Appearing close to tears, she dove back into the water and darted off. His hands were everywhere, gliding through her hair as it floated in the water behind her, and finding her firm breast. The mermaid recovered quickly, but didn’t climb back onto the rock, opting instead to keep everything below her navel in the ocean. The two of them sat there for hours, hand in hand, and perfectly content to watch the candle burn to a stub. Despite having seen mermaids from time to time, he still found their culture very much a mystery, since usually (present company excepted) they were too shy to do much more than show themselves for just a moment, darting and diving between the waves. He hoped there would be, with a power he normally reserved for his duty: upkeep and operation of his home. He suspected the legends of mermaids dragging men to their deaths were most likely just that: legends, exaggerated like those of the supposed malice in their songs. He was staring at an indistinct point in the sky, a hand cupping his ear, enraptured once again by the music that he’d been hearing on and off for years.
