Iron Night

by M. L. Brennan

  “I have plenty of other reasons,” I defended. It was even true. While my decision to eschew eating meat had been primarily driven by my desire to date Beth, the choice to continue that had been because of what I’d discovered about the diet. It had helped quiet some of my less desirable, more predatory instincts. Since cutting out meat (other than the force-fed mouthfuls from Chef Jerome and some periodic backsliding, usually involving bacon), I’d found it far easier to ignore a few stimuli that had usually had my vampire side sitting up and taking notice. Feeding regularly from my mother had also helped, but I wasn’t about to abandon any useful element.

  Suzume rolled her eyes expressively, and I very pointedly turned away from her and looked across the street. The Starbucks looked like a lone outpost of the Roman Empire against Visigoths, and Matt was seated front and center beneath the green logo on the glass window. His favorite stakeout Red Sox hat was pulled low, and an open newspaper was providing cover for him, but I knew his methods from many years of exposure. I wondered briefly how the increasing shift to notepads and tablets would affect the private detective methods of camouflage, but shrugged it off as not my problem.

  The inside of the Iron Needle showed the same highly questionable sanitary conditions as the outside, with a cheap vinyl floor that hadn’t been mopped since the early years of the Clinton presidency, and a waiting area that looked furnished mainly with living room furniture rescued from the dump. There was a long counter that separated the front of the shop from the back, where the tattooing chair and equipment were set up. With the front window blacked out, the only illumination came from a set of rickety office ceiling lights, which were flickering ominously. A few half-full containers of rubbing alcohol and fat binders sat on a shelf behind the tattoo chair, beside an assortment of needles and many containers of inks. The walls were covered in layers of tattoo designs that ranged from the surprisingly delicate to the profoundly disturbing, with a distinct overrepresentation of the disturbing. In rare gaps between the pictures, knotty pine wall paneling was revealed. In the back was a half-closed door labeled EMPLOYEES ONLY.

  There was a long silence after Suze and I walked in, as we both looked around and took in our surroundings. We were the only people in the shop.

  “Okay,” Suze said under her breath, finally looking impressed, “whoever made that card was amazing.” Then, louder, she yelled, “Hello? Paying customers!”

  The Employees Only door creaked open wider, revealing a man sitting in a wheeled office chair. From his ripped jeans, unraveling wool hat, and disturbingly soiled and frayed wife-beater undershirt that matched the general décor (which Matt’s home-decorator office mate would probably have labeled Miasma of Despair), I deduced that this was probably the owner of the store. From the long and incredibly detailed arm-sleeve tattoos revealed by the undershirt, I assumed that this was also the tattoo artist.

  From the hypodermic needle protruding from the inside of the man’s arm and the glassiness of his stare, I could safely state that this man was a junkie of the first order.

  “I hope we’re not interrupting,” I said automatically. Immediately after the words left my mouth I began mentally kicking myself. Years of Chivalry’s pestering had ingrained social inanities that trotted out at the most insane moments.

  “Nope,” the man said, and pushed the plunger on the needle. I was relieved to see a look of profound disgust on Suzume’s face that matched what I was sure was plastered over my own. “I’ll be out in five. Look through the sample sheets if you want.” With no visible change in his deadened expression, the man walked his wheeled chair backward again and closed the door.

  There was a significant pause.

  “He must have very reasonable pricing,” I offered at last.

  Suzume nodded. “And offer discounts.”

  Another large binder sat on the counter next to an aged and yellowed cash register, helpfully titled SAMPLES. I opened it up and started flipping through the plastic insert pages while Suze prowled behind me, conducting her own investigation with a few muffled sniffs. I’d turned only a few pages before I found what I was looking for, and I gestured Suze over. When she was at my shoulder, we both looked down.

  Gage’s Celtic band tattoo was in front of us, painstakingly rendered in ink on a small piece of paper. Beside it was a photo printout, obviously from someone’s computer, of a shirtless guy with the bands tattooed at bicep and wrist, though the man’s face had been cropped off. I’d flipped quickly and easily to this page, but I was physically incapable of going any further, even though I knew what I was feeling was obviously unnatural and another well-laid glamour. Just like with the advertisement, I could see the vague heat shimmer, but the knowledge of its false nature only barely chipped away at its allure. It was more compelling than any masterpiece I’d ever seen hanging in the RISD Museum, where I’d spent more than a few afternoons, courtesy of the reduced student-admission rate.

  “Yup, that’s Yahtzee,” Suze said. “Same glamour, too.”

  I nodded toward the closed door. “So, I’m thinking elf?”

  “Oh?” Suze gave me a look like a third-grade math teacher asking to see a student’s work.

  “Glamour on the card, glamour on the sample, and he’s wearing a hat indoors that very conveniently covers his ears. Seems to point elf to me. Am I right?” I waited expectantly for her congratulations.

  “Nope.”

  “Really?” I could feel my confidence deflating.

  “Psych!” Suze laughed and held up one hand for a congratulatory high five. I glared at her, not wanting to reward her successful bait and switch, but finally had to give in. After all, congratulatory high fives didn’t come along every day, and losing Gage had removed half my usual supply of them. “Yes, beneath the smell of BO and rampant pharmacological self-abuse, it’s definitely the pine-fresh whiff of halfsie.”

  That was definitely a gross thought. I decided to try not envying Suzume’s ability to identify supernatural species by smell if those were some of the potential downsides.

  “Okay.” I took a deep breath. We’d actually located a very real lead—the first one I’d ever dealt with without Chivalry’s chaperonage. I concentrated, not wanting to screw this up. “Now, how are we going to get some information? Should we be sneaky, just pretend we’re really here for the tattoo? Or good cop/bad cop? Or—”

  I broke off as Suze walked behind the counter, pounded loudly on the knotty pine door, and yelled, “Hey, Legolas! Shoot it up and get out here—we’ve got questions.”

  “Or do that, I guess,” I muttered, feeling distinctly miffed. “Suze, I think that’s going beyond just the direct approach.”

  She ignored me completely as the door opened and one very wary-looking junkie stuck his head out.

  “Who the fuck are you?” the half-blood, whole-junkie asked.

  Suze pointed at me. “Vampire.” Then at herself. “Kitsune.” And then at him. “Worm food.”

  As the words managed to penetrate the owner’s drug haze, he started looking extremely freaked out and raised his hands in a supplicating gesture. “Hey, hey, if this is about paying a percentage, I’ve got zip.” He appealed directly to me. “Recession, man. Killing my business.” We all looked around, and there was a very pregnant pause as we took in the filth of our surroundings, which clearly predated the housing collapse. He continued weakly. “And a slick place moved in two blocks away. All, like, fancy and shit.”

  In his world, fancy probably meant “hygienic.” I cut in before he could continue his litany of woe. “This isn’t about money.”

  He blinked. I was starkly reminded of the expressions cows made when faced with something new and unexpected—it was exactly this level of blunt-force stupidity. “It isn’t?” he asked.

  I picked up the binder and pointed to the drawing of Gage’s tattoo. “Start talking.”

  Stupidity cleared away, lea
ving dawning comprehension and very real surprise. “Really? That?” He shrugged. “That’s, you know, Neighbor shit.” His lip curled derisively at the word, and he warmed to his topic, showing more energy than I’d seen yet from him. “You should be getting money out of them. Snobby pricks and star fuckers, all of them.”

  The thought of someone who had just so casually shot up in front of us passing judgment on anyone else blew my mind a bit, and I was also confused about the level of hostility he seemed to have. “But, um . . . aren’t you . . .” I paused, feeling for the right words. “Kind of . . .” Suze shook her head, and the look in her eyes read epic fail. He kept looking at me blankly, and I gave up and finally just tapped the top of my own ear significantly.

  “One of them?” he finally asked, then made an extremely rude noise when I nodded. “I’m one of their changelings, man,” he said bitterly. “I spent the whole first fourteen years of my life thinking I was human. You know, suburbia, soccer practice, oboe lessons. Then one day I’m snatched by those fuckers and told I’m actually an elf”—he gave a shrill laugh—“and belong in their community. And it’s not a choice, see, because they actually faked my goddamn death, and told me that the only way to keep my parents alive was to never contact them again.”

  “Jesus.” I said, feeling a sudden rush of empathy. Yes, hard drugs weren’t the best response, but it wasn’t exactly like he could walk himself down to a therapist to work on that one. Maybe he was coping the best he could.

  Though it still wouldn’t have killed him to run a Swiffer over the floor.

  “No, actually, we were Jewish,” he corrected. “But, anyway, after all that shit it turns out that they just want me for the numbers, see? ’Cuz of their fucking ‘population crisis.’” He actually made air quotes with his fingers. “But I’m just the dirt on their shoes, ’cuz I don’t even have the juice to hide my own goddamn ears.” He pulled off his wool hat, revealing a receding hairline and a set of distinctly nonhuman ears. The ears had the same point as Lilah’s, with a soft dusting of dark brown fuzz along the backs that matched the few stubborn tufts of hair that still remained on his head, but there was a weird little sagging at the tips. They looked weak and almost unhealthy—which rather did match the rest of him. “I’m fine to knock up some changeling girl, but they don’t want me near any of their own precious kiddies.” He snorted and replaced the hat, patting and tugging it in place with the same nervous movements that I remembered from Lilah checking her braids. Though, admittedly, with Lilah there had been fewer noticeable needle track marks. “Not that I care, you know? They’re all crazy.”

  “So, the glamour on that sample . . .” Suze prompted.

  “No, that’s not me. I’ve tried to, you know, put glamour on stuff before. Doesn’t do anything. Man”—again that shrill laugh, and I had to work hard not to wince at the sound—“they were all so disappointed when they grabbed me. Told me I was practically human.” He snorted again, not noticing when snot actually came out his nose. I glanced down at it, then forced myself to look away. “They consider that an insult, of course.” There was a feverish brightness in his eyes now, and his words were getting faster, as if he couldn’t get them out quickly enough. Clearly his drugs were kicking in.

  “But you do a lot of favors for the Neighbors?” Suze asked, and I recognized the slyness in her voice.

  Another wet snort. This time some of the snot that came out was bloody. Apparently he was not restricting himself to administering his drugs intravenously. “Shit, no. Got paid up front to put that sketch out.”

  “Who paid you?” I asked.

  A ratlike look assessed me. “Hard to remember.” He glanced over at Suze and said, with lots of emphasis, “Might need a little help.”

  Suze gave me a significant glance, which I was completely unable to decipher, and I shook my head helplessly. She rubbed two fingers together behind her back, nodding broadly. Again, I shrugged. Finally, exasperated, she snapped, “Bribe the man, Fort.”

  “Oh,” I said, finally understanding. Embarrassment followed quickly. “Sorry. I mean . . .” I glanced from one to the other. “Never mind.” I pulled my wallet out of my back pocket and offered the entire contents of my billfold.

  My intended recipient looked at my offering and said, “Yeah . . . it’s going to take more than eight dollars, man.” At my expression he turned sullen, complaining, “Come one, everyone knows the vampires are loaded. Cough it up.”

  “Maybe I’d rather beat it out of you,” I said, dropping my voice and stepping around the counter threateningly.

  Unfortunately the guy looked completely unimpressed. “If you were going to do that, you would’ve already done it. Also, seriously, you really don’t look like enough of a dick.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond to that one. Suze gave me a one-shouldered shrug and said, “Take compliments where you find them, Fort.” Turning back to our junkie, she said, “Legolas—”

  “Jacoby,” he interrupted.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Enough with the gay little elf name. It’s Jacoby. Jacoby Goldstein.”

  Unable to stop myself, I broke in. “Actually, I’m pretty sure that Legolas wasn’t—” Suze gave me a not now, dumbshit look, and I stopped. “Okay, fine, never mind.” Then, “Not that there would be anything wrong with being—” Now even Jacoby looked irritated. “Yeah, okay, shutting up.”

  After a quick check to make sure that this time I was staying quiet, Suze picked up again. “Jacoby, then. I bet you deal with a lot of impulse buys.” She glanced around and shuddered. “And a lack of comparison shopping?”

  “Sure, sure. Drunk girls walk out of here with lots of dolphins and flowers.”

  “I’m guessing you prefer cash transactions?”

  “ATM is two doors down in the booze joint.”

  Suze turned to me. “You heard the man.” She gave him a fast up-and-down look. “I’m thinking Ben Franklin?”

  “If you bring along his twin brother, sure.”

  As the person paying the bribe, I broke in, saying, “Goddamnit, I make minimum wage!”

  Suzume ignored me. “Franklin with Ulysses S. Grant as his wingman.”

  “Suze! My rent is due in two weeks!” And there was no way on this earth that I was going to call Gage’s grieving parents and try to get a partial payment out of them.

  Jacoby looked flummoxed, then leaned in, dropped his voice, and asked Suze, “Are you sure he’s a vampire? He sure doesn’t sound loaded.”

  “It is a recession,” she reminded him.

  He gave a gusty sigh. “Fine, one fifty and I sing like frickin’ Pavarotti.”

  Suze had the nerve to give me a thumbs-up.

  One quick trip next door, where I was pleased to see that the owner of the alcohol store wasn’t letting a little thing like two drunks sleeping in his aisles get between him and basic cleanliness, and I returned with much more of my weekly paycheck than I could actually afford to spend. As I handed it over I shot Suze a hard look and muttered, “Way to chip in, bestie.”

  “Just count your blessings I’m waiving my negotiating fee, Fort,” she replied. She watched as Jacoby carefully counted the cash, then stuck it into the top of his underpants—clearly to prevent us from trying to take it back once he’d talked. Which was actually rather smart; even I was suddenly very willing to let the money go. “Now talk.”

  Looking significantly more chipper, he complied. “Beginning of January, one of the Neighbors came in. Told me he wanted me to do him a favor, so I said to screw himself.”

  “Who was it?” I asked.

  “I don’t remember, man. One of the older, really snotty fucks, always brownnosing it up, making like he was more important than he was. I remember him from the Neighbor gatherings, but he never wanted anything to do with the changelings. But now he wanted something from me, so he kept whining about how i
t was my responsibility to fucking serve our community and all that bullshit. I told him what he could do with that, but I was broke, so I said that I’d do whatever the hell he wanted for a little cash. So he took a stack of my business fliers and said that someone would come by with money and what I had to do.” He shrugged. “Nothing happened for a few days, so I forgot about it. Then this chick swings in, has that sketch”—he pointed helpfully—“all jazzed up so that every young guy wants it. She gives me a few containers of ink too; says that if any guy comes in with one of my promotional cards that has a similar mark on it, I need to give him that tattoo with this ink.”

  “Do you know who the woman was?” Suze asked.

  “Said her name was Soli. Girl was hot too—real sexy Latina.” A happy look filled his eyes as he reminisced. Other parts of him were revisiting memory lane as well, judging from the front of his pants. Both Suzume and I took a few subtle steps backward.

  “Another of the Neighbors?” I resolutely decided that I was not looking below eye level for the rest of the visit.

  Jacoby shook off his mental IMAX moment. “No, but she definitely knew what I was, so I don’t think she’s human. I don’t know what the fuck she was, but she paid enough that I didn’t give a shit. And pretty soon after that a guy came in with one of my cards that had been glamoured like crazy, and I inked him up. That was good work I did too, because Soli went really nuts on me, saying that the tat had to be perfect. If there was just one flaw in it, I wouldn’t get my bonus.”

  “Bonus?”

  “Yeah, each time I did one of the guys with the cards I got a bonus.”

  “How many men did you tattoo with the ink?”

  “Four of them.”

  “Do you remember any names?” I asked, hopeful but not with much expectation.

  Shockingly, he responded with a nod. “Wrote all of them down. Mailing list, you know? Gotta use new technology to grow the business.”

  We both stared at him. It was as if a dog had just talked.