Ink (23 page)

“He may have said so, but he lied. I own the shop and my name is Carl, not John.”

“This is the shop on Merritt Avenue, right?”

“Yeah, but I promise you, there’s nobody named Iblis here. It’s just the name of the shop. Sort of my idea of a joke.”

“A joke?”

“Yeah, my father’s a preacher. Different religion and all, but whatever. It’s still funny. Do you want to make an appointment with one of the other artists?”

“Let me think about it, and I’ll call you back.”

The phone disconnected with a soft click. The name was a religious joke? He opened up a search window, typed in the word Iblis, and clicked the first link. He frowned.

Iblis was the name for the devil in the Quran. He closed the window and rubbed his upper arm, still frowning.

It wasn’t a very funny joke.

6

Jason woke from a deep, dreamless sleep clutching his left arm and holding in a groan. The pain—liquid and hot—centered just under the tattoo. The hallway light bathed the room in pale shades of gray; Mitch slept on her side with one hand tucked under her cheek and a lock of hair curled across her face. His fingers trembled as he tucked it behind her ear, then he rolled over on his back when another sharp pain struck. It faded into a sensation similar to an itch deep under the skin.

He pressed his palm flat against the skin, covering everything but the tips of the wings and the top of the griffin’s head, and a strange, pulsing heat radiated up through his hand. Despite the heat, he didn’t take his hand away. The promise of sleep tugged at the corners of his mind. He shifted his head on the pillow and closed his eyes, listening to Mitch’s shallow, even breaths.

When the skin moved under his hand, Jason started. Opened his eyes wide.

No, that’s not right.

The skin rippled against his palm, like a tide pool after a rock met its surface or a plastic bag caught in the wind, then it moved again, the wave of an ocean, rushing in and rushing out. Definitely not a muscle spasm. He sat up and pulled his hand away, breathing hard. The skin undulated, a roll starting at the top of his arm, near his shoulder, moving down to just above his elbow, the movement mesmerizing, almost hypnotic, but wrong, so wrong.

The pain pulsed and throbbed. He clamped his jaw shut tight. His heart raced when he touched his arm again. The skin, rough and soft and slippery at the same time, like feathers rubbed first the right way, then the wrong, rose under his touch, a hard pebble of skin rising up under the griffin’s head, pushing his hand away.

No, oh no. Not real, not real, not real.

The pain in his arm turned brittle as it shifted and turned, then lifted. Pain like the edge of a dull knife tearing into his skin from the inside out. A thin moan locked in the back of his throat. His heart sped up, thudding hard against his chest.

As the skin rose higher, the ink of the tattoo blurred and changed, the one-dimensional image shifting into more. Under the skin, the griffin’s head pushed and pushed, an implacable beast bent on escape. And under that, deep down, a sensation of weight, flexing and moving, coiling to strike. Then a trembling, like fluttering wings.

Inside? Inside me?

Ice cold sweat ran down his back.

Frank?

Jason tried to pull away, but he couldn’t get away from his own arm. His own skin.

I’m not seeing this. I’m not seeing—feeling—this at all.

With a quick, wasplike sting, the griffin broke free, pulling apart from his skin like a blister, joined together in flesh, but not of the same. A smell spread out into the room—a hot, feral stink. The ears, gently furred, emerged first, then the rounded curve of the top of the head, all bronze and gold. A doll-sized living nightmare, warm and alive. The eyes opened, the green gaze fixed on Jason as the beak slid razor-sharp from its prison of flesh. He bit his lip to keep in a scream, and the sweet-sick taste of blood filled his mouth. The green eyes bored into his with grim intelligence. Staring at him. Seeing him.

It’s just ink on skin.

The tip of one taloned limb rose up and rested its sharp edges on his skin. Tiny spots of blood bloomed like dark petals under the talons. The griffin turned its head in a slow arc to look at Mitch. She slept on, peaceful and still. It opened its beak, revealing a dark cavern

Just ink on skin. Not real. NOT REAL!

and turned back to Jason, its eyes narrowing. Fetid warmth spread across his skin as it hissed—a quiet, terrible whispering sound that held a dark promise of bitterness and pain. A fresh flare of agony raced through his arm as it moved inside, against his bone, and he shuddered. With one last hiss, the griffin sank back under,
into
, his skin, the talons digging fresh little gouges, the fur brushing with a silky wisp, the beak opening and closing, the head, its eyes like spots of green fire, and last, the ears, disappearing like tiny periscopes retreating back into the depths of an ocean, the whole turning back to ink on a flesh canvas. His skin quivered, gave one last ripple and stilled. Jason jumped up from bed, his heart screaming madness in his chest. Mitch sighed but didn’t open her eyes.

He fled from the bedroom into the harsh light of the bathroom, bile rising in his throat. Hot tears streamed down his face as he staggered to the toilet, lifted the lid and threw up until his stomach ached with emptiness. His mind screaming twisted knots, he slipped to the bathroom floor, the tile cool against his cheek, then he slipped down into the dark.

7

A cold cloth on his forehead. The warmth of a blanket on his shoulders. A hand, rubbing his arm. Pain digging into his stomach. Heat. The world swirling around his head.

Then the darkness returned.

8

The cemetery on the corner of Fayette and Greene Street, once known as the Old Western Burying Grounds, smelled faintly of cigarette smoke and old sex. John S. Iblis made his way through the gloom to one headstone and sat down on the ground. To a passerby, he would look as if he were paying his respects. In truth, he bent his head to hide his smile.

The man honored on the tombstone died inexplicably in Baltimore on October 7, 1849. The ghost of the dead man was said to haunt the grounds. A lie, but a good tale nonetheless. “Lord help my poor soul,” were his last words, or so it was said. His exact cause of death remained a mystery. To most, anyway.

John S. Iblis had offered him a way out. Regrettably, Mr. Poe had not taken him up on the offer.

9

Jason opened his eyes and blinked at the sun streaming in the bedroom windows.

“Hey,” Mitch said, touching the back of her hand to his forehead. “I think your fever broke.”

He shifted in the bed and started to rise, but she pushed him back down. “Nope, you stay in bed. Doctor’s orders. You got sick last night. I woke up and found you on the bathroom floor.”

“What time is it?” he said, his throat raw.

“It’s about four.”

“Four?” He started to rise again.

“Uh-uh.” She pressed him down, her hand warm on his chest. “Stay put. I mean it. You were really sick. Chills, fever, the whole ball of wax. You don’t remember any of it?”

He shook his head.

“That’s probably a good thing. I had a hell of a time getting you back in bed. I dropped you on your head a few times.” She smiled and pushed her hair back behind her ears. “You kept telling me to go away, it wasn’t safe. How do you feel now?”

“I feel okay, just tired and sore. You should go home. I don’t want you to catch this.”

“It’s probably too late for that but don’t worry, if I get sick, you can take care of me.” His stomach rumbled, and Mitch laughed.

“I went out and got tea and chicken soup. Do you want to try and eat something?”

“Maybe in a little bit. Not just yet.”

“Okay.” She climbed up on the bed and curled her legs up underneath her. “What does ‘I know’ mean?”

“What?”

“I found the card on the kitchen table. I tried to straighten up a little bit and it fell out, the index card, I mean. The one that says ‘I know’.”

“I don’t know,” he said.

Mitch lifted one eyebrow. “Is this a ‘who’s on first’ thing?”

“No, I really don’t know. Someone left it in my mailbox.”

“That’s weird.”

“I…”

“Know,” she said with a laugh.

“My guess is it’s from the kid across the street.”

“So he knows you know he was looking in the window? That doesn’t make sense.”

“Right, but remember I told you about the missing animals? Maybe he meant he knows I know.”

“Okay, but you just suspect it, right? You don’t really know, do you? He definitely looks like he’s weird, and the whole hiding in your backyard is strange—”

“Don’t forget looking in the windows.”

“Yeah, but even that doesn’t mean he’s responsible for the animals,” she said. “Pets run away all the time, and if they get out and get hit by a car…”

The words pushed at his lips, and he twisted the sheets in one hand. “But I found something in my yard a few weeks ago. It was, um, a cat’s tail. Only the tail. The rest of it wasn’t there. I thought maybe another animal did it, you know? Like a raccoon.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Ugh. That’s horrible and gross. Maybe a possum did it. They’re pretty fierce.”

He rolled over on his side. “But then I found another one on my doormat, and there was a piece of gum stuck on one of the steps. I don’t chew gum, you don’t chew gum, and no one else has been on my back porch.”

He opened his mouth to mention the other tail but clamped it shut before a word could escape. The dog’s tail pushed the whole thing way past possum territory. If the tail had belonged to a Chihuahua, maybe he could believe it, but he didn’t think a possum could kill a large dog unless it was some sort of mutant.
 

“Okay, but that still doesn’t make sense. If he did cut off a cat’s tail on purpose, and that’s disgusting and creepy as hell, and then left it in your yard, isn’t that sort of daring you to find out? So his ‘I know’ note is just stupid. Maybe he’s just trying to get a reaction.”

He groaned and put his hands over his eyes. “I have no idea. I just wish he’d picked someone else. I’ve never done anything to him. Hell, I barely noticed him until he started poking around. Unless…”

“What?”

“Maybe he found the tails before I did and thinks I did it.”

“That’s ridiculous.” Mitch traced her fingers on his upper arm. “You? Why would you cut off a cat’s tail?” She shuddered.

“But he doesn’t know me, and if he didn’t do it, who did?”

She shook her head. “It’s all too weird. There has to be some logical, normal, explanation. Maybe a fox? They can get pretty big, I think. Either way, I think you should still talk to his parents.”

His stomach growled again, low and insistent.

“Okay, enough of this. It’s time for you to eat,” Mitch said, sliding off the bed. “No arguments.” She leaned forward and kissed his cheek. “I’ll be back up in a few minutes.”

She slipped from the room, her footsteps soft on the stairs. Jason closed his eyes, and an image of the griffin hissing as it pushed itself out of his skin swam up in his mind.

“Shit,” he said, opening his eyes to look at his arm.

I might have been sick, but sick enough to imagine that?

10

Later, after Mitch left, Jason stripped off his shirt and stood under the glare of the bathroom light, staring at his arm. The lines of the griffin were still, the green eyes immobile. He ran his fingertips over the skin. No heat, no pulsing flesh, no strange texture. Just…skin. “Frank?” He rubbed the skin hard, then pushed his finger in, distorting the ink. Nothing. Nothing but skin, nothing but
him
. “Frank, are you in there?”

He pawed through the medicine cabinet and found a jar of face cream Shelley had left behind.

Do you really think this is a good idea?

No, maybe not, but it was worth a shot.

Here comes your wake up call, Frank.

He curled his fingers around the heavy glass and swung it down. Pain flared up and out, and the griffin’s colors darkened underneath a reddened circle of flesh.

Good thing you didn’t do this when Mitch was here because do you know what this looks like?

“Shut up.”

No movement. No Frank. Maybe he wouldn’t come out during the day. Jason tried to laugh, but the dry, papery sound caught in the back of his throat.

11

At midnight, Jason sat on the sofa, his shirt in a fabric lump on the edge of the coffee table. His fingers drummed on the cover of the book in his hands, and he flipped page after page, seeing the words but not comprehending the text. He put the book down. Lifted his coffee cup. Took a long swallow. In the quiet gloom of closed curtains and dim lights, the hiss of the coffeemaker crept out of the kitchen, sputtering as it brewed a second pot.