Inked

My parents had been married for more than four decades, but no Were had considered them mated. I think most of Lobizon had assumed that Mother was going through some kind of phase and would eventually come to her senses. Because human marriages, even long-standing ones, didn’t bind two people as closely as a mating.
    Or so I’d heard. It wasn’t like Mom had bothered to explain exactly what the term meant. With Neuri forcing me to keep my distance from the clan, she’d assumed I would marry a human. So had I, until I met Cyrus. Not that we’d gotten around to talking marriage. In fact, we’d only recently gotten back together after a lengthy split. So mating didn’t seem too likely. Not to mention that Cyrus had never so much as uttered the term.
    But despite occasional rumors about my mental stability, I didn’t go around hallucinating.
    I didn’t want to feel hopeful, in case I was wrong. But I didn’t think I was—that crack to the jaw still hurt like a bitch. And if that was what Cyrus was currently experiencing, then he was already in trouble.
    “And I’m telling you, a map won’t do you any good!” My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of Jamie’s distinctive burr coming down the hall. “Tartarus isn’t fixed like the city above. The tunnels are, o’ course, but the rest of it…floats around, so to speak.”
    “What rest of it? I thought the tunnels were the city,” Hargrove was frowning at the map he had in his hand.
    “That’s a typical newbie mistake,” Jamie said kindly. “The tunnels are like the roads above—they get you from place to place. But the markets, the shantytowns, the bars—they’re mostly carved out of the surrounding ground. One of these days, I fully expect half the city to implode, they’ve undermined so much of it.”
    “Then those caverns should be on the map,” Hargrove insisted, trying to hand it to him.
    Jamie didn’t even bother to glance at it. “If that thing’s more than a week old, it’s out of date; if it’s more than a month, it’s useless. There are turf wars going on all the time, and the city shifts with them. You have to have someone who knows the signs to get you anywhere, much less to get you back. You need a guide.”
    “I thought you—” Sebastian began, but Jamie was already shaking his head.
    “I’ve been out of it too long. Sure, I could figure it out, given time. The main markets are pretty stable, although I doubt your beastie is holed up anywhere so public. But what you need is someone who has been there recently. And that lets out every tunnel rat we have.”
    They disappeared into medical, probably looking for me. I stared at Sebastian’s back until the closing doors hid it from view. Then I took off in the other direction.
    If a dark mage was responsible for this, then a mage needed to go after him, not someone who would be just as vulnerable to his spells as Grayshadow had been. I knew Sebastian wanted to help, but he’d said it himself: if he died, the next bardric might not be so interested in maintaining ties with the humans. Not if it was going to get some of his people killed.
    So I was going alone. Well, more or less.

    “NOPE, nothing.” The moon-faced mage behind the desk made a brief moue of disappointment to show camaraderie before preparing to blow me off.
    “What do you mean, nothing? A bum, a bag lady, a freaking pimp. I don’t care!”
    “Yeah, I got it the first time,” Michaelson told me, scowling. He was already having a rough day, and I wasn’t making it better. “Look, I gave you the report, okay? That’s all I got. If you want to talk to street people, go to a police station; hell, go to the street! But you won’t find ’em here.”
    “Since when?”
    “Since we started needing the lockup for more dangerous types.”
    “Nsquital demons are not dangerous!” I pointed out, referring to the red-haired creature who had just been escorted in back.
    “Ever had one spit at you? Anyway, he was selling weapons to the wrong people, so we picked him up. But he’ll probably be out on bail in a couple hours, after he gives up his cache. These days, if it doesn’t relate to the war, nobody cares.”
    He motioned the next person in line forward, without so much as another sympathy pout. I was jostled out of the way, over near a window where a bounty hunter was waiting to turn in a prisoner. The guy in question didn’t look dangerous, just an average junkie with waist-length dreads, dirty