Inked

leave. She’ll kill you.” He began to stand. I caught his wrist. His tattoo was raised and warm beneath my hand—almost too warm, as though it were infected. Or burning with a life of its own.
    “She can’t hurt me,” I told him, staring into his eyes. “But she can hurt you, your family. Which is why I need to be very careful in how I handle her.”
    He shook his head, despair creeping into his eyes. “You don’t understand.”
    “I understand that she has connections, that she frightens you, but—”
    “No!” He gasped, wrenching his hand away. “She’ll make me betray you— and Jean. I won’t have any choice.”
    I stood, looming over him. “If she threatens your family—”
    He shook his head so violently that spittle flew from his mouth, and a low strained sound tore from his throat, guttural and hard. It was not the kind of sound any child should make—too desperate, too old, too wild. He began clawing at the tattoo on his wrist, nails raking so deeply he drew blood.
    I grabbed his arms, holding him still. He would not look at me. I waited for him to say something. Anything.
    “She asked me once about Jean,” he finally mumbled. “She asked all of us about her. Before she marked us. She asked if we knew a woman covered in tattoos. Tattoos that disappear at night. The others had no idea. But I…I’ve seen Jean when she didn’t know it.”
    His voice was thick with shame. I wondered exactly what he had seen when spying on Jean, and quite honestly did not want to know. He was a twelve-year-old boy, though. I could take a wild guess.
    “So you saw…her tattoos,” I said carefully. “Anything else?”
    Ernie’s cheeks flushed bright red. “No. And I didn’t say anything, not even when she asked.” He rubbed his wrist. “If she asks again, I don’t think I’ll be able to hold back.”
    “You act like that mark gives her power over you.”
    “It does,” he said simply.
    I released him. He rubbed his arms, and pushed past me into the building. Head down, shoulders hunched. He never saw Jean standing in the shadows, watching him.
    She waited until the floorboards creaked on the second-story landing, and then stepped outside to join me. Her hair was a mess, and there were circles under her eyes.
    “How much did you hear?” I asked.
    “Enough to know that I need to push some cotton into the keyhole of my door.”
    “Forget that. The Black Cat knows about our bloodline. She knows you’re close. Which means she’s not human…or very well informed.”
    Jean stared thoughtfully at her feet. Two tiny heads poked free of her hair, blinking lazily at me. Dek and Mal, who had been utterly still until that moment, returned the favor.
    I said, “Were you already aware of this?”
    “No,” said Jean, but slowly, as if she was not entirely certain of her answer. “I had been feeling something, though. At the back of my head. Just…instinct.”
    “The boys never mentioned anything?”
    “I never asked.” She finally met my gaze. “My hands were full. I didn’t want to know.”
    I stared, waiting to feel appalled, angry—but all that hit me was a sense of deep, abiding sorrow. My grandmother was being truthful when she said that her hands were full. Overwhelmed, not sure what to do, whom to help, how far to extend herself. Fighting to survive—mentally, emotionally—in the same way that people here were trying to keep their bodies alive.
    “How long has it been since your mother died?” I asked abruptly.
    Jean stiffened. “What—”
    “It’s been five years for me,” I interrupted. “Close to six. She was murdered on my birthday, shot to death in front of me. Right here.” I touched my head. “Worst day of my life.”
    Jean backed away, and then stopped. “It’s been seven years for me.”
    I don’t know what I had been expecting to hear, but seven years was not it. Seemed like a lifetime. “You must have been a baby.”
    “Eleven.” Jean’s voice was strained, her eyes dark and empty in the shadows. “We were in the countryside, helping refugees. My mother had traded one war zone for another. I guess it was the times. But Zee…the boys…they didn’t want us there. They thought it was too dangerous for me, with only my mother for protection during the day. I think…I think that’s why they left her when they did. She wouldn’t listen. She didn’t…give them a choice. It was me or her.”
    They made the right choice, I almost said, thinking about my