When the queen sighs, I pivot my head back toward her, the three syllables forplease—krehiya—warming my tongue. I rein them in behind my teeth, flattening my palms over her blistered ones, choosing a silent entreaty instead of a hissed one.
I draw in a breath when a twilit forest develops on the back of my lids, one that mustn’t be in Shabbe, for the trees that line the queendom’s ramparts have thin trunks and broad, glossy leaves. The ones in the queen’s vision have fat trunks impaled with slender branches dappled in thumb-sized, papery leaves.
I slither through the forest like a serpent, stopping only once I reach a clearing strewn with three black boulders. The queen glides me closer to these dark mounds, close enough for me to realize that they are, in fact, effigies of giant birds.
I wonder why she shows me these statues. Do Crows not appreciate replicas of themselves? She must feel my brow furrow, for she directs my stare toward striped brown feathers that protrude from a splayed wing. Before I can comprehend why feathers have been glued to stone, the landscape of her mind changes and I catch her hand folded around a dagger tipped in black stone. I see her stabbing it through Lorcan’s heart and his skin hardening to iron.
She yanks her palms off my forehead, her gaze wide with what resembles fear, while mine is narrowed with a frown, one that grows when Fallon points to herself and says: “batara azish.” I know the meaning ofazishfor it’s been used many times to describe my condition—curse—but I’m unfamiliar with the termbatara.
As I sit back on my heels, my temples buzz as though a bee were trapped behind them. What link exists between the forest statues and Lorcan’s stabbing? And why does the queen’s hand tremble as she reaches for her glass of steaming date tea?
When her gaze flicks to Behati’s, the buzzing grows so insistent that I knead my temples. Were those visions? Did she not intend to show me the one of her stabbing Lorcan? Was it even her? The Two-legs holding the dagger had long white hair. Behati’s is also white, though hers is streaked through with gold.
The seer directs words to Fallon in Crow. She usually always speaks to her in Shabbin. Has she switched languages to thwart me, or is it simply for her audience’s benefit?
Smoke slithers around Lorcan like vines as he growls something at the Shabbin Queen that must concern Fallon since he uses the Crow term for mate. Fallon sidles in front of him and brackets his cheeks between her palms. His complexion, usually moon-pale, currently resembles the berries clustered in the platter before him.
Lightning cracks and thunder grumbles over the window that stretches almost the full length of the Kasha’s ceiling. Fallon once told me that her mate can control the sky. Is the incoming cloud front Lorcan’s doing?
Out loud and in Shabbin—for my sake, I imagine—she asks why he and Dádhi don’t trust the Mahananda. My frown deepens, for what does the Mahananda have to do with the bird statues and Lorcan’s stabbing?
Dádhi Cathal Báeinach folds his thick arms and slits his dark gaze.What?I want to ask.What did I do wrong now?
I hear Fallon murmur the name she sometimes calls me to Lorcan—Mádhi. I’m not sure what it means, only that it sounds vaguely similar to how she refers to her father. Since I’m not a mother, I suppose the likeness is coincidental.
“EmAzish,” Lorcan murmurs.My curse. And then he says something else that starts with-embut finishes with a word I’m unfamiliar with.
His curse? What is his curse?
Fallon shakes her head and murmurs that it’s hers, that she’s the “batara azish.”
I blow out my cheeks, my frustration mounting. What doesbataramean?
As the queen takes a sip of her tea, her eyes whiten like Behati’s. Except, in the Shabbin monarch’s case, it happens when she convenes with the Mahananda. A moment later, she proclaims, “Mahananda keteh ab.”The Mahananda says now.
Lorcan closes his eyes and shakes his head, repeating the word “no” in both Shabbin and Crow.
The queen sets down her glass of tea. “Ab va kada.”Now or never.
Lorcan’s jaw turns bladed. “Kada.”Never.
Neverwhat?
A meaningful look passes between the queens that makes Priya climb to her feet. As she strides toward Lorcan, she asks everyone to depart, save for the Crow King. Does she believe he’ll change his mind if we’re gone? And what of the dagger? Is she planning on hurting him? I reassure myself that she’d never harm her descendant’s mate, for it would hurt her beloved Fallon.
For some reason, this is when I comprehend the second part of her vision. The stabbing had been an explanation of the forest statues since, when the dagger had breached the Crow King’s skin, it had hardened his flesh like theirs.
“Daya?” Behati holds out her arm to me.
I stand, then pad over to where she sits, take her forearm, and boost her up. Once she’s stable, I reach for her cane, but she shakes her head and curls her callused fingers around my elbow.
All right…no cane.
Behati’s body might be brittle, but her mind’s alarmingly firm. There’s no changing it once she’s decided something. And apparently, today, she’s decided I will be her crutch instead of the gnarled branch carved to resemble a coiled serpent. I suppose that if Kanti had been present, Behati would’ve taken her arm.
Fallon catches up to us, her features blurring and writhing behind the gossamer veil of smoke that envelops her. I wonder if it’s her mate’s smoke or her own beast pushing against her flesh, desirous to emerge. She says something to her father in Crow that has the umber rings surrounding his pupils shrinking and his scowl darkening as though his smudged stripes had penetrated into the pale canvas beneath.
He shoves open the door just as Fallon pricks her finger on the shell she wears around her neck and sketches a motif in blood. Though my stance is solid, Behati teeters and grabs ahold of the wall on our way out. I try to ease her away but she resists. I soon understand why when I catch her finger traipsing over the door frame, leaving behind knots of blood that quickly absorb into the stone.
