She read slowly, but the answers soon unfolded for me, the first bit of true hope I had felt in these many months.
A mermaid can become a creature of the land, and bear a child with men, but it is not easy magic. It is a custom in some areas of the world for a young mermaid to be offered to a human chieftain as a bride, whether she wishes it or not. She must swallow a shore-stone and then he must take the shore-stone from her. This will give her legs forever and she will be as beautiful as any woman who ever walked the earth, but she will lose her memories and if she ever lays eyes on the stone, she is likely to steal it back and abandon her husband and children. Her children are likely to be sickly. The other path is harder still, for it requires true trust and love between a man and his bride…
Chapter Twenty-Three
Wrindel
“Ngaaah…!” In the wave of a painful contraction, Talwyn scraped my bare leg. I had rolled up my trousers and was trying to help as best I could, but she had mostly been clawing at me and squeezing my hands off. “Just get it over with already!” she snapped at her own belly.
“It’ll be over soon,” I said, trying my best to soothe her. I don’t think I was much use at this point.
She slumped into the water for a moment, just her hands still remaining above the surface, now clenching the edge of the pool.
The royal midwife hovered in the background, looking calm but staying out of it. She was a kind woman who seemed to genuinely like Talwyn, but she had been very uncomfortable examining her. I think she was just praying nothing bad happened. Talwyn had spoken to a mermaid midwife about what to expect, but the woman wouldn’t come to the palace. Ellara was there too, and had been fetching water and towels all through the night since Talwyn first went into labor.
I don’t think it was only pain that had Talwyn clawing at me and screaming. The stakes were so high that I had been drinking a little too much ale this evening myself.
According to the book, there was a proper way to make a mermaid your bride. First, she had to activate the magic of the shore-stone. Then, the man must take the shore-stone. A child must be conceived. And then, the man must return the shore-stone to her, restore her memories, and claim her once more in her true form.
Only this, the book said, would seal the bonds of love and trust to a sufficient degree that she could become a part of her lover’s world forever.
By pure accident, we had done everything right.
“Hardly by accident,” Talwyn said at the time. “It makes perfect sense. It was the right way to treat someone you love, that’s all.”
But putting all our trust in a thousand-year-old book was all we could lean on, and it still didn’t give all the details we wanted. Would our child be healthy? Was Talwyn going to get her legs back? If the book was wrong, it was wrong, and that would be that. The lack of surety or having any control over our fate was making us both a little crazy.
We would love this child no matter what it was, but there was nothing we could do if it couldn’t survive. And if that happened, we could never dare to try again.
“It’s coming…” She gripped my hand and then looked at me plaintively. “Oh, Wrin, here we go…please tell me it will be all right.”
“It’ll be all right, sunshine.”
She gripped both my hands, screaming as she pushed. Her tail thrashed and her face turned bright red. Ellara covered her eyes.
“Try to breathe,” the midwife urged.
“Should she come out of the water so we can see what’s happening?” Ellara asked, slowly lowering her hands, looking pale and very pregnant herself. She had wanted to help, but I wondered if it was such a good idea.
Talwyn’s eyes opened wide and she pulled away from me. “Something’s happening…” She sounded scared. I thought my heart might bloody well stop. I jumped into the water with her, instantly soaking my clothes, and tried to hold her.
She flailed, and kicked me. At least it felt that way. And then I saw—it was true. Her tail had split into legs. Her scream now was absolutely bloodcurdling. “What’s happening to me? It hurts…”
“You have legs.”
She started sobbing in a choked way.
“Get her to the bed,” the midwife said.
“No—no, I still want to be in the water…please…” She pushed again, and I saw a head starting to emerge, past all the bubbles kicked up by our commotion. Ellara had walked right up to the edge of the pool.
“Talwyn, I can see it! You’re doing great!” she said.
Another push, another scream—Ithrin knocked on the door and was ignored by everyone—and I tried to catch the infant in my hands but the baby was born screaming—and swimming. Talwyn seemed ready for this and caught the wriggling little creature in her hands.
Our child was a mer.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Talwyn
When I saw her, I started crying with some relief and a good dose of complete despair. The midwife rushed over to help. Now that the baby was out, she seemed to know what to do, cutting the cord and cleaning her off. “You should get into bed so I can examine you,” she said, but I hardly paid attention. I looked at my little girl, stroking the fine layer of fair hair on her head. She looked elven.
“Is it a girl or a boy?” Wrindel asked, in a preternaturally calm voice.
“A girl…the easiest way to tell is that males have a small extra fin at the base of their tail.”
“She looks healthy,” he said. Her tail already felt strong, her fins flopping as she let out little furious cries.
I sobbed again, utterly exhausted and weak, blood clouding the water. “My legs, Wrin… I can’t change back. I don’t understand what happened…”
“It must have something to do with the magic. Like the book said, if you conceive a child while you have legs, you can become a part of this world forever.”
“She—she can’t grow up as a mermaid if neither of us are merfolk! I can’t consign my baby to a life inside of a tiny pool…” I started bawling. Gods, I just felt broken. After all the build up, all the worry…I realized how much I had expected a baby with legs. I wasn’t supposed to be the one who got legs out of this. What could I do? Find her a mer-family to foster her? Maybe one of my sisters would raise her?
But she was ours. I didn’t want to give her up. But now it seemed I was human.
I felt like the gods had just played a huge trick on me.
Ellara and the midwife both seemed speechless. Damn it all, I knew everyone expected a new elven prince or princess.
Wrin, my poor soaking wet and shivering Wrin, cradled my head against his chest. “Can I hold her?” he asked.
“Of—of course…”
I passed her into his arms.
As the baby left my touch and was swept into her elven father’s embrace, fully out of the water, a miracle happened before my eyes. Her tail split into legs. She started kicking and screaming now.
“Talwyn—look—”
“I see!”
Ellara gasped. “Legs!” she cried.
“Does that mean she’ll be a mermaid whenever I hold her, and an elf whenever you hold her?” I asked, which was horrifying in another way.
“Let’s see.”
“I’m almost afraid to touch her now…” But when I took her back, she kept her legs. It was only when I lowered her back into the water that she changed into a mermaid again. And then, back to legs when Wrindel pulled her out. She started screaming her little head off.
“She’s both,” I marveled. “It’s—it’s perfect.”
“I don’t she likes changing,” he said with a laugh. “Come on, let’s get you both into the bed.”
Ellara took the baby and toweled her off, gushing over her little toes, while Wrindel toweled me off and helped me into a shift. My legs felt newborn again, and I was deeply sore and utterly exhausted. Still, it was such a happy time, now that I knew it had all worked out. I could hardly believe that I was human again, and so was she.
> I woke up a little later, groggy and disoriented. My baby was in her crib right beside my bed, swaddled and sleeping. Ellara was on the other side of the room at the breakfast table, setting out a spread.
“The menfolk are celebrating with a little honey wine,” Ellara said. “You’d better wake up if you don’t like the name Melitara. Wrindel wants to name her after his late mother. Ithrin was planning naming two girls after his mother and sister, but yours did come first. They’re arguing over it now.”
“You know, if they can work it out amongst themselves, it’s fine with me,” I said. “It’s a nice name. I know how important the late family is to them. I never thought of what to call her. I was…superstitious about it, I guess.”
“She’s beautiful,” Ellara said, looking into the crib.
“She’s very small…” It made me nervous to be responsible for such a helpless little thing.
“Babies typically are small,” Ellara said.
“Read up on that, did you?” I teased her. She was always starting sentences with “I read in one of the baby books…” I was still struggling with the words a bit, although improving. Wrindel said he didn’t take to reading easily either.
“Our little ones are going to be almost as close in age as twins.” She handed me a cup of coffee. “I put a lot of milk in it because I don’t know if you should drink that while you’re nursing. I guess I’d better find out, shouldn’t I?”
“I’m drinking it anyway.” I sighed, throwing off the covers. I still wasn’t used to being smothered in cloth. I looked at my feet and slowly flexed my toes. Then I looked at little possibly-Melitara. “I envy her. She can change back. I guess you have to be born of both worlds to exist in both worlds.”
“It’s the magic of love,” Ellara said dreamily. “I told you.”
“You’re such a romantic.”
“I have turned into one, haven’t I? I wasn’t always. But I’m still a naughty goblin—hold on.” She waved a finger at me and crossed the room, rummaging in a bag. “By the way, I almost threw up when you were having the baby. It probably doesn’t bode well for me.”
“Oh yes, I saw you covering your eyes over there.”
“I didn’t think I was squeamish, but…when your tail split into legs, at first I thought the baby broke you.”
“You and me both.”
“The goblin queen, Sabela? She sent me this healing stone when she heard I was pregnant…” She took out a smooth white stone that could only be described as…phallic. “It’s a goblin spell. Actually, a faery spell. Those faeries, my goodness! The stories I’ve heard about them. But—the goblins and the faeries trade a lot. It heals you up after pregnancy very fast. Of course, first you are only going to think about feeling better. But it’ll also help shorten the time for you to…get back to business with Wrindel, you know. She sent it to me, but I think you should have it.”
After she left, with considerable trepidation, I slid the stone inside me. I was braced for it to hurt, but it was actually soothing and warm and felt really wonderful—and vaguely arousing. I nursed Melitara and fell into the sleep of ages—until she started crying again.
The next several days were much the same and we weren’t alone enough to do anything, but I must say I rather enjoyed them. I finally felt like a proper princess, laying in bed with my newborn, sleeping as much as I could, with no responsibilities whatsoever. Occasionally a maid would come and spruce up my hair and offer me a robe so I could show her off to members of the court. I was also appointed a nurse for the baby, a very kind woman around fifty years of age—young for an elf—who had once been a nurse for Wrin.
Best of all, my sisters came to the court for the first time. Wrindel and Ithrin met them at the shore and brought them to my room, and we all tried to give Melitara a bath. She hated it. Her screams were unrelenting. At least for now, Melitara liked legs better, but maybe she was just used to them. I knew how that felt.
Allie and Mirella were still delighted. They loved the palace and gushed over little Mellie despite her crying.
“Just think, Arlion and I might have one of our own in another couple of years!” Mirella said, to my horror. I had to remind myself that even Mirella was almost eighteen now.
I embarrassed myself by sobbing when they had to go, but soon I would be able to walk to the shore and visit them and show Mellie her other home.
Finally, a calm afternoon fell, the nurse was taking the baby out for a stroll in the garden, and the healing stone seemed to have done a miraculous job of putting my poor body back to rights. When Wrindel came in from an evening card game with Ithrin, I was waiting for him wearing nothing but stockings.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Wrindel
I swung open the door, shrugging off my jacket, and stopped short when I saw Talwyn spread out on the bed, almost entirely naked, her breasts full and luscious, her belly still a little rounded from carrying our child. In recent months I had noticed, despite the pregnancy, that her once tanned skin had grown pale and she wasn’t as strong as she once was.
But right now, she had never looked so content and fertile and I could see the sunlight coming back into her eyes, the bright future ahead of us. Soon, I would teach her to ride and take her all over the countryside.
“Talwyn…gods. Isn’t it too soon? I don’t know much about these things…”
“Ellara gave me a little faery trick to help with that, a healing stone that goes inside me. It’s been healing me right up and it works very well. It also has been reminding me constantly how good it’s going to feel to have you inside me again… It’s made me feel so open and ready for you. Take off your trousers.”
My cock was already painfully hard, but I didn’t obey her right away. Instead I slid onto the bed beside her, grabbed her wrists and pinned them to the sheets, kissing her roughly.
“Is it still inside you now?” I asked.
“Yes…”
“Good.” I kept her hands pinned so she couldn’t do anything about it, but now I crossed her wrists just behind her head and held them with one of mine. I fondled her heavy breasts until she was panting hard. I bit her nipples, tasting drops of her sweet milk, but then I left them alone so there would be milk enough for Mellie.
I slipped my fingers between her folds, finding the base of the healing stone, a warm hard shaft inside her.
“Should I be jealous?”
“It’s not as big as you,” she said.
I pulled it out to see its size. “A little faery trick, huh? Not so little.” I shoved it back inside her and felt her stiffen at the invasion. I hoped I hadn’t been too rough—but then I saw her mouth fall open and her eyes hood with pleasure and knew I had not. My girl was ready for anything by now.
“Please, Wrin, it’s just a tease,” she said. “It stirs my senses without satisfying anything.”
“You need satisfaction, sunshine?”
“Yes…yes. Don’t take too long. I don’t know how long Hanaria will be gone with Mellie.”
I let go of her hands, spread her gorgeous legs, and sucked on her clit.
“Oh gods…”
“You missed this, didn’t you?”
“More than I wanted to admit!”
I licked and sucked on her clit with complete focus, deciding that this was no time to keep her waiting long. She was so wet and ripe. The spring strawberries could not have tasted sweeter than she did, but even sweeter was the way she writhed and let out shuddering gasps.
“More, please…,” she said.
“You really are the girl of my dreams, aren’t you?”
“I’d better be, after all we’ve been through.”
“But I still haven’t had all of you, sunshine. I want to fuck that sweet little ass of yours. While that stone is inside you, filling you up everywhere.”
She blushed so deeply that it tested all my willpower.
“You want to know how it feels, don’t you?” I spoke softly in her ear.
“I
do.” She nibbled her nail. “It won’t hurt?”
“What happened the last time you asked that question?”
“Nothing bad.”
“Exactly.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Talwyn
Wrindel put his hands on my hips and rolled me over, just stroking my bare bottom for a moment. I was still nervous that the nursemaid might return, but I was also nervous for what he was about to do, so I let him caress me. It felt so good to have legs again, even though they didn’t feel quite right. The skin was so exquisitely sensitive. In some ways, I hope I never got entirely used to having legs. It made his touch all the more stimulating.
Gently, he slipped a hand under my pelvis and pulled me up so I was kneeling on the bed, my ass in the air. I could feel his anticipation and it made me want it more. I could hear his breath quicken with excitement. He opened a drawer and took out a bottle of oil.
“You’re so perfect, Tal,” he said. “Since the day I saw you.”
“I’m just so glad I’m…human again.”
“I’m glad you don’t have to live like a decorative fish in a pond,” he said. “And yes, I’m glad that it’s so much easier for us to give each other pleasure this way. But you’ve never been less than perfect to me.”
“I know.” I swallowed down a lump of joy threatening to become tears. “But get on with it already. The nursemaid!”
He tugged my ass back against his pelvis and cupped my dangling breasts. “The door has a lock.” I could feel the healing stone teasing against my inner walls, building up my arousal, and slowly ground my ass against him, feeling it inside me like an itch being scratched.
He slicked his cock with the lubricant and spread my knees apart a little farther on the bed, so I was at the right level. In another moment I felt the head press against my nether hole. It was a strange sensation, but he had already been preparing me for this. I was used to his fingers there, just not something as thick as his cock. And at the same time, the healing stone was already filling me, but not nearly enough. I craved something more. I wanted to satisfy him in every way, and I trusted him that he would never hurt me. He pushed farther, and I forced myself to relax, as I knew I must not tense my muscles if I was going to take him.
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