Epilogue

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Shafts of light danced in the water’s depths, illuminating swathes of waving plants in shades of blue and green and silver. Ella smiled and spun, savoring the water’s caress on her skin. “I am so glad you are feeling better,” she said to the pond, and, tucking her bundle snuggly under her arm, swam towards home.

She had finished tidying the stream only a few days ago, but the water was already crystalline. Shimmering schools of fish darted across her path. Near the surface, she had seen strands of late frog spawn swaying like ropes of fairy lights. Her parents would have been delighted.

She found living under the pond surface delightful. Indeed, she was in danger of overusing the word, but it was the best she could think of to describe her new life. The pearls which Rodan gave her for underwater breathing were made of transformed morning dew. He could make an endless supply for her. She learned to swim, to grow plants underwater, which Rodan helped her to harvest and cooked himself, and to hold her breath long enough to swim to the surface without a pearl. The first thing they had done was to find that all the bottles in Rodan’s possession were, in fact, empty.

“But Rodan,” she had asked him after this discovery, “why sex?”

He shot her a look both surprised and amused. “Why did I bed all those people? Sir Edward told me to kill anyone who wandered onto his property. He never demanded a specific type of death. I chose le petit mort.”

“I suppose he never noticed you only took a single day instead of their whole lives,” Ella had mused.

Rodan had laughed. “I shall be eternally grateful for this failure of his.”

He never admitted another client from then on.

She found him harvesting a patch of water plants as she arrived. He glanced up and sent her a grin that still made her blush.

“Ella, darling.” He finished tying the bundle to keep them from floating away and kissed her, stroked her flowing hair, which had loosened in her descent. “How was the village?”

“Quite busy. And I heard the most fascinating news. Apparently, my stepmother now lives in Sir Edward’s estate.”

“However did the good lady achieve such luxury? Certainly not by stooping to deceit!” Rodan’s eyes widened in exaggerated surprise. Ella had grown accustomed to his expressions and felt a smile tugging her own lips. “And how, pray tell, did she manage that?”

“I am not sure. But the word is she married him before his tragic passing, and now lives the life she’s always wanted as his widow.”

“How lucky for her.” Rodan’s voice was grim.

Ella, upon hearing the news, had immediately wondered how the woman had convinced the authorities of her supposed marriage, and if she enjoyed ordering numerous servants around as much as she had enjoyed ordering around one stepdaughter. Perhaps those numerous servants would prove less malleable than she had been, but she would never know.

She held up the bundle. “This is the last of the chicken eggs,” she said. “One of the Romani families my stepmother so feared has taken up residence in the house. They have even begun repairs. It belongs to them now.”

“Does that bother you terribly?”

“No. I have a home. Without Sir Edward, they should be able to live there unmolested. And there’s a certain poetic justice to it that I cannot help but delight in.”

Rodan smiled, pulling her close and kissing her. Ella sighed and kissed him back.

“Rodan,” she murmured, “as much as I love playing in the water, there is nothing better than lying in bed with you. Or,” she continued as he trailed kisses down her jaw and memories of recent events replayed themselves in her mind, “on the rug, or sofa, or standing up against a wall.”

“Agreed.” He was doing things that made Ella appreciate her floating state, as her knees might have buckled had they stood on solid ground. Rodan tugged her towards the cottage.

“We might try all of them,” Ella murmured, to which Rodan also agreed, and they set about doing just that.

THE END