Her legs fused together. They sprouted scales, pale as sand, and patterned with little pink things like coral, which she would tell me many years later were called “flowers”. I pulled the ragged remains of her clothing from her, and carried her home to the Sea Witch. She would know what to do. What I had done.

As I passed into the colony I signed with my free hand to another soldier that there was an emergency. He would tell the Captain, and she would find someone to fill in for me. The girl was asleep, passed out. I carried her to our home, and directly into the Sea Witch’s workshop. She was with someone, a client – something about true love? – So I laid the girl in one of the alcoves in the cave, and waited patiently.

There’s always a price for the Sea Witch’s magic. A goal must be met, or else. My goal had been to marry a landwalker, or else turn into sea foam. It was a common price for merpeople, turning into sea foam. I didn’t know what goal this landwalker child would have to try to reach, or what price she might have to pay, to live under the sea.

When the mermaid left with her potion, and knowledge of the price that might need paying, the Sea Witch turned to me. “Who is this?” She signed to me.

“A landwalker child.” I signed back. “I gave her my potion.”

The Sea Witch nodded absently and went to look at the girl. She tested the girl’s tail, arms, checked her eyes, looked at the new gils on the side of the girl’s neck, and listened, for a moment, to the girl’s chest. When she finished she went to a shelf in the workshop and took down a carved stone tablet. She looked it over as I waited impatiently, trying not to fidget.

Finally she turned back to me. “There is a price for all things.” She signed to me.

I nodded. “I will pay it.”

“You cannot.” The signing took me by surprise.

“It was my potion.” I signed back emphatically.

“If you want to pay a price, then you may choose to raise the child. But she must pay her own price.”

“What is it?” I signed, thinking there might still be a way for me to pay it.

“She must marry a merperson in thirteen years, or she will turn into a colony of jellyfish.”

I drifted to the sea flow beside the sleeping child. I looked at her. “She is so young.”

The Sea Witch touched my shoulder gently, understanding. “Children grow.”