70. Zendaya

Chapter 70

Zendaya

I suddenly want to rip the invisibility sigil from my forehead so they can see me.

Not yet, Cathal says, drawing my attention back to the clustered witches huddled over us.

Can you communicate with Lore?

Let me check. His fingers melt out of mine. Don't move.

I won't.

"What just sent Behati's body skittering?" Rosh's pitch is unsteady.

Kanti jumps to her feet and scuttles back so fast that she almost trips over her long white skirt that's streaked with blood. Hers? Antoni's? "Crow," she gasps.

"Didn't Lazarus plant the sword inside his heart?" Rosh whirls toward the embankment where the Faerie healer stands planted like a tree, his face as stark as the lightning-striated heavens.

I'm guessing I'm no longer invisible? Cathal murmurs.

No. Did his shapeshifting shorten the duration of my spell or is our watery environment to blame? I check my own body. Find that I'm still concealed.

"Hey, Lazarus, you fucking missed his heart!" Rosh's hair gleams as though shot through with the same molten gold that decorates her ears and neck and wrists. "Shit," she suddenly says, "Meriam's here."

"They won't be able to carve through wards drawn by a hundred witches." Soorya gives them a little wave. "At least not for a while. Come, sisters, let's not tarry." She starts walking, the other two falling into step beside her. "Aori!"

Of course Aori's involved. Did Tamar also rejoin her old Akwale, or is she staying out of this conflict?

As Aori's familiar, hateful form comes into view just beside my ladder, Soorya asks, "Did you manage to penetrate the guest wing?"

I grit my teeth so hard my mandible squeaks.

"No, Asha warded it."

I love you, sweet Asha.

"Have the children lost consciousness? Were we right about the curse of the shifter monarch?" Kanti asks, just as hair that's too long to be Cathal's coils around my bicep.

I whirl to find it's Agrippina's. I stroke her cheek, then touch the base of her neck to make sure her heart beats. The exhale that drifts through my teeth is so powerful, it manages to relax my jaw.

All of a sudden, two hands shape my waist. I must go rigid, because Cathal murmurs, It's me, mo Sífair. Just me.

"I heard the boy's voice, so I don't think it applies to this new shifter breed." Aori's bright eyes tighten on Cathal. "Unless Daya's not knocked out?"

"The boat's hull was packed with Serpent poison." Kanti grabs onto my ladder and climbs. "Not to mention I started dosing the Amkhuti the second we got home in case you couldn't get the boat inside. There's no way she's conscious."

I glance over Cathal's shoulder at the red robe ballooning around the seer's child-sized body, picture her white cane again, the dead barracuda, the colorless coral. Pity plaits with my anger and my thirst for revenge. They used her just like they used me. I kick away from Cathal.

Where are you going? he asks.

I'm going to wake Behati, for I could use a little guidance to shatter these wards.

" We're coming, abi. " Water snakes into my flaring nostrils at the sound of my mother's voice.

My throat tightens. I press my palm to my forehead and coax out my invisibility spell, done hiding.

" I see you, batee, " she murmurs.

The word daughter gusts warmth down my spine. I don't ask whether she sent me the corpses because I know it cannot be her, but I do ask, " You haven't killed lots of humans recently, have you? "

" Humans? No. "

My ribcage swells with relief. The killer— killers —must've worn Meriam's face when they committed their heinous crimes, which is why Behati saw Meriam. If only the Mahananda could've seen through their spell. I dip my fingers in my headwound, reawakening the sting which had abated, and stripe Behati's throat. Her spine arches. Her lashes flutter.

" Your magic works underwater… " I hear a smile in Meriam's voice. " How incredible. "

For a moment, Behati floats there on her back like the benumbed fish, like the corpses fanned around us. Though Cathal's wings had driven them away, they're closing in around us once more. Behati startles and kicks her legs. She must whack her head against the ward, because with a hard blink, she sinks, and air bubbles stream from her nostrils.

She flattens her hands against the red fabric puffing around her bowed, bony legs as though to keep a wall between her and the dead, and then she reaches up. It's only when her fingers connect with the skin of magic that she sees me. Her mouth rounds around my name, then around Cathal's.

I proffer my hand. When her fingers slide over mine, I tell Cathal, Hold on to me.

The instant his fingers pinch my waist again, I draw the lock sigil and flatten my palm against it. My heart slams with anticipation for the revenge I will reap.

But then it slams with something else: frustration.