Traditional style knife tattoo on an upper arm, with a black and grey face in the blade, a red dotted handle and red blood spatter below.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Knife with face and blood on upper arm

Traditional · Upper arm · Mixed · Photo

A knife runs vertically down the upper arm, with its handle at the top and a pale face with a single open eye shaded in the blade. Red blood splatter sits at the base of the blade. The linework is bold and dark, with black and grey shading on the face and blade and red used for the handle dots and blood.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Nell, the Harvest Fair pulled into Thetford on Tuesday, and Mr Corran has finally let me stand at the board. He calls it the Wheel of Six, though there are only four knives left after the damp got into the rest. Every handle is painted with red spots because Ma Tiller swore red hides the little nicks, and she was right about that much.

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The trick is simple enough. He throws, I hold still with my arms out and my heart going like a rattle, and the crowd gasps when the blades bite the wood a finger's width from my sleeves. The one he always throws last is the old knife with the face in its blade, a pale face with one open eye, shaded so grey it looks wet. He says that one watches the crowd so they never look at him. I have never once seen him look at it.

Last night I came back to the wagon for my shawl and found that knife lying on the bench. Its face was turned toward the door, and I would swear on Ma's grave the eye had been closed when we packed up. I wrapped it in my mother's scarf and put it under the seat, and I have not slept properly since. Corran laughed when I told him, then went very quiet and asked me to pack the wheel himself.

Write back soon, and tell me the post has reached you. If the fair vanishes from the Thetford field one morning, don't come looking for us. Just check the blade on the bench, and if the eye is open, you will know where we went.

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