Inked, p.2
Inked, page 2
“Caenum?” I looked up to spot my grandmother giving me her telltale stare, her head tilted, her eyebrows raised.
“Sorry, I’ll stop,” I muttered, digging my toes firmly into the ground. My grandmother always kept a perfectly clean house, despite the dirt floor, thatched roof, and rickety, generally broken, wooden furniture. A seemingly impossible task, but she managed somehow.
“Caenum, look . . . ,” my grandmother started.
“Not now.” I said, looking over at Dreya, who immediately returned my look with a gaze that insisted I talk, her amber eyes wide and welcoming. “I don’t want to hear it. For the next three days, I just want to be left alone.” Never mind that I was planning on getting out of there once the sun went down. What was the point in talking about how I felt when I was going to be far away from it all tomorrow morning?
“Caenum . . . ,” Dreya started.
Don’t, I thought to myself, closing my eyes tight.
“So, Grandmother, will you finally tell me your secret ingredient?” I quickly asked, eager to change the subject. The steam from the soup bowl rose in front of my face, my grandmother’s grin, wavy in the heat, told me she had no intention of revealing her recipe. Instead, she reached over and placed a hand on my shoulder. This time, I didn’t flinch.
“I was scared too when the time came for my Inking,” she said, her face warm and kind.
I looked at my grandmother’s hand, where dark lines extended from her fingers down to her wrist, cascading in swirls up her forearm and disappeared into the sleeves of her shawl. The lines were raised, like tracks one might sow while planting seeds in a garden or on a farm. She shook her arm a little, tightening her hand on my shoulder, which caused small Inked grains to tumble onto her unmarked skin, creating tiny, blackened freckles.
In the spring, the tattooed tracks of earth on her arm would start to show bits of green, which would grow into thicker, vibrant lines in shades of sage and hunter. And as the days turned to weeks, the weeks into months, the green lines would blossom and burst with other Inked flowers, fruits, and vegetables. She even had an enormous apple tree on her back that bloomed white at the base of her neck.
It was one of the few pieces she had that didn’t change seasonally, as the orchards regularly produced apples.
If I stayed until it was time for my Inking, would I too end up a farmer like my grandmother? Or like my parents, also bound to the land?
“What,” I began, stumbling to find the words, “what if I don’t like what I get?”
“Oh, sweetheart,” Grandmother said, smiling warmly. “Everyone worries about that. I know I did. But in the end, the Ink knew exactly what was best for me.” She looked down at her tattoos and ran her hand over one of her arms.
“You always wanted to work with plants? With food?” I asked, swirling the wooden spoon around in the bowl.
“In a way, yes,” she said, tracing the lines on her arm. “It was something I always had a knack for. You should have seen your father and me . . .” She paused while mentioning him, and looked out the foggy glass window and toward the meadows. As if he were going to be out in the fields someplace, sweat dripping down his brow as he tilled the land. I glanced over at Dreya, who squirmed uncomfortably. Her vines tightened up around her arms, the flowers closing.
My father was a touchy subject, and I was always careful when he was brought up. But if I was truly leaving that night, I at least wanted a little more information about him.
“He wanted to farm too?”
“In a way, yes. He really didn’t have much of a choice. He was gifted.” She wasn’t smiling anymore. Inked pebbles and dirt scattered as she ran her fingers across the tracts of land that decorated her arms.
“But what about his Ink?” I continued to prod.
“That’s a story for another time, Caenum.”
“But what if . . . ,” I started to stammer. I felt the panic rising in my voice. “I don’t even know what I want to do with my life. How are the Scribes supposed to know? They don’t know me!”
“Caenum—”
The urge to get up and run out of the room, out of the house, across the farms, through the meadows and into the ancient woods, far away from Frosthaven, was suddenly more than I could bear. I looked from Dreya to my grandmother, my breath grew short and my chest grew heavy. There it was, the panic I had been trying to avoid.
“I don’t even know me!”
My grandmother touched my chin, turning my face so I was forced to look at her again. Tears welled up in my eyes and my chest constricted as I fought to keep it all buried down, not wanting Dreya to see me cry. My grandmother spoke, stressing every single word as she did so.
“Your Ink isn’t who you are,” my grandmother said. “Remember that.”
Bong!
The sound of the large brass bell in the town square was loud and clear, reverberating all the way to our small house on the outskirts of Frosthaven.
Bong.
A second bell. Two more and it would be an emergency. It’d been a while since the last major incident, when several horses trampled a family on a narrow path leading into the village. Anticipating the worst, I closed my eyes and felt Dreya’s soft hand wedge itself into my closed fist. I looked at her soft eyes staring back at me, awash in concern, filled with a promise that everything would be all right.
And for a moment, I believed her.
Bong!
Three bells.
I knew what the third bell meant. Three bells signaled their arrival.
I tightened my grip on Dreya’s hand, and for the first time, I wished for tragedy. I couldn’t help myself. Let that fourth bell sound, let it welcome in a tornado, a monsoon, a plague, or even a dragon to descend upon the land. I just wanted to hear the sweet sound of that fourth bell, welcoming in the destruction of the world. Any disaster would be better than letting the third bell echo in my mind.
Please ring. Please ring. Please ring. I could feel my lips moving as I repeated the chant in my head. The third bell continued to resonate with a seemingly endless tone, and my chest constricted tightly. As it faded Dreya nodded her head at me, squeezing my hand. We were left alone, frozen in the kitchen as the soft din of the bell faded away, quickly overwhelmed by the sounds of the crackling fire and the breeze rushing through the window.
I glanced down at the vines and flowers on her arms, all of which were wilting, mirroring our mutual disappointment.
“Caenum, it’s time to get ready,” Dreya said, squeezing my hand tight.
“They’re here.”
Chapter Two
The Canvas and the Ink
Dreya and I had watched the Scribes come into town over the years, as they always arrived in their wagons at the peak of every season. But we had never really watched them, not even the year she came of age. However this time around, they practically commanded my attention. I knew that inside the caravan was a set of scrolls listing the citizens that were coming of age that season, orders delivered straight from the Citadel.
Only two carriages rode into town that day, both pulled along by a pair of enormous horses, each with Ink that shimmered with each powerful step, covered with images of hard work, in the shape of pistons, gears and levers.
We ventured over to the rumbling carts, and once we were close enough to touch them, I found myself strangely transfixed by the wagon tents, supported on strong wooden platforms by brass beams and stilts.
All my life I had watched those wagons rumble by, and the dark beige tents looked just like that . . . a solid color, normal even. But now that we had gotten so close, I noticed intricate markings that moved up and down the entire length of the tent.
“Do you see that?” I asked Dreya. I let go of her hand and pointed at the tents.
“Looks like even their tents are Inked,” she said, and moved her head in for a closer look.
“Just . . . ,” Dreya muttered as we walked, her voice muffled by the neck of her tunic that covered her mouth, “don’t let them see you or anything.”
“Come on,” I said and squeezed her hand, “we’re just following them into town. What’s the worst that could happen?”
“Could you not say that? Ever? People always say that,” she said, and I felt as though I could almost see the grimace behind the tunic that covered her mouth, “right before everything goes wrong. You know that, right?”
“I wonder . . .” I reached out to touch the tent.
“Caenum, don’t!” Dreya shouted, taking a lunge to snatch my hand away.
But she was too late. I reached out and ran a finger along the patterns on the tent, and kept pace with the cart as it slowly lumbered along the road. When my finger brushed across the crosshatched canvas, the patterns pulsed and sent a soft white light rippling across the fabric, like small bolts of lightning. I jumped back, surprised, and Dreya let out a shriek.
“It’s okay!” I shouted, and picked my pace back up to follow the wagon. I held my hand up and waved at her as I walked. “Nothing happened, it’s just—”
The back of the tent flipped open.
“Hey!” A young man with fiery hair shouted. I scrambled over to Dreya as he yelled inside the tent to an unseen person. “Some Canvas is trying to peek into our caravan!”
Canvas?
His head poked back outside the tent, glaring at me with fierce green eyes that emitted a challenge. I stood back with Dreya and watched the wagon teeter along the road until it entered the town, where it quickly became absorbed by a crowd of onlookers that poured out from their houses, clearly curious about who was up for Inking that season.
As we walked into town and squeezed around the milling crowd, Dreya and I stepped over a number of knickknacks and offerings strewn about the dirt road. Preserves, food, spices, even bits of gold and silver, were lying next to the wagon treads. I tried to grab some pieces, but Dreya promptly slapped me away. It was a nice gesture, I suppose, trying to offer up gifts in hope of gaining some sort of favor, but these gifts were always left behind, as they clattered beneath the wagons, leaving a sad trail of lost wealth and broken hopes smashed into the loose, soft earth.
None of these little offerings ever worked. And if they did, no one ever said anything about it.
“We’re lucky we don’t have any Unprinted in this town,” Dreya muttered as we stepped around the discarded and ignored gifts. “Prime pickings for them, really.”
I felt a shudder rise through me at the thought of them. Unprinted were those who escaped their Inking, either due to running away or committing any number of serious crimes. With bare arms and legs, empty chests and backs, they were the dregs of society. Sometimes they tried to get regular tattoos, to blend in, but this seldom worked. Plain tattoos didn’t move. From what I heard, some managed to scratch out a life for themselves, something I was counting on. Supposedly, most of the Unprinted spent their time in alleys of bigger cities. They lurked outside of homes, stole from shopkeepers, and kidnapped individuals or even the Scribes themselves.
Frosthaven was free of them, thankfully, though I wished there was at least one I could talk to.
Once they reached the town square, the Scribes stopped their miniature convoy of wagons. I gingerly nudged and pushed my way through the crowd of townsfolk that gathered along the outskirts of the square.
“What do you think they are doing in there?” I whispered to Dreya, nudging her with my shoulder. A hush had fallen over the crowd, and the Scribes’ wagons remained strangely still and unmoving.
“They probably aren’t crushing their best friend’s hand with their hairy paws,” she whispered back, wriggling her arm.
“Oops, sorry,” I muttered as I let go of her hand.
We smiled at each other and turned back to face the wagons. The horses dug their hooves into the ground anxiously, with Ink of pistons and pulleys faded to match their black and brown coats. The wagons began to rock ever so slightly, and the townsfolk muttered loudly to one another, a hum raised over the square. The horses, which had been quiet for a moment, snuffed and kicked their feet at the ground, as the Scribe I’d bumped into moments ago popped out of the back of the tent.
“What’s up, Canvas?” he said with a wink as he jumped out of the tent and into the square.
I couldn’t help but notice that his red hair was strangely vibrant, his bright, gleaming green eyes unusually vivid, almost like the Ink on Dreya’s arms. His face, long and narrow with a sharp nose, was dotted with freckles, large patches of them spotted around his cheekbones, and unlike every other Scribe I’d ever seen, his skin was empty. Most Scribes had swirling patterns of splashed Ink, blots and blooms of black that flecked their skin, chaotic, yet meaningful. This Scribe was just as unprinted as I was.
He surveyed the crowd as if he was sizing them up and then settled on my face. Was he sizing me up as well? I tried to look at him as intently as he stared at me, and I took some comfort in the fact he was a little shorter than I am. His eyes glinted as his mouth turned into a grin, wide and broad, before he opened it to speak.
“So . . . ,” he started. His mouth twisted up into a snide smirk and he stepped away from the wagon and walked toward me. His body movement oozed confidence. He lifted a hand up and inspected his fingernails, and flicked at his fingers with his thumb. I saw the knowing grin on his face, and tightened my grip on Dreya’s hand. She squeezed back and nudged me with her shoulder.
“I, um,” I stammered between gritted teeth, “shouldn’t have been messing around near your wagons. I was just kind of—”
He flicked out all his fingers. “Just kind of stupid?” he interjected.
Dreya squeezed my hand.
“Yes,” I said through my teeth. It was hard to swallow my pride like that. “Just kind of stupid. And curious. I didn’t know that the tents were Inked too.” I cleared my throat, and tried to lighten the mood. “How does it—”
“Yeah,” he interrupted, “to someone like you it must seem that way.” He took a step back toward the wagon and pressed his hands down against it, the cart moved just a little with the pressure. He looked around again, surveyed the crowd, and set his eyes on Dreya. “Are we done here?”
I shrugged. “I suppose. I don’t want any hard feelings or anything—”
“Relax, Canvas,” he said. “I’ve got no qualm with you or your little friend there.” He brushed us off with a gesture. “Just go back home. In three more days, you’ll get the Ink of your dreams.” I sighed and felt a rush of relief wash over me. Even though I wasn’t planning on letting this kid give me any Ink, I still didn’t want to cause problems for the town. Maybe this guy wasn’t so bad, and this had all been just a misunderstanding. I loosened my grip on Dreya’s hand.
“Waste disposal, right?” He snapped a finger at me and grinned. “No, no . . . you’re hanging out with a—” he looked Dreya up and down in a way that made me feel angry, hot all over—“what are you, doll, a florist or something?”
Dreya nodded. I ground my teeth a little, and tightened my grip on Dreya’s hand. Doll. Who did he think he was, talking to her like that?
“Not much of a talker is she, Canvas?” He grinned. “Good, that’s how it should be.” He twirled around and started climbing back into his wagon. “Yeah, sanitation worker. Probably in the Citadel, though. I mean, look at this place. Do you even have plumbing here?”
“Hey, listen—” I began.
He silenced me by holding up his hand, a stern look on his puckish face.
“Don’t make me give you something worse. There are such things, believe it or not. After all, isn’t this the hole that Molivar is from?”
I stopped myself from gasping, but the townsfolk who had been listening let their muttered whispers fill the air.
Molivar. The first citizen to be Inked as an assassin. No one had ever seen anything like it that year, or ever since.
I’ve heard his job is to hunt and kill others who fled their chosen futures. This included any number of Citadel enemies: the violent Unprinted, notorious criminals, small patches of rebellious exiles, and worst of all, Conduits.
People say his Ink forces his hand. Makes him do unspeakable things.
But people say a lot of things.
I looked up at the Scribe and his wagon, the tent tarp fluttered lightly in the passing breeze, the Inked illustrations unmoved by their soft touch. He stared at me hard, his eyes with that same challenging look frozen into them.
“Caenum, we should leave,” Dreya said, her voice soft. Her eyes darted back and forth from the townsfolk to the Scribe. “You’re only going to make it worse.”
“You should listen to her, Canvas,” the Scribe said, his voice cold. “I mean, with all those welcoming floral images . . . she might even be taken for a courtesan. Isn’t she here to entertain us while we’re visiting your town?”
A pause lingered in the air as I felt a rush of heat flow through my body. A furnace of anger slowly burned in my chest, and I took several deep breaths to try and maintain my composure.
“What—” I started, and paused, “what did you call her?”
“Caenum . . .” Dreya pressed.
“Call who, Canvas?” asked the Scribe with a grin. “Oh, her? Courtesan. It’s a fancy word, something you small-town people might not understand. It means whor—”
Before I could even tell what had happened, I had balled my hand into a fist and punched him in the face. I heard his teeth snap in his mouth as my fist connected squarely with his jaw. His body lurched against the wagon and he collapsed onto the ground. A thick silence hung over the townsfolk in the square like a blanket. My hand, still balled in a fist, shook violently as he pulled himself to his feet. He wiped a trickle of blood out of the corner of his mouth and spit a thick red glob into the dirt.
“You’re going to regret that,” he snarled, and climbed back into the wagon.
A wave of heat flushed through my body and my mouth went dry. I turned to Dreya, her mouth agape and eyes glistening. That was it. I had sealed my fate. At this point, there were really only two options. One, I could run. Leave the town now. If I decided to change my mind, to get marked by this Scribe, there was no telling what he would do.
