“Only you don’t have feet.Oh, God.Oh, God.”
“Calm down, you infant.Even Jacques Cousteau wasn’t asoverwrought as this.”
“You really did know him?So—wait...”Priddy tried to catch hisbreath and bring his voice down an octave or so.“What does thatmake you—immortal, as well as a mermaid?”
“Not immortal, no.I’d have died tonight if not for you.Achange on land is one of the few ways to kill us.And...there’snothing maidenly about me, as you’ll find out soonenough.”
Priddyshivered hotly.“Sorry.I scarcely dare ask what’s become of JohnThomas.”
“Oh, he’s in there.Just tucked away behind an armoured wall ofmuscle and scales, like any sensible penis ought to be.Can youplease pay attention?This has to be done in the proper, formalway.”
“What has?”
“Just a short ceremony.Landlings can’t be allowed to knowabout us, you see, not unless they’ve done us a greatservice.”
“But...doesn’t my dad know about you now?”
“Not at all.I’m just a drunken vision that will haunt him therest of his life.But you, Jem Priddy...Wait.What’s Jem shortfor, when it’s a boy?”
“Nothing.”
“Yes, it is.You’d better tell me, or you’ll go down in theannals as Jemima.”
“Jeremy, then,” Priddy growled.“And don’t ever call me that.What annals?”
“Never mind now.”Merou cleared his throat and raised hisvoice, as if something in the water or the diamond-blazing sky wasbearing witness.“Jeremy Priddy, you have done a favour for aspirit of the sea.In consideration of such, I can now, by thepowers of the Mer in Lyonesse, grant you a wish.”
Priddy settled more comfortably on the great coil of tail.He’d been cold for a while, but now he too was sin-toasty warm.Maybe he was drowning, or in end-stage hypothermia, and somebodyelse’s life was flashing in front of him.“An actualwish?”
“Yes.Just like in a fairytale, or...”The tail gave a teasingjounce beneath him.“...or when you were a little lad on Santa’sknee in Trago.Come on—make it a good one.You saved mylife.”
“Technically I saved it twice.Once just now, and the otherday—”
“Crikey, did you bargain with Santa like this?That one doesn’tcount.I only needed saving then because you turned me into abiped.”
“Idid?How is that supposed to havehappened?”
“I tried to tell you at the time.Youtouchedme.If a landling lays a handon us, and if we like the hand enough, we can change.Sometimes,”he said ruefully, tightening his grasp round Priddy’s waist, “welike it so much, we don’t get any choice.”
“I’m sorry.”Priddy didn’t mean it: he was overwhelmed withpride, to have been the catalyst for such a transformation.“Itdidn’t seem to hurt you then, though.Not much, anyway.”
“It’s fine if it happens in the sea.It just feels likebeing...unzipped, or zipped up again, if I’m going the other way.Did you think of your wish yet?Would you like a speedboat?Yourfather’s heart, liver and lungs served up to you on a silverplate?”
“Jesus, Merou.”Priddy pulled a face, but the thought of oldVigo’s entrails didn’t really disturb him.What scared him was thepower of his wish.I wish you’d stay withme forever, with your magic and your laughter, and your sweetnessthat makes everything else I’ve discovered in this world so farseem hollow and bitter and dry.But thatwish wasn’t fair.It involved someone else, and what if Meroudidn’t want to stay?If by some insane chance all of this was real,and the wish had binding force, he’d be trapped.
Priddycould only ask for something for himself.“I wish,” he saidfaintly, leaning his brow against Merou’s, “that I’d never takenthose damn pills.”
Meroubecame very still.Somewhere in the waters below, the great flukewas sculling, place-holding them against the tide, but he stoppedstroking Priddy’s hair and tipped his head a little, as iflistening.“Ah,” he said regretfully after a moment.“Can’t bedone.Would involve swimming in time with an unqualified person,and the inevitable paradox.If you hadn’t taken the pills, you’dnever have ended up here, so we’d never have met, and I couldn’t behere granting your wish, or trying to.You see?”
“I do, but so far you’re a pretty crap Santa, if you don’t mindmy saying so.”And where would you havegot the speedboat from—whipped it out from under some innocentfamily of five, three of them under eighteen and one a baby?The thought glanced through Priddy’s mind thenflew away.He laid his head on Merou’s shoulder.“Don’t worry.Thatwas a stupid thing to ask.”
“Not at all.And I do have an alternative.Come withme.”
“Where?”
“Not topside.Not back to your lighthouse.”Merou stroked hishair, and after a momentary shiver at the feel of the webbingagainst his neck, Priddy pushed back to find the touch.“I canbreathe for both of us, Priddy.Listen to me.My kind can store andshare a lungful of air for hours.We worship the air, just like adesert-dweller would worship water.It was so hard for you, turningdown that dope.I can cleanse you.I can take all that pain out ofyour bones forever, wipe away the addictive pathways in yourbrain.”
Not analternative.The true essence of Priddy’s wish laid bare.“This iscrazy.How?”
