didn’t take it as threatening as she could have. Perhaps she would have assumed the worst from the other partner in their relationship, but not from him. “Yes, King Vega has been very happy to spread your artifact rings to his favorites.” She flashed one on her own hand with a copper initialed EC. “You’ll be seeing a number of them today, especially at dinner.”

  “D . . . Dinner?” Tyson stuttered.

  Again with a smile that mimicked her uncle. She even scrunched up her shoulders and neck like she was confiding a secret. “It might not be as completely out-of-control as you would see during a Nation Meet, but we are pulling out a number of stops for the two of you. Josephine planned every moment of your weekend herself, including a tour when we arrive at Vega Hall.”

  For the first time, Vicky seemed a little worried. “She understands that spectro-portraits take a great deal of time and layers to truly capture a moment, yes? While I appreciate being given all the honors as a friend of the Coyote Nation, I would much rather your indulgence to my presence be put towards the portrait itself.”

  “One session today, two tomorrow, and a final one Sunday morning before you leave,” Esme Castro explained in a tone that might have still been friendly but also made it clear there would be no change to this outcome. “King Vega is a busy man with many interests and can’t pose for you any more than has been allowed. I’m certain you will succeed despite the constraints. You’re spoken of very highly as an artist after all.”

  Vicky kept her face friendly until Castro turned back around to watch a sharp turn in the road. Vicky leaned next to Tyson, whispering, “Just once I would like a subject to do what I ask of them instead of telling me how little time I need to capture every essence of their being. Like art’s just . . . building a roof, or something equally mundane!”

  Tyson grunted as he watched Castro’s cheek twitch. “They’re being polite and not saying anything, but Weres have good enough hearing to hear everything you whisper.”

  Vicky gave him the first significant look of their relationship, whatever that relationship was. “Why didn’t you tell me this in the car before we arrived?”

  A shrug was all he could come up with, helpless. “You’re Old Mancy, I thought you knew about Weres.”

  “I was taught they are scroungey, disgusting beasts not to be trusted, which is precisely the type of prejudice I’m trying to overcome with this trip and now they just heard me call them that because they have enhanced anima-driven aural abilities you didn’t inform me about!”

  Esme turned back towards them. “No offense taken, I was taught mancers are holier-than-thou hypocrites who only earned their position in life over the bodies of the Coyotes who came before me. As my uncle always says, ‘the past is useless when navigating towards the future.’”

  “But not every Coyote agrees,” Tyson pointed out.

  Again with the smile that mimicked Horatio Vega. “Nor does every mancer. Did you know that your mother called about an hour ago and threatened vengeance on my entire family if one of us so much as laid a hand on you, Beaconkeeper Welf?”

  Vicky’s face was horrified. “I apologize profusely.”

  “No need . . . I haven’t seen uncle laugh so hard in years.”

  Tyson reached out to put a supportive hand on Vicky’s knee. She glanced down at it, surprised. “I can—”

  “No,” she whispered, “please don’t.”

  Esme raised her dark eyebrows at him. “That must mean either you’re not included in the threat or else she doesn’t know about the two of you, I take it.”

  Vicky and Tyson both blushed, but his hand stayed, covered a moment later by hers.

  *

  After the better part of half an hour navigating what felt like part-commune, part-reservation, the Jeep arrived at a sprawling mansion situated on a hill, overlooking a cluster of orchards and a small vineyard of grapes. They had passed all sorts of structures on the way, so why not the customary drug lord’s villa?

  Though I’ve yet to see any drugs or the sort of things I would assume a drug lord would need to be a drug lord. There had been an airstrip and a helipad, but it had reminded Tyson more of the private airport Harris Ranch had situated near its famous steakhouse than it did something you would see in Narcos or Miami Vice or . . . other crime movies. Tyson was not up-to-date on crime movies. He was very up-to-date on superhero and fantasy movies. Star Wars Episode IX in a few months, he couldn’t wait!

  You can’t geek out while you’re trying to protect Vicky!

  So an airstrip with a hanger for a personal jet . . . Tyson imagined it got quite a bit of use ferrying Vega from the First Lie Ranch down to the Ouroboros. Increased cash flow thanks to the gambling but he’s also splitting his attention; I wonder if it co
uld cause problems in the future? Especially since a large number of Were Nations were partners in the Ouroboros, including the cult that had tried to assassinate King Henry. Are the Coyotes unruly when Vega is away?

  No mancer knew the answer to that question. If a mancer tried to become a Were then they lost the Mancy . . . making it just about impossible for ESLED to find willing spies, even among Intras. Very few people want to become a Were, I think . . . usually it’s just an act of desperation or a plea for community. Tyson imagined that more Nations than just the Eternal Order had their own cult-like aspects. They say the Jaguar Nation still practices ritual sacrifice and cannibalism!

  Rocky fields made up most of the First Lie Ranch, the rest of it gravel roads and even rockier hills. Tyson caught sight of a few coyotes, though whether they were normal animals or werecoyotes he couldn’t say. Werecoyotes are larger from what I can tell, but I don’t even know how large a normal coyote is to guess. Tyson was a city-boy in addition to being a geek, his idea of wildlife was stray cats and maybe an adventurous possum.

  Homes dotted the land. Old homes usually. The kind of farmhouse homes you expected to see in documentaries on the dustbowl. The comparison was particularly eerie given the drought California had been battling on and off for the last decade, with the Sword of Damocles that was Climate Change hanging over the planet’s neck. The homes made Tyson wonder about when they were built and who built them and why people still lived in them. More of these older families who don’t like mancers much?

  “Do you live in one of those?” he asked Esme.

  She laughed at the thought. “Back in 2005 we built a small tract of homes about five minutes out from Vega Hall. I live in one of those with my sisters. Generally the closer you are to Vega Hall the more trusted and protected you are. This out here is just . . . leftovers.”

  “2005, my first year at the Asylum,” Tyson rambled a little bit, “War on Terror exploding overseas and booming credit at home. Hurricane Katrina was in the news just before I went in and after that it was a complete blackout until Christmas. They were so happy to have me back I had an Xbox 360 waiting under the tree. PS3 and a Wii the next year. It just made being home that much stranger . . . proof of the world advancing in a different direction than I was.”

  “I was nine,” Vicky whispered into his ear, “you cradle robber.”

  “And no video games?” he guessed.

  She shook her head. “Or television. I read a lot . . . and spent time making up games with Brother. The first movie I ever saw was my first night at the Asylum. Grease. I blushed through all the parts about sex, but the songs were nice.”

  “You’ve . . . grown up quite a bit.”

  “Cradle robber,” she whispered again, giving his cheek a peck.

  The only odd structure they came across was what looked like a miniature prison. “Who . . . who lives there?” Vicky asked both curious but also caught a little off guard by the forbidding barbed wire fences and sniper towers.

  Esme Castro waved it away. “It’s only our vault. Bearer bonds, diamonds, grenade launchers, that sort of thing. Nothing nearly as ominous as it looks, but Coyotes need the extra reminder not to steal what isn’t nailed down. Uncle says it has to do with the Theory of Anima Personalization, whatever that is.”

  Tyson counted over ten guards in the small window of time that passed as they sped by the structure. “Grenade launchers?”

  “Probably some anti-personnel cannons too . . . I’m told they work wonders against vampires.”

  “We . . . just use pyromancers,” was all Tyson could think to say. Mostly because he wasn’t sure if he believed Esme. How else would you guard a Totem in the age of drone bombers and guided missiles if not by surrounding it with a blast-resistant concrete bunker? If that’s not their Totem then I can’t imagine how guarded the Totem must be . . . and can’t help but wonder if it’s just weapons inside this ‘armory.’

  “And banks for our bearer bonds,” Vicky tried to lighten the mood with a joke.

  The rest of the trip was uneventful and mostly silent besides the sound of the gas engine and the spray of gravel pebbles under their feet. Once they neared Vega Hall, visible on its hill and dominating the landscape, even the gravel ebbed as it was replaced by actual asphalt road that twisted and turned through more hilly land than that near the highway had been.

  The trip took twenty to thirty minutes in all and there was no sign that they had even neared the opposite edge of Coyote territory. Like the Asylum itself, as far as Google Maps and other public information were concerned, none of this was here. It was undeveloped foothills and perhaps the reality wasn’t so developed itself, but it was surely more than nothing. Especially Vega Hall.

  Pueblo in style, it was a mash of blocky buildings faking at being nothing but mud and stone, but the mud itself was expensively chiseled, the stone aesthetically placed. There was a wrought-iron fence separating a green swath away from the rough terrain that surrounded the mansion. The fence enclosed four or five adobe buildings, the largest massive in size beyond anything Tyson even thought of as a “house.” Beyond the buildings was a small man-made lake with a boathouse, a bright blue pool, a basketball court, and a tennis court. On the edge were eight to ten miniature orchards of apples and walnuts and almonds, pomegranates, tangerines, oranges, lemons . . . Tyson caught sight of a familiarly designed floro-seeder sitting next to a pistachio tree.

  Vega’s using them for his orchards and his vineyard . . . not for opium or marijuana or . . . some other drug plant, Tyson realized.

  There was an armed guard at the fence gate who let them in, the first sign this wasn’t just some Hollywood starlet’s retreat from the paparazzi. The guard glanced in the Jeep, hand on the machine gun that hung down from a shoulder-strap. He grunted when he saw Esme in the passenger seat. “No problems?” he asked.

  “As I predicted, the natives have no teeth, only howls. You can tell Antonio to relax for once,” Esme explained as a superior to an employee.

  The guard nodded, saying nothing more.

  On the Jeep moved into Vega Hall’s embrace.

  *

  Esme led them through a garage into a small waiting room. A waiting room in a house. Vicky seemed unfazed by the idea, but to Tyson it felt very wrong. There were glasses filled with ice and accompanying pitchers of orange juice and sweet tea, plus a tray of crackers and dips and chips with a variety of salsas. Vicky attacked the food with gusto; Tyson nervously poured a glass of sweet tea and sipped on it.

  Vega Hall wasn’t a home . . . it was the Coyote Nation version of the White House. Outside of that small waiting room he’d seen bustling groups of men, maids working at cleaning a statue, and the garage had been filled to the brim with trucks and SUVs, watched over by a small cadre of mechanics in jean overalls.

  “Don’t leave the room,” were the only words Esme gave them before leaving.

  Tyson fidgeted.

  Vicky tried the dips.

  Tyson sipped his sweet tea.

  Vicky tried the salsas.

  Tyson stood to study the light fixture. Bugged, he thought, imagining a security room somewhere with audio and video feeds.

  Vicky started choking as she went too hot for her blue-blood taste buds on the Scoville scale. After her tea did nothing to lessen the heat, she grimaced. “How can anyone like that?”

  “It’s a California thing,” Tyson said with a sympathetic wince.

  “It’s torture!”

  “Never had a pyromancer friend?”

  Vicky moved back down the line to the cooler salsas, especially a tasty looking tomatillo chile verde. “There’s jalapeño toppings and sriracha sauce on normal foods and then there’s whatever that hell-borne concoction is.”

  Eventually they both sat back down beside each other. The room felt like a doctor’s waiting room. A doctor’s waiting room in Beverly Hills, but still a doctor’s waiting room. Or a dentist’s waiting room. Tyson had always felt the dentist office was the wors
t of the two. His doctor’s only complaints were that he was overweight and needed more exercise, but his dentist had viewed even the smallest cavity as a sin worthy of wherever that salsa came from.

  He felt like he was in trouble . . . under the watch of some receptionist. Very much he didn’t feel like a guest at someone’s house. Snacks or no snacks. Vega Hall . . . he couldn’t imagine living like this . . . every day official, surrounded by servants and the Coyote court . . . it almost was a throwback to the days of royalty. “Is Welf Manor like this?”

  “No,” Vicky said immediately. “Welf Manor is . . . very quiet, almost deserted really. It was made for an entire extended family after all . . . now only the four of us live there. Mother’s doing mostly, although Father fought horribly with my uncles and aunts and cousins when they did live there during his youth. We have servants, of course. I grew up with a maid and Brother with a butler, there’s a groundskeeper and a gardener and a chauffeur . . . but nothing as authoritative as this. It reminds me of the Administrative building at school . . . so many teachers and Learning Council employees about . . .”

  “JoJo will have her work cut out to keep her child grounded, won’t she?”

  Vicky smirked at him. “King Henry can get away with that affection, but you can’t. Make sure you call her ‘Josephine’ when we’re not alone, please. And yes, she will . . . I think about how sheltered I was . . . but this will be the opposite, won’t it? There will be very little childhood for the Vega heir . . . even worse than it was for Brother.”

  “We can trust in King Henry to tell the child it’s a spoiled little shit if it does happen to be one at least,” Tyson joked.

  Vicky glanced around the room. “You realize they’re recording us?”

  Tyson nodded at the light fixture. “They are.”

  She smirked again. “Maybe King Henry is wearing off on you too.”

  “Asshole,” Tyson said without a hint of his usual twinge.