Malice (Malice Duology #1)(3)
I imagine my own green blood will Fade one day, as I’m not full-blooded Vila. But I don’t care half as much about losing my power as the Graces do. I’ve seen Rose picking through her hair when she thinks she’s alone, looking for the dreaded telltale silver in her roots. And if she’s overzealous—crafting too many elixirs or increasing the dosage of her blood to heighten their potency—her gift could Fade well before her time.
“Don’t even dare.” Rose’s golden eyes narrow to slits. She’s been marked as one of the most skilled beauty Graces since she Bloomed five years ago, consistently ranked in the top quarter of the house standings each year. “Mistress Lavender will dock your coin for spreading such lies.”
“And what will she do to you?” Laurel lazily flips a page. “For speaking ill of a patron?”
Rose’s pink curls begin to vibrate. I smile into my tea.
“And what are you so pleased about, Malyce?”
After so many years, I would have thought myself immune to the ugly nickname. But humiliation flames in my cheeks anyway. Rose watches me with her perpetual haughty smirk as she drops another sugar cube into her teacup.
“Well. Are you going to sit there and gawp at me?” She drums her nails against the linen tablecloth. “Pass the cream.”
Scowling, I reach for the pitcher. But not before I use the tines of my fork to open the small wound on my fingertip, earned from crafting elixirs that morning. I let a pearl of green blood fall into the cream before Rose can see. She accepts the pitcher carefully, making sure not to accidently brush hands with me, and chatters to Marigold about inane court gossip.
One heartbeat. Two. I suck the tip of my finger, tasting the leather and damp earth of my magic. The next time Rose sips her tea, her lips come away black. She chokes, spewing a stream of filth across the table.
“You stupid Vila!” Rose slams her fists on the table. The dishes rattle. Her pearly teeth are now coated in pitch. Laurel covers her shocked laughter with her book.
“I’m not a Vila.” Not entirely, anyway. Though my exact heritage is unclear, it’s obvious from my outward appearance that I am at least half human. The other half, though…
“You’re right.” Calliope yaps and growls, her wispy-haired ears lying flat. “You’re worse. You’re a mongrel.”
The room goes silent. Even the buttery afternoon sunlight dulls as a cloud passes by the arched windows. Laurel and Marigold dart nervous glances between us. They’re wondering what I’ll do next. Make boils erupt on Rose’s skin? Tie her tongue into a knot? Anger surges inside me. I want nothing more than to do exactly what they expect of me. To live up to my reputation. The Dark Grace. Dealer of black wishes and evil deeds. But I don’t get the chance.
“Graces!” Mistress Lavender sails into the room, clapping twice. “That’s quite enough.”
“It’s her fault. Look at what she did to me!” Rose bares her inky teeth. Her tongue looks like a garden slug.
Mistress Lavender sighs, beleaguered. “Alyce, really.”
“This is intolerable,” Rose continues. “I cannot be expected to work in a house that—”
“Rose, go and clean up.”
“But—”
“I trust you have your schedule from Delphine. You don’t want your patrons to see you looking like that.” Mistress Lavender straightens her bodice. “I’ll deal with your sister.”
“She’s not our sister.” Rose flings her napkin onto the crumbly pastry remains on her plate, pinches Marigold’s elbow, and stalks away, her dog trotting at her heels. Laurel follows mutely behind them, shooting me a sympathetic look.
“I don’t understand you, Alyce.” Mistress Lavender perches in the always-empty seat beside me. Her gaze—silver now that she’s Faded—is tempered with accusation. “Why do you insist on making a target of yourself?”
“Me?” My blood begins to heat. “Rose hates me. All of them do. I’m too…different.”
The word presses against my eardrums and my temples begin to throb. My “sisters” are Graces, able to grant hundreds of prized attributes with mere drops of their blood. I study the reptilian green veins marring the backs of my hands. Next to the Graces, I’m like the sludge staining Rose’s teacup: a nuisance someone else has to clean up.
“That may be.” Mistress Lavender risks a tentative touch on my arm. The amethyst ring on her first finger, denoting her status as housemistress of Lavender House, glints. “But you earn your keep in this house. You have value, Alyce.”
I snort. “Curses?”
“All magic has a purpose.” A refrain I’ve heard a hundred thousand times. As if it’s possible to somehow gloss over the fact that the purpose of my magic seems to be to do harm. “And it isn’t as if you lack for patrons. Lavender House rose three rankings once you Bloomed. Surely that’s worth something. Even to you.”
I clench my fingernails into my palms. It isn’t.
There are about twenty Grace houses in Briar, each with anywhere from three to thirty Graces. Every year, the Grace Council—a handful of noblemen selected by the king and tasked with regulating the Grace system—determines the rank of those houses based on a number of factors: the tabulation of each house’s yearly earnings, accuracy and precision of its Graces’ elixirs, growth from the previous year, patron loyalty, and a hundred other things, it seems. Official rankings are announced at the Grace Celebration thrown at the palace each spring. High-ranking houses accrue royal favor and increased patronage. Exceptional Graces and housemistresses are recognized with gifts and more desirable house placements. Mistress Lavender, obsessed with earning a position at a more prestigious house, drills our weaknesses into us at every opportunity.