She settled down with them. Merrigan paused to fight down the flash of irritation, because wasn't this her mermaid, her discovery? What right did Ma have, sticking her nose into what was turning out to be an interesting story? Then as Merrigan listened to Bib filling Ma in on what they had seen and learned so far, and the struggle to figure out how to pronounce the girl's name, she reasoned that of course, Ma had every right. She was the queen of the Bookish Mermaid, just as much as Merrigan had been queen of Carlion. How would Merrigan feel if someone brought a stranger into her palace and tried to keep information from her? After that, she could smile with the others as they decided that Elli was the easiest name to use for the girl. By this time, Elli had drunk half of the brew Ma had thrown together for her, and Merrigan could have sworn that most of the dry, frizzy look to her hair had smoothed out. Unfortunately, no instant hair growth. Her skin took on a faintly silvery cast, almost a glow, and she looked ... well, "damper" would be the best word Merrigan could come up with.
"Every Sea King has a dozen daughters, at least, for every son they produce," Elli said, when they returned to the explanation of how she had come to be so far from her home territory under the waves. "Despite the losses we incur every generation, from foolish maidens who go up to the surface and fall in love with some handsome land-walker who pretends to be a prince, there are at least nine or ten daughters who take a mate and produce another daughter or two or three. My great-great-great-great-grandmother was a daughter of the Sea King." She sighed and her tears had an even stronger green tint as they plopped down into the last mouthful of the brew in her cup. "You'd think with all the land-walker blood in me, between her and my mother, I would have had the sense to stay away from the surface."
"Excuse me—land-walker?" Merrigan interrupted.
"With all those women in the water, it's not that easy finding a merman willing to settle down and take responsibility for his mate's mother and sisters and nieces, besides all the daughters they're likely to produce," Bib said. "The usual tactic is for a mermaid to come up on dry land for fifteen, twenty years, pretend to be a Human woman, take a husband—generally an old, retired sailor—and have several children. When he dies of happy old age, she takes her children and returns to the sea. The really lucky ones have a son or two with their Human husbands, which gains them quite a lot of prestige under the waves."
Chapter Eight
"That sounds ... well, that sounds rather sensible." Merrigan wondered if that was where she had made her mistake. There had been a few older kings looking for second wives who had been interested in her. The dangers of becoming a stepmother and automatically being blamed for anything that went wrong in the lives of her stepchildren had been the main reason for refusing to let the emissaries present their courting gifts.
"Not sensible enough. Not where I was concerned," Elli said. "My bad luck was to run into a real prince. I should have taken that old sailor with a fleet of small boats, who took rich people out on overnight trips up and down the coast. He didn't care about treasure, and I did like the paintings he made."
"Since when is it bad luck to marry a real prince?" Merrigan said with a chuckle.
"Run into a prince," Ma corrected her gently. "That's the problem, isn't it? He cut off your hair with a magic knife, to ensure you couldn't regain your tail and swim away from him."
"Ughsalla the Sea Witch gave it to him. She's had a grudge against my family line since my great-great-great-grandmother went to another sea witch to trade her singing voice to win a prince and live happily ever after. Ughsalla has always wanted to be in the Storm Surge Chorus, but her voice is only suited to creating typhoons." A few more green teardrops slid down Elli's cheeks and plopped into her cup.
"We need to get that knife back," Ma said. "Can you think of any other way to make her hair grow back and regain her tail, Bib?"
"No, I'm sorry." Bib riffled his pages, flipping up and then down again in a shrug. "I've been ransacking all the books I have ever visited that even mention mermaids. They disagree on so many details, some so ludicrous I could laugh until my pages tear out. However, they do agree that any change made to a mermaid through magic must be repaired by that same magic. Especially a magical tool."
"How do we get that knife?" Merrigan said. "What kingdom is that wretched prince from?"
The prince, it turned out, was now the king of Quibblshtahn, a small kingdom north of Swyfflbyrne. When Elli ran away from him, he didn't suffer a broken heart, but proved he was a vindictive, spoiled brat. In his search for a royal bride, he crossed the Great Ocean to Armorica. He left the magic knife, encrusted with jewels, with his bride's father in the tiny kingdom of Seafoam. Since Elli couldn't swim or buy passage on a ship to take her there, she couldn't retrieve the knife.
Merrigan could barely hold back a squeak of delight at that
