by Kim Harrison
Seeing David and me making our way to the counter, Wayde put his thumbs into his pockets and sauntered over to the young woman who’d answered the door. Mary Jo, maybe? She looked up from the invoices she was going over and smiled, and I rolled my eyes.
“So you’re David’s alpha?” Emojin said as I halted before her. She was eyeing me pensively as she settled herself on a high stool before a state-of-the-art monitor and keyboard. “You’re nothing like the other girls.”
Pulling myself straight, I extended my hand over the counter to her. “I’m Rachel,” I said, feeling her smooth, unworked hand slip coolly into mine. “I don’t want to be a bother,” I said, looking over the clearly closed store.
Emojin’s pale eyebrows rose. “Too late for that,” she said sourly. “Well, you’re here, but I’m not going to do this if you don’t want it.” She crossed her arms over her chest and looked from David to me. “I know he dragged you here. Let me hear it.”
I was so embarrassed. “I want this,” I said, then glanced up, seeing her tight expression of disapproval. “Really. I’ve been unconscionably rude to you and to David. And the rest of the pack. I was unprofessional in standing you up, and I’m sorry. I was just scared.”
The big woman grunted in surprise, and her arms uncrossed. “Still scared?” she asked, the first hints of her mood softening starting to show.
I looked at David, then Wayde, who had rolled up his sleeve to show off one of his tattoos to the young woman, and then back to Emojin. “Yes,” I blurted out, and David winced. “But I’m scared about a lot of things that I do. I want this more than I’m scared.” The skin around my eyes tightened as I looked at Wayde. “If I had really wanted to get away, I would have.”
Exhaling heavily, Emojin nodded. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but okay. I’ll do it. And I accept your apology.”
I sighed, not realizing until now how much this meant to me. “Thank you. I’m really sorry. I do some of the stupidest things sometimes.”
Emojin glanced up. “You think this is one of them?”
“No,” I said quickly. “I meant ignoring this was. I should have handled it better.”
“Well, it’s done,” the big woman said. Beside me, David had regained his excitement, and was leaning on the glass counter until Emojin tapped a hand-lettered sign taped to the top telling him not to.
“You’re a witch, right?” Emojin muttered as her fingers clicked over the keyboard. She had a beautiful voice, as soft and full as the rest of her. Her perfume was nice. Sort of a powdery coolness. “We have David’s basic design on file.”
David ducked his head, tugging his coat straight as he looked up eagerly again. “I’d like to add to it to show her higher status.”
Emojin stared at her monitor as one finger kept tapping a key, scrolling. “Not a problem. I thought you might.”
Something special? For me? “Really?” I said, then warmed at the eagerness in my voice.
David smiled, showing his teeth, taking my hand and giving it a quick squeeze before letting go. “Of course. This is important to me.”
And here I’d been avoiding it. God! I was such a jerk.
Behind Emojin, Wayde was following the younger woman to one of the “offices.” She flicked on the light and put her hand on the Were’s chest, stopping him at the archway. Telling him to stay outside, she started to clean everything. The smell of antiseptic tickled my nose, and Emojin lit a stick of incense, waving it briefly before dropping it into a dusky bottle to smoke to nothing.
“Here’s your registered design,” she said as she spun the screen to David and me, and we both leaned closer, being careful to not put our weight on the glass. The basic tattoo was a simple dandelion flower gone to seed, the fluffy parachutes being black instead of white, and the green stem coming from a small cluster of leaves. The moon was behind it. It was nice, I guess, but David clearly wanted something special. To be honest, it wasn’t doing anything for me. I was just happy the other ladies hadn’t wanted broomsticks and bats.
“I’ll do the draw myself,” Emojin said, and I blinked in surprise. She had put on a pair of round-rimmed glasses, reminding me of Al as she looked over them at me. “But Mary Jo will color you in. She’s my daughter and almost as good as me.”
“Okay,” I said, glancing at Wayde and Mary Jo. She was pushing him out of her way, firmly pointing a finger to the front waiting area. The guy didn’t have a chance, but they both looked like they were enjoying the game.
“A tattoo should have meaning beyond its individual art,” Emojin was saying as she tapped the design. “What can you bring to this that is entirely you?”
Wincing, I tilted my head. “I don’t know. What do you think, David?” I asked, seeing that he’d clearly given this a lot more thought than I had. I was such a bad alpha.
“More flowers on Rachel’s tattoo,” he said immediately. “And the moon behind it.”
Emojin was nodding, her gaze distant as she saw it in her mind. “To match yours?”
“Yes, but we’re not a couple, so they should be different,” he said. “Make hers full to show her completeness.”
Complete? Was he kidding? I was about as unfinished as one could be and still survive.
“Let me think.” Emojin hit a few buttons on her keyboard, and a huge, outdated printer behind her hummed to life. “I gave you black fluffs. Let’s keep that element the same between you to show unity.”
This was getting more complicated by the moment, but I didn’t want the two of them to come up with something that was going to take more than a day to complete and cover my entire back. “Um . . .” I said hesitantly as a piece of paper slid from the printer. “Sometimes less is more. Maybe we could stick with just three flowers. Make one yellow, one that’s closed and ready to change, and the last one with the black dandelion fluff?”
Emojin leaned to take the printout. Her eyes were sharp on mine when she came back and set it before her. “Change,” she said, looking me up and down with the same evaluating air she’d had when I first met her. “That’s what you’re all about, isn’t it? David, she’s right. Give me a second.”
“Only three flowers?” he said, clearly thinking that I should have more, and I smiled nervously. I didn’t want a bouquet. I wanted something simple.
Emojin had a black pencil in one hand and another in her teeth. Almost oblivious to us, she began sketching a new drawing beside the original print. She was a true artist, and as I watched the tattoo start to take shape, I decided I liked the idea of wearing something that this woman created.
“This is good,” she said as she added a few floating seeds from the open seed head. “Simple, elegant, easy to do, and rich in symbolism. What do you think?”
She spun the drawing to us, and I took in a breath, loving it. “Oh, this is beautiful,” I said as I picked it up, and Emojin beamed. Even David seemed happy despite there being just three flowers and only two actually looking pretty. The third was in an ugly in-between stage, like me, I suppose. My God, she had somehow made the angles on the leaves look like wolf heads, and with the moon highlighting it, it was a true piece of art. And it was mine—if I wanted it.
“Okay,” I said, handing it back. “I’ll do it. I don’t care how much it hurts.”
Emojin smiled, all her wrinkles folding in, making her beautiful. “I knew you would.”
From the front of the store, Wayde made a rude bark of laughter, and I turned to him. “What are you laughing at?” I demanded, and David put a calming hand on me.
“You.” Wayde slouched in his chair. “God, Rachel. It’s not going to hurt that bad. The way I hear it, you’ve had worse.”
“Not intentionally,” I said, stifling a shiver. “You’re just sulking because you got pwned by an elf.”
David gave my arm a squeeze as Emojin slid from her stool. “Thank you,” he said earnes
tly. “I know this means more to me than you.”
Uncomfortable, I winced. “I’m sorry it took me so long, but at least now I know it will last.” I shook my arm with the silver band, and a hint of worry crossed his expression.
Moving slowly, Emojin joined us. “So, all I need to know is where you want it.”
I blinked, remembering a demon asking me the same thing. “Uh . . .” I said intelligently. “Where would you suggest?”
She exhaled, tired. “You’ve not given this any thought.”
Wayde had started our way, and he pulled his collar aside, saying, “A real Were would put it here, where everyone could see it, but since you don’t want to show affiliation—”
“Mr. Benson,” David growled, facing him with his hands clenched.
“That’s not it at all!” I said, angry as well. “I just didn’t want to get one only to have it vanish after some stupid demon transformation curse! They don’t last through that, you know.”
Wayde stopped a good eight feet back, slumped with his weight on one foot in a maybe-show of submissiveness, but his jaw was still clenched defiantly. Smirking, Emojin stepped between them. “I’d suggest an arm or an ankle,” she said as if the two weren’t ready to face off. Training or not, Wayde would lose badly. The only reason David had asked for Wayde’s help was because David had a problem forcing me, his alpha, into anything.
Emojin shook the paper to get David and me to look at it. “You’re going to want to show this off on request. Putting it on your ass might be a bad idea.”
I laughed to help defuse the tension, and both men turned from each other. “The ladies have put theirs on their front shoulders,” David said. “It’s very showy.”
But I didn’t want showy. I wanted subtle, and my stomach started to hurt.
“With your fair skin, this is going to look fabulous,” Emojin said, seeing my hesitation. “I may ink this myself. Can you hold still when something hurts?”
I nodded, remembering the needles from when I was a child. God, I hated needles. “Yes,” I said, trying to find a way to meld my desire for subtlety with David’s wish for show. If it wasn’t where someone could see it, there wasn’t much point to it as far as he was concerned.
“I’d like this on the back of my neck, high and almost behind my ear so my hair covers it most of the time,” I said, taking the drawing from Emojin. “And the detached fluffs coming around the front somewhat. One on my neck by the main piece, one on my collarbone where everyone can see it, and a third where you think appropriate.”
I looked up, fixing on David’s eyes. “If someone knows it’s a pack tattoo, they’ll recognize it flat out. And if they don’t, then they won’t need to see the larger one.”
David thought about that, and Emojin took the paper back. “Like an open secret,” she said, pleased. “Rachel, this is good. I’m so pleased that you came in. This is going to be one of my more satisfying pieces.”
“Why?” Wayde asked, his stance belligerent. “Because she’s been such an ass about it?”
Emojin stopped, turned, and nailed him with her glare. “Because she’s making this one piece all she’ll ever need to show the world who she is instead of coloring her body with random images and needing thirty expressions to show her soul.”
My lips parted, and I stared as she paced to him, looking as if she wanted to smack him.
“She might have come in sooner if she had had something to mull over other than you men telling her it isn’t going to hurt, because she knows it is, and to believe otherwise is stupid.”
Wayde backed up another alarmed step as the shorter woman faced him. “I told you to bring her by for a drawing session first,” she said. “Rachel may have been an ass for standing me up, but she did come in.” Turning, she made a last huff, then smiled at me. “Men,” she said as she took my arm and led me to the brightly lit room. “They forget we need to see the outcome of pain before we willingly put ourselves through it. How else would we suffer nine months to have a beautiful child? We already know we have guts. Getting a tattoo to prove it means little. You’re going to like this. I know it.”
She patted my arm again, inviting me to follow her into her small/big world of ink and needles and expression of soul. And this time, trusting her, I went.
Seven
I squinted, trying to tilt Ivy’s hand mirror just so and keep the damp hair off my shoulder as I stood with my back to the bathroom mirror so I could see my tattoo. It was a sunny afternoon, but not much light made it into the old men’s room that had been converted into a laundry and bath. Exhaling loudly, I dropped my hair to turn on the light.
“Hey!” Jenks complained as he darted out of the way, but I wanted to see it, too.
“What do you think?” I asked as the bright fluorescent light flickered on, and I pulled my hair back again. The mirror was foggy from my shower, and it took me a second to get the hand mirror lined up with the cleared spot, but then I eyed the back of my neck in the small mirror. Jenks’s wings were a cool draft, and he hovered behind me spilling a silver dust. His hands were on his hips, a garden sword on his belt, and a dirty jacket on his back. He’d been in the garden all morning strengthening the security lines and was probably trying to get his afternoon nap in. He’d finally cut his hair, and I felt better knowing he’d gotten over that stumbling block. It had grown long in the months that Matalina had been gone, and it was nice seeing him getting back to normal.
“I suppose it’s okay,” he said, being of the mind that no one should subject themselves to injury for vanity’s sake, though in my case, it hadn’t been vanity, but a real need to show affiliation. “If you like that kind of thing.”
“Okay?” I shifted to get a better look at it. “I love it. I shouldn’t have waited so long.”
“Sure, it looks good now.” He cocked his head and tugged his garden jacket up where it belonged. “But it’s going to peel soon. And what about when you’re a hundred and sixty? Those flowers are going to look u-u-u-u-ugl-y-y-y when your skin gets all saggy.” I frowned at him through my reflection, and he added, “Did it hurt?”
Dropping my damp hair, slick with detangler, I turned to face him. My eyes were drawn to the tuft on my collarbone. The shower water had burned, but I didn’t think that’s what he’d meant. “It hurt like hell,” I said, meeting his gaze. “I passed out.”
“You?” Jenks hovered backward until there were twin pixies in my mirror.
Nodding, I set Ivy’s mirror on the dryer and looked through my drawer for my comb. “It was weird. I could take the pain okay. I could’ve taken more, but I passed out.” Finding one, I tried working the detangler through my hair some more. “David panicked. Emojin told him that it only meant my mind was stronger than my body.” Which was about par for me. It had always been that way. I was tired of people overreacting when I had a minor problem that would work itself through. So I had passed out. So what?
Jenks snickered, wings clattering as he dropped down to take a closer look at the seed tufts.
“I’m glad you got your hair cut. Did Jhi do it?” I asked.
Darting back, Jenks’s face was aghast. “Jhi?” he yelped. “No. It was, uh—”
He hesitated, and I winced as I found a knot in my hair. “Who? Bis?” I guessed, the thought of the somewhat clumsy gargoyle near Jenks’s head with a pair of scissors kind of scary.
“It was Belle,” he admitted, his feet landing on the faucet’s knob.
I looked at him, surprised. “Belle?” I thought he hated the fairy.
Jenks’s wings were a bright red, fanning into motion though he didn’t move at all. “She cut it for me when I got it tangled in some burrs. She said that only babies have short hair, but if I was clumsy enough to catch it on something, I needed to cut it.”
“Short is probably a good idea,” I said. “Fairies can’t move as fast as pixies, so they
don’t have to be worried about snagging it. Personally, I like the way men look with long hair.”
“Really?”
I glanced at him, thinking about Trent’s wispy hair. His wasn’t curly like Jenks’s, but it had been oh-my-God silky as I had run it through my fingers. Stop it, Rachel.
“Short looks better on you, though,” I said, shaking away the memory.
He squinted at me in mistrust, probably wondering why I wouldn’t meet his eyes. “It won’t tangle in the garden now,” he said cautiously. “I don’t know how the girls deal with it, but theirs isn’t curly.”
I switched sides, carefully going through my hair as I tried to plan my day, thinking that seeing Jenks get back to normal was a quiet relief. The tasks that Matalina had performed were slowly being picked up by Jenks’s kids, and now Belle, apparently. I never would have guessed that that would happen, but maybe because she was a fairy, she could do the matronly things Matalina had done without threatening Matalina’s place in Jenks’s mind.
I didn’t quite know what to do with myself today. It was Saturday, and usually I’d be in the ever-after. The amulets that the I.S. had were either not working or they weren’t telling us what they’d found. We’d probably hear nothing new until I got the amulets I’d made yesterday invoked and out to the FIB. Setting down the comb, I picked up the cream that Emojin had sent me home with and dabbed a bit on, starting with the little fluffs at my throat. Weres would recognize even this small bit as part of a pack tattoo, and humans wouldn’t care. It was perfect.
Jenks noticed my wince, and he rose, wings clattering. “Does it still hurt? You want a pain amulet?”
I squeezed a small amount onto my fingertips and reached for the fluff in back. “No. I wouldn’t use one anyway. Pain is apparently part of the mystique. That’s why vampires don’t get tattoos.”
“Yeah, okay. I still think it’s stupid.” Jenks looked to the front of the church when the front door opened with a creak. “Scarring yourself to show you belong to something.”