Amazon Ink

by Lori Devoti

  It hit me then. I was beginning to accept the idea of Harmony with a givnomai, beginning to think of her as a young Amazon, and not just the little girl I’d spent the last ten years protecting from everything that even hinted of Amazon.

  Peter had pulled on his pants, stood barefoot and bare-chested while he answered. The lynx on his shoulder seemed bigger now, impossible to ignore. I forced my eyes to look away.

  “We don’t know, but since she’s second generation, we think it’s possible-or it might be a trait that’s gender based. There’s no way for us to know.”

  Standing there, he was glorious, all male with his long firm muscles, even his tattoos had a masculine look that the same animal and scenery wouldn’t have had on a woman. I couldn’t put my finger on what the difference was, but it was there-and I was drawn to it, but I was still angry too, and wary.

  “What other skills do you have?” I asked. I had to check.

  His shirt bunched in his hand; he frowned. “I’m an artisan. I figured you knew that.”

  “No…” I twisted my mouth to the side, not sure of my word choice; finally giving up, I went on, “Priestess skills?”

  “Magic?” He lowered the shirt, frowned. “You have both, don’t you? And not just shades of both. You can truly use both-compete as either.”

  He seemed fascinated by me again, watched me like I’d just shared some new pain-free technique for tattooing.

  “Are you sure you don’t shift? Have you tried?” he continued. The expression in his eyes was so intense, I couldn’t help but place my hand over my givnomai. Even through my shirt, I could feel the power that had been put in the little creature pulse.

  “No. I don’t shift and I wouldn’t even know how to try. I never realized…” I let the words drift off. I had never realized the possibility existed.

  The creature under my fingers seemed to move, swish its tail. I curled my fingers over it, silenced it…or more accurately, my imagination gone wild.

  Peter wanted to know if I’d tried shifting. He didn’t know how useless shifting into my givnomai would be. I wouldn’t gain any great strength or athletic prowess, but then…I’d be able to blend anywhere, hide out in the open.

  Again, I wondered what Harmony had chosen.

  “Did you tell her? Tell Harmony? Or does she think she just got a tattoo?” I asked.

  He finished tugging the shirt over his head. “Just a tattoo. It’s not my place to tell her about the Amazons. I can’t imagine she would have believed me if I had. But I did tell her she had to keep it secret, that no one could find out she had one…that you could lose your business.”

  I shook my head. Oh yeah, my daughter wouldn’t tell anyone she had a tattoo. I believed that. Obviously, Peter had no experience with teenage girls, especially one who would see a secret tattoo as some kind of victory over her too-protective mother. Which brought me right back to where I started. Harmony had a givnomai and there was a killer somehow connected to me, or drawn to me, who was collecting them.

  Peter was dressed now, but his feet were still bare. He lounged against my desk, relaxed, apparently willing to stay there all day and chat. Seemingly unaware that he might have put Harmony in the path of any danger.

  But then, while he knew about the killings, I didn’t know if he had realized the victims were Amazons. And he couldn’t know what I’d been hiding-their delivery to my door, or their missing givnomais. Couldn’t know unless he was the killer, and frustrating as the realization was, I didn’t think he had killed anyone. I really thought by giving Harmony a givnomai he believed he had been helping, doing what was right.

  Not his choice to make for my daughter or my family, but I couldn’t fault his motives. Truth be told, Mother and Bubbe would have applauded his motives, maybe even his actions-if he hadn’t been a man.

  Looking up at him was beginning to make me uncomfortable. I stood. “There’s something you don’t know.”

  “There are all kinds of things I don’t know.” He shoved a piece of broken pottery across the floor with his foot. It came to a rest next to mine.

  “The girls, the ones found dead near Milwaukee? They were Amazons.”

  He looked past me, to a spot on the wall.

  He knew.

  “The girls on that site you showed me? The one of the tattoos? Two of them were the victims.”

  Again, nothing.

  I picked up the pottery shard and threw it at his feet. “What don’t you know? What else have you been doing besides tattooing my daughter and-” I clamped my lips shut before “tempting me” could come out.

  “You asked why I came here. A big part was Harmony. We hadn’t been able to get close to her before, at least not as close as we wanted, and with her age and the need for a givnomai…well, when you advertised for an artist, we couldn’t let it pass by.”

  “How did you know she didn’t have a givnomai?” Ugly scenarios were playing out in my head. My hand tightened on the tattoo machine I’d thrown earlier. This time I’d figure out a way to use it more effectively.

  His brows lifted. “We didn’t for sure, but we’d been in your shop, heard the two of you arguing. It seemed pretty obvious.”

  I pressed the tattoo machine against my leg, felt my heart slow a little.

  “But after I was here, I noticed things. Things that worried me. That’s why I called in Makis.”

  “Makis? The art teacher?” The art teacher…“The wheelchair? You don’t mean…?” The mutilations. They’d been horrifying enough when they’d just been in theory, something that had happened long ago, but to realize someone I’d met…“He’s a son,” I finished, unable to say more.

  “The son or our leader anyway. Makis is one of our oldest. Both of his legs were broken, then he was left on a church doorstep. Medical care wasn’t much back then, and no one wanted a crippled baby, but he survived. As he grew, he realized he was different, started finding others like him, and slowly pieced together who we were, where we came from.”

  “He must hate us.” I said the words without realizing their significance at first, just voicing what I felt.

  “You would think, but he doesn’t seem to,” Peter replied, but I barely heard what he said.

  “He must hate us,” I repeated. I dropped the machine back on the floor, took two giant steps forward, crushing another chunk of pottery under my boot as I did. “Is he a priestess?” I was too focused on my suspicions to worry over terminology this time. “Can he do magic?”

  Peter lost his casual posture, stood erect. “Yes, but he doesn’t hate Amazons. I don’t know why he doesn’t. He has every reason to, but he doesn’t.”

  “He’s a priestess and an artisan.” Again, to myself. I headed for the exit.

  “Where are you going?” I could feel Peter moving behind me, heard him curse as he stepped on another shard of pottery or some other debris left on the floor. Still, he followed me.

  I raised my left hand, blew air over my shoulder, and slammed the door in his face, mumbled a spell and twisted my fingers-using compressed air to turn the lock.

  He’d get out eventually, but at least I had a head start. I didn’t think Peter was involved in the killings, but I didn’t need him arguing with me, slowing me down.

  My life was a mess, but none of it mattered-not compared to stopping this killer.

  I met Reynolds on the steps. I tried to walk past him. He stepped in front of me. My body shook with the need to get past him, to shove him out of my way and sprint down the stairs.

  “I didn’t give you permission to come in here,” I said.

  “This place is open to the public. I don’t need your permission.” He placed his hand on the railing beside me.

  My jaw tensed. “I’m leaving. You do need something to stop me.”

  One finger tapped the wooden rail…once, twice, three times. “Depends. Maybe I think you’re acting”-his gaze drifted over me-“suspicious. I have reason to suspect you, you know?”

  Sane Mel, th
e Mel who wanted so much to blend, would have stood there and argued, would have played the game, but that Mel had disappeared when she’d realized her daughter was on her way to meet a killer, and that Mel wasn’t coming back-not for a long time, maybe never.

  I kicked him in the groin.

  The look on his face, the way his eyes rounded, then squinched together as he doubled over, would have been comical, if I hadn’t actually liked him, already regretted to some small degree the need for the move. But any humor or pity was lost as he fell to his knees and reached for his gun. I started moving, fast.

  “Stop.”

  I looked back. He was hanging onto the railing with one hand. In the other was a black handgun, and it was pointed at me.

  I shook my head. “I can’t.” Then I turned my back on him.

  Behind me, he cursed. I could hear him rustling, forcing himself to stand, I guessed. I quickened my pace, made it to the front door, and jerked it open.

  “Mel,” he yelled. He was closer-too close. I sped through the door, thinking I’d have to lock it behind me, play the same trick on him I’d played on Peter, but as the breath seeped from my lips, a grayish-brown body streaked around the corner of the building toward me.

  Open window, tree. Didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how Peter had escaped.

  “Mel,” Reynolds yelled again.

  Peter stared up at me, his eyes still his, just in the face of a cat.

  “Please” was all I said. I didn’t have time to fight Peter and Reynolds too. Didn’t have the mental wherewithal to stand there and argue either. I needed to get to my daughter.

  Reynolds’ shoes squeaked on the floor. He was almost to the door. I glanced back, could see him lunging forward, his gun still drawn.

  Peter saw it too, leapt past me and into the building.

  Reynolds yelled a curse. A shot fired, hit the door as the breath I’d been holding shoved it closed behind Peter.

  I broke into a run.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  It took less than three minutes to get to the address on Makis’s business card. It took twenty to find Makis’s class space.

  I thought I knew the building where Harmony had been taking art classes-I’d driven by it thousands of times. But once I parked the truck and jogged toward it, things got fuzzy.

  I found myself standing in front of the address, suddenly unable to remember where I was going, what had driven me here.

  I turned, started to shuffle back to my truck and, just as quickly, my memory returned, my panic with it, but increased.

  Three steps forward and the fog returned. I blinked. An older woman wandering past asked if I needed a drink. I refused, stumbled again to my truck.

  I slammed into it, my palm smashing down on the hood. Harmony. How could I…? I stared back at the building, focused on the door that bore the same numbers as the card in my hand.

  A ward. Makis had some kind of ward on the door, something akin to what Bubbe had cast over my front yard when the Amazons were gathered there trying to save Zery, I guessed.

  I had no experience with the spell, no idea how to combat it. I forced my heart to slow and my gaze to wander over the building front. Through the glass door I could see ferns and vines hanging from seventies-era macramé hangers. The mass of plants blocked my view deeper into the shop. Murals, a scene of the Capitol, one of some cows, and a group of football fans wearing white and red, covered the front windows.

  Makis had managed to provide his shop with complete privacy in a way no one would think to question. I glanced around, looking for inspiration-considered tossing a rock through the Badger fan’s red jersey, smashing the window, and maybe the ward. But there were too many people around. And a move like that would only alert Makis to my presence and state of mind.

  The roof was flat. A one-story, probably with no attic, not even a crawl space. I glanced back at the plants, at their junglelike growth. Plants needed sun, and painted-over windows didn’t provide much.

  I had an idea. I left my truck and jogged around the end of the block, into the alley that ran behind the shops.

  A Dumpster was set a few feet away from the building’s back wall. It was an easy jump from there to the roof. I paused, checked my grip on reality. I still knew where I was and what I had to do. Makis hadn’t been guarding against someone trying to break into his shop, just been trying to stop the casual passerby from entering.

  Letting out a relieved breath, I crept toward the front and the upraised white square I prayed was what I thought it would be.

  I stopped next to the skylight, a grin breaking across my face. I allowed myself less than a second of self-congratulation before hunkering down next to it and peering inside.

  It was darker than normal outside and lights were on in the shop, making the scene below well lit, if small. The window was only a couple of feet wide. Even leaning side to side, I could see only a small piece of the shop below, but it was enough. Directly below me, a paintbrush in her hand, stood Harmony.

  My palms pressed on the window’s edges, I leaned forward, tried to see what was happening below-to decide what my next move should be. Makis had had access to Harmony for over a week. There was no reason to believe tonight was the night he would target her-not that I wanted to take the risk and leave her alone with him. But I also didn’t want to do something that would send him over the edge, cause him to attack if he hadn’t planned to.

  For the first time I wished I’d given in to another of Harmony’s demands-for her, us, to get cell phones. I had just never seen the need. But now, staring down at her, so close, but so impossible for me to reach without crashing through the glass, I did.

  When we got out of this, I was taking her to the mall. I’d be supermom for at least a day. The thought made me smile, and as I settled down next to the window where I could keep an eye on my girl, I relaxed.

  Until I saw the wheelchair behind a bookcase, visible to me, but not my daughter. The chair was turned over, its occupant sprawled across the floor.

  Makis’s face was pale, his arms and legs akimbo-unnatural. And three feet away, completely unaware, sat Harmony, painting.

  Something was very wrong.

  I lifted my fist, ready to rap on the glass, but as my knuckles lowered, a figure stepped into view-a boy, brown hair, slim build. The boy I’d seen Harmony flirting with at school. The boy she’d been mooning over with Dana, I assumed.

  He angled his head as he talked to her. A diamond stud winked at me from his ear. He moved again, to stand behind Harmony. He wrapped his hand around hers, the hand that held the paintbrush. Together their hands moved up and down in broad strokes, slow, sensual, almost sexual.

  As his arm moved up, his T-shirt shifted, revealing the edge of a tattoo. My already tense muscles squeezed tighter. My fingers dug into the edge of the skylight, until the tips became numb. Another upward, then downward stroke and the tattoo was revealed-a dog, a hound, black and tan. Just like the stray that had followed me around my shop, followed Zery into the shower, watched Pisto jerk off her shirt.

  The boy pressed closer to my daughter, his face so close to hers his breath stirred her hair.

  The skylight creaked, the casement coming loose under the pressure of my grip. The boy and Harmony looked up, revealing his face.

  Nick, the boy I’d offered a job to, who’d shown up but left and never came back.

  I saw him, knew him, realized I’d been wrong more than right-but it was too late. He’d seen me too.

  He grabbed Harmony by the arm and threw her to the ground, reached behind him, and grabbed the notebook I’d seen him sketching in that day on State Street.

  I stood and jumped at the same time, praying the glass would give. My feet hit the pane, cracked but didn’t give.

  Harmony struggled to her feet, her hair falling free around her shoulders. Her eyes rounded and her face paled when she saw me. I screamed for her to run, to get back, to find cover, then jumped again, this time adding
a rush of air.

  The glass shrieked and gave beneath me. I plunged downward, trying to weave a bubble of protection around me as I did, but only succeeding partially. Glass tore at my jeans, caught my shirt, ripped into my shoulder. I fell to the ground, landing in a squat-not the best position unless you’re a cat.

  Pain shot through my ankle. Without thinking, I pressed my hands onto the floor for balance. They came back up bloody, pieces of glass protruding from my palms.

  I glanced around, looking for Harmony…Nick. To my left there was the sound of fighting, bodies bumping into furniture, paintbrushes or pens scattering to the floor. Then Harmony, yelling, “What the fu-?” The rest was muffled, by nothing more than a hand, I prayed.

  I clawed the bigger pieces of glass out of my palm, and scrambled through the debris. The shop was like a maze, file cabinets and drafting tables with their tops flipped up formed walls that cut right, then left. I whirled around one corner, only thinking of getting to my daughter as quickly as I could, and tripped over the downed Makis, grabbed his fallen wheelchair to keep from tumbling onto him.

  His olive skin was ashen, his breathing shallow. My heart told me to crawl over him, continue toward Nick and Harmony, but as I moved my foot to step over him, I stopped, placed two fingers against his throat. A pulse strong and steady beat under his skin.

  Deeper in the shop, Harmony yelled, but her voice was strong, angry. Something crashed. She yelled again. My girl was putting up a fight, holding her own.

  I pulled my hand away from Makis and folded my fingers into my palm. He was unconscious, but not dead. I couldn’t help him now, but I could set him back in his chair, roll him somewhere out of the line of fire. It took only seconds to right his chair, a little longer to get the dead weight of his body into it. Then I shoved it into a nook, behind a double-wide steel file cabinet I thought would stay standing, even through the tsunami I was prepared to unleash in this place to free my daughter.