The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes (The King Henry Tapes)

by Richard Raley

  Then the skull talked.

  To be exact, the skull actually quoted us some Julius Caesar. I don’t remember the quote, had something to do with Antony, but not the words, so I guess you’ll have to do without, kiddos. Still . . . the skull fucking talked. Not jaw-moving talk either, but a freaky ass voice from the beyond coming from inside its dome.

  When it finished, Smith walked it back to the shelf and returned it to its spot. “That will be happening a lot in this room,” he told us in a rough voice sounding like rules or not, he smoked something regularly, “so if you don’t like it . . . you can leave.” He raised his eyebrows, motioning for the Hispanic girl with the nice ass to say something, since she’d crossed herself about three times through the Shakespeare.

  She only shook her head.

  Smith shrugged, walked back over to his desk, pulled out a bottle of Scotch and a shot glass, and poured some of the liquor into it. “You can’t have any,” he told us. “I tried to share my first year but someone tattled, so no mas.” He sipped at his glass, licking his lips. “So . . . Ultra class of ‘09. Heard some things about you. Got yourselves a High Five. How ‘bout that?”

  No one was quite sure what to make of him. I actually doubt most even knew about the High Five. A minute of silence went by with his eyebrow raising and Scotch sipping before he asked, “Who were your first two teachers?”

  An Indian boy with a turban put his hand up. “Mrs. Ambrose and Mrs. Dingle, sir.”

  Smith started chuckling. “And did Mrs. Ambrose and Mrs. Dingle go over some information with you?”

  The Indian boy was very polite. “Yes, sir.”

  “Ambrose gave you some rules of conduct and Dingle told you about some of our clubs, yes?”

  A number of us nodded.

  “Thank the fucking Lord,” Smith growled in his rasp. He smiled at us. “We get to have the fun part! All of you stand up by your tables, don’t sit until I’ve talked with you!” He motioned at the Indian boy with his mostly empty glass of Scotch, “Name!”

  “Raj Malik, sir.”

  “Ahhh, if I remember our uniform system correctly then you’re a cryomancer, yes?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Hmmm, from now on you’re not Raj, you’re Ice Cube. Tell us about yourself, Ice-cube!”

  Malik looked like he might run but eventually manners got him. Fucking manners . . . the first ones to die in the zombie uprising will have manners. “I’m from Oregon,” he said.

  “That’s too bad,” Smith grumbled. He pointed at the next in line, an Asian boy I didn’t know who looked very nerdy. “What about you?”

  “Miles Hun Pak, sir,” the boy said, sounding very nerdy too.

  “Stop siring me, Miles.” Smith waved at all of us then pointed at himself. “From now on I’m ‘Jet’ or at worst ‘Jethro’ and anyone who calls me ‘Mr. Smith’ with get a fail for the day.” He went back to his desk and poured another glass of Scotch. “Miles, you’re a sciomancer.”

  “Yes . . . Jethro.”

  “How much you know about the Mancy?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Ever have you’re an accidental discharge?”

  “Umm . . . I . . . I . . .” Pak frowned. “I . . .”

  “I’m not talking about what happens at night when you’re dreaming about touching a girl’s breasts, I’m talking anima!”

  Pak’s face went so red it was crimson.

  “On account of your lack of answer,” Smith declared, swinging his glass around like he planned to baptize Pak, “you’re not Miles any longer, you’re Shifty.”

  A tall platinum-haired girl in the front row gasped. “That’s racist!”

  “Is not!” Smith growled. “It’s Mancist!” Instead of interrogating the girl with the almost-white hair, he motioned at the girl next to her. “Name?”

  It was the rainbow girl who had laughed at me earlier. “Quinn Walden,” she said with a bit of a northern accent, “spectromancer, daughter of two mancers, sister of two mancers, from New Haven, Connecticut. I like horse riding and speak four languages.”

  Smith’s smile got larger with every bit of added information. “Indeed? And what are the extra three?”

  “French, Spanish, and Italian.”

  “Blah! Same language, different dyed muff, you speak two languages.” He pointed back at the platinum-haired girl. “What’s her name and how do you know her?”

  Quinn gave a cute little smile. “She’s Hope Hunting and our fathers are friends from their time at the Institution.”

  “Institution?” Smith whispered with sudden menace. “This is the Asylum, sister!”

  “Most teachers don’t like—“

  “I do like it!” Smith told us, taking the rest of his Scotch in one shot. “The Asylum! One word expressing more than that long phrase they made up back when this place was founded. The Asylum! Greatest name a school could want! From now on, all of you say ‘Asylum’ in my class. You say ‘Institution’ and I’ll mark you as a fail for the day, you say ‘Institution of Elements’ and I’ll make you clean my skulls, and God forbid you say that ‘Nature Camp’ bullshit they added in the 80s for grant money . . . I don’t know what I’d do to you . . .”

  Platinum-haired girl—Hope—crossed her arms over her chest. There wasn’t a bit of tit to her, so nothing got cupped. “You can’t fail us unless we do badly on our tests; it’s in the school guidelines.”

  Smith stared at her for an uncomfortably long time. “From now on you aren’t Hope, you’re Storm Cloud and your friend is Sunshine, clear?” Not waiting for an answer he got up and ran around the edge of the room, stopping right next to me and pointing at the brown-haired green-eyed kid. “Name!”

  “Preston Landry!”

  “Where you from?”

  “Pismo Beach, California, Jet!”

  “See that? Pismo Beach . . . now that’s a good place to live, Ice Cube!”

  “It is,” Preston agreed.

  “You surf?” Smith asked.

  “I do.”

  “And a floromancer . . .”

  “That’s what they tell me.”

  “You’ve been really nice about this, so I’m going to let you stay as Preston.”

  “But no one calls me ‘Preston’!”

  “What do they call you?”

  “Pocket.”

  “See that, Storm Cloud, that’s how you act in my class. No school guidelines in here!” Smith flipped around so fast he almost poked me in my eye. “Who are you?”

  A few of the kids groaned, Welf the loudest of them all. Standing next to Smith I felt smaller than I usually did but I still glared him down . . . or up. “King Henry Price,” I told him.

  Smith winked at me. “Our late arrival.”

  “I was busy.”

  “Do you know that you’re the only Artificer attending this school, King Henry Price?” Smith asked me.

  “So I’ve heard.”

  “Guess it means I should give you the name Snowflake on account of being unique.”

  I shook my head at him. “No . . . I think King Henry is name enough for anyone.”

  Smith’s smile got all twisted up in a smirk. “King Henry and Pocket . . . and I don’t even have to do any work, it’s not fair, it’s not fair! So . . . King Henry . . . what’re your hobbies?”

  I smirked back at him. “Fighting, stealing, fucking, and smoking . . . in that order.”

  It started Smith into a laughing fit that ended up in a coughing fit. When he could breathe again he just shook his head. “I love this job . . .”

  [CLICK]

  By fourth period you’re starting to get hungry and just a little worn out. Since the world hates me, or at least the Asylum staff hates me, they decided my class could have Science fourth period.

  We were taught by Nevada Slaton, a cryomancer Intra who I never found particularly interesting beside the fact she kept a freezer in class that she pulled popsicles out of if we got a perfect score on our pop quiz at the end of
class. Pop quiz, get it?

  That first day you don’t have normal class though, you’ve got library familiarization.

  For us only one interesting thing happened. The class was left to roam in the Entry, which is the size of most normal libraries and has thousands of books on shelves all around you, tables in the middle for study once the year really gets going. Thirty kids, one of the junior librarians, Hanks, and Ms. Slaton walking, mixing, and mingling.

  Most of us contented ourselves with reading titles but a few opened up books from a section on Basic Elementalism—a class later that day apparently. After Smith’s hour of interrogation we finally had a vague sense of names, or at least the stupid nicknames he’d given. Valentine Ward, Ice Cube, and Miranda Daniels sat in a row. Miranda’s nickname was Airhead as an aside. Peaceful, quiet, typical library sounds. Then Welf dropped a thick tome of a book on the table opposite them.

  THUD.

  Followed by: BLAM.

  Like an explosion going off right in front of Welf, his book bursting into flames, pages crimpling with red fire, blackened at a stunning pace. He won’t admit it if you ever ask, but he screamed like a girl. I know because so did Valentine, running away before anyone could stop her.

  It didn’t spread, wasn’t even a big deal apparently. Ms. Slaton gave us a nice show with a bit of ice to kill the fire, Hanks threw down his coat to stamp the embers. No problem at all. Accidental anima discharge . . . wasn’t a single one of us in the Class of ‘09 that didn’t have at least one.

  I had several.

  But this time my little foul mouth made a comment. “She’s not a bookworm, she’s a boomworm!”

  Name stuck.

  A joke at the time . . . but you’d be surprised how many times I’ve said that word tenderly since . . .

  We had PE next—more bullshit information—then lunch. You’re going to love lunch. Monday . . . let’s see . . . that means mac and cheese, burger and fries, or the sushi-rice plate. Every day was different, but the same every week. There’s a non-meat meal, a meat meal, and then something with fish or the like. Friday, fish tacos, do yourself a favor and take my advice. Monday? I’ve tried all three and you’d think I’d go for the burger—which is great—but I’m fond of the mac and cheese. They put mushrooms and some kind of soft gooey cheese in it that just makes your mouth water.

  Damn it . . . now I’m hungry.

  Know what? Fuck doing the whole day for you little brats. We’re getting through lunch and that’s all you’re getting. I’m damn starving now . . . want to drive up to the Asylum just for the mac and cheese. Maybe I can figure out the recipe . . . wonder if I called if the lunch ladies would give it to me . . .

  Okay, so . . . lunch. Groups were starting to form, not the whole thing, but the tightest bonds of friends in those groups. Valentine and Miranda, Curt and Rick, Quinn and Hope, Nizhoni and Asa, Miles and Ronaldo, Estefan and Debra.

  Me and Pocket.

  He sat across from me at the table, big burger on his plate. Interesting fact—floromancers love eating nothing but animal, faunamancers are always vegetarian. Other interesting fact—floromancers and faunamancers end up grunting and humping with each other like they have magnets up their asses. Mancy will do weird shit to you. For example . . . me eating mushrooms over a plump succulent burger.

  Pocket grinned at me. “King Henry, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Fighting, stealing, fucking, and smoking—in that order?”

  I shrugged. “He wanted the truth.”

  “Must be hard on you.”

  “What’s that mean?” I said, getting all angry thinking he pitied my life or something.

  “The smoking, dude . . . my mom quit awhile back and she was mean for a whole month.” Pocket took a big bite out of his burger, continuing with a mouthful of food, “She’s not usually mean, but she got mean then, so I figure . . .” He swallowed. “You’re extra mean right now.”

  I thought about it. “Mean?”

  “You made the fire girl cry twice and you knocked out Von-Von.” Von-Von was Smith’s nickname for Welf. “That’s pretty mean, dude.”

  I sighed, pushing away a plate of empty mac and cheese. “I love fighting, love beating up bullies . . . love telling someone if they’re being an asshole, what an asshole they are . . .” I frowned some, sucking soda through a straw at the corner of my mouth. “But I’m not mean . . . I just . . . protect mine, you know?”

  Pocket nodded. “I got it. Von-Von made fun of you . . . you punched him so other people wouldn’t make fun of you.”

  “That’s the idea.”

  “But what about fire girl?”

  “ . . . Just my big mouth.”

  Pocket grinned a mouthful of burger. “I got one too.”

  We shared a laugh, then shared some fries, then shared a bit about the absolutely nothing we knew about the Mancy.

  My first real friend . . . just like that.

  The rest of the day? Guess you’ll have to find out for yourself, cuz this tape is moving on to another story.

  Session 114

  Questions are like a swarm, one makes more. The number of them always moves upward. They never end. Just building and building on top of each other, trying to reach the pinnacle of the Tower; a pyramid into the fucking sky, mankind reaching and screaming, feet on the soil of Babel, asking ‘why this way, you cruel bastard?’

  The End of Questions is just another name for the End of Everything. Once they run out, there’s no damned point, is there?

  “I don’t understand . . . how are you a mancer?” JoJo asked me.

  “And I don’t understand . . . how do you know what a mancer is?” I asked back.

  As far as questions go, those are some good ones to begin with.

  We glared at each other, neither giving in. Nothing changed on that score. We’d had thirteen years of practice and that shit is the kind that takes a while to fade away from you. Could have been old geezers in our eighties and we would have glared the same fire and brimstone we had as teenagers.

  The crowds of videotaping spectators and the knocked-out bullies—who my sister was apparently riding with—were all left behind. It took some pretty talking from Sis along with Suit handing out some twenties from a rolled up wad of cash to keep the cops from being called, but it got managed.

  Good thing too. Last thing I needed in my life was Ceinwyn Dale bailing me out of jail.

  Owing to life’s continued need to destroy expectations, our reunion took place in the burger joint near my shop, where JoJo slurped at a strawberry milkshake and I ate my Taco Bell grande whatever-the-fucks. They tasted like all the rest of the grande whatever-the-fucks I’ve ever had. Unhealthy but cheap.

  Fighting makes me hungry.

  Eating makes me want to fuck.

  Fucking makes me want to fight.

  Talk about a vicious circle.

  Finishing the first whatever-the-fuck in silence, I decided I’d answer her question and hope for the best in return. “I’m a mancer because I was born a mancer.” Okay, I never said it would be much of an answer.

  “I know about mancers because someone told me about them,” JoJo shot back. Yeah . . . she’s my sister all right.

  Guess I wasn’t going to get anything back unless I opened up . . . and now that the fighting was over and the alarm bells could be heard, I needed some opening up on her part. I took a bite of whatever-the-fuck, cheesy meat filling my mouth.

  Outside the window, Suit, Tatter, and Overcoat had pulled their truck up to the burger joint—all three of them glaring at me with nothing near JoJo’s skill. The girl in pajamas who had walked out of the grocery store with JoJo stood with them, watching me too, but scared-like. I know the difference in types of scared looks and this look wasn’t the kind of scared about the person they looked at, it was the kind of scared for the person they looked at.

  Alarm Bell Number Four . . . like I needed another one.

  “The Institution recruited me abou
t a year after you left home.” Notice the politeness. Institution instead of Asylum. Left home instead of ran away. Left home instead of abandoned me. “I graduated a couple years back and set up my shop across the way. This is my amazing story.”

  She sipped at her shake, not meeting my eyes. JoJo was always flighty. Not like Susan. When Susan left I’d taken it like a gunshot to my heart, when JoJo left it was almost a relief and it wasn’t even close to a surprise. Dad had been the only one who seemed to care, yelling about how she was up to no good. If I remember right, Mom even had a few ‘Good Days’ in a row right after.

  “Your turn,” I pushed.

  “What kind are you?” she asked instead, eyes on my brown coat.

  “I’m an Artificer.”

  Her mouth opened in shock around her straw. “Isn’t that like one of the best ones?”

  “Someone didn’t just tell you about us . . . someone schooled you.”

  She shrugged, all little-girl-gotten-caught in her act. “Horatio explained it all.”

  “Who’s Horatio?”

  She flashed a ring on her finger I’d neglected to see, big with pink-colored diamonds. “Horatio Vega . . . my husband.”

  Some deep Arkie-Okie part of my being was annoyed she’d married a Mexican. It’s pretty amazing where the racism will sneak up on you even when you thought it exorcised completely.

  Another part, the thinking part, put two and two together. King Vega’s Coyotes. The ‘princess’, Suit had called her. My sister had gotten herself mixed up in some horrible shit. The kind of shit that sticks on your shoes and won’t leave for water or soap, got to get in there with a knife to get it out.

  Shouldn’t call it a butter-knife, should call it a shit-scalpel.

  JoJo’s face got some defiance in it. Dared me to get all defensive of her. Dared me to tell her what a little screw-up she was . . . just like Dad used to.

  But I played it cool. “He good to you?”

  “Better than most men I’ve known.”