Ink Bound (Ink Born Book 3)

by Holly Evans

  I laughed.

  “You’re welcome to stay here as long as you need,” I said.

  Tala relaxed and lifted his eyes.

  “Thank you.”

  “A tracker’s a good trade. It will allow you to travel the world. Hunters and trackers have incredible bonds. You’ll never be alone again,” Luka said.

  “What about a pack?” I asked.

  Tala shrugged.

  “I don’t think I’m cut out for pack life. Too many people,” he said.

  “Whatever makes you happy,” I said before I went looking for Keirn.

  “Any news on Keirn’s deal, Vyx?” I asked.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  I double-checked my phone, hoping to see a text from him. I wanted his company, to lose myself in his excitement over his art. My head was spinning over everything. My life had descended into chaos, and he was my rock. As selfish as it was, I needed him.

  29

  Keirn returned home with a few bottles of very nice elven wines. He had sold the entire collection, and had some interest from potential future buyers. I wrapped my arms around him and kissed him fiercely.

  “I’m proud of you,” I said.

  He had worked incredibly hard to get where he was. He’d taken a huge risk in leaving the safety of his clan to chase his dream, and it made my heart swell with pride to see it coming together for him. Everyone else crowded in around Keirn, even Tala, and gave him hugs and congratulations. Vyx declared that she’d turned down the show in Austria and was talking with a couple of her artist friends about setting up another show in Prague. Tyn must have been told the good news, too, as he showed up with an alchemical liquor to join the celebrations. The stresses and worries of the slaves were forgotten for a blissful couple of hours. Everyone was happy to have Tala staying longer. The wolf feral relaxed some and even joined in the conversation a couple of times. I kissed Keirn’s temple and looked around the group of smiling faces. That was what I was fighting for.

  I was on my third glass of wine when the topic of conversation changed over to the slaves and the problems in the criminal underground.

  “There’s something odd about the beings being taken as slaves,” Caiden said as he refilled his glass.

  “And the timing is peculiar,” Luka said.

  “It’s weird that they’re taking corvid shifters and familiars. They’re pissing off the hedgewitches by stealing the familiars, and corvid shifters are shitty slaves,” Tyn said.

  “And there’s been a lot more cat ferals gone missing, too,” Shadow said.

  “So they’re picking very specific types of beings? This is planned? To order?” I asked.

  “Those are all popular with the alchemists for their magical properties,” Tala snarled.

  “We’ve been battering the alchemists, it’s not them. They’ve cut down recently due to push back from a number of different directions,” Luka said.

  “Ceremonials,” Vyx said.

  We all looked at her.

  “They haven’t tried anything big in a decade…” Caiden said.

  “So, they’re overdue,” Luka said.

  “And those three beings would work together well, magically speaking,” Keirn said.

  Everyone paused and looked at him. He shrugged.

  “Their energies are such that they can be woven together quite smoothly.”

  “Are we saying that the ceremonials are gathering up slaves for a ritual?” I asked.

  “We’re saying it’s a possibility,” Caiden growled.

  He pulled out his phone and headed into the kitchen area to make a call.

  “They’re not responsible for all of them, though. There are too many, and we have records of the usual suspects taking ferals and shifters off the streets. There are two new groups, though, we need to look into those,” Shadow said, more to himself than the rest of us.

  “What would they use these poor people for?” I asked.

  I was sure I didn’t want to know, but I had to ask.

  “Blood sacrifice,” Tala growled. He curled up into himself. “They take a few of our kind every couple of years, something to do with when the stars align just right. Their slaves whisper of atrocities committed,” he said.

  I was beginning to wonder if the good people in the world were outweighed by the bad, or if Prague was just particularly unclear on the idea of morality. Of course, I knew that the ceremonials liked to do big magical rituals and ceremonies, hence their name. I had thought of them using hundreds of candles and chanting, maybe the odd orgy or two, not blood sacrifices. I’d been so naive.

  “I have mentioned this theory to Fein. He’ll start digging tonight and let everyone know their next step tomorrow,” Caiden said.

  “Next step?” I asked.

  “How we stop the bastards and make them pay,” Tyn said with a smile.

  Keirn pulled me closer to him and ran his fingers over the back of my hand.

  “I have faith in you,” he whispered.

  I took a long deep breath and calmed myself. This was what I was quite literally made for. Saving people, returning the balance. Although it seemed that the ink network had a rather different view on what constituted balance and the correct way of the world.

  “I’m going to call it a night,” I said.

  I needed to speak with the ink network. I had to try and get my head straight and understand exactly what role it wanted me to fill.

  30

  The ink network was even more stubborn and useless than normal.

  “You tell me I’m here to balance, to stop people abusing you, and yet you’re fine with blood ink,” I said.

  A ripple of greys and silvers passed around me. It was shrugging at me.

  “You dislike tattoo magicians stealing tattoos and forming their own nodes, what else are you against? What else am I supposed to fix?”

  More greys and silvers followed by it nudging me away. I dug my heels in.

  “No. I need some idea of what you expect from me.”

  A flash of crimson was quickly drowned out by heather greys and lilacs.

  A collection of dots formed on the black canvas before me. Each of them the same size and a faint golden colour against the smooth pitch. Slender lines of sky blue spread out from those dots and connected to a large black orb.

  “They’re the tattoo magicians,” I said.

  More dots formed, some larger than others, in a multitude of colours. Some of the dots spread out and touched the sky-blue lines. A gold and amber dot shot across the space and engulfed the colours that had touched the threads.

  “You want me to stop anyone that tries to steal some of your threads?”

  Everything swirled with bright colours. I got the impression that it was being sarcastic and condescending as the colours flashed and sparked around me. I’m not entirely sure how a cloud of colour can be sarcastic, but I know that it managed it.

  “So you don’t give a fuck how your threads are used, as long as no one steals them?”

  The colours dimmed to pastels and rippled in the shrugging motion, soft waves rolling against the periphery of my vision.

  It was an ink network, of course it wasn’t going to have the morality we mortals had. I turned and returned to the physical world entirely, where Keirn held me close.

  “It only cares if someone tries to steal its magic,” I said.

  Keirn kissed my cheek and stroked his fingertips over my ribs.

  “That’s hardly surprising. It has no reason to care what we do to each other,” he said.

  “I want to make the most of this situation, to help people,” I said quietly.

  “Go to sleep, Dacian. Stop torturing yourself.”

  I laughed softly and took comfort in the feeling of his body moulded to mine.

  “What would I do without you?”

  “Nothing. You’d get nothing done without me,” he said with a wicked grin on his face.

  I feared he was right, but I wasn’t going to giv
e him the satisfaction of saying as much.

  Everyone was up bright and early the next morning. I hated mornings. The cougars and Caiden were very pleased with the revelation about the slaves and those being taken. Tala tried to make pancakes by himself amidst the chaos around him. His face scrunched with intense focus. Half of what he made was edible, which wasn’t a bad start. I didn’t want to offend the feral and ate as much of what he’d offered me as I could. The burnt taste clung to my tongue like glue, and strong coffee didn’t remove it. I was in the process of looking through the cupboards for something to scrub my tongue with when a text came through from Caiden.

  It said that Scott was unimpressed at my pushing him out and he’d begun digging; I was to avoid the club for a while. Tickets for the big magicians’ conference would arrive before lunch. The fact that Fein was concerned about his digging worried me. I’d been careful to cover my tracks; surely Scott wouldn’t be able to pull up anything too bad? I was supposed to go and find new information at the conference. Caiden would have been invited, had he have shown any interest, but as a hound he would have stood out. As a tier-two tattoo magician, I’d blend in, though, which Fein thought would allow me to try and ‘have the right conversations with the right people,’ as he put it.

  “It looks like I’m going to the magicians’ conference tomorrow, do you want to come along, Tala?” I asked.

  He raised an eyebrow at me.

  “Would I like to go and spend the day surrounded by magicians who will see me as a feral slave…?” he said slowly, with amber creeping around his eyes.

  I shrugged. “I thought it might be a new experience for you. No offence intended.”

  He nodded and calmed himself before he began poking at something in his coffee cup.

  “I thought I’d made coffee, but… it has red swirls in it,” he said with deep creases between his brows and a look of intense confusion on his face.

  I took the cup off him and looked at the black liquid. The red swirls shimmered like jewels. I sniffed it and found my nose filled with a sickly-sweet berry scent.

  “I think that was one of Vyx’s syrups that she likes to put on cookies and things,” I said, handing the cup back.

  Tala sniffed it and curled his lip.

  “Someone needs to organise your kitchen,” he grumbled.

  “I’ve tried.”

  Oh, how I’d tried. I’d tried labelling the cupboards, that worked for all of forty-eight hours before Keirn started moving the labels around. I’d tried keeping Keirn out of the kitchen entirely, but he only snuck in to make his coffee, and things returned to their chaos quickly after that. When we’d moved in with the cougars, I gave up. I accepted that I’d never understand the logic of the kitchen and I’d have to hope for the best whenever I went looking for something.

  I was pretty sure there was some philosophical statement about life buried in there somewhere. Shame philosophy wasn’t my thing.

  31

  I don’t know which one was going to drive me mad first, Tala or Kyra. Neither of them could stay still and both were poking at each other. Kyra kept trying to sneak around the armchair to poke Tala with her paw before he could catch her. It resulted in flurries of quick movements, hissing, and snarling.

  “Why don’t you explore the city, Tala?” I asked as calmly as I could muster.

  “Because I’d end up in a fight or taken by some slaver before sundown,” he said flatly.

  “Surely it’s not as bad as that?”

  “A feral without a pack or family for protection is fair game for everyone. They’d soon notice that I wasn’t just running errands for a master when they saw my aimless wandering.”

  I had no idea the streets were as rough as all of that.

  “Then couldn’t you do some tracker training with this hunter Fein has lined up?” I asked.

  I didn’t really know how that worked. I was familiar with the concept, and the bond was supposed to be incredibly tight, but that was the limit of my understanding.

  He shrugged. Kyra patted his knee with her paw and ran off with her tail high and a feeling of victory rolling down the bond.

  “Did Fein not mention anything about your training?” I tried.

  He looked down and away.

  “Tala…” I pressed.

  “I’m not ready,” he said quietly.

  “There’s no shame in that,” I said.

  It couldn’t have been easy on the little feral. He’d had a shitty start in life. I could understand him not wanting to leave the small shred of stability he’d managed to find here with us. I wasn’t going to push him into anything. He was welcome to stay with us as long as he needed to. He could make himself useful around the flat and with small errands until he was ready.

  He narrowed his eyes at me.

  “I told you you’re welcome to stay here until you’re ready, and I stand by that,” I said firmly.

  I wasn’t sure what would happen with the brand he wore when he left, would he forever be mine? Surely Fein would have it removed. At worst his hunter would replace it with their own, wouldn’t they?

  He chewed on his bottom lip.

  “Thank you. You’re not bad for a magician,” he said as he smiled and relaxed.

  I hadn’t asked to have him come into my life, but I wasn’t going to abandon him. The gods had landed me with the situation I had. I was going to do my best to make the world a better place.

  The tickets to the con showed up just as Tala stole his sandwich back from Kyra. I had to give it to the feral, he hadn’t made any moves to harm the wretch, despite her best efforts. Fein had sent two tickets, no doubt assuming that Tala would be accompanying me. They were made from thick paperstock with shimmering silvers and pinks around the edge. Fein had given us full VIP passes and even added in a helpful note reminding me that I should return home with useful information about the criminal activities present.

  I returned to the living room to find that Tala had stolen Kyra’s ball of yarn and was tossing it up in the air and catching it again, with her watching raptly.

  “She’s not bad for a cat,” he said to me, a smile on his face.

  “I have two tickets here for the con tomorrow, sure you don’t want to come?”

  He curled his lip at me. “It sounds hellish.”

  I shrugged. I’d leave it for Caiden, then. I doubted the hound would use it, given he was busy trying to resolve the slave issue, but it was Fein’s money, not mine. I spent the rest of the afternoon reading up on the history of ink magic. None of it really struck me as interesting, but I was bored out of my mind and had no one to go out and play with. Tala was resistant to the idea of socialising out in the city; he feared people whispering about him.

  In the end, my boredom won.

  “Come on, little wolf, we’re heading out for a coffee.”

  I needed to get out of the apartment and be around some people, even if we didn’t strike up a conversation. I was going to go mad if I remained indoors with my nose in a boring history book for another hour.

  Tala muttered under his breath and tossed the yarn for Kyra to chase.

  “You’re going to be a tracker. It’ll do you good to get used to being out in the city with your head high,” I said.

  He growled, but pulled on his shoes and followed me.

  “There’s a place I’ve heard about but haven’t visited yet. It roasts the beans right there. You like coffee, right?”

  “It won’t have any fucking awful syrups in, will it?” he asked.

  I laughed. “Not unless you ask for them.”

  He walked behind me with his eyes hard but his chin tucked down, displaying a mix of submission and defiance.

  “Come and walk next to me, as my equal,” I said as I tucked my hands in my pockets.

  He glared at the elf who walked past us looking aghast at the words that had just left my mouth. Tala lifted his chin and stepped up to walk at my side. I had no doubt that it was going to be a hard path for the li
ttle wolf to walk, but I was not going to allow people to treat him as a worthless beast.

  I stared down the pair of alchemists that slowed to gawp at Tala as he walked proud by me. They had the good sense to look away and keep their whispers to themselves. The little wolf had a smile on his face and walked with a confident stride by the time we reached the coffee shop.

  “I told you I was going to help,” I said.

  He gave me a sharp nod and paused to check all the exit routes before we stepped into the small coffee shop. Small round wooden tables were dotted throughout the space with a wide counter to our left. Only half the tables were occupied. A young fire elemental with flames running over his short black hair greeted us with a broad smile. I ordered a simple coffee. I’d never really gotten into those fancy coffees with odd names and all sorts of things put into them. Tala followed my lead and finally began to relax a little. I took a deep breath and took in the sound of conversations around us, allowing it to wash over me. The tension of the day ebbed away. I wasn’t meant to be cooped up indoors all the time.

  32

  Tala kept fidgeting and playing with the laminated card on the lanyard around his neck. He walked close to me as we made our way through the crowds looking for the tattoo magician section. The building hadn’t looked that big on the outside, but it had clearly been subjected to some rather interesting magics, as it sprawled out all around us. The Sidhe mix on the door had started to say something about ferals not being allowed. I’d cut her off and pointed out that my friend had a VIP ticket.

  The fire elementals were putting on quite a show with a large fire dragon lazily hovering in the large space over our heads. People paused in the middle of the walkways to look up at it in awe. I really wished people would pay more attention to those around them. Tala bared his teeth at a life magician that bumped his shoulder as she pushed her way past him. The life magician ignored him entirely. I’d never been to one of these cons before, and I was completely lost as to what I was meant to be doing. The tattoo magician section felt safe. I told myself it was a good place to start our exploration.