Black line drawing of a crescent bow with ornate scrollwork inside its curve, crossed by three arrows with feathered fletching, shown without any body placement.

Crescent bow and arrows line design

Black and grey · Flash

The drawing shows a thick black crescent shaped like a bow, filled with scrolls, spirals and oval motifs along its inner edge. Three arrows cross the centre, with feathered fletching at the top and pointed tips at the bottom. It is drawn in bold outline and fine interior linework on a plain white background.

Bow Arrow Crescent Scrollwork Spiral Feather

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Mother, the bow arrived at last, though not the way the quartermaster promised. It came wrapped in oilcloth on the back of a grain mule, and the drover who carried it swore the wood had been steamed to a curve in the hills above Tarsa and never once let go of its string. I have had it strung for three days now. It sings when the wind comes off the river, a low note like a man clearing his throat before he tells you something you will not want to hear.

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The carvers put scrolls along the inner belly of it, spirals that unwind toward the grip and stop short, as if the wood itself was not sure it wanted to be a weapon. Old Pellan says every spiral is a day the maker sat with the stave before cutting. I counted forty-one. He says that is a good number for a bow that will outlive its owner, and then he laughed in the way he does when he means the opposite.

Yesterday I took three arrows from the quiver, the grey-fletched ones you sent me the winter I left, and I laid them across the bow at the centre where the limbs meet. The shafts lined up so neatly that for a moment the whole thing looked like a crescent moon with a fist of light through its middle. I did not loose them. I kept them there until the sun went behind the watchtower, and then I put them back, feathers down, the way you taught me.

I am sending this with the mule. Tell Father the river is high, and tell him I am learning to shoot without flinching. I will write again when the moon is full.