52. Zendaya

Chapter 52

Zendaya

I emerge from the darkness with the Mahananda's words still prickling my temples.

Fingers tighten around mine—Cathal's. He hasn't left. And not only that, but he holds my hand.

I swallow, then squeeze his fingers and murmur, "I thought I'd slipped into the Mahananda."

He doesn't say anything, his gaze roving over my face, hounding each furrow for a sign of distress. Or perhaps he's trying to extract what the Mahananda had to say. When its words scroll through my mind, I snare my bottom lip.

"What is it? What did the Cauldron say?"

"That it cannot—it cannot undo what Taytah led it to do."

His eyebrows ruffle, bend, ruffle.

"It cannot immunize Lorcan to obsidian." I lower my attention to our twined hands before he spots the lie. The truth is that the Mahananda can make Lorcan and his people impervious to the toxin, but it would cost Fallon her Crow magic, for the cure is braided into it.

"It's more complicated than that, isn't it?"

I nibble on the inside of my cheek. "It is." I hesitate to tell him. He might be Fallon's father, but would he pick her over his race? I hate the thought almost as much as I hate possessing the coveted solution to the Crows' curse.

"It concerns our daughter, doesn't it?"

I meet his shadowed gaze. "Don't ask me to tell you, for I will demand an oath of silence from you if I do."

He balks. "Do you think I'd endanger our daughter?"

"If it could benefit your people?—"

"What sort of monster do you think I am, Zendaya?" He sets down my hand and straightens, his knees clicking in time with his knuckles. "I would never hurt our daughter. Never ." He jams a hand through his disheveled locks. "She's one of the only reasons I didn't ask Lorcan to turn me into a forever-Crow."

Am I the other? As I roll up to sitting, I nip this query in the bud because this isn't the time and place for it. "Swear that if you're ever asked whether the Mahananda gave me the solution to your curse, you will lie."

He side-eyes me, anger jostling not just the air between us but inside the entire throne room. "I wish you'd trust me."

"This has nothing to do with trust, Cathal."

"Doesn't it?"

"No. This has to do with slips-of-the-tongue, torture sessions, or confessions whispered upon pillows. I've heard that people have a tendency to reveal all in the throes of passion." When he gapes at me, I add, "I hold this fact from several different sources: Taytah, Asha, Agrippina, Sybille, and Phoebus."

He mutters under his breath before giving his hair another violent tug. "First off, my tongue never slips, so there's no chance of your secret popping out. Secondly, one would have to catch me in order to torture me, and yes, I'm aware that I can potentially be caught. If that happened, I'd stake myself in the heart with obsidian so my tongue turned into a lump of stone. As for pillow-talk"—he tilts his head and spears me with a look—"the only person I want to fuck already knows, so not much risk there."

His words take a moment to land, but once they do, they soak into me like water and irrigate the thing behind my ribs with so much blood that I knead the palpitating skin.

"But again, I'd prefer to be gagged with magic than kept in the dark, so tell me and then make me forget."

"I know there's a sigil for lifting memories from someone's mind, but I wouldn't dare use it on you. I still need much practice."

"Fine." He takes a breath, releases it. "I owe you, Zendaya amMeriam, Queen of Shabbe."

My bicep warms. The burning dot must stamp his chest, because the angle of his jaw steepens and one of his eyes twitches. "After you tell me, you'll claim your bargain and make me forget the entire discussion."

I nod. "Fallon's Crow magic. That is the cost of transferring the immunity from her veins into Lorcan's."

Cathal's mouth flattens. "Why in the world did you think I would ever tell anyone about this, Zendaya?"

"Because it would break your people's curse once and for all."

"But it would also break my daughter. Now make me forget or?—"

I rise and stride over the low backrest to stand in front of him. "Cathal Báeinach of the Sky Kingdom, I call forth my bargain and strip your mind of the Mahananda's solution to your people's obsidian curse. The source of all magic has sadly offered no solution."

His eyes seem to spark in the obscurity. Probably an illusion caused by the flickering candlelight.

"I'm sorry for not bringing better news," I say, while my mind replays and polishes his earlier words until they burn through the shadows veiling my mood: the only person I want to fuck already knows . "I'll just have to create more healers. Especially now that I've the responsibility of a queendom. I cannot exactly afford week-long convalescences. Not to mention, I'd prefer not to go around licking all your murder-mates."

His pupils have shrunk to the width of dust motes. "Are you trying to test the tenuous hold I have on my temper, Daya?"

The only person I want to fuck already knows…

I seize one of his hands and carry it to my waist. Once he grips it, I reach for the other but it's already finding its way to my body…to my cheek.

"Can we start over, Cathal Báeinach?" When he doesn't say anything, after having said a lot, I add, "I hear the third time's the charm."

His forehead falls to mine. "Except I won't survive a third ending, mo Sífair ."

I grip his shoulders. "Then let's never end."

"What if—" His lids close. "What if the Cauldron mates you to someone who isn't me?"

" Mahananda, will my kind have mates? " I ask as Cruaih sniffs the jewels on my crown before giving them a tentative lick.

The Mahananda is quiet, probably resting from the magic it depleted whisking my consciousness into its depths. Why didn't I think of asking it before? Because I feared its answer?

I raise my eyes back to the Crow, turning the question on him: "What if the Mahananda mates you to someone who isn't me?"

His thumb sweeps across my cheek, coming to rest on the apex of my cheekbone. "Crows have only one mate. Once that mate is lost—" He swallows. "There's no stand-in waiting in the wings."

"Then I guess I'll swear an oath."

"No." He splays his fingers on the small of my back and rakes me closer. Though armor and leather wall off our bodies, I don't miss the harshness of his heartbeats beneath. "I will not have you loving me out of obligation or fear of physical pain."

I thread one of my hands through his hair, which drags a weighted exhalation from his lips. "I cannot be the reason for your death, Cathal. Not only would Fallon never forgive me, but I—" Moisture pools behind my lids as I bring his face nearer. "I couldn't live in a world in which you didn't exist."

He gives me a sad smile. "That's my line, Príona."

We must still be mates for there's no rhyme or reason to how deeply I love Cathal Báeinach. Either Serpents cannot communicate with their mates through a mental bond or?—

Fuck, fuck, fuck, Day, Agrippina's voice startles a breath from my lungs.

What is it?

Are you in the Kasha?

Yes. What is it?

On my way.

"Daya?" Cathal's gaze swivels over each one of my features. "Something's wrong. Tell me what's wrong?"

"I don't know. It's Agrippina. She's coming here."