13. Zendaya

Chapter 13

Zendaya

M y palms remain flush with the leather gloving Cathal's chest. I wonder if he'll go back to wearing armor now that obsidian can still harm him. Then again, he's already harmed. "Why here, Cathal?"

"I was waiting for you."

"Why?"

"To check how you were faring."

My gaze locks on his thigh. "How you faring?"

"You didn't answer my question."

"I not hurt."

"I was talking emotionally, not physically, Daya. How do you feel after having met another serpent?"

I shrug. "I feel not serpent."

His jaw tightens, flexes, like the line of his shoulders. Like all the lines on his body. Unlike serpents that are all curves, the Crow before me is all edges. "So you're not champing at the bit to rendezvous with Mister Yellow again?"

I have no clue what champing at the bit means. What I do have a clue about is who Mister Yellow could be. "No. I no want see Mister Yellow." My lips twitch at the name Cathal gives Sun Warrior. "Call me Mister Pink now?"

He snorts. "No Miss Pink in your future. I'll stick to calling you Princess."

"Princess? You call me Príona."

"That's how we say Princess in Crow."

"Ah. I think it mean Fish."

A small smile titillates the corners of his mouth. "Fish? If I was going with an original moniker, I would've chosen a more fitting one: Sífair . Serpent."

"You call me Serpent, I call you Crow." I push away from him with a smile. "Enough chat. Take off pants."

His cheeks color as though Asha has rubbed rouge into them.

"You say I swear. Bargain," I remind him when his fingers still haven't inched closer to the waistband of his trousers.

"You must be exhausted from your swim."

"I no tired." I add a headshake in case he isn't convinced.

"Daya, I've—I don't—" He grimaces, then mutters words I don't understand. I think he must be in pain because his hands tremble as they finally grip the cord that secures his trousers over his hips and fusses with the knot.

As he upholds his end of the bargain, I pray to my mother, the Mahananda, that I will be able to help, because I'd like to have a useful power.

Cathal's throat jostles as he finally pushes down his pants. The crimson flush on his face doesn't extend to his thighs, which are moon-white beneath the sprinkling of black hair. Manifestly, the Crows do not wax. Is that why he didn't want to show me his legs?

In case that was his concern, I say, "I no have wax in room, Cathal, so no need afraid."

He blinks. "Wax?"

I gesture to his legs, then drag my long skirt up to display my hairless shins. "You scared wax, no?"

His eyes grow infinitesimally larger.

I tilt my head. "Reason you red. You scared…no?"

His mouth curves with a full-blown smile that transforms into a rough, marvelous boom. Although his laughter has neither color nor temperature, it feels golden and warm like sunshine dripping through water…like a drizzle of syrup.

He rubs at his mouth as though to force his lips to flatten. "I do not fear an impromptu waxing session, Príona."

"Then what you fear?"

"I…I…" He sighs. "I just…I'm not used to pulling my pants down in front of people."

"I am not people, Cathal."

He swallows, and his lashes sweep low.

"I am healer." I bite my lip. Let it go. "Maybe."

The extra limb between his legs bounces as I kneel, and then it juts out and to the side as though demanding I pay it some attention, so I do. And my heart misses a beat because… "Did poison dagger go inside there?"

"What?" he croaks.

"There." I skim my finger over the puffed, purple tip. "Little leg is swollen." My fingertip comes back wet with something transparent and sticky. "And ooze." I carry my finger to my nose, then dart my tongue over the spot of wetness. It does not taste bad like his blood. It tastes like the ocean.

He asks Mórrígan for strength. Is the pain so great that he has trouble standing?

"If you weak, you need sit or you fall."

"I do not feel weak." He chafes the growth on his jaw. "And to set your mind at ease, I did not stab myself in the cock."

" Cock ?"

He grumbles in Crow, then addresses Mórrígan once more. "That is the word for my ‘little leg.' Didn't Priya teach you about this yet?"

"Cock," I repeat, moving my head back a little because his cock is growing very long, like my horn. Is he about to shift into his other form? I sweep my gaze over his legs, but neither smoke nor feathers obscure his skin. "Why get bigger?"

"Because it's sensitive," he mumbles.

"So it swell? Like when I bump head?"

"When did you bump your head?"

"No important this, Cathal. What important is?—"

One of his hand settles on the back of my head, then combs through the thick mass of pink. His touch sends a shiver down my spine…many shivers. Although I rattle, it's Cathal's breathing that seems to intensify. Because his fingers are distracting, I seize his wrist and carry it away from my head.

"It gone. It was small lump." I jut my chin toward his cock. " You have big lump."

"It's not a—I didn't run into anything." The muscles along his stomach clench. "I can't believe I'm about to offer to have this conversation with you." He purses his lips, which deepens the hollows beneath his cheekbones. "It's probably retribution for being a block of stone when Fallon needed to learn about how bodies worked."

I sit back on my heels, head tilted sideways.

"I need a drink. Or ten." He pulls his pants back up and then walks toward the tufted chair, his strides so long and rushed they make every flame on the way shiver.

I stand and follow at a slower pace, the bare soles of my feet whispering over the heated stone. "After you drink and talk, I heal. We bargain."

I take a seat on the sofa cushions across from him and tuck my legs underneath me. The date wine he brought to my chambers last night is already tipped to his lips. The ball in his throat bobs many times before he lowers the bottle and plants his elbows on his wide knees. "All right." He rolls the slender glass neck between his palms. "So…"

"So?"

"So males have cocks, and females do not."

"I know."

"The same way females have breasts and males do not."

"Phoebus has little beads on breasts too."

Cathal coughs, then rakes his throat. Is it possible he swallowed an insect? "Those are called nipples."

I touch mine, and their points sharpen. "Why males flat under nipples ?"

"Because it's the females who store the milk for babes."

I glance down at my breasts. "I have milk in body?"

"Not yet. But if you ever grow a babe, then yes, chances are you will produce milk."

"Sybille grow babe. Mattia plant seed inside."

His gaze flips off the neck of the bottle. "You know about the male seed?"

I nod enthusiastically. "Taytah show me that female and male rub front together until seed come out."

Even though a table rests between us, I see his pupils dilating, the black chewing through the brown but not spilling over. "Did she show you exactly where the seed came from?"

"From male."

"I meant, from— focá ." One of his hands slicks back his hair while the other tilts the bottle to his mouth for another drink. Once he's swallowed and swiped his tongue over his lips a few times, he says, "What oozed from my cock"—he grimaces, his gaze going to the forever-filled water carafe—"that is a male's seed. That is what we plant inside a female's womb to grow a babe." Another pass of his fingers through his hair. Another gulp of wine.

"I lick it from finger."

"I know." His lids slam shut. "I'm so sorry. I should've—I should've explained things before. I thought…I assumed?—"

My pulse picks up speed. "I grow babe now?"

He hangs his head low, then rubs his nape as though it aches. "No. You only grow a babe if the seed enters another cavity in your body."

"Which cavity?"

"A hole located between your legs."

I untuck my legs from beneath me and grip my dress's hem to lift it when Cathal lets out a strangled, "Please, Daya, this is hard enough as it is. Don't—" He swallows. "Please inspect your body after I'm gone, all right?" His eyes are bright, but not with mirth; they're bright with pain.

I wonder why, but decide not to ask. He's already answered so many of my questions. "Thank you for talk."

He goes back to rolling the bottle. "You're welcome."

I stand and go toward him. "I promise I no touch cock this time."

When I reach him, he cranes his neck and stares at me, his expression a mixture of so many emotions that I cannot pinpoint one in particular.

"I look only at wound." I unscrew the bottle from his fingers and set it down beside the water carafe. "Pants."

Reluctantly, he stands, towering over me, and pushes his trousers back down. His cock has shrunk again, but the second I kneel, it starts to expand. I assume it's because he's cold since my nipples grow stiff when the air is brisk. I become convinced that's the reason when he shells it with his fingers and pins it to his abdomen.

I study the wound. It's deep and black, as though the stone left a layer of dust that's climbing into his veins. "Pain?"

He swallows.

"Cathal?"

He shakes his head.

"You consent I touch leg?"

The tendons in his neck strain. "Yes."

I lightly grip the outer edge of his thigh, making sure not to touch the infected skin. The muscle is so hard and jagged, it feels like a ledge. As I bring my head closer, my stomach spasms because the smell… It is terrible.

You are better than those serpents, Daya. You can do this.

I curl my tongue and jam it into the oozing wound. The dreadful savor makes my throat clench with the need to retch, but I sense doing so will make Cathal cancel our bargain, so I pool more saliva onto my tongue and into the wound.

" Focá ." His thigh trembles like the surface of the Amkhuti after I dive into it.

I lift my head and look up into his face. "What?"

"Burns."

I stare at the wound, at the trickle of deep crimson that oozes down his pale skin and mattes the black hair. Did my saliva make him bleed? I swipe it with my fingertips and rub. The texture is grainy, as though sand has mixed with his blood.

"I make ooze more."

"Yes, but I think… Do it again, Daya."

What is it he thinks? That it's helping?

I spear my tongue back inside the narrow crevasse. This time, I cannot swallow. I reach for the small bowl beside the fruit basket, the one filled with water and a citrus wedge. I spit. Cathal's grainy blood stains the water black.

His mouth twists. Before he can change his mind, I penetrate the wound with my tongue again, and…is it me or has it become shallower? I spit, lick, fill the gap with my tongue, then wipe the trickle of spit and blood. My heart begins to beat faster when I note that the web surrounding his wound has receded. I think it's working but don't dare share my impression with Cathal, for it would be cruel to give him hope if I'm wrong.

I lick and spit until my tongue barely pokes past the surface of his skin and his blood becomes silky and sweet. The muscle in his thigh remains hard, but the tremors have quieted. I flatten my tongue over his skin once more, heart lancing in my jaw when the puckered flesh smooths like the buffed sunstone beneath my knees.

Could I have managed to break the Crows' new curse?