Black and grey Celtic knotwork dragon tattoo on a calf, with interlaced bands, a scaled crest and a triquetra-style knot at the base.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Celtic knotwork dragon on a calf

Calf · Black and grey · Photo

A dragon with an open jaw and a scaled crest curls up the leg, its body filled with interlaced Celtic knotwork bands. Bold black outlines are combined with grey shading on the scales and wing-like fins. A triquetra-style knot sits at the bottom of the design, and a reddish tint along the body adds some colour to an otherwise monochrome piece.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Flat 14, Harrow Point, Tuesday. The lift has been out since Friday, so I've carried the shopping up eleven floors and passed that wall on every landing. Mr Okonedo from the ground floor says the council painted over the graffiti, but he is wrong. Last night the lines were still coming through the new emulsion, a long serpent winding up the stairwell between the doors, its jaw open at the height of my hip.

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Nobody here draws like that. The lads on six do tags and bubble letters. This thing had knots in its body, plaited bands that went over and under each other until I lost my place following them, and where its belly should be the paint had a rusty bloom, as if something had bled through. I took a photo on my phone. When I showed Ruth on eight she laughed and said the dragon was the only thing in the block with any ambition.

On Wednesday the lift was working again, and I stood in the stairwell with a torch. The knots had shifted. The three-cornered loop at the bottom had crept down to the skirting board, and the crest sat one step higher than before. I counted the scales. Forty-one, then forty-two.

I've started leaving the landing light on. Tonight I put the kettle on and wrote this down so someone would know what I saw. Tomorrow I'll take the stairs again, and I'll look up.

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