EPILOGUE
They drove along thecoast until they found a sheltered beach. Granite cliffs curved around it, forming a cup and cutting them off from view. In warmer weather the beach would have been packed, but snow was falling lightly and it was completely empty. Of people, that was. A few seagulls flew in the distance, and the tidepools teemed with cold-hardy life.
Norris and Annabeth had stopped to change out of their party clothes and into warmer attire, but Annabeth had kept on her Star of David necklace and her Christmas tree ornament earrings, a pair of cheerful red balls dangling from tinsel chains.
She fingered them both now. “My jewelry comes with me, right?”
Norris nodded. “Jewelry, clothes, shoes, and small items without much mass, like wallets.”
“I wonder where the mass of the Dunkleosteus comes from. And where it goes.”
“That,” he said enthusiastically, “Is the key mystery of shifters. I was hoping to study that when I had access to Elayne’s lab, but it wasn’t anything she was interested in. And then, well.”
Jail,his Dunkleosteus put in gloomily.Durance vile on dry land.
“After that, nobody else was interested either,” he concluded. “At least, not interested enough to fund the research. Shifters just shrug and say it’s magic. But whatismagic? Is it a force, like gravity? Is it a new field in biology? Is it a new field of study altogether?”
“Maybe when I get my PhD, we can start our own lab,” she suggested. “We can figure out what sort of equipment we’d need. And what sort of colleagues we’d want. I have a feeling we’d need a physicist.”
“And a witch,” said Norris.
Annabeth snickered. “Imagine Blossom trotting around the lab in a fuzzy sweater.”
“I was thinking more of asking Kerenza if she knew anyone who wasn’t retired.”
“And has a less terrifying familiar?”
“Aww,” said Norris reproachfully. “Blossom’s sweet once you get used to her.”
“Imagine us trying to interview some poor unsuspecting physicist with Blossom hissing in the background,” Annabeth said, grinning. “And no bugbears either. Or flying kittens. Nothing that sheds.”
“Blossom doesn’t shed.”
“Her sweaters do.”
Norris laughed, and Annabeth joined him. She felt giddy with happiness. It felt impossible how quickly her life had been upended, and how wonderful the new pattern had been. Tomorrow she’d bring Norris to celebrate Christmakkalistice with her family. She knew they’d love him—how could they not?—and he’d love them.
And now, she was about to become a new woman—to irrevocably alter her very self.
She couldn’t wait.
“Ready to become Fish Woman?” Norris asked.
“Bring it, Fish Boy.”
They walked out on to a rocky promontory that jutted out into deeper waters. Snowflakes whirled around them in the cold and briny breeze. Annabeth’s nose and cheeks were going numb, and she shivered with cold as much as with anticipation.
Norris held up his hand. “Stop here.”
He gave her a last, lingering kiss, then ran straight out to the edge. Just before he reached it, he leaped into the air. Annabeth’s heart rose as high as the flying Dunkleosteus he became. The splash was magnificent, but she was standing back far enough that she wasn’t soaked. As the foamy ripples subsided, an immense armored head arose from the water. Norris’s eyes fixed on her as he opened his vast toothy jaws.
Annabeth walked up to the edge. She took a moment to admire his sharp triangular teeth, each one bigger than her head, and leaned out to give his armored nose a pat. He happily flapped his fins.
This is it, she thought.The moment when everything changes.
She thought of the curse, and of that strange, heartbroken look in Roland’s eyes when Merlin had talked about how the Defenders hadn’t been able to recognize their mates until the fell in love. Being a shifter had its down sides, too. She could still change her mind, if she wanted.
