Frost Moon Read Online Free PDF Page B

six weeks—”
    “Hell,” I said, disgusted. “What have you gotten me into?”
    “He says he needs the discipline, or he’s going to lose it at the next full—”
    “Next Sunday, I know,” I said, staring at the tattoo, at the German words I could no longer read. “I don’t know how I feel about inking some Nazi… occultism. If I was Jewish I’d probably throw this in your face.”
    “I wanted to chuck it at first,” Spleen said, a bit bashfully. “But Wulf says he looked for years and couldn’t find a better design. And he paid me a lot of money—”
    “Slide,” I said, standing, and Spleen moved so I could unlock the cabinet that held my supplies. I pulled out a long, plain wooden case and opened it slowly. The inside was divided into two long compartments, one holding a glass tube containing a fragment of a long spiral horn, and the other holding ten compartments for tattoo needles, six of them empty.
    I held up the fragment and examined it. “Enough for the needles, I think—”
    “Is that—” Spleen breathed, eyes gleaming, reaching out for the horn.
    “Yes,” I snapped, “mitts off. It’s naturally shed, vestal gathered. I need needles made from untainted horn to ink a white charm—this is a white charm, isn’t it?”
    “A… Nazi… white charm?” Spleen asked, perplexed.
    “The Nazis had candy and ice cream, didn’t they?”
    “Well…”
    “Just because Hitler painted pictures of Baby Jesus, Jesus’s image didn’t suddenly ‘go bad,’” I said, checking the bottles of ink. Newtseye green, nightshade black—I’d need a replacement for my cinnabar red; a recent FDA study had linked it to melanomas, even when inked with the healing power of free-range horn. I stood there a moment, spinning the newtseye in my hand, watching it glimmer, when I started to get a sinking feeling that I was getting ahead of myself. The design was made by Nazis. There were no obvious swastikas or more subtle black magic marks on it, but really, I knew nothing about this tattoo… or its future wearer.
    “Look, Spleen, I only ink white or grey.”
    “That looks green,” he said, somehow playing dumb and wheedling at the same time.
    “You know what I mean,” I snapped. “What do you know about this tat, other than what he told you?”
    Spleen looked at me helplessly.
    “What about Wulf? Other than the obvious?” Nothing. “Who recommended him to you?”
    “I, uh…”
    “So he found you, is that it?” I kneaded my brow. “So you know zip—”
    “He seemed genuine,” Spleen repeated. “And he paid a lot of money—”
    “How much?” I held up my hand. “How much is my cut?”
    “I… dunno?” Spleen said. “I mean, how much would you charge—”
    “Stop being a dick,” I said. “And don’t lie. I’ll have him under my needle for…” I squinted at the screen “… three or four hours. I guarantee you, he’ll spill the details.”
    “Seventy-five hundred,” Spleen said.
    A thousand for the needles, five hundred for the ink and powders. Another five hundred for graphomancy and license fees on a “new” design. Take out the Rogue’s twenty percent cut… and I could stand to land close to forty-five hundred dollars—putting me halfway to a new Vectrix electric motorbike to replace my old Vespa.
    “I’ll d—” I began, and stopped. Before the money made me stupid.
    I have rules. I don’t do black ink. I don’t do religious marks. And I sure don’t do bad charms. And I knew zip about this tat. For all I knew it was originally an evil Norse mark designed to curse a werewolf with terrible pain every full moon, but after the Nazis fiddled with it… the tat might be just as likely to set him on fire. “I’ll… consider it. My statement to Wulf stands—I need to get this flash vetted by a witch before I ink it.”
    “Do we reeeally need to deal with that?” Spleen said. “I mean, the fees—”
    “When’s the last time you changed the oil on your