Leigh Bardugo - Shadow and Bone

“Wait!” I called before I could stop myself. The Darkling halted and turned those slate-colored eyes on me. “I… If it would be all right, I’d prefer to have blue robes, Summoners’ blue.”

“Alina!” exclaimed Genya, clearly horrified.

But the Darkling held up a hand to silence her. “Why?” he asked, his expression unreadable.

“I already feel like I don’t belong here. I think it might be easier if I weren’t… singled out.”

“Are you so anxious to be like everyone else?”

My chin lifted. He clearly didn’t approve, but I wasn’t going to back down. “I just don’t want to be more conspicuous than I already am.”

The Darkling looked at me for a long moment. I wasn’t sure if he was thinking over what I’d said or trying to intimidate me, but I gritted my teeth and returned his gaze.

Abruptly, he nodded. “As you wish,” he said. “Your kefta will be blue.” And without another word, he turned his back on us and disappeared down the hall.

Genya stared at me, aghast.

“What?” I asked defensively.

“Alina,” Genya said slowly, “no other Grisha has ever been permitted to wear a Darkling’s colors.”

“Do you think he’s angry?”

“That’s hardly the point! It would have been a mark of your standing, of the Darkling’s esteem. It would have placed you high above all others.”

“Well, I don’t want to be high above all others.”

Genya threw up her hands in exasperation and took me by the elbow, leading me back through the palace to the main entrance. Two liveried servants opened the large golden doors for us. With a jolt, I realized that they were wearing white and gold, the same colors as Genya’s kefta, a servant’s colors. No wonder she thought I was crazy for refusing the Darkling’s offer. And maybe she was right.

The thought stayed with me through the long walk back across the grounds to the Little Palace. Dusk was falling, and servants were lighting the lamps that lined the gravel path. By the time we climbed the stairs to my room, my stomach was in knots.

I sat down by the window, staring out at the grounds. While I brooded, Genya rang for a servant, whom she sent to find a seamstress and order up a dinner tray. But before she sent the girl away, she turned to me. “Maybe you’d prefer to wait and dine with the Grisha later tonight?” she asked.

I shook my head. I was far too tired and overwhelmed to even think about being around another crowd of people. “But would you stay?” I asked her.

She hesitated.

“You don’t have to, of course,” I said quickly. “I’m sure you’ll want to eat with everyone else.”

“Not at all. Dinner for two then,” she said imperiously, and the servant raced off. Genya closed the door and walked to the little dressing table, where she started straightening the items on its surface: a comb, a brush, a pen and pot of ink. I didn’t recognize any of them, but someone must have had them brought to my room for me.

With her back still to me, Genya said, “Alina, you should understand that, when you start your training tomorrow… well, Corporalki don’t eat with Summoners. Summoners don’t dine with Fabrikators, and—”

I felt instantly defensive. “Look, if you don’t want to stay for dinner, I promise not to cry into my soup.”

“No!” she exclaimed. “It’s not that at all! I’m just trying to explain the way things work.”

“Forget it.”

Genya blew out a frustrated breath. “You don’t understand. It’s a great honor to be asked to dine with you, but the other Grisha might not approve.”

“Why?”

Genya sighed and sat down on one of the carved chairs. “Because I’m the Queen’s pet. Because they don’t consider what I do valuable. A lot of reasons.”

I considered what the other reasons might be and if they had something to do with the King. I thought of the liveried servants standing at every doorway in the Grand Palace, all of them dressed in white and gold. What must it be like for Genya, isolated from her own kind but not a true member of the court?

“It’s funny,” I said after a while. “I always thought that being beautiful would make life so much easier.”

“Oh it does,” Genya said, and laughed. I couldn’t help but laugh, too.

We were interrupted by a knock on the door, and the seamstress soon had us occupied with fittings and measurements. When she had finished and was gathering up her muslin and pins, Genya whispered, “It isn’t too late, you know. You could still—”

But I cut her off. “Blue,” I said firmly, though my stomach clenched again.

The seamstress left, and we turned our attention to dinner. The food was less alien than I’d expected, the kind of food we’d eaten on feast days at Keramzin: sweet pea porridge, quail roasted in honey, and fresh figs. I found I was hungrier than I’d ever been and had to resist picking up my plate to lick it.

Genya maintained a steady stream of chatter during dinner, mostly about Grisha gossip. I didn’t know any of the people she was talking about, but I was grateful not to have to make conversation, so I nodded and smiled when necessary. When the last servants left, taking our dinner dishes with them, I couldn’t suppress a yawn, and Genya rose.

“I’ll come get you for breakfast in the morning. It will take a while for you to learn your way around. The Little Palace can be a bit of a maze.” Then her perfect lips turned up in a mischievous smile. “You should try to rest. Tomorrow you meet Baghra.”

“Baghra?”

Genya grinned wickedly. “Oh yes. She’s an absolute treat.”

Before I could ask what she meant, she gave me a little wave and slipped out the door. I bit my lip. Exactly what was in store for me tomorrow?

As the door closed behind Genya, I felt fatigue creep over me. The thrill of knowing that my power might actually be real, the excitement of meeting the King and Queen, the strange marvels of the Grand Palace and the Little Palace had kept my exhaustion at bay, but now it returned—and, with it, a huge, echoing feeling of loneliness.

I undressed, hung my uniform neatly on a peg behind the star-speckled screen, and placed my shiny new boots beneath it. I rubbed the brushed wool of the coat between my fingers, hoping to find some sense of familiarity, but the fabric felt wrong, too stiff, too new. I suddenly missed my dirty old coat.

I changed into a nightdress of soft white cotton and rinsed my face. As I patted it dry, I caught a glimpse of myself in the glass above the basin. Maybe it was the lamplight, but I thought I looked even better than when Genya had first finished her work on me. After a moment, I realized I was just gawking at myself in the mirror and had to smile. For a girl who hated looking at herself, I was at risk of becoming vain.

I climbed onto the high bed, slid beneath the heavy silks and furs, and blew out the lamp. Distantly, I heard a door closing, voices calling their goodnights, the sounds of the Little Palace going to sleep. I stared into the darkness. I’d never had a room to myself before. In Keramzin, I’d slept in an old portrait hall that had been converted into a dormitory, surrounded by countless other girls. In the army, I’d slept in the barracks or tents with the other Surveyors. My new room felt huge and empty. In the silence, all the events of the day rushed in on me, and tears pricked my eyes.

Maybe I would wake tomorrow and find that it had all been a dream, that Alexei was still alive and Mal was unhurt, that no one had tried to kill me, that I’d never met the King and Queen or seen the Apparat, or felt the Darkling’s hand on the nape of my neck. Maybe I would wake to smell the campfires burning, safe in my own clothes, on my little cot, and I could tell Mal all about this strange and terrifying, but very beautiful, dream.