He sat down at the water’s edge, his legs crossed, and gazed at her with a look she couldn’t decipher. Whatever it was she saw on his face, it definitely wasn’t the love she longed for. She swam over and sat near him, carefully holding his gaze, and the longer they looked at each other the worse her disappointment became. He wasn’t avoiding her now, but he didn’t seem all that happy to see her either.

The air around them was very quiet. Luce could hear the far-off trill of a bird, but there was nothing else. No haunted mutterings moved through the wind, and Luce suddenly wondered if her father felt lonely now that the enchantment was broken.

“I guess you aren’t what I thought you were,” her father said after a minute. “But I know you can’t really be her. Not really, even if I want you to be. Don’t know what that does make you, though . . .”

Luce’s pain began to shift into anger. He’d seemed to understand, but now he was shutting out the truth all over again, and after everything she’d gone through . . . She glared at him. “I’m Lucette Korchak. I’m your daughter!”

Her father shook his head and covered his eyes with his hands. Was he trying to shut out her face, too? “Lucette is living with my brother, Peter. Back in Pittley. And I hope to God he can find the strength in his heart to treat her decently!”

His voice broke, and Luce almost reached out to hold him, then stopped. He might recoil from her touch, and she wasn’t sure if she could stand that. And at the same time she was amazed by the implications of what her father had just said: the idea that her uncle Peter had hurt her out of weakness . . .

Maybe that was right, though. Maybe the problem with Peter was that he was simply sick and feeble, with no strength in his heart.

As tired as she was, as sick as she still felt, Luce realized her struggle wasn’t over yet. She’d brought her father part of the way toward accepting the situation, but there was still further to go. And, Luce realized grimly, she was going to have to hurt him more to persuade him.

“Peter didn’t find that much strength,” Luce announced. Her voice came out harsh, bitter. “Not even close. Like a month after you vanished he started hitting me whenever he got drunk, and it just kept getting worse.”

Her father took his hands away from his eyes, and Luce saw that he was crying. But she couldn’t stop now. It was simply too incredible: that this was his own girl, his Luce, but somehow transfigured into a mermaid. He’d only accept it once he really understood what had happened to her.