Chapter 8 #2
“I figured you would need your victories etched,” the artist answered. The night he’d inked the Bind between me and Malakai seemed like an eternity ago.
“Is the shop in Palerman closed?”
The bearded Mystique shrugged. “I’ll keep both, but there’s more need of me here now.
With so many of our next generation migrating to Damenal to train for their Undertakings, it only makes sense.
” His eyes swept over the room, taking in the crowd who had come to see the legendary tattoos inked for the first time in years.
His gaze froze on someone tucked in the corner. “Malakai.”
His head snapped up. Malakai plastered a smile on his face, the group parting so he could approach Marxian.
“It’s good to see you,” Marxian said, voice thick.
Malakai’s shoulders tightened as they clasped hands. “And you.”
How painful was this for Malakai? Watching his friends receive the tattoo solidifying a fate taken from him. Was it too much? Was I being horribly selfish in coming here tonight?
But I needed to do this for myself.
Still, I placed a hand on Malakai’s arm and squeezed once, to tell him I was there. He gave me a tight-lipped smile before stepping back and fading into the crowd.
“The four of you then?” Marxian whispered.
“That’s right.” I smiled.
He directed us to the table we’d lie on. “Who’s first?”
“I’ll go.” Cyph stepped up, untying the linen shirt he wore tonight instead of his leathers. I rolled my eyes when warriors behind me muttered appreciations of his body. Cyph had probably just earned himself a dozen new admirers.
“What’s the purpose of it?” Esmond asked, watching Marxian prepare the needle.
I was surprised he hadn’t been taught our customs; Mystiques studied most clans’ public practices and declarations of loyalty, and the Bond, the Band, and the Bind were no secret.
But I explained the purpose of the three tattoos.
When I mentioned the Bind was to be received last, his eyes dropped to my arm, then flitted to Malakai, full lips pursed.
“I like to break rules sometimes.”
A hint of appreciation swept through the Bodymelder’s eyes.
“Will you be receiving the other two tonight, then?” Vale asked, watching Cyph settle face down on the table, the muscles in his back flexing.
I hadn’t thought past the Bond, the thin outline of mountains we’d receive on the back of our necks to mark our success in the Undertaking and tie us unbreakably to our cause. I supposed we could receive the Band, too, solidifying our ranks within the Mystiques.
“Can’t do both,” Marxian said. He tested the needle on a scrap of paper. “The magic is too strong. I condone rule-breaking sometimes, but I won’t do that.”
I nodded, understanding.
“What does it feel like?” Esmond asked.
Erista’s sharp voice answered, “If it’s anything like mine, it’s very personal.”
I didn’t know the purpose of the Soulguider tattoos—theirs being more private than ours—but Erista had a gold band around her forearm with a crescent moon in the center.
I imagined the sensation was similar to what I’d experienced, given that all ink was fueled by the same magic, even if it took different shapes.
“It floods your entire body. It’s…all-encompassing and instills purpose,” Vale added. She rubbed a hand over her shoulder, pulling her hair across it.
“That’s a beautiful way to explain it,” Cyph said, propping himself on one elbow to survey the Starsearcher. His stare was inquisitive, searing.
“What did yours feel like?” Tol asked, leaning against the wall beside me, eyes tracing the North Star on my arm. The room quieted.
“It was intimate. The most intimate thing I’ve experienced.
” The sensation of unknown power working its way through my blood and rooting itself within me was a promise I’d never forget.
“Like a thread pulling through every facet of my body, driving into my bones. Then, it stopped. And it waited for the other half.” My eyes found Malakai’s across the room.
“And they tangled together. Two slips of soul becoming one.”
“Can you feel each other through them?” Esmond sounded clinical, a scholar gathering research on the body.
I flushed, unable to look him in the eye. I didn’t know how to explain the disjointed feeling our Bind had always given us and was reluctant to share a flaw or weakness with the crowd whose eyes burrowed into me. I looked at my feet, my thumb stroking over the tattoo.
“Did it hurt?” Tol asked loudly. His eyes remained on my star, jaw ticking.
“Scared, Vincienzo?” Jezebel smirked, sipping from a bottle of ale she’d brought with her.
Tol flipped her off. “Terrified, Jezzie,” he drawled.
“Careful not to scream when the needle hits your skin.” She kicked her feet up on an empty table, leaning back in her chair.
I flashed them each a tight-lipped smile, grateful for the distraction.
“I guess we’ll see now who’s got the strongest tolerance,” Marxian interrupted. “Face down, Cypherion.”
Cyph did as he was told, brushing aside the auburn curls at the back of his neck so the artist would have a clean surface. Marxian dragged a razor over the skin, removing any hair, and cleaned it.
“Don’t move,” he instructed.
Buzzing echoed from the needle, and the room held its breath.
All eyes were on Cyph, waiting to see the legendary event take shape.
Like a dream imprinting itself over the present, I was transported back to the night, two and a half years ago, when I’d first experienced this.
The buzzing wrapped itself around me, teasing out my excitement and restoring that same purpose.
Slowly, the ink bled into Cyph’s skin. He didn’t flinch, didn’t say he was in pain at all. As the mountains took shape against his neck, I could practically feel the needled magic pressing into my bones. I tried to catch Malakai’s eye, but he faced the window, ignoring the scene.
It was over quickly. The room erupted into conversation, the buzzing needle releasing its hypnotic hold on them once fate sealed itself within Cyph.
Marxian applied the soothing ointment, which Esmond and Santorina asked many questions about, then Cyph rose from the table. With the shorter haircut Jezebel had given him after the Undertaking, his curls brushed the tops of the mountains, a burnt sun teasing the peaks.
“Next.” Marxian patted the bench, turning to his workstation to switch out the supplies.
“Jezzie?” Tol asked.
My sister bit her lip, watching the needle with narrowed eyes.
“Scared?” Tol teased. I elbowed him in the ribs. “Ouch,” he muttered.
“It’s not that,” Jez said. “I—oh, never mind.”
She untied the straps of her dress where they were knotted behind her neck and lay face down on the surface.
Marxian repeated the ritual as he had with Cyph.
The crowd trickled out, losing interest after the first tattoo.
A few lingered, talking, dancing, and drinking.
Cyph and Vale were in conversation with a pair of warriors we knew from Palerman—the Bristol sisters—and a blonde man from Turren.
Malakai sat silently in the corner. Hands clenched, elbows braced against his knees, gaze out the window.
Tolek took his place after Jezebel, removing his dark shirt to reveal defined muscles.
A group of Mystiques moved closer, eyes lingering across his sculpted back.
Cyph wouldn’t be the only one with his options, then.
I narrowed my eyes at them, wondering what plans they were concocting in hushed tones.
One girl I recognized from Palerman—Hylia, I recalled—certainly had a hungry look in her eye—
“Damien’s balls!” Tol yelped when the needle touched his skin.
“Oh for the love of the Angels, Tolek!” I laughed, Cypherion and Jezebel joining me. “It’s not that bad.”
“It feels like my damn bones are being shredded.”
“Interesting,” Marxian hummed.
“What is?” Tolek asked, face buried in a pillow.
“Nothing, don’t move, kid.”
Tol grumbled but bit his tongue as Marxian finished the tattoo. The artist’s gaze stayed narrowed.
When Tolek sat up, his cheeks were red. “Jezebel, give me your fucking drink.” She handed it to him, and he finished it in one swallow.
“You’re all sadists if you think that didn’t hurt,” he panted, his bare chest rising and falling.
One drop of ale dripped down his chin, carving a path along his neck and settling in the dip of his collarbone.
“Get out of my way, Vincienzo. I’ll show you how it’s done.” I piled my hair atop my head, tying it with a leather band from Rina, and settled onto the table. Tolek whispered something I couldn’t make out.
The razor smoothed along my skin, the cleanser cool in its wake. I held my arms carefully at my sides and closed my eyes.
“Welcome back, Revered,” Marxian whispered, and I smiled into the pillow.
Buzzing filled the air, and when the needle met my skin, I almost gasped. Not from pain—it was nothing like the Bind, when the ink seemed to be rooting itself into my bones, twisting through my blood.
This was everything I experienced during the Undertaking slamming into me at once.
The shock of the fall melding with the vindication of solving the riddles.
The pain of being torn apart in the Spirit Fire tempered by all of my loose ends being forged back together.
All of my senses heightened. All of my dreams fulfilled.
The ink bolstered everything the Undertaking had planted in me and pushed it to the surface. I was a canvas for the memories, the tattoo painting an image of my future.
And when the buzzing ceased, when the mountains were forever printed on my skin, those feelings rooted in me for eternity.
I rose from the table, finding Cyph, Jez, and Tol staring at me expectantly. We didn’t have to say anything.
We felt it, too, the gazes confirmed. We made it.
Vale nodded in silent understanding.
The twisting fluttered along my bones, the magic adjusting to its new home. I was curious to see how it differed from the magic in my Bind. Biting my lip, I shoved away the worry that this promise, too, would malfunction, and indulged in the empowering ink.
The high faded, though, when a bell above the shop door cut through the noise.
Malakai rushed by the window, disappearing into the night.
I tore from the parlor, cool night air tickling the back of my neck where the ink was still settling. Selfish guilt trickled down my spine with the magic.
“Malakai!” I called, but the city soaked up my voice.
Why had I thought this was a good idea? Of course, it would be hard for him to watch us receive the Bond. I’d known that—known he wouldn’t voice that pain—and yet I’d done it anyway.
Tolek and Cypherion appeared behind me. “Where did he go?” the latter asked.
“There.” Tol pointed as Malakai rounded a corner down an alley, and they started after him.
“No.” I put a hand on both their chests, a defeated sigh coating my voice. “Let me.”
Taking off down the cobbled streets, I followed the direction Malakai disappeared. A subtle scent of honeysuckle and leather clung to the air, the only way I knew he was heading back toward the palace.
As I crossed into our grounds, I was so homed in on that familiar aura and the sound of his distant steps, I didn’t notice another broad chest until I smacked into it.
I bounced back, hand immediately reaching for a weapon—until I saw—
“Aird?”
The Mindshaper chancellor stood on my soil, looking down at me. Platinum hair braided back, thick beard reaching his chest, all attempting intimidation.
“What are you doing here?” Danger seeped into my voice, hand within reach of the dagger at my thigh.
“Evening, Miss Alabath.” There was condescension in the way his lips curled around my name, I was certain of it. His wolf’s cloak bristled with the rise and fall of his shoulders. “Lovely to run into you.”
“In my home. I can imagine the surprise.” I waited for him to respond. When he didn’t, I added, “You were supposed to have returned to your territory days ago.”
“I had business to resolve here.” A casual shrug. “But I’ve found what I needed, and I’ll be on my way.”
I didn’t like it. Didn’t like him being in my city without my knowledge. Didn’t like the entitlement in the lift of his chin or the way he eyed me, begging for an outburst. A reaction that would justify all of his beliefs about my hotheaded actions and subsequent inability to rule.
Uncurling my fingers from the dagger, I blinked up at him, unaware I’d even grabbed it. I deliberately coated my voice in saccharine sweet mockery. “I do hope you enjoyed your stay. The path through the Merchant Quarter will be the most direct for your exit.”
“Thank you for the advice,” he bit out. “I’ll be seeing you soon.”
He left then, cloak dragging across the dirt and stones. With each step, my anger bubbled beneath the surface, uncertainty fueling it, until he was nothing but a silhouette, and the force of the Spirit Volcano roared within me.
Groaning, I stomped up the path to the palace, nearly forgetting the other battle that awaited me inside.