Frost Moon by Anthony Francis Page A

black—ornate petticoat and satin dress, Victorian corset and ruffled jacket, black bonnet and folded-back veil, all outlined here and there in shocking white lace. Elegant Gothic Lolita, the style was called, though you rarely saw it outside of a science fiction convention.
    Yet here Skye “Jinx” Anderson sat, decked out in the middle of the Starbucks, oblivious to the stares of the college boys at the next table as she moved one hand over a spiral-bound book, still murmuring. Whenever she took a sip, raising her coffee to her lips with a delicate hand wrapped in a fingerless black lace glove and jingling charm bracelets, the boys drew in a breath; when she set the cup back down with deliberate grace, they all seemed to sag.
    I knew the drill by this point—Jinx already knew I was here, but didn’t care to be interrupted. So I waited in line and got some coffee, creamed it, and joined her.
    Jinx looked up at me over her black disc sunglasses, and now I drew in a breath. I never failed to be shocked by her eyes: blue, gleaming, the iris inlaid with a milky white ring, like a snowflake embedded into the surface of blue marble. She caught me looking and pushed her glasses up with one delicate gloved hand, at which point I could see the glowing nub of a Bluetooth mike poking out of the lace mesh and curls of dyed, blue-black hair. Beside her book, there was a cute little laptop with raised spider decals. She’d been dictating notes.
    “Hi, Jinx.”
    “Dakota,” she said, smiling, drawing her fingers over one last line of Braille before closing the book. “It’s been too long. You’re normally not so shocked.”
    “Actually, I always am, spooky-eyes,” I replied. She scowled, and I said, “You’d prefer ‘Little Miss Anderson’?”
    “NO!” she said, throwing her hands to her cheeks in mock horror. “Shame on you for dredging up high school memories, Miss Frost!”
    “Don’t you start,” I said. “I’ve heard that far too much over the past few days—”
    “So,” she said primly, leaning her elbows on the table, folding one hand over the other, and propping her chin atop them, “Let’s see this tattoo you’ve got for me.”
    “Actually,” I said, pulling out the envelope, “I have two today, and maybe one later—”
    “Oh, goody,” she said, clapping her hands together.
    “Don’t get too excited, I may be taking one of them on spec.”
    “Anything for you, Dakota.” She leaned her head against her hands. “What are they?”
    “The one I called you about is a werewolf control charm. Spleen—”
    “Feh,” Jinx said. “He smells.”
    “Spleen hooked me up with a were who wants more control over his beast.” I grew uncomfortable, but Jinx kept ‘staring’ at me from behind her black glasses. “I think it may be a Nazi design, or something they collected. Frankly it scares me. I’m not comfortable inking it without knowing what it does.”
    “As you should be,” she said. “And the rest?”
    “A magical wristwatch.”
    “Oh, my,” Jinx said, making gimme, gimme motions with her fingers.
    “This one is a… stunt,” I said, holding off. “I don’t know if I’ll get paid, but I’ll cut you in for ten percent if I win the contest.”
    “Dakota,” she said reprovingly. “Anything for you. But really! A contest. That’s so unlike you. What’s my cut going to be?”
    “One hundred thousand dollars,” I said.
    “Mmm.hmm,” she said. I couldn’t tell whether she believed me. Or maybe she missed the ‘thousand’ part? “Well, anything for you, Dakota. Let’s see what you’ve got.”
    I slid the flash out of the envelope and arrayed it on the table. She stared down at it for a moment, then let her fingers run over it, looking off into the distance, murmuring. Then she pushed her glasses down and picked the flash up, holding it close to her spooky geode eyes, staring first at the detailed joins of the clock, then at the edge of the wolfsbane charm.
    I felt so sad.