Power Trio

“So you just fill this out, initial right there and there, and bring it back up to me,” Evan explains. “And then you’re good to go.”

The ogre gives him an affirmative snort and takes the clipboard from his hand. “You think is good idea, yes?”

“The waiver? You need the waiver. Do you mean the tattoo?”

“Tattoo.”

“Well, how much do you love clam chowder?”

“Is greatest food to be invented,” the ogre solemnly intones. “Is reason for to live.”

“Then yes. I think it’s a wonderful idea.” Evan says. “And a great tattoo. Muriel’s gonna make it look amazing.”

“Will hurt, tattoo?”

“Right at the start, it’s unpleasant. My first tat, the minute it started I was like ‘fuck! I made a mistake!’ But knuckle through and the endorphins kick in fast and it’s gonna feel fine.” Evan pats the ogre on the arm. “If a pinkskin can tough it out, you can, right?”

The ogre takes a seat on the leather couch by the shop door. Muriel gives Evan an affirmative wave as she sterilizes her station, the clam chowder stencil already printed and ready next to her.

It’s his third day working at the shop. Thekla neglected to mention he’s the only human employee, but everyone has been more than accommodating. Most of the day he just spends parked at the desk, feeling vaguely useless, but Hockham reassures him he just needs to stay on call and relatively sober and he’s already far ahead of the curve. The bugbear just gave him a brief nod when he supplied his last name as “H” on the employment form.

The shop bell tinkles cheerfully as Thekla Kamiyon strides into the shop, lugging a cold brew the size of a mop bucket. It takes Evan a moment of looking at her to realize that her sleeveless pink blouse and her high-waisted khaki shorts are the same as she was wearing yesterday. “Good morning, labrydors,” she says, her voice scratchy.

“It’s noon,” Asher, the shop’s other tattoo goblin, supplies.

“That’s punk morning.” Thekla takes a long sip of her coffee as she approaches the desk. Her customary chunky heels let her just peek over it. “Busy, Evan?” she murmurs. She still hasn’t taken her aviators off.

“Just got my man the chowder fan over here doing his waiver.”

She puts a hand on his forearm. “Get unbusy and then meet me on the patio, please.”

What’s this about? “Yo, Muriel,” he calls. “Can you take that form when he’s done and just put it on the desk? I’ll scan it in a sec.”

“Okay, human boy,” Muriel says. “But you check his ID and make sure he gets his name right, yes?”

Evan shoots her a pair of finger guns as he follows Thekla outside.

The patio is where the busy artists of Labyrinth take smoke breaks, film reels for their social accounts, and hide from work. The wall opposite the shop hosts a vast mural, done by its employees, of a twisting dragon. One of the mythical beasts that never ended up in the Laytham field back in the day, but all its transmigrants insisted they were real. Why not, Evan figures. So many other legends proved themselves true that day.

A stainless steel grill rests against the wall, cheekily placed right in the cone of the dragon’s fiery breath. Apparently Hockham is a proper artist at barbecue, and Evan’s already been invited to the next Labyrinth family dinner back here. He doesn’t exactly feel like he belongs, not yet, but they’re showing him the path. Just another in a long line of new beginnings.

Thekla lights a cigarette. She’s explained that the tar doesn’t hurt goblins in the same way it does humans, that their tracheas evolved to filter impurities and hack them back up later. The mental image is a little disturbing, and Evan supposes he should be mindful of secondhand smoke, but it’s hard to care. He’s always liked the smell.

“So,” Thekla says, rolling the cigarette between her fingers. “I had a very interesting conversation with my best friend last night.”

Ah. That’s what this is about.

Evan fidgets. “I’m guessing that’s why you never came home last night.”

“You’ve been a busy little pinkskin, haven’t you?” Thekla lowers her sunglasses. Underneath, her eyes are bleary. “Ugh.” She lifts them again. “Imagine I whipped these off in a cool way. Bit hungover.”

“What did you talk about?”

Thekla’s mouth twists. “You want to do another guess? You’re batting 1000 so far.”

“The, uh, the triangle thing, I am guessing.”

“We discussed it,” Thekla says. “But that wasn’t the interesting part.”

“It wasn’t?”

“Not for the purposes of this conversation. The interesting part,” she says, clacking closer to him, “was when she told me you were willing to try me.”

Evan swallows. His throat has gone quite dry. “Well, she asked, and I answered.” And then he thinks: Fuck it. “I told her the truth,” he says.

For a moment, Thekla is stock still. Then she taps the ash off her cigarette, sticks it back in her mouth, and flounces to one of the picnic tables they’ve set up back here. There’s a bit of extra sway in those hips.

“All right.” She takes a seat facing him, leans back against the lip of the table and crosses her legs. “Try me.”

His eyes wander down to where her plush thighs fold over each other. Her skin is a lovely shade of sage against the khaki fabric of her shorts. “Try you?”

“You want to date me? Date me. Take me somewhere tonight. And we’ll see if Kell’s idea holds water.”

Why not? Evan sticks his chin out. Is it that scary, the idea of taking a pretty girl on a date? “All right,” he says. “You have a place in mind?”

“No, I do not,” Thekla smears her smoke out against the bench. “You’re picking.”

“I can do that.”

“Well then.” Thekla keeps her face unreadable behind her sunglasses. “I’m looking forward.”

“Me too.” Evan suppresses a grin. She’s doing a great job at keeping her cool, but there’s a slight inflection in her voice she gets when she’s nervous or excited, her goblintongue accent sibilating through around the esses. “I’ll come get you when it’s time to head out.”

“Take your time, Evan H. Oh, and if you’re going back inside, be a good human boy and bring my coffee out for me, yeah?” She smiles a predatory smile. The dusting of freckles above her button nose contrasts with the forest of teeth below it.

Evan gives her a little bow as he backs away into the shop. “You’re the boss.”

* * *

Evan takes them on the subway after work, keeping mum about their destination. Thekla stops asking eventually, determined to exude the same casual cool she did on the patio earlier. They make limited conversation; she wants to act like her nerves are just her being an aloof ice queen, and he follows the fantasy. Thekla gets tense when she’s not in command of the situation, and she’s placed herself in a position that cedes control to Evan. He’s set on honoring that trust.

He manages to draw her into a conversation about how she got into tattooing. “I started out thinking I’d be an architect,” she says. “Went to school at Trager Tech. The legends of the old world goblin caves always fascinated me. I got it in my head I’d be part of this rediscovery of the old ways. So it was half architecture, half historiography. Every clan had its own techniques and secrets, but they all linked their warrens together in this complex hierarchy. One massive city, built underground, spread across the whole world.”

“An ecumenopolis,” offers Evan. “I think that’s the word for it.”

Thekla quirks a brow. “Damn. How did you know that?”

“It’s how they describe Coruscant on Wookieepedia.”

“Forget I asked,” Thekla says. “Anyway, where was I? So it turns out that even though architect is a big thing for characters in romantic comedy movies, there’s not a ton of actual jobs. Especially not when you’re half the size of most of the world and everyone just assumes they’re going to scrape their heads on your ceilings. I guess there’s firms that would take me in New Laytham, but we’re already built out so severely and getting anything new put up is apparently a years-long nightmare. And it’s not exactly up to code to put warrens in a fully developed metro area. So that’s something I should have put more thought into. Tattooing was the only backup plan that didn’t make me want to jump off a cliff.”

“I can see it in your work,” Evan says. “It’s very… geometrical? I don’t know what I’m talking about. But it’s like I can imagine your flash as something that actually exists in the world, that you could really build.”

“Well, if I can’t make an edifice that will last in actual space, I can at least feel that sense of permanence when I look at my work on someone’s skin.” Thekla shrugs. “I guess that was the thought process. And I knew a guy who knew a guy who knew Hockham, so I got an apprenticeship, and here I am. And that’s how I met Kell, and I guess that means it’s how I met you.”

“Well, they’re lucky to have you,” Evan says. “You’re really good.”

“Yeah?” Thekla leers. “You want some goblin ink, Evan? Gonna let me dig a warren on that bicep of yours?”

“I’d love that.”

“Oh?” Thekla realizes her angle of attack isn’t working quite how she intended. “Maybe we can do a trade at some point. You know how to cook?”

“It’s actually so interesting you mention that.”

Her eyes narrow. “How so?”

Evan hums, looks out the subway window at the tunnel’s streaking lights. “You’ll see.”