Malice

like a winged Fae-beast from a story, gluttonous and ready to dive. “And then, after we granted you clemency for your infraction—allowed you to keep working and earning in your house—you attempted to leave the realm. No doubt to sell your blood across the sea and grow rich.”
Narcisse swallows. Musters the last of her strength. “It was the only thing I could do.”
A splash of heat lands on my wrist. I look to Laurel. A single tear quivers at her jawline, glittering in the sunlight.
“It was not, in fact, the only thing.” Tarkin’s grin is wolfish. He knows he’s won. “It was betrayal. Treason to the Crown. And you admit it.” His attention swivels to his audience. “I’ve summoned you today”—he rubs his thumb over the Briar rose on his signet ring—“because these Grace trials grow tiresome.”
Tiresome? It’s rare to hear of a Grace facing punishment, much less being brought to trial. A few Graces around me look puzzled, too.
“I have consulted with the Grace Council, and we are in agreement. No matter how severe the punishment, Graces continue to break the law. I mean to stop it. Once and for all.”
A few cheers sound from the mezzanine. Probably from the members of the Grace Council. Laurel stands straighter.
“Narcisse.” Tarkin wears the same look he wore when commissioning my service, and a chill needles between my shoulder blades. “You attempted to steal from the Crown when you tried to remove yourself from the realm.” More grunts of agreement from the nobles. “And so the Crown is just in taking what it rightfully owns. You, obviously, cannot be trusted.”
Dozens of vibrant Grace heads bend toward one another, trying to sort out what the king means. I find Aurora. Her lips are pressed together into a firm line.
“You, Narcisse, have forfeited your gift. You will be bled until you Fade, your blood used immediately in elixirs for the Crown.”
A heartbeat of stunned silence. And then the room explodes. The nobles are shouting and jeering. A few Graces faint, falling into one another like wilting flowers. Narcisse begins to wail, crumpling in a boneless puddle as the guards work to heave her upright.
“She will die!” a Grace pleads. “You will kill her!”
And it seems even a few of the nobles agree. Cries against the king’s decision ring sharp and clear across the hall. Tarkin ignores them.
My arm wraps around Laurel’s waist, expecting her to sway and falter. But she is rigid, steel-spined and eyes blazing. Mariel rubs her temples, her true age eating through the veil of countless Grace elixirs and revealing a bone-weary woman Leythana would not recognize as her kin. And Aurora—Aurora looks like it is everything she can do to remain seated. She closes her eyes and breathes in short, staccato bursts as several healing Graces enter the hall.
“Remember.” The king’s voice soars above the muddle. “She brought this on herself.” He jabs a finger at the Graces. “Let it be a warning.”
As if struck by lightning, Narcisse flares to life and tries to bolt, bare feet slapping the marble as her earsplitting shrieks threaten to cleave me in half. The guards are faster, catching her around the middle and swinging her back as her legs kick in the air.
And then one of the healing Graces pulls on a pair of thick leather gloves. She produces a wooden box, opens the lid, and extracts the very same golden bracelet I cursed for the king.
The room tilts and I waver with it.
No, no, no, no.
Dragon’s teeth, it was never a bracelet.
It was a shackle.
“No, no!” Narcisse’s screams are knives of panic.
The healing Grace fixes the shackle to Narcisse’s wrist. The paralysis curse hits instantly. Narcisse stills all at once, the echo of her wails ringing against my eardrums. The guards strap her to a table, and one of the healing Graces begins arranging a series of elaborate tubes. The other produces a long needle and punctures the fragile skin on the underside of Narcisse’s elbow. And then her golden Grace blood begins to flow, gushing through the tubes and dribbling into waiting vials.
Marigold collapses at the sight of so much Grace blood lost. Years and years of gift. Rose doesn’t move to help her. Like Laurel, Rose is all defiance and fury, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. But I see beneath the gilt powder on her cheeks and neck, the sallow ravages of the bloodrot. Know that what she’s doing, trying to alter her power, is a violation of the Grace Laws. She could be in Narcisse’s place in an instant.
Some of the Graces press toward the doors, but the guards keep them back. Not even the swooning Graces are carried out. Soon, the hall reeks of rancid bile and salty tears and thick, musty fear. Even the nobles are affected. Some clamor for Tarkin to ease the punishment once a half-dozen vials are filled with Narcisse’s blood. He does not. Not until that sparkling river of gold dulls. Until the roots of Narcisse’s fire-touched hair bleed silver. Only then are the doors opened and the rest of us allowed to file out, dazed and sick.
But I cannot move, transfixed by the sight of the shackle I cursed. I helped do this. Narcisse is unbound, her wooden limbs falling in unnatural angles as she slides from the table. No one even bothers to keep her head from smacking the tile. Tarkin is the one who ordered the bleeding, I tell myself. He would have done it with or without my curse. And yet he used it. He used me. And I let him.
As if called by my thoughts, the Briar King’s gaze finds mine in the thinning crowd.
He dips his chin to me, and smiles.
—
I cannot think. My skin feels too tight for my body. Narcisse’s screams chase me through the rest of the day and night. The sticky-sweet scent of her blood scalds my nostrils. The next morning, the Graces and I drift through the corridors