Prologue
The day started off the way every Bad Day in the town of Barrow began: with the sun shining like a gold coin against a backdrop of cloudless sky. Birds sang loudly off-key while citizens of that strange little town shuttered their windows, hoping the worst had already come to pass.
The mayor and his wife did as their neighbors did, pulling their curtains tight. They sat at their large dining table, eagerly awaiting the return of Barrow’s perpetual rain. Mrs. Porto nursed a cup of steaming-hot tea while Mr. Porto read yesterday’s newspaper, since there obviously wouldn’t be a delivery under such dire circumstances. Occasionally, the two glanced at each other to offer reassuring smiles as they slowly counted down the hours until this Bad Day was over.
But then Mrs. Porto felt a sharp pain start in her belly. She stared at her handsome husband in dismay, realizing that the baby she was carrying would arrive early.
Today.
On the worst day of the year.
Mr. Porto ran out of that grand house on the hill, calling for help. As mayor, he had access to the best doctors and healers and blacksmiths-moonlighting-as-midwives that their little town had to offer. Unfortunately, this meant very little now, for he would receive no aid on a day that was deemed very, very Bad.
Mrs. Porto could not sit still on her old wooden chair. She forced herself up, one hand on her belly, the other at her back, and waddled to the front door to survey her poor, deluded husband.
The baby gave a swift kick to remind the almost-mother what was happening.
Mrs. Porto was about to give up and plop onto the first step of the porch when she saw what looked like a mangled tree stump striding confidently to their front gate. She stared wide-eyed and fearful until the stump came closer, revealing itself to be a wizened old woman with a cane, clad in several moss-covered shawls.
“Need help?” asked the old woman. Mrs. Porto swore that the crone exhaled dust.
“No,” Mrs. Porto called back, ignoring the blinding pain that came from her sudden labor. “We’re perfectly fine here.”
The old woman was not convinced. She raised one scraggly eyebrow as her pitch-black eyes fell upon Mrs. Porto’s burgeoning form. “Really?”
“Everything is quite all right,” Mrs. Porto said, patting her belly before a gush of water burst from between her legs.
“Quite,” said the old woman.
But things were not quite all right.
Things were terrible. Awful. Horrible.
Bad.
And so Risa Porto was born into a sun-drenched world with a shriveled gray hag welcoming her to the town of Barrow, where she would forever be known as a Bad Thing.
CHAPTER ONEIn Which a Witch Returns
Bad Things happened around Risa Porto.
She didn’twillthem to happen. She didn’t stare at Farmer Juan’s barn and think,Yes, I would much prefer that this dilapidated, termite-ridden monstrosity be on fire right about now, and then watch it burst into flames despite the perpetual rain that fell on Barrow. She didn’t skip to the river and wonder what it would look like swollen and overflowing, only to have it rise above the banks and flood the empty valley at the edge of town. In fact, most of the time, she wasn’t even around for those disastrous events. They happened while she was sleeping, or minding her own business, or getting chased by the other children.
But none of that mattered to the people of Barrow. They believed crossing the path of a black cat meant certain death; that sweeping the shoes of a maiden guaranteed spinsterhood; andabove all, that being a girl born on a Bad Day made that girl a Bad Thing.
That was the issue with superstitions and superstitious towns, and Barrow was most certainly a superstitious town. Bad luck was a shadow. It followed—a warped, monstrous thing—until it was bigger than itself. Until it touched everything and made it unrecognizable.
Less than eight hours after turning seventeen, Risa drifted through the town square, aware of the way her shadow lay long and drawn-out. The slanted figure loomed larger than life against the wooden door of the tailor’s shop shuttered before her, a padlock firmly secured in place. Nailed to the door was an aged piece of parchment, which had been hammered to that very same spot several times before.
“‘We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone, specifically Bad Things by the name of Risa Porto,’” she read aloud, her voice ringing in the empty square. “Seriously? It’s been ten years since the tavern flooded!”
But there was no answer from the townspeople of Barrow, who remained safe behind their drawn curtains and closed shutters, hiding from the day. It didn’t matter that the tavern had been flooded by the tavernownerin an attempted insurance scam; the owner had simply pointed his grubby finger at seven-year-old Risa and proclaimed it her fault. The people agreed. The insurance provider did not. They hadn’t addedcursed girlsto their checklist underActs of Gods, and they had no desire to listen to the claims of superstitious people when they still had to cross the Bosque back to Kheadon’s capital before nightfall.
A clatter overhead drew Risa’s attention skyward.
“Go home!” came a voice. Emilia, the tailor’s daughter, poked her head out of the window above the store.
Risa waved a black satin ribbon in the air like a white flag. Bought on a whim the day before, after Emilia’s mother had shown her every ribbonbutthe one requested. When the tailor’s wife finally brought out a strip of pale yellow satin with scalloped lace edges, Risa decided to purchase the ribbon the woman had shown her an hour earlier instead. To be contrary. Impossible.
