“Why would he need to be told?”
“He’d find out. The only reason he hasn’t flocked over here is because he isn’t aware that Liora and I were injured.”
I roll my gaze toward the dawn-filled immensity, wishing he’d learn of it. Cathal might not want to see me, but I would very much like to lay eyes on him. If only to make sure he’s well. “Ready?”
Erwin nods, reaching for his mate’s hand. “Thank you for doing this. I owe you, Zendaya of Shabbe.”
I suck in a breath when something stings my bicep. I pop my arm out of the water to find a glowing band circling my skin.
When I look back at Erwin, his expression holds no inkling of surprise. “It’s the least I can do to show my gratitude.”
I nod my thanks and sink. As I lap at his noxious blood to draw out the toxins, I decide exactly how I will use his bargain. Picturing the queen’s fury distracts me from the Mahananda-awful task and makes time tick by faster. I see the infection clear and his skin draw close and then I see nothing but soothing darkness.
Chapter 32
Zendaya
When my eyes finally peel open, Enzo is resting beside me at the bottom of the Amkhuti, his green scales flush against my pink ones. My grandmother might not have drained the Amkhuti of water this time, but she’s drained it of sea life. Was she worried fish would pick at our inert bodies and disturb our slumber?
I shift into flesh, then kick my legs to circle around Enzo. The instant my palm grazes his cheek, his eyes snap wide, and then he too morphs into skin.You’re awake!
I smile.Yes, and so are you.
I woke up two days ago, Day.Considering the dark hue staining the skin beneath his eyes, I take it that he hasn’t slept since then.
Two days? How long have I been out?
Almost a week.
As we float to the surface, I reach out and take his hand to give it a squeeze.Thank you for staying with me.
You’re my… You’re like my mother.He manages to redden underwater.Actually, you’re nothing alike,because she wasn’t very nice. But it wasn’t her fault,he’s quick to add.She was overworked.
I know his life story, even though it took him a while to confide in me. At first, I believed it was because he was wary, but later came to understand that he avoided talking of his past because it depressed him.
Enzo’s mother worked in a human brothel—a place where coin is exchanged against sexual favors. He was an undesirable byproduct of her job. Instead of raising him, she sent her baby to live with her father on the other side of Luce. When Enzo was nine, he came home from the market to find his beloved grandfather and house turned to ash. His neighbor was the one to explain that the soldiers had come for the tithe and his grandfather couldn’t pay it.
After sleeping in the streets, he started working on fishing boats to earn coin to pay for a corner of hay inside a barn. I can still remember his look of sheer disbelief the night of our arrival when Asha and I showed him to an apartment in the palace’s guest wing. His eyes had grown so large, I’d worried he would shift right there and then. His quiet wonder had sloughed off a layer of my antipathy. I shed the rest of it like a molting land serpent—all at once—for the boy had done nothing to merit my scorn.
The second our heads break the surface, Asha’s voice detonates through the air with an, “Abrax, she’s up! Go tell the queen.”
I meet my guard’s concerned eyes, catch the bob of his throat before he sprints toward the palace.
Asha is sitting on a sofa I had made for her right on the cliff so she didn’t have to sit on stone while we swam. Her blistered fingers work a strip of green paper into a serpent which she tosses, after completion, into a wicker basket overflowing withmulti-hued origami. “Seven days,” she says matter-of-factly. “Seven. Days.”
“I heard.” I paddle toward the stone edge. “I sense a lecture coming.”
“You’re right, but it won’t be coming from me.” She flicks her gaze in the direction of the palace.
Of course…The queen. I’ve no doubt she’ll have much to say about my extensive convalescence. “They’re both cured, right?”
Asha snatches another strip of paper—orange this time. “Yes.”
“Then it was worth it.” As I grab ahold of the ladder, I press my hair aside, catching the glimmer of the magical band on my bicep. My heart quickens, creating little ripples around my body. “Hey, Asha, how does bargaining work? Does the supernatural being need be present to claim a bargain?”
“Afraid your grandmother’s about to strike one with you to prevent you from healing other birds?”
“Yes,” I lie.
