22. Zendaya

Chapter 22

Zendaya

" T he Glacin galleon just pulled in. It's time," Fallon says. "Will you both come stand by my side?"

"Yes." The answer rushes from my lips at the same time as Cathal says, "We better not, sweetheart."

"But no one will know who she is since she is concealed."

"They'll wonder—like you did—why I'm standing beside a stranger."

"They'll assume you fell for a Shabbin during our month-long stay."

"I would never." Cathal balls his fingers, which makes the leather he's wrapped around his forearms creak.

Fallon rolls her eyes. "I know this, but the Fae don't understand much about our customs, Dádhi."

"I will not risk it."

As Fallon's smile slips, I say, "Cathal, you go. I stay on ship with Taytah."

"I—" He stares at our daughter, then at me, then back at our daughter. "I?—"

"Important to Fallon. Go." I squeeze her hand once more. "I hear Taytah call me."

I don't. I imagine they both know I lie since their hearing is as sharp as my sense of smell. I sidestep the beast with the sad eyes and our beautiful, grown-up child to join my grandmother. She's chatting with a woman on a neighboring vessel that's as white as my tusk. When I approach my grandmother, the Faerie's gaze slides over me. I can tell she wonders who I am. The Shabbin Queen does not make introductions, but the Faerie's identity is easy to guess from the ornate crown she wears, a composition of cut emeralds as green as her eyes arranged around a crest depicting a maple leaf—the Queen of Nebba.

She must be Eponine, the sympathetic daughter of the monster who recently lost his life. Fallon despised him but likes her, so I like her by default. I like her even more when I spy Fallon's friend Sybille aboard the white ship, bracketed by an older male and female with brown skin and gray irises. Her parents, I presume? And the woman with the halo of dark curls standing in Eponine's shadow must be Sybille's sister, the one Eponine chose as her foreign advisor. Her features and stare are as sharp as Eponine's ears, a stark contrast to her younger sibling, who's all curves and laughter.

I'm trying to recall her name when my gaze clocks a mammoth vessel pulling in beside us, flanked by a myriad of other ships. All of them fly pale blue flags adorned with the Glacin crest—a white snowflake. Its sight steals my breath for it represents what past-me had apparently adored: snow.

Asha arches her eyebrows and snorts. "Did the northerners' invitation mention a war instead of a wedding?"

"They come fight?" I murmur.

The queen clasps my hand. "No, emMoti. King Vladimir merely enjoys having an entourage."

" And the largest ship," Asha says. "Probably to compensate for what rests between his legs."

I squint to make out what rests between his legs but spot only something resting on his shoulder—a slumbering white-furred beast.

Wait…does legs mean shoulders? Did I confuse the words?

As I contemplate this, I study the monarch whose hair is the same white as my grandmother's, the same shade as the male standing right behind him. I imagine it's his son, just like I imagine the two young females framing him must be his daughters. I'm struck by how much the girls resemble one another. It's as though they are one and the same.

Music suddenly rises from the ocean. Well, not from the ocean, but from little boats garlanded in roses in full bloom where males in great regalia are stroking instruments made of wood and strings. The melody is lovely, delicate, like a warm, lulling breeze that dances through leaves and flutters petals.

It casts a deep tranquility over Lorcan's land. One that is only disturbed by the swivel of heads as everyone looks between the sky and a large wooden raft shaded by an arbor festooned with black ribbons and crimson roses in full bloom. Next to one of the four slender pillars stands Cathal and a woman with silver-black hair wearing Crow stripes—Arin.

When I'd first met her at my "rebirth," I assumed she was Phoebus's mother from how affectionate they were, but then Fallon had explained that Arin was Lorcan's mother, and that she and Phoebus had bonded when he'd moved into the Sky Castle.

A deep voice suddenly rolls over the string music, matching the subtle notes, before strengthening and overpowering them. Though I don't grasp the words, their unctuous beauty coaxes little bumps over my skin and carries Arin's hand to her lashes.

Two more people join Arin and Cathal on the floating platform—Justus Rossi and…and Ceres.

I turn toward Priya. "Why Ceres and no you, Taytah?"

"Because I'd rather watch over them from here with you, emMoti." She squeezes my fingers, drawing them to her lips for a kiss.

The gesture catches Sybille's sister's eye, who seems to be the only one not waiting with bated breath for the arrival of the Lucin King and his mate. I can feel her giving me another long once-over. Will she figure out who I am or will she assume I'm one of the Shabbin Queen's lovers? I realize I don't much care, for I like Sybille and she loves her sister. I've nothing to fear from them.

My thoughts evaporate when five streaks of darkness strike the platform and knit into the shape of Lorcan Ríhbiadh. Like Cathal, he wears leather and iron. Like all the other monarchs, he wears a crown, though his is so thin and simple, it gets lost in his wind-tossed black locks. He extends his hand toward the sky. A Crow sweeps low before becoming smoke and finally flesh.

Fallon's appearance causes another wave of goosebumps to dash across my skin. It also causes the water to churn and foam around the platform. I think an air-Fae must be blowing on the bobbing platform, which agitates my heart, but soon realize the commotion isn't Faerie-made.

Dozens of serpents rise and slap the water around Fallon, all of them seeking her attention, which she gives them in spades. While she crouches to stroke their tusks and the skin around them, Lorcan speaks words in Lucin to his people. I don't even attempt to glean what he's saying, my skin tightening and tightening.

"Taytah," I whisper.

"What is it, emMoti?"

"I need?—"

"What do you need?"

My fingers jerk out of hers. "I need—I need shift."

"Right now? You cannot repress…"

I shake my head, my vision crackling at the edges, my bones aching. If I don't dive into the water, I will shift right here on the deck and everyone will see what Priya took such care to hide.

Her warning about Faeries slaughtering serpents brightens my mind. What if one of them tries to kill me? What if the Nebban queen grows vines and trusses me up in them? Could she squeeze the air from my lungs? Could she kill me?

My ears buzz. My jaw clenches. A blaze pricks my forehead.

"Asha, dive with her," Priya murmurs.

Asha removes her weapon's belt and tosses it at Abrax.

"And do not let her wander."

"I won't leave her side, Sumaca," Asha promises, already painting the stripes along her neck that will help her breathe underwater.

"I'm sorry," I murmur, my lips tingling as hard as the rest of me.

Asha grins. "I was getting too hot, anyway."

She jumps in before me, which garners quite a lot of attention.

"What if…?" I side-eye the serpents around the wedding platform, but the more I stare at them, the more my desire to shift becomes pressing.

The queen brackets my cheeks. "Every serpent in the ocean is your friend, emMoti. You are safe."

I blink away the heat creeping under my lashes.

"You—are—safe," she repeats, and then she kisses my forehead that tingles so hard, I push away from her before I spear her mouth and jump in after Asha.

The instant my skin connects with the ocean's salt, my scales pop free. For a moment, I'm overwhelmed by bliss, as though my human flesh had been compressing all of my organs, but then I catch sight of the whirlwind of serpents ringing the wooden platform upon which my daughter stands. I snap into movement and muscle past them. Although they hiss and bleat, I shove them aside, using both my tusk and body, which are significantly larger than theirs.

And then I spring my face out of the water. It is only once my gaze meets Fallon's that I calm. She blinks at me, then glances over her shoulder at the Shabbin ship as though to ascertain that I'm missing from it. At Priya's nod, her face spins back toward me. Cathal's, too. Where Fallon smiles, he scowls and pops his fingers into fists.

Fallon presses her lips to the slit that is my ear in this form and murmurs, "Mádhi, I will always love you most."

I gobble down her words, hissing when a blue serpent attempts to steal Fallon's attention.

She kisses my nose before standing. I stare as Justus hands Lorcan a golden crown that isn't the same as his. Though simple, it's composed of sticks of gold that stick up like my tusk. The king speaks a few words before slipping the crown into Fallon's braided hair. And then he molds her waist with his palms and slants his mouth over hers.

The music slows, coming to a standstill before picking up in both volume and speed when Fallon and Lorcan break apart under a thunder of smacking palms that has me twisting around and around.

It's all so loud, so pungent, so much. My crazed gaze snares Cathal's a second before I topple back, and my place is usurped by another serpent craving Fallon's attention.

A rattling tail slaps me across the face, and I blink. Sink. Something grazes my scales. I whirl to find Asha's pink eyes steady on my rounded ones. She tries to press her palms to my forehead, but I don't want her thoughts.

My thoughts are already too much.

Too much.

I roll away, head spinning, heart galloping. The water beneath me is so murky that I think night has fallen, but a glance above reveals a glimmering cyan striated with foam and?—

Something large and dark carves into the water. I think it's a sinking ship, but then I spy feathers, a metal beak, and black eyes that shrink into brown ones. Bubbles snake out of Cathal's nose as he flutters his feet and windmills his arms to reach me, but the deeper he dives, the deeper I drop, until my body hits something so sharp it tears a shriek from my mouth.

I crane my neck and wring my body until I've managed to unhook myself from whatever coral impaled me. I jerk around, then recoil when I meet a giant, vacant stare. Arms band around me, clasp me from behind, and then a hand snares my tusk, pink eyes replacing the colorless ones.

Asha sets one palm on my forehead, then slowly unwraps her other hand from my tusk. As she smooths it across my forehead, my gaze snicks on the giant's eyes again. They belong to a bloodless face that's topped with a crown made of sticks like Fallon's, only these are as tall as Cathal and pure white, save for a black smear on top of one.

Suddenly the giant's face fades and I see my human self walking in the palace's Shabbin gardens, pink hair bouncing against my hot nape, sunshine glinting against my retracted tusk. Hands clasp mine, squeeze. And then Fallon's face materializes before mine and she says, "Shift, Zendaya."

I blink. I don't want her to call me by my name. I want her to call me Mádhi. I want to be her mother.

"Shift," she repeats. And then another voice, a deep raucous one, garbles the very same word.

My throat clenches as I wrench my face from Asha's and twirl. Two tiny bubbles pop from Cathal's lips. And then his eyes roll and his strength wanes, the knot of his arms slipping.

Air. He needs air. I coil my aching tail around his large body and grip him. And then I shoot upward, swimming fast in spite of the weight I carry. Asha swims beside me, propelling herself using her arms.

When I reach the surface, I sweep my tail and bowl Cathal's body upward. Asha snares him around the torso. The ocean suddenly flickers, darkens, and my body shudders. When light fans across the obscurity, I find that my tail has split.

I give a hard kick. Pain flares down my leg. I hook the pink fabric of my gown and pluck it from my skin, finding a deep gouge weeping black blood. I squint at the ocean floor, toward that spot of white, but get distracted by the long, indigo slit and the scaled bodies undulating over it.

A few serpents look up. Their nostrils flare. A juvenile darts toward me but halts, scrutinizes me, then curls in on itself like a millipede, before dashing toward the underwater trench. I'm still staring after it when two rough palms seize my cheeks and hinge my neck back.

Cathal nods to the surface, to the only place where we can coexist. I use my arms to avoid jostling my legs, but stretching my arms shortens my breaths and stokes the fire engulfing my upper thigh. The second we break the surface, I gulp in the warm, bright air as though my lungs had been stripped of it since I dove off my grandmother's ship.

Cathal's thumbs arc across my cheekbones. "Shh."

Asha murmurs a word which the Shabbins use when something not good happens. One glance upward reveals the reason for her word. We've emerged right beside the Glacin galleon, and everyone aboard is peering down at us.

At me.