A sinewy, red-haired man doesn’t look the sort to be talented in the art of drawing on skin, but as always, appearances are deceiving. With surprising gentleness he takes a soft leather cloth to my skin, cleaning from it the weeks of grime and blood and dye. Turning it into the perfect canvas for his tools. “Aye, jus’ like ye be drawin’ miss.”
A sharp breath is drawn in, and Julea barely represses a shudder from the contact of a sinewy, red-haired man. Her body tense and neck held stiffly to the side. “You did a good job on the last, it’s nearly healed, see?” Julea’s hand reaches down, exposing more naked flesh as she shows off the tattoo inked in black that wraps around her right thigh. “You got the last payment?”
A sinewy, red-haired man eyes the work on Julea’s thigh critically with the eye on an artist evaluating a masterpiece. “Aye, I did. An’ it looks good iffin I do be sayin’ so meself. One of me best.” When she conceals the tattoo again, he returns his focus to her nape and with a simple quill, he draws a shape directly on her skin.
Julea, for her part, just holds still. Waiting and in silence. She reaches up to grab a fistful of her matted locks, drawing them forward over her shoulder when he pulls out his tattoo tools, ready to chisel the design into her flesh.
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It is almost delicious, the pain. At least, it distracts me from the horror that is my foot. I don’t even want to think about that and whether I will be able to walk properly again. It just makes me want to Rage and I can’t afford to do that. Yet. Time and a place Julea. Just breathe. In out. In out.
He is quick and efficient and silent as he works. I am grateful for that, I’m in no mental state to be creating small talk.
The tattoo on my thigh was long over due. I don’t know why I delayed it. This one, is new. Perhaps a little early, but still I am certain of it.
You would think there would be a third. But, of all of them, him I am most unsure of. Which… many might find surprising. I think he would find it surprising. But I still am wavering. He has not proven himself to me. Not yet.
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