The Cerulean (The Cerulean Duology #1) - Amy Ewing Page 0,118

that he felt should be told on the front steps. “Come on, quiet now, okay? Let’s get you to bed.”

She stumbled twice going up the stairs, but he managed to get her into her room without waking the house. She fell back onto her bed and stared up at the ceiling. Leo had to acknowledge the incredible role reversal that was going on this evening—he’d been sneaking around trying to do good and help Sera, while his sister was the one out getting drunk.

“You know I’m not going to let you live this down for, oh, at least a year,” he said as he knelt to unlace her shoes.

“That’s okay.” Agnes let out a little sigh. “It was worth it.”

“Who was that Pelagan girl?”

“Vada. Her name is Vada.” She said it softly, like it was precious. “She’s a sailor. She’s going to help me get Sera to Pelago.”

Leo dropped her shoe and stood up. “Sera?” he said. “To Pelago?”

Agnes clapped a hand over her mouth. “I didn’t say that. You didn’t hear that. I didn’t—”

“Are you going to get her to that . . . that tether? The one she saw in the photograph of the ruins?” He sat on the edge of the bed.

“How do you know about that?”

“I can understand her now. I saw her tonight—talked to her. Father’s keeping her locked up in a crate in the Maribelle.”

“What . . .” Agnes rubbed her eyes. “How did she . . . did you two . . .” She tapped her index fingers together. “The thing with the glowing and the magic . . .”

“What?” Leo wondered if the Pelagan had miscounted the number of drinks Agnes had had. “No, I think it was when her blood healed me. Is that how it happened with you? Did she heal you too?”

Agnes pressed her index fingers together again. “No, no, it was the thing,” she said again, insistently. “Blood bond, that’s what she called it. And I saw . . .”

“You saw her memories, didn’t you,” he said.

She sucked in a breath. “Yes.”

“She saw mine too. Did she see—”

“Yes,” she said again.

They sat in silence, lost in thought.

“What did you see?” Agnes asked.

“Grandmother McLellan being her usual charming self,” Leo said wryly. “Making snow angels with Robert and his mother. I saw her friend who gave her the star necklace and her three mothers. That’s weird, isn’t it? Three mothers.”

“I saw them too,” she said. “And her city made of glass.”

“How do they even make babies? I mean, there didn’t seem to be any men.”

“I know. It’s wonderful, isn’t it?” She lay down again. “A city with no men.”

“Thanks,” Leo said.

“Parthenogenesis,” Agnes said, sitting back up abruptly.

“Um . . . bless you?”

She frowned at him. It took her eyes a second to focus. “Parthenogenesis,” she said. “It’s the process by which an embryo can develop from an unfertilized egg. I think Sera’s people, the Cerulean, must procreate using some form of parthenogenesis. I’ve only ever heard of it happening in bees and lizards and sometimes birds. But they are magic, I suppose. . . .” She cocked her head. “What were you doing there anyway? Why did you go see her?”

“Because I wanted some answers. I tried to talk to you, didn’t I? But you had more important things to do, like get drunk with Pelagan sailors.”

Agnes giggled again. “I had very important things to do,” she clarified.

“I can see that.” Leo scratched the back of his neck. “And I wanted to apologize to her. For, you know, the net and . . . everything else.”

She stared at him, then threw back her head and laughed.

“Shh!” he hissed. “You’ll wake the whole house!”

Agnes pressed her face into her pillow, her body shaking with laughter. “I’m sorry,” she gasped, coming up for air. “You went to apologize? Oh, I wish I could have seen that. Have you ever apologized before? For anything? What did you even say?”

There is nothing that is keeping you from choosing to be the right kind of person.

Leo hesitated. It was different confessing to Agnes than it had been to Sera. She might have seen a few of his memories, but he had known Agnes his whole life, and he had spent much of that life obsequiously following his father and trying to make her miserable. He wasn’t sure she would believe what he told her now. But he supposed he had to start somewhere. He picked a piece of lint off his trousers and stared