“Hello.” From the rearmost area of the building, my mother stepped into the hallway.
She’s here.
Though I had rarely seen it, I remembered that smile.
She walked toward me, smiling like a good shopkeeper. “Welcome to the Arcane Ink Emporium. What can I help you with today?”
She wore a black concert T-shirt for some band called Shatter Messiah. The sleeves were rolled up and the length of the shirt had been cut, revealing both her excessive tan and the spike-studded belt threaded through the loops of her black jeans. Snakeskin boots completed the whole badass fashion show.
“I’m considering a tattoo,” I said. “I’ve heard good things about …” I frowned, as if searching for the name. “Arcanum.”
She sidestepped to take her place behind the counter. “Everyone says good things about Arcanum. My other artists are work-on-demand, but Arcanum decides on a case-by-case basis. Here.” She put a clipboard with a single sheet of paper on it before me, added a pen. “Take a seat and fill that out. I’ll make sure Arcanum gets it.”
“Don’t I get to meet Arcanum first? I mean, what if I don’t like him? I don’t want to yank his chain.”
“Doesn’t matter if you like Arcanum or not. All that matters is if you like the art.” Eris took a binder from under the counter. “Here. Scan through this.” After offering the binder to me, she relaxed into the seat behind the counter and did something on the computer.
I flipped quickly through the photographs in page protectors. The art was certainly not contained in one style. There were brightly colored tattoos and grayscale ones. There was tribal art, modern skulls, standard Chinese dragons. The last dragon in the binder reminded me of Johnny’s tattoo.
“You like the dragons?” Eris asked as I lingered over that image.
“I do.”
“Why?”
“Does that matter?”
She shrugged. “To some people. It can relate to the dragon’s pose, color, where it goes on the body, whether it is oriental or more fantasy. A tattoo should say something about you, it should have meaning beyond the art and color. It should be a badge you give yourself, like a rite of passage.”
“You make it sound magical.”
“It can be.”
I caught the suggestion in her tone. “Are you saying Arcanum makes magical tattoos?” I sounded skeptical.
“All tattoos are magical, if their owner wants them to be.”
“And what if the owner doesn’t want them to be? Can a tattoo be magic against someone’s will?”
She squinted then, but before she could answer, the door opened behind me. I knew it was Johnny. Eris patted the countertop. “Lance has some fabulous dragons in his binder. Why don’t you explore his portfolio, too? It’s on the table there.”
I watched her round the counter, smoothing her hair and not truly looking at her new patron until she’d stepped into the main area. “Welcome to the Arcane Ink Emp—” She stopped in her tracks, swallowed hard, and didn’t finish.
“Hello,” he said.
Johnny had fixed her with a look, and I knew how powerful his dark blue eyes ringed in the ebony Wedjat lines could be, peering out from under those black waves, the only sparkle coming from the white-gold hoops in one brow.
Eris was staring, openmouthed. “You …” She said it so softly, I almost didn’t hear it. But she recognized him.
My breath caught. My heart sputtered in my chest.
Sweet Goddess … my mother is Arcanum?
Before I could recover, she said, “Just a minute,” and headed down the hall at a quick pace.
I looked at Johnny; he nodded. We moved into the head of the hallway.
In seconds, Eris, who had disappeared, was backing into view again. Todd and Kirk had come in the back door when she tried to go out that way.
To her credit, she didn’t scream or call for help from the other artist. I could hear the men talking quietly and the tools of the trade buzzing now that I was in the hall. The rooms were separated only by curtains.
Eris faced Johnny squarely. “What do you want?”
“To talk,” he said.
She took a well-balanced, square-shouldered pose. “Then talk.”
Johnny walked forward three paces. “You recognized me. That means you’re Arcanum.”
A man burst through the curtain, slamming into Johnny. They crashed through the open doorway of the workstation opposite. The curtain was torn down and the curtain rod clattered on the wood floor. I glanced into the room to see the client—brows high and mouth hanging open—holding the still-buzzing tattoo gun that had been thrust in his grip.
The men grappled on the floor. The artist was straddling Johnny, and limbs were flailing every which way. Then Johnny got tired of trying to stop him without hurting him and cold-cocked him.
“Lance!” Eris shouted.
The guy slumped to the side, unconscious.
Johnny wrestled his way out from under the dead weight still partially atop him.
Then I felt a distinctive tingle.
It was energy, buzzing not unlike the instrument in the room beside me. Eris was calling on a ley line. Todd and Kirk are too close.
My feet moved, I raced and launched myself in a move not unlike the tackle that had just taken down Johnny. “Mom! No!”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Eris dropped whatever magic she’d been calling when I knocked her to the floor. She lay stunned and groaning under me.
Crouched over my mother, I craned my neck to check on the wæres. Todd, stricken, rubbed at his arms. Kirk shivered and resettled his overcoat. Behind me, Johnny was standing in the hall, where he could monitor the knocked-out artist and his customer. “You two okay back there?”
They nodded. Thank the Goddess it hadn’t been enough to cause either Todd or Kirk to go into a partial shift.
A hand jerked my hat and wig off. “Persephone!”
I must have been a frightful sight as I glowered down at her. “If you try a spell or call any energies, before I’m through with you, you’ll wish your curling iron had set a faster fire.”
After I let Eris up, she checked on her artist, then his client. She relieved the man of the buzzing thing in his grasp and set it aside. “Ray, you better just go on home.”
“But … are you okay? Is Lance?”
“They’ll be fine,” Johnny said.
Ray’s dirty fingernails made me peg him as a mechanic, and he sized Johnny up like he was considering whether or not he could take him.
I tore the bobby pins from my hair and shook it out, but maneuvered the metal hair fasteners around my fingers with the pointy sides out, just in case.
“Let me bandage your arm then you can flip the closed sign and lock the door on your way out,” Eris said as she pulled bandaging items from a drawer. When she put the last piece of tape on him she patted his shoulder. “You know the drill, keep it covered, blah, blah, blah. And don’t forget to turn the sign and lock the door.”
“B-but,” Ray stammered. He clearly hadn’t made up his mind yet that he couldn’t lick Johnny.
“No buts, Ray,” she said. “And no fighting. Just go. Lance will finish you up soon and I’ll pay for your next tattoo.”
“Walk me out?” he asked.
“I’ll be your escort,” Johnny said. Ray stood, and the defiant glimmer in his eyes made his intentions clear. “Try it, Ray, and you’ll leave with some part of you broken.”
“Ray,” Eris snapped. “We’re fine. They just want an explanation and I owe them that. Don’t do anything stupid, just go home and fuck Julie. Come back tomorrow.”
Johnny walked Ray out. Eris crouched over her artist and smacked Lance’s cheek with increasing force. Lance looked like he’d barely graduated high school. “Shake it off, bitch boy.” His eyelids fluttered. “There you go, show me those baby blues.” He moaned, then blinked and focused on her. “How many fingers am I holding up?” she asked as she flipped him off.