Do Your Worst

by Rosie Danan

While other women inherited a knack for singing or swearing from their grandmothers, Riley Rhodes received a faded leather journal, a few adolescent summers of field training, and the guarantee that she’d die alone.

Curse breaking—the Rhodes family talent—was a mysterious and often misunderstood practice, especially in the modern age. Lack of demand wasn’t the problem. If anything, the world was more cursed than ever. But as the presence of an angry mob in any good folktale will tell you, people fear what they don’t understand.

No one appreciates a curse breaker until they’re cursed.

Gran had taught Riley that curses came from people, born out of their most extreme emotions—suffering, longing, desperation—feelings so raw, so heavy, that they poured out and drew consequences from the universe.

Clark released her at once. Next time, he’d simply let her fall on her perfect backside.

“Enemies it is,” Clark said, all crisp consonants and barely leashed scorn. “Do your worst.”