Anne Brown: Promise Bound

She was concerned? I didn’t know what to make of that.

“It was no picnic,” Dad said.

This time it was Maris’s turn to laugh. “I can’t imagine.” She touched my dad’s arm lightly, and both he and Calder braced against it.

She said to Dad and me, “I am glad you both came to the pier today. If we’re going to be sharing the lake, it’s about time we got to know each other better.”

“Um … yeah,” I said. “We should hang out sometime.” And Maris laughed again. Weird.

“Sophie is well?” Pavati asked. “Has she …?”

“No,” I said. My shoulders relaxed at her question. “She’s still the same little girl as before.”

“I see how it is,” Pavati said as she drew her conclusion: the consequence of a merman father was that the gene did not pass down to all the heirs. I didn’t know if she was right. Only time would tell.

Pavati looked anxiously at the lake. “Now, Maris?”

“Yes,” Maris said. “If you’ll excuse us, Lily. Jason.” Dad’s name still sounded hard for her to say. She didn’t acknowledge Calder or Danny at all. “We need to go.” Maris headed for the trees, but despite her own apparent eagerness, Pavati held back.

Calder and Dad headed toward the parking lot.

“Already?” Danny asked, looking up from the baby’s face. “But you just—”

Pavati’s eyes grew glossy, then thick with tears that she refused to let fall. She dropped a quick kiss onto the baby’s forehead without a word to Danny. To me, she said, “You got my letter?”

“I did,” I whispered, casting a nervous glance in Calder’s direction. He had to be listening, even from his distance.

“And?” Pavati asked.

I shook my head infinitesimally. Just my luck she’d bring that up with Calder in earshot.

“We’ll talk later,” she said, and with that she followed Maris into the trees. I pulled at Danny’s arm. He didn’t need to watch them stripping down. In fact, I was pretty sure that would be a really bad idea.

“Wait,” Danny called out to Pavati. “You didn’t tell me his name.”

“Come on,” I said, tugging harder on his elbow, pulling him in Calder’s direction. “We can figure all that out later.”

“He needs to have a name,” Danny said.

There were two clean splashes as Maris and Pavati entered the lake, their migration complete. Danny and I turned at the sound. We watched for some last sign of them, but the lake had returned to a glassy sheet.

“Come on,” I said. “Let’s go back to our house.”

Danny fumbled the bundle of blankets as he readjusted his grip. Calder hit the horn lightly and I waved at him to be patient.

“You okay?” Dad asked. He had his car door open and he stood just inside it, with one arm resting on the roof. “You want me to take the baby?”

Danny sighed and looked down at the face of his sleeping son. “No. I’m okay for now. He’s”—Danny swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing—“he’s mine. I’ve got him.”

CALDER

As I drove back to the Hancock house with Lily in the passenger seat, I watched Daniel Catron’s car in my rearview mirror. What speed was he going? Fifteen miles an hour? I slowed down so I didn’t get too far ahead of him. The kid was twitchy, and he made me nervous. Was he slowing down again? The boy had slipped into protective father mode more easily than I had feared.

Lily played with her pendant, rolling it around in her fingers as she stared out the window. She said, “Y’know, Maris wasn’t actually that bad. Is it possible you’ve misjudged her all these years?”

At first I thought Lily was joking and I laughed out loud, but she kept her serious expression, so I had to level her with reason. “Maybe you’ve forgotten. She used your little sister as bait, knocked me unconscious, trapped me in a fishing net, had Tallulah lure you to your death, then made us risk our lives by going into Copper Falls.”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” she said.

“Don’t tell me I’ve misjudged her.”

“But still,” Lily persisted. “It is possible she’s changed.”

“You’re generous to a fault,” I said.

“Maris said she wants us all to share the lake in peace.”

I pulled into the Hancocks’ driveway and parked in Jason’s usual spot. Daniel pulled in beside us. “Only because she knows you, me, and Jason aren’t competition.”

“Competition?” Lily asked.

Why hadn’t I kept my mouth shut? I looked down at my hands, still on the steering wheel, and said, “We won’t interfere with her hunting schedule. She won’t have to factor us in when she figures out the pacing and rationing for the summer.”

“Oh,” Lily said, because what more could she say.

I turned to face her, taking in her innocent expression. Her gray eyes, now tinted with silver. Her auburn hair fanned out across her shoulders. She still looked so very human. Her transformation hadn’t brought on many mer-characteristics: no silver ring around her neck, no ability to see emotion, no electrical impulse. She couldn’t even breathe underwater, though she could now hold her breath for nearly an hour. The thought that she might not escape the worst of our traits—that she might one day feel the need to hunt—filled me with dread.

I couldn’t help but ask, “Are you going to tell me about the letter?”

She blinked. “What letter?”

Fine. We could do this later. I kicked open my door and got out. Lily followed. Jason pulled in behind us, and once the driveway dust settled, Daniel got out of his car with the baby. He handed Lily a folded piece of paper.

“What’s this?” she asked, unfolding it.

“It was tucked inside the blankets,” Daniel said. “It fell out when I put him in the car.”

I looked over Lily’s shoulder and read the note aloud: “Ambuj. Born from the water.”

Daniel said, “I know, right?”

“I don’t get it,” Lily said. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Daniel took the note back and shoved it in his jeans pocket. “I think it’s what Pavati wants to name the baby. We talked about it back when …,” Daniel faded off. “Pavati’s father was from India. Ambuj must be Hindu or something for ‘born from the water,’ but how does someone walk around Bayfield with a name like that?”

“He won’t be walking around here for long,” Lily reminded him. She bent down and tugged at her leg warmers. “As soon as he’s walking, he’s out of here. Got it?” She held out her arms and Daniel passed her the baby. Lily looked good holding him. Very natural. I liked it.

The front door opened and Sophie wheeled Mrs. H onto the porch. “Is that who I think it is?” Mrs. H asked, her voice lighter and more gleeful than any of ours had been. Of course we’d let her in on the Daniel-Pavati situation months ago. There was no point in secrets anymore. Now that her husband and her daughter broke into tails on a regular basis, Mrs. H had raised her bar when it came to weird. Sophie had been right about her all along. Mrs. H was stronger than her wheelchair let on.

“Is it a boy or a girl?” she asked.

“Boy,” Daniel said.

“Oh, bring him here. Bring him here!” she exclaimed. Lily climbed the porch steps and tried to place the baby in her mother’s arms, but Mrs. H declined, saying, “Oh, no. You hold him. I’ll just look from here. Isn’t he darling, such a sweet baby.” She looked up at Daniel. “What did your parents say?”

Daniel shifted his feet and Lily raised both eyebrows at him as if to say, See what an idiot you are? Her expression made me choke back a laugh, and Daniel shot me an irritated look.

“I haven’t exactly told them yet,” Daniel said, as Lily handed the baby back to him. “I’m going to be staying at my cousin’s apartment in Washburn. She’s been deployed to Afghanistan for the next eighteen months, and she’s letting me stay rent-free so long as I keep the place up. My parents are just glad to have me finally move out.”