This is more or less how I envision Phedre's marque from the Kushiel's Legacy series. I drew upon several ideas for this design I'd seen, mostly the one on the cover of the books and one that was deemed "official" and dispalyed on the author's site for a bit. Although lately I'm not liking this design very much, so I might redo this. That, and the blood droplets suck.

For those of you unfamiliar with the series, I first of all urge you to read it [link]. It's a brilliant work of historical fantasy, and if you like fantasy, history, linguistics, weird psychology and/or sex, you'll love these books. Mind you, the sex is extremely tasteful, though there's rather a lot of it, seeing as the books are about a courtesan. Never fear, though -- the sex scenes are less about the sex and more about the characters' reactions to it.

Secondly, a short explanation. This is supposed to be a tattoo that spans the length of the main character's back, starting at the nape and ending around the tailbone (that' how I interpret it, at least, though I'm pretty damn sure the full-length is canon). It's a briar rose with blood droplets.