“What are you doing here so early?” I asked as I came back into the tattooing room with the gun. I opened one of the cabinets on the far side of the room with the toe of my worn black boot, removed the magazine from the bottom of the grip, and threw the gun and magazine in with the others that I had collected over the past few years. This was a somewhat dangerous business even under the best of circumstances. Luckily, having a troll on staff helped to keep the scuffles to a minimum.

“You said today was inventory day. I thought I would come in early and help,” she said with a bright smile.

I made some nondescript noise in the back of my throat as I kicked the cabinet door shut, mentally plucking the wings off the butterflies that took flight in my stomach. After working with her for roughly two years, I would like to think that I could get through a workday without acting like a hormone-filled idiot.

My shift at the Asylum usually ran from the middle of the afternoon until midevening, while Trixie came in a few hours after me. Bronx didn’t show up until a couple of hours after the sun set and stayed until a couple of hours before dawn. Oddly enough, these were typical hours for tattoo parlors. No one worked mornings. Who the hell wanted a tattoo first thing in the morning with their coffee?

“Are you ever going to do anything about those guns? Or are you just collecting them as mementoes of your past conquests?” Trixie continued.

One corner of my mouth lifted before I could stop it and I shook my head. “Would you rather I called the cops so I could hand them all over like a good boy?”

“And then try to survive the barrage of questions that would accompany that armory?” she scoffed. “I’d like to stay below the radar of all the local law enforcement.”

“Agreed. I’ve got some contacts. I’ll start asking around to see what I can get for them. We could use some new equipment,” I said, letting my eyes skim over the work area while carefully avoiding Trixie. We could always use some fresh ingredients, and some of the tattooing equipment was starting to get worn in such a way that we were making personal modifications just so it kept working through a tattoo. I had made some nice cash from this business over the past few years, but it was obvious that it was time to start reinvesting.

Walking over to the counter opposite where Trixie was currently perched, I turned on the small television linked to the security camera that looked over the lobby of the parlor. It allowed us to see who came through the door when we were all busy with a chair. It wasn’t completely foolproof—some creatures didn’t show up on camera—but it caught most who wandered through our door.

“So are you going to tell me what happened?” Trixie prodded after a moment of silence had stretched between us.

I shrugged as I turned to face her. “Nothing important.” I finally raised my eyes to look at her again, feeling as if I had better control over myself following the initial shock of her outfit.

“Nothing important, but it involved a gun,” she said, crossing her arms over her bosom. “Come on, Gage. Spill it or I’ll get Bronx to sit on you when he comes in and we’ll crush it out of you.”

“Russell Dalton caught me on my way into the parlor this afternoon. Seems he’s a little pissed regarding the results of his tattoo.”

“Dalton? I don’t remember him.”

“Came in a couple of weeks ago wanting a good luck charm. He had only fifty bucks on him.”

“Oh, that idiot!” she gasped. She dropped her hands back to her lap and shook her head at me. “I still can’t believe you took that one.”

I sighed, once again forced to question either my sanity or my decision-making process when it came to clients. “I was feeling generous.”

“So, I’m guessing the tattoo hasn’t worked like he wanted.”

“I put a shamrock on the heel of his left foot. Do you honestly think anything good could come of that?”

“Not really. But then, I wouldn’t expect things to go all that bad for him either.”

“Yeah, well, neither did I, but they did. Lost job, car stolen, and wife wants a divorce.”

Trixie let out a low whistle as she leaned back against the set of cabinets above the counter that wrapped around the far wall. “That’s odd.”

“Not really. I put a leprechaun hair in the ink.”

“It go bad?”

“That or it was bad to begin with,” I said with another sigh. This wasn’t how I expected my day to go. “I’ve already called for some fresh, but it’ll be a few days. Just be careful and cut the mixture with something else to counteract it if you happen to use the hair between now and then. Pass the word along to Bronx if you see him before I do.”

“Got it, boss,” she said, hopping down from her perch on the countertop.

“Shall we get started?” I asked, trying to ignore the jiggle of her breasts as she landed lightly on her toes.

“Do you want front room or back room?” she inquired, looking over her shoulder at me as she walked toward the front glass counter and bent down so that I could catch the perfect roundness of her rear in the tight jeans. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she was doing it on purpose. But she was just switching on the music like we did every day.

“Back room,” I bit out, turning to look for the pair of clipboards that held the list of supplies we kept on hand. The front room held the random necessary items such as paper towels, latex gloves, petroleum jelly, needles, and ink. The processing of the items in the front room took less than thirty minutes and an order form was quickly filled out.

The back room possessed all the unique ingredients that we used in our potions. Each container needed to be checked, opened, and assessed as to whether the contents were still good or if we needed more. The back-room check could take up to three hours to process and the order form was even trickier because not everything could be purchased at the local ingredients shop. Some things had to be acquired through a series of back-alley transactions and black-market connections.

“If you need any help, just give a shout,” she offered as I turned toward the back room again.

“I’ve got it.”

“Gage …”

I stopped and turned half around to see where she was standing, one hand on the glass top of the counter in the lobby. “Thanks for not getting shot.”

“No problem. I hear the job market is a killer right now.” I winked at her, a wide, devilish grin crossing my mouth.

“Asshole,” she mumbled under her breath as she turned back toward the stereo she was fiddling with. I didn’t miss the smile that graced her lovely face. Before I could escape into the back room, Beethoven was blasted through the four speakers that were spread around the main tattoo room. I suppressed a laugh when I heard Trixie cursing Bronx’s taste in music. By the time I had shut the door, she had hooked up her own MP3 player to the speakers and Dropkick Murphys was filling the air. Trixie had a thing for both punk bands and bagpipes.

ASIDE FROM NEARLY being shot in the alley, it was proving to be a slow night. Trixie and I finished the inventory in record time as the parlor remained dead for the first few hours of the night and I passed the next hour on the phone lining up sellers for the few hard-to-get items that I needed to put back in stock. Nothing that had to be acquired through the black market, but not all were through the most reputable channels. Just people who were willing to take some risks for the right price. One of the things I had learned quickly when I opened this shop was that in order to get the necessary and best resources it was all about the connections you made.

I had finished up my phone calls when Bronx lumbered through the front door and shrugged off the massive black leather trench coat he wore despite the heat. But then, even with the sun down, most trolls had a lingering fear of their skin being exposed to the sunlight. Hanging it on the coat stand near the front door, he grunted once at me in greeting before scowling up at the speakers still blaring the Dropkick Murphys throughout the parlor. I smiled as I leaned down behind the counter and picked up Trixie’s MP3 player. I skimmed through her hundreds of artists and albums until I finally settled on a “Best of” Pink Floyd collection. It was a nice in-between band that both Trixie and Bronx could live with for the next couple of hours before the bickering began about music choice.

“Killjoy,” Trixie grumbled behind me from where she was lying back in one of the chairs with her arm thrown over her eyes.

“It can’t be that bad if it’s on your MP3 player,” I replied as I stepped back so that Bronx could enter the back room.

As I moved back to my position in front of the glass case, the front door flew open and four people rushed inside. By the horrified, panicked expressions twisting their faces, I knew they weren’t in the market for new tattoos. In fact, a couple of them gazed around the lobby for a second, looking confused as to where exactly they were.

“What’s up?” I asked, coming around the glass case to approach the front window where the four people were huddled together, staring down the street. I was trying for easygoing, but my question came out tight and tense. The door opened again and two women darted inside. Beyond the front window, I could see more people running up the street and slipping into any store that was open.

“One of them is down at Cock’s Crow,” one woman whispered. As she spoke, she backed away from the window so that she was nearing the shadows of the far corner of the lobby.

One of them.

At that utterance, it felt as if every muscle in my body tensed painfully. The world lived in daily terror of seeing one of them. Damn warlocks. Fucking witches. Because of them, fields had been dug up for enormous mass graves during the Great War. Because of them, both unicorns and dragons were now extinct, while others dangled on the cusp. Because of them, we all lived in fear.

“Gage?” Trixie’s unsure voice snapped me from dark thoughts, jerking my head around to find her standing in the doorway between the lobby and the tattooing room. She had turned off the music, blanketing the shop in silence. Bronx stood behind her, a heavy hand on her slim shoulder.

“Bronx, take these people out the back door and direct them down the alley.”

“The tunnels?” the troll asked, dropping his hand from Trixie.

“If they want, but I think this is just going to be an isolated incident,” I said with a frown. I knew the warlocks and witches were aware of the tunnels, because I had learned about the tunnels from them. The only good thing was that they didn’t know all the entrances or where all the tunnels led. They had been built under all the cities and into the countryside over the past couple of centuries as a means of escape.

I glanced back out the window, looking down the now empty street toward the Cock’s Crow bar. Right now, nothing was happening on the street, but I could make out a form hovering near the entrance to the bar. It wasn’t over yet. “Take Trixie with you to the tunnels.”

“I’m staying,” she declared, snapping my eyes back to her. I bit my tongue, fighting the urge to tell Bronx to flip her over his shoulder and carry her out of the shop. I wanted her safe and nowhere near another warlock or witch if I could help it. I knew why someone had appeared down at Cock’s Crow and I didn’t think anyone else would be affected, but I didn’t want to take chances with her safety.

Turning back toward the people gathered in the lobby, I raised my voice. “Everyone follow Bronx! He’ll show you how to get safely out of the neighborhood. Don’t come back until you hear on the news that everything is clear.” I looked out the window again, staring down the street as I listened to the thunder of feet across the hardwood floor toward the back room. Their whispers were rough and tinged with fear, which only made me angrier. These monsters didn’t deserve to be feared. They were bullies, mocking everyone with their powers.

When the slam of the back door echoed through the silent shop, I pulled open the front door and stepped onto the first concrete step so that I could better see what was happening. I held open the door with my right hand while I leaned against the doorjamb. The night air was silent and thick, as if even Mother Nature was holding her breath, waiting for the evil to leave our midst. The only small relief I could find in this was that for once they weren’t looking for me.

“Why do you think they’re down at the Cock’s Crow?” Trixie asked from over my shoulder. I hadn’t heard her approach. I looked around to find her standing in the open doorway just behind me, staring down the street.

“They’re looking for Dolan,” I said, wishing she would at least go into the back room where no one could see her.

As if cued by some higher force, the warlock standing in the open doorway of the bar stepped aside in time for a large creature to come stumbling out into the middle of the street followed by a witch. Despite the dim light, I could see their arms extended toward the minotaur, keeping him under the point of their wands.

“Why?”

“He … He’s been selling fix out of the bar.”

“What?” she nearly shrieked.

Jerking around, I grabbed her arm and prepared to shove her back inside the parlor. “Keep your voice down. I really don’t want them coming here.”

Trixie winced, her eyes darting to the window to check that no one was approaching us. “Sorry.” I released her with a grunt and turned back to where I had been just moments before, my gaze locked on the three figures in the middle of the street.

“How do you know?”

“I make it my business to know what kind of neighborhood I’m in. It makes it easier to protect yourself.” Rather, it made it easier to judge whether a warlock or a witch might have a reason to stop in this part of town and happen across me. Per our agreement, only the council and my assigned guardian/parole officer, Gideon, were supposed to know my exact location. I knew Dolan’s illegal activities might draw the attention of the Ivory Towers, but I had been secretly hoping they would go after the supplier rather than the dealer.

“Dolan was always so nice. Why would he sell fix?”

“The money’s good.”

“It’s murder,” she growled.

“On both ends.”

Fix was a high-end drug, one of the few potent enough to affect the larger creatures such as trolls, ogres, and minotaurs. However, for humans, it was almost instantly lethal. Yet I had heard whispers that a few dealers had found a way to mix it with cocaine so that humans could use it. It wasn’t because the owner of the Cock’s Crow was dealing drugs in our neighborhood that Trixie was so upset. Hell, there wasn’t a bar within a thirty-mile radius that didn’t specialize in a little something.

No, Trixie was pissed over the source of fix. It was made exclusively from pixie livers. Thousands of pixies were trapped, ripped open, and harvested throughout the year simply for their organs. The pixie livers were dried and pounded into a fine powder, to be used later in a variety of ways.

Sadly, the warlock and the witch weren’t at Cock’s Crow because of the murder of countless pixies. They weren’t even there because scores more creatures died every year from the use of fix. They were there because the drug dealers were cutting into their supply of the potent organs. There were more than a dozen potions that benefited from the use of pixie livers, not to mention a few charms and countercurses. The Ivory Towers didn’t appreciate the competition.

A bloodcurdling scream ripped up the street as the minotaur buckled to his knees under a double blast of energy from the wands of the witch and the warlock. Dolan fell onto his back, writhing around on the asphalt in agony as the assault continued.

“He deserves what he gets,” Trixie muttered. The hand she’d laid on my shoulder had clenched when his screaming started. I wasn’t sure that I agreed with her. I thought that he deserved to be stopped, but the warlock and the witch had no business being the ones to mete out punishment. They were no better.

“You should go inside,” I bit out through clenched teeth. I was tired of this. Everyone along the street was cowering inside in fear, terrified that if they were seen they could suffer a similar fate simply because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. I was stepping down to the second step when Trixie’s hand tightened on my shoulder and she started to pull me back toward the shop.

“No, Gage!” she said in a harsh whisper. “Get back inside. Please, they might see you.”

I stopped on the second step, just above the sidewalk, still staring at the warlock and the witch laughing at the whimpering Dolan. There was a brief pause before Dolan’s pain-filled scream rang out again and then abruptly stopped. I flinched at the silence, knowing he was dead.

Trixie increased pressure on my shoulder, turning me slightly back toward the entrance of the shop while placing her other hand against my cheek. “Please, Gage, come inside where it’s safe. There’s nothing you could have done. They would have killed you too. Please, come inside. Please.”

It was the waver I heard in her final “please” that had me closing my eyes and releasing the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. I leaned my cheek into the palm of her hand for a couple of seconds, letting her soft touch push the last of the fiery anger out of my veins. She was right. There was nothing I could do, and if I had tried, I would be dead and she could very well be in danger as well.

“I’m coming in,” I murmured, opening my eyes. Trixie dropped her hand from my cheek, but didn’t release her hold on my shoulder until I stepped over the threshold of the shop. As I shut the front door behind me, I heard the back door open when Bronx returned. Pulling Trixie against my chest, I tightly hugged her. “They’ll be leaving soon. We’ll be safe.” My lips brushed against her temple as I spoke. Her scent wrapped around me, helping to ease the last of the tension still humming in my frame. I didn’t know whether I was trying to reassure her, or was simply clinging to something good and wonderful for a few moments in an effort to blot out the horror of our reality.

As I released her, Trixie looked up at me, a faint smile lifting her lips. “Thanks.” I watched her walk back into the tattooing room where she patted Bronx’s arm before disappearing from sight. Gazing back out the window, I found that the warlock and the witch had taken the time to set the bar on fire before disappearing. With any luck, everyone had escaped through the back exit before it was too late.

I moved back behind the glass counter and restarted the MP3 so that the first notes of “Comfortably Numb” drifted through the shop as the world started up again. We had two choices: ignore what had happened or die at the point of a wand. Those who still lived chose to ignore, but no one ever forgot.

Settling onto the stool, I watched as Bronx dropped onto his own stool at his workstation. The troll silently began organizing his area in the far corner, pulling together a collection of paper plates and ink caps and checking to make sure that he had an ample selection of tattooing needles still neatly packaged in their sterile casings. At the same time, Trixie pulled open one of the drawers and withdrew a large number of greasepaint sticks, tubes, and containers that she carried over to Bronx. Because of the thickness of his skin, Bronx could not be tattooed, which had always made him feel uncomfortable considering that he worked in a tattoo parlor. So at the start of his shift each night, if Trixie wasn’t busy with a client, she would use greasepaint to cover him in a series of designs and images that could pass as tattoos. Despite their constant arguing over music, the two actually worked quite well together.

“What are you in the mood for tonight?” she inquired, lining up her colors along the nearby counter. Sometimes, it was just easier to pretend that certain things never happened.

Bronx pushed over a stool on wheels for her to sit on. “I want white ivy with green leaves all along my right arm.”

Trixie arched one thin blond eyebrow at him in surprise and even I was taken aback. After more than two years of this process, Bronx had begun to run out of fresh ideas and simply let Trixie draw whatever she was in the mood to draw on him. He had even come to tolerate her preference for flowers and butterflies as long as she stopped drawing hearts and rainbows on him.

“Anything on the left arm?” she inquired.

“Nothing.”

Leaning against the door frame, I crossed my arms over my chest and stared at the troll in the sleeveless shirt and spiked pale blond hair. I had known Bronx slightly longer than I had known Trixie. Trolls, from my experience, were naturally reticent creatures, preferring to keep to themselves. No one would ever accuse them of being chatty, but I had gotten pretty good at reading Bronx’s moods. Something was bothering him and I wasn’t sure that it was tonight’s spectacle down the street.

“Is there a special reason for the ivy?” I asked.

“Got a feeling.”

“Oooo … Do tell,” Trixie purred as she settled on the stool next to Bronx.

The troll clenched his jaw as if he fought the words, but even the hardened creature wasn’t immune to Trixie’s charm. Hell, she could get a serial killer to confess his sins while sitting in the tattoo chair if she just batted her eyes and asked him in her sweet, come-hither voice. “Something dark is creeping toward us,” he reluctantly said. “Like a vine that’s going to wrap around us and choke … someone.”

“Like tonight’s …” she offered, letting her voice drift off.

“No, that wasn’t it.”

“Maybe the darkness has already passed,” Trixie suggested. “I mean, Gage was shot at today and he survived.”

“I wasn’t shot at,” I corrected quickly as Bronx turned his head to look at me. “Disgruntled customer, nothing more. Just avoid using the leprechaun hair for the next few days until I get some fresh.”

“No, that wasn’t it,” Bronx replied, again turning his head to stare straight at the wall before him. I was afraid to ask more about the shadow that lingered in his golden eyes.

We all remained silent as Trixie patiently traced out a thick line curling down the length of his arm with a Q-tip and a container of white greasepaint. The elf had a knack for not only creating great beauty, but she also managed to work very fast. Within an hour, his right arm, from shoulder to wrist, was covered in a curling vine of ivy with thick green leaves highlighted in black to give them more depth. It was an exquisite work of art and it was a shame that he would wash it off before he left at the end of the night.

As Trixie cleaned up her greasepaint, the first of our customers for the night started to roll in, life once again trickling into our small part of the world. The first few were a handful of teenage humans looking to pop their tattoo cherries. They were giggling, indecisive, and squirmy in the chair when the needle was applied to their skin for any length of time. The two guys finally decided on some tribal bands around their flexed biceps, while the two females chose some tasteful and simple designs on their lower backs. All in all, as clichéd as they come, but for some, that was how the addiction started. Between the buzz of the needle and the sensual play of pleasure and pain, at least one of these kids would be back for something more intricate and interesting.

The hulking Bronx was more than a little intimidating under most circumstances so he was given the brash, cocky male, while I gave the most nervous female to Trixie. I took the remaining female first, knowing that if she was left to watch her friends, she would chicken out before she could get her tattoo. The second male wouldn’t survive the ribbing of his friends if he chickened out, so I felt safe leaving him on his own for a while.

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