Roses (7 page)

“Would you like me to take you to Rose Herm?”

Ma Dane nodded.

The party made its way to a carriage nearby that was drawn by two horses the child knew well. They snorted at her as she passed, but she had no time to pet or feed them with Ma Dane dragging her along.

The child had never sat in a carriage before—only cleaned them with Owaine—and the leather seats felt foreign beneath her legs. The journey was strained and quiet, with Ma Dane sitting in a silent, fuming rage, and Pa Coo-se-Nutoes trying to make awkward chitchat.

“So, what is your ward’s name?”

Ma Dane glanced down at the child.

“Little Beauty,” she said with curled lips.

“Ah . . . unusual. Good day to you, Beauty.”

The child hesitated before putting her left hand to her chest.

The name stuck. The child became Beauty, though for a long time she did not realize that it was said in cruel jest.

When they returned to Rose Herm that day, Ma Dane hauled Beauty through the house screaming, “Beauty? Beauty! Little Beauty!”

She towed Beauty from one side of the mansion to the other, finally flinging them both into her study. She was angry and terrified of what could have been. Maids had left a selection of omelets on a side table and she threw them to the floor in her rage, ruining the fur rug.

“What were you doing there?” she shrieked.

Terrified, Beauty curled into a tight ball on the carpet.

“What did you tell them? How did they know about Asha?”

Beauty began to snivel and cry.

“Answer me!”

Ma Dane stalked across her study to the servants’ bell and pulled it so hard that the cord snapped. There was a clanging through the house followed by a long pause, no doubt while the servants pulled straws for who should answer their mistress in this rage.

After a moment the scuffling of feet could be heard and a meek head peered around the door. It was the new maid who had brought Beauty’s lunch that morning.

“You rang for me, Ma?”

“Bring me Nan!”

“Right away, Ma.”

The maid disappeared and Ma Dane strode across the room, knocking papers off of tables and kicking books. She heard the sobbing of the child and it enraged her further. Marching over to Beauty’s side, she yanked her up by her arm and stared into her amethyst eyes.

“So,
Beauty
,” she spat. “What grieves you so? You are trouble just as I knew you would be, you are so like—”

Suddenly there was the sound of a wave crashing. The windows of Ma Dane’s study were always open and you could usually hear the soft sucking of the sea, but this was different. It instantly took Ma Dane back to seasons past, to a promise that she had made while she stood at twilight on Sago’s docks, bidding farewell to a loved one.

The memory took her by surprise and she staggered slightly.

“Asha,” she said, one tear escaping her eye. “Asha, why must it be like this?”

Beauty blinked back at her with innocent eyes and bit on her thumb.

Ma Dane gently let her go.

“It is hard for me,” she said, reaching out a tentative hand and slowly brushing a lock of white hair from Beauty’s eyes.

The door opened and Nan entered, her shriveled face set in a hard expression.

“You rang for me, Ma.”

“I wish to dismiss you.”

Nan’s mouth dropped open.

“I charged you to look after my ward, and you have not fulfilled your duty.”

“No one can tame that fallen creature! It bewitches me!”

Ma Dane’s vast chest puffed up to double its size. “Be wary of what you suggest,” she growled. “This child is not a Magic Blood.”

“No . . .”

Ma Dane looked visibly relieved, as if she had actually feared saying those words.

“But she is evil all the same! I will hand in my notice, for I cannot look after such a damned creature.”

“Leave—it is all the same to me.”

Nan glared at Beauty, her sharp pupils needling into the clear violet of her eyes.

“You are damned,” she whispered, and she swept herself from the room, never to be seen by the girl again—except in the fetid darkness of her nightmares.

C
HAPTER
S
EVEN

The Child with Amethyst Eyes

S
o Beauty became Beauty and her life dramatically changed.

In her study that day, Ma Dane realized that she could no longer pretend that Asha’s child did not exist. Shutting her away did not fulfill her promise, and she had a new sense that it might be dangerous to avoid her duty. The professor had recognized something in the child and Ma Dane was wary.

Nan left that evening, muttering curses to the family—although Pa Hamish paid her highly to ensure that she kept her time at Rose Herm to herself—and Ma Dane introduced Beauty to the rest of the Herm-se-Hollis family over dinner. Pa Hamish coughed and looked the other way as Beauty entered, hoping that the thing would disappear back to wherever it came from soon. Eli was far more interested in her. He was now in his thirty-third season and spoiled to the point of no return.

“It is true what the servants say then!” he exclaimed after Ma Dane had stiffly introduced Beauty as her ward.

He stared at her long and hard. “We can play together,” he said decisively.

“You shall not play together,” grunted Pa Hamish.

“We shall!”

A silence ensued, and Beauty’s legs trembled.

Ma Dane called for a maid and instructed that Beauty be bathed and put to bed. “Brush out the knots in her hair,” she added. “Be gentle, for she has had a difficult day.”

The maid glanced at the silvery being in horror.

“
Do it
,” Ma Dane added.

The maid pressed her left hand to her chest and did as she was ordered.

In the days and seasons that followed, Beauty lived a dual existence. Sometimes tolerated by Ma Dane, sometimes detested by her, and sometimes ignored—but never loved. Riddled with guilt, Ma Dane would occasionally send presents of sweetmeats to Beauty’s room, only to cast her from the dinner table later that evening. She did not want Beauty to have to wear her son’s old clothes anymore, but neither did she want her to have the formal, lavish dresses of a young lady. Instead, Beauty wore plain peasant clothing of expensive cloth. She was given the smallest grand room in the mansion and told that she should make herself useful rather than have lessons. As a result, Beauty spent most of her time in the stables.

Having met Beauty in the carriage that day, Pa Coo-se-Nutoes promptly told the rest of Sago high society about the strange girl and gossip spread, fogging drawing rooms all over the city with its
scandalous news. Keen to avoid all the rumors, Ma Dane decided to introduce Beauty openly. In the weeks following Nan’s dismissal, curious families arrived at Rose Herm in droves, and after they were seated and sipping syrupy tea, Beauty would be marched down to stand before them.

“Her skin is just as lustrous as Peony said!”

“Yes, she is of a curious coloring.”

“You are so good to look after her, Ma Dane.”

“Quite an angel.”

While they stared and talked of her, Beauty would stand quietly, her eyes downcast and her cheeks flushed. It felt so very strange to be standing before these people who she had once peeked at from various hiding places.

One time, a fat State Leader ogled her silently for five long minutes before breaking out in a snort of laughter, “Oh, Beauty? I get it!”

The truth was that Beauty did not look as strange as she once had. Her shiny skin and white hair were still as bizarre as ever, but they did not seem threatening anymore. Looking upon her, humans no longer felt that she might suddenly attack.

“Is she some kind of Magic Being?” a gentleman asked at one particular soiree once Beauty had been called into the room.

Pa Hamish, as usual, did not like to deal with questions about the strange child. He had some sense that his wife was not telling the whole truth about her, but he did not care to be enlightened. Ignorance was bliss.

“Ma Dane . . . this gentleman . . .” he motioned to his wife and the gentleman repeated his question.

“I only ask because collectors in The Neighbor would be very interested,” he added. “They are trying to document new species at the University of Magic.”

Ma Dane gave a high, trilled laugh.

“I can assure you that there is nothing Magic about this child. She is human through and through.”

“Magic Blood, then?”

“Certainly not, Pa! You think that I would allow that in my house? I’m afraid to say that she is the child of a common prostitute.”

And that always appeared to settle matters.

Circumstances had changed greatly for Beauty and it was some time before she was able to adjust to her new life. At first she lived in fear of Nan returning and the formidable punishment that would ensue, but as her purple bruises faded, she began to find strength. Her new life did not demand her to sneak and hide and escape. In fact, she was almost afraid of the freedom that she now commanded. She soon realized that Ma Dane wished nothing more of her than that she would stay quiet and out of the way, so she lived by these unsaid rules. When she was called upon she came, but otherwise she could be found with Owaine in the stables.

“May I groom Comrade?” Beauty asked one autumn afternoon.

It was the rainy season and outside thick, fat droplets were drumming against the roof.

Owaine glanced up from a stall he was cleaning, pushing a damp strand of his gray hair from his eyes. Unlike the middle-aged men of Sago, he kept his hair long in the Hillands custom.

“All right, then,” he said, though Comrade had already been groomed by one of the lads that morning. Beauty had been talking lately and he wished to encourage her. Besides, Comrade was her favorite.

With a wide smile, Beauty slid the bolt of the black stallion’s half door and led him out. Though she had grown recently, Beauty only reached the horse’s belly in height.

“How old’re yur now?”

“Twenty-six seasons.”

She found her stool in the store cupboard and took a body brush from the pile.

“Where were yur this morn?”

Climbing onto the stool, she began strong, long strokes across Comrade’s flank, delighted as he bent his head and tried to lip her elbow in response. He always went soft on anyone that petted him, but he became as sweet as a lap dog whenever Beauty was around.

“The Coo-se-Nutoes were visiting and they wanted to see me.”

Peony and Bow were entranced by Beauty. She was disappointed now that she had ever thought so highly of them. They treated her like a spectacle, begging Ma Dane to command her to the drawing room and then asking her pointless questions for hours on end, thinking her answers quite hilarious.

“Hmm,” grunted Owaine. “Yur not some circus performer.”

Beauty started at his words, thoughts of
The
Beautiful Spectacular
flooding her mind. It was two seasons since she had escaped Rose Herm’s iron fence, but she had not forgotten the lyan, the troll, or the Sago slums. At night she was troubled by odd dreams about them.

“All right?”

She looked up to see Owaine gazing at her with concern.

She nodded, but the back of her neck was suddenly slick with sweat.