8. Zendaya

Chapter 8

Zendaya

P riya reaches for her wine glass and takes a slow swallow. "Do share the Mahananda's new terms, Behati."

"Do they concern my seduction mission?" Kanti asks.

I don't miss Imogen's eye roll. Even Erwin seems to have trouble keeping his eyeballs level.

"The Mahananda's decided that the Crows' immunity to obsidian will be merit-based."

"Excuse me?" Lorcan squeezes the handle of his knife with such vigor that he manages to warp the metal. "Merit-based?"

A smirk tugs at Kanti's lips. "Does this restore your faith in the Mahananda, sisters?" Though she directs her question to all her fellow Akwale members, she singles out one in particular with her gaze—Malka.

"There was nothing to restore, Kanti." Though Malka's brown cheeks don't deepen in color, her voice seems uncharacteristically strained. Not to mention that her pink eyes flick to Priya, as though to check whether her lover believes her. "I trust the Mahananda with all my heart."

The Shabbin Queen seems too preoccupied to challenge her bedmate. "Tell us more, Behati."

"What I've gleaned from the vision is that Crows will not turn to stone immediately—or to iron, in your case, Mórrgaht. The change will happen gradually after an injury."

Imogen's cup teeters from her fingers and spills amber liquid across the sunstone tabletop and onto Kanti, who pushes away with a screech, as though the date wine had broiled her delicate lap.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" So many shadows lift off Lorcan's skin that he becomes a steel blur.

"Your mate's cured, Lore." The queen's pitch is so abrupt it disturbs the flames atop the long row of candles separating the monarchs. "If you do not wish to jeopardize her immunity, then I'd suggest showing the Mahananda a little gratitude."

Thunder bangs over Shabbe with such robustness that it scatters the glowing moths and extinguishes the stars. "Did you know this was a possibility before you incited her to step into the Cauldron, Priya?" The Sky King remains all-shadow.

The queen slits her eyes. "No one forced Fallon inside."

Lorcan's smoke funnels back underneath his skin and then he presses away from the table. I think he's about to stand, but he merely readjusts his posture. "If the Mahananda "—for once, he uses the Shabbin term for it instead of the other non-Shabbins favor—"doesn't make mistakes, then could your seer have misinterpreted the vision?"

Behati glowers at the Crow King but doesn't speak. Perhaps she senses that defending herself would only make her seem guilty.

Aza scoffs. "Our seer has never once deceived you, Ríhbiadh, for if she had, she'd have lost her gift."

He grips his bent knee with one hand and the armrest of his chair with the other. "I've learned there's always a first time for everything."

The queen shoves back her chair so violently that the grind of its feet rivals Lorcan's thunder. "You're mated to my flesh and blood, yet dare question my intent?"

The sky flares with zigzags of lightning.

"Behati's, actually," Lorcan says with false calm.

My ribs clench as the monarchs keep glowering at one another, the rift between them widening. Unease lends every being in attendance glass-sharp edges that fray the tenuous relations between the shifters and the Shabbins. For several heartbeats, I feel as though I'm teetering on the brink of a war.

On what side of the battlefield would I end up? Beside the queen, or with the other creatures shaped by the Mahananda? But more importantly, did Behati deliberately betray Lorcan? Is that why I saw the queen stab Lorcan's chest in her vision?

I yearn for Fallon and her father to return to restore the peace.

"How long will the Cauldron be out of sorts, Sumaca?" Erwin scrutinizes the trail of wine that's yet to be sopped up by the attendants. It only strikes me then that most have scattered. Because of the tension, or did someone command them to leave?

The guards are still here, forming a loose circle around us. I catch Abrax's stare, see his hand poised on the pommel of the sword belted at his waist, smell the fresh blood pooling off Asha's fingertip. I'm not sure when she arrived, or why she's on duty at the same time as Abrax, but her presence is comforting.

"Because you believe it will welcome you after the king questioned its keepers?" Priya shakes her head a great many times, dislodging strands from her intricate, braided updo. "Show yourselves out of my queendom." And then she turns and hastens away.

My distress grows because I've never seen the queen rush anywhere. I almost go after her, but Malka is already out of her seat, fisting her long white gown to avoid tripping over it. The rest of the Akwale—save for Kanti and Behati—stand and glower at the Crows.

Kanti coils a lock of her straight black hair around her finger. "Must I still travel with them, Taytah?"

Behati disregards Kanti's interrogation. "I saw snow fall on the obsidian bodies of your injured, Mórrgaht."

"Because the Cauldron abandons us?" Imogen asks. "Or because it will stay sealed until the winter months?"

"I cannot tell." Behati reaches for her cane, this one made of gold and embedded with pink rubies.

While I wonder what snow is, the black-skinned female Crow sighs. "So our injured have a month. Two, at best."

"Kanti?" Behati stands, leaning heavily on her cane. Once her granddaughter has risen, she takes ahold of her arm. "Which one of you will fly my child out of Shabbe?"

The Crows exchange glances.

Finally, a pale-faced male with black eyes and no hair sighs. "I'll take her."

"Contain your excitement." Kanti wrinkles her nose. "On second thought, I'll sail there."

"No. You'll go with Naoise so he can help you get sorted and settled. And so he can introduce you to the Tarespagian governor," Lorcan replies, just as Fallon and Cathal finally reappear.

"What's going on?" The swim has wiped away every last fleck of black powder on her face.

On her father's, too. Where her complexion is pink, Cathal's is waxen.

"We were discussing travel arrangements for your cousin." Lorcan nods to Cathal's thigh. "Did it help?"

"The serpents wouldn't approach." Fallon's shoulders are hunched, unlike Cathal's that are as rigid as a pillar.

"So, only the Cauldron can heal us?" Reid's grandmother murmurs, while Erwin says, " If it deems us worthy of being healed, Iona."

My insides feel cold, as though I've gulped down one of those cubes of hardened water the attendants use to keep the fruit from spoiling.

"What if it doesn't deem us worthy?" Iona murmurs. "Does that mean we've lost our immortality?"

The air grows quiet and stiff. Unbreathable.

"So we're just supposed to sit back and watch Dádhi transform into obsidian?" Fallon's cheeks glimmer with— what had Priya called them again? — shil .

"What if he saws off the infected limb?" ever-practical Kanti suggests.

"I'm not fucking sawing off any of my limbs!"

Kanti rolls her large pink eyes. "Don't bite my head off, Crow; it was merely a suggestion."

"And a sound one." Behati raises her chin. "One which you should take under consideration, Cathal."

"Does the Cauldron have thoughts on amputation, Behati?" Imogen asks.

"Not that I've foreseen, but once Priya calms, I'll ask her to confer with the Mahananda."

"I should never have gone through with it." Fallon wets her trembling lips. "I made everything worse." Her body flickers behind thickening smoke. I think it's hers until her mate materializes at her side and cloaks her white-knuckled fist with his hand.

"Like Priya, I trust the Mahananda had its reasons," Behati says, lumbering toward the pathway on Kanti's arm, cane clicking.

"Yes. To keep the Crows weak and under Shabbe's thumb," Lorcan murmurs just loud enough for us all to hear.

Behati's pink eyes tighten on him. "Before you motivate the Mahananda to lock itself up for another five centuries, Mórrgaht, take a second to turn over what it's done and its reasoning. Imagine if it had made your kind immune to obsidian. Your species would've become infallible. And even though you've proven yourself a noble leader, not all Crows are beyond reproach." Her rickety voice cuts across the moist air. "The same way not all Shabbins are saintly. Beneath our magic, we all remain animated and consumed by our desires."

"I'm immensely grateful that it's made my mate immune." Lorcan lifts Fallon's hand to his lips. "Truly, I am," he repeats, staring over Behati's shoulder, in the direction of the courtyard. "But I wish we'd been told of the consequences. I wish we could've discussed it with our people and given them the choice of whether to preserve our curse as it was or warp it." His eyes now rest on Cathal, who hasn't uttered a single word since his earlier outburst.

"What about my blood?" Fallon asks suddenly.

"It didn't penetrate your father's skin earlier," Behati reminds her.

"What if he ingests it?"

"I'm not drinking your blood, ínon." Cathal's face is tense and pale, as though the mere thought is turning his stomach.

"Perhaps it could help you."

Behati's lashes sweep low before rising anew. "A few drops may slow the progression."

The answer invigorates Fallon and makes her reach for the mollusk dwelling she wears around her neck. After pricking her finger, she drips blood into Lorcan's wine goblet and tenders it to her father. "Drink."

"No." A drop of seawater glides down the side of Cathal's face—or is it perspiration?

"Please, Dádhi."

"No." I suppose the male, who already trusts almost no one, isn't about to trust the seer who set all of this in motion.

"We'll test it on the others, Behach éan." Lorcan kisses Fallon's temple before murmuring, "Come. Let's go home."

More shils brim over Fallon's lash line. Is she imagining the large male gone from this world forever? Though he and I have our differences, the possibility makes my fingers rise to my neck and trace my palpitating scar.

His love for his daughter and devotion to his king will make him worthy in the Mahananda's eyes…right?