53. Zendaya

Chapter 53

Zendaya

A sha says that you aren't to be disturbed. Can you please tell her that you can be disturbed? I really need to see you. The panic that grips Agrippina's tone makes me rush to unseal the doors.

The second she bursts through, I run my gaze over her. Her blue hair is wild, her skin as pale as the milk inside Cruaih's bowl, and her eyes are pitched wide.

"Did something happen to Ceres?" I ask.

She blinks, then parrots, "Ceres?" as though she cannot recall who that is. My heart slams into my ribs and I swing my gaze up to Cathal who stands beside me, Cruaih tucked inside his palm. Has Agrippina lost her memories again?

He must have the same thought, because he says, "Your mother. Ceres is your mother."

She snorts. "I fucking know who Ceres is, Cathal." She starts kneading her temples with such force I worry she'll crack her skull.

After thundering, my pulse goes dead. "Did something happen to Enzo?"

Cathal's carriage rigidifies at the mention of my Serpent's name. How long will he stay jealous of that boy?

"No, Day, something's happened to me ."

Since she's alive, I take it that whatever's going on with her isn't a matter of life and death. "What happened?"

"Cathal, do you mind stepping—" She suddenly hisses because a shadow streaks in beside her and morphs into a Crow, the one she does not have a crush on.

Reid's sun-kissed brown hair pokes out from his scalp, unruly like hers. Unlike the desperate horror painting her features, he wears the smuggest grin. Cathal mutters something under his breath that wipes the expression from his mouth and makes his head jerk into a deferential bow.

"Forgive my eruption inside your throne room, Sumaca." Reid mumbles in Crow. It's only my title that he pronounces in Shabbin.

I couldn't care less about his manners. Not with Agrippina rocking from heel to toe like a ship caught in a squall. Tell me what's happened through our bond.

I slept with him.

Well that explains the volume she's acquired to her hair. What it doesn't explain is her distress.

Cathal's leather and armor creak from how tightly he's wound up. I begin to wonder why my shifter's anguish is causing him such discomfort when Agrippina juts her finger toward Reid, whose lips have curled up anew. I can hear him, Day! Please tell me you can too?

Why on earth would me hearing Reid make you feel better?

Because then that would mean he's a Serpent and not my— She squeezes her temples once more and goes back to rocking.

She doesn't need to finish her sentence for me to understand what Reid has become to her. "Reid, can you try to speak into my mind?"

Cathal frowns. Reid does as well.

"It's to make sure you haven't become a Serpent."

"I'm not sure what Agrippina told you," he says in Crow, "but when I said I left my body when she rattled, I didn't literally mean I'd died and changed shifter race."

Since Agrippina is fluent in Crow, his disclosure paints her cheeks red. "I'm aware that you didn't die, you idiot," she snaps. " Santo Caldrone , I cannot have a self-centered, promiscuous prick as a mate. I just cannot."

"A self-centered, promiscuous prick ?" he repeats, grin gone. "You think my dream mate was a pretentious Faerie whose transformation into a Serpent has only made her more arrogant?"

Agrippina crosses her arms.

"Should've done more chatting and less banging," Asha, who's stationed herself in the entrance, quips.

Where it brings a smile to my mouth, it merely deepens Agrippina and Reid's matching scowls.

"What's done is done," I murmur.

"What's done can surely be undone ," Agrippina mutters before gesturing toward us. "I mean look at…" Her voice fritters away when she catches my stricken expression. Or maybe it's Cathal's clenched jaw that makes her mouth stop moving over the dismal reminder of our broken bond. Ah, shit. I'm so sorry. I forgot and—I'm so sorry.

It's all right.

"The bond…when exactly did it click into place?" Cathal's timbre is coarser than usual, as though little Cruaih had used his vocal folds as a scratching post.

"When she and I, um…" Reid's light-brown complexion takes on a deeper hue. He scrubs a hand up his face, then through his hair. "After… Well, during, but at the end." He glances toward Agrippina, who smiles now, but like her earlier rocking, it's slightly hysterical.

"You don't need my help," she says, which earns her a scowl. "You're doing a fantastic job of detailing the circumstances."

He releases a shallow growl before blurting out, "We were locked together for a while. That's when it happened."

Agrippina must say something to him, because his cheeks heat some more, and so does his gaze, and then Agrippina is no longer smiling. She's swallowing. Hard.

Cathal grimaces before jutting his chin toward the door and muttering a, " Labh ."

Even I know the Crow word for leave.

"Yes. Please," Asha says, a smile digging into her cheeks as she sweeps open the door for Reid and Agrippina. "No hate-fucking in the Kasha. Unless it's your Kasha," she adds with a wink in my direction. When I don't reciprocate her pleasant humor, she sighs. "I'll just see myself out."

Enzo? I suddenly call out through the bond.

Yes, Day?

Could you and Taytah…could you communicate inside your minds?

No. Why?

I'll explain in a second but I need to understand one last thing. It's intrusive of me, so forgive me for asking, but I swear it's important. Were your parts ever locked together?

Our parts?

Your sexual organs.

I'd really prefer not to discuss this with you.

Trust me, I feel the same way.

Then why are you asking?

Because it just happened to Agrippina and Reid, and it opened a mind link between the two of them.

He lapses into silence. So do I.

"Daya?" Cathal touches my elbow, making me jerk back to the here and now.

"Sorry. I was trying to find out if Enzo had experienced this when he slept with"—I grimace—"my grandmother."

"Wouldn't he have told you if he'd been able to communicate with Priya?"

My fingers find their way to the scar on my neck. "I suppose he would have."

Cathal gently shackles my wrist and drags it away before I can scrub the skin raw, and then he's folding his fingers over mine. "The way I see it, this is good news." At my frown, he adds, "Mating bonds only clicking into place through sexual relations. If you don't lay with another man, then I don't lose you."

His logic should appease me, yet I don't feel at piece. No, I feel nervous—anguished, even, because I now know that if our bodies don't mesh like Agrippina's and Reid's, then Cathal Báeinach is well and truly not my mate.

He squeezes our palms together. "Please say something."

I try, but my throat has become so narrow that I can't. Instead I press my body against his, press my cheek against his armor, and sink my hand into Cruaih's long fur.

He sighs and kisses the top of my head. "No amount of magic will make me love you more than I already do, mo mila Sífair."

An easy declaration to utter now, before knowing.

"I hope you feel the same. If you don't—" He inhales a hoarse breath. "If you think the lack of a knot will make you love me less, then?—"

Before he can suggest we part ways—again—I grip the back of his head and drag his mouth down to mine.