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eyes shone at least as brightly as any of the witchlings’.
    Kevin and Nathan stood off to one side, trying to look cool.  Which wasn’t the easiest thing to pull off as teenage boys who had been deemed honorary mermaids.
    Lauren smiled.  They might not have donned plastic jewels, but their tail illusion spells were firmly in place, as per Aervyn’s happy orders. 
    Don’t put them too high up on a pedestal.  Jamie grinned.  They’re about to work magic with every water witch on two coasts.  A few jewels aren’t going to make that any less cool. 
    She rolled her eyes.  So why are the rest of us here again?   There were an awful lot of suckers in this crowd who had zilcho water magic.
    Jamie grinned.  My brother has a plan.  And you were dumb enough to marry him.
    This wasn’t in the vows.   Except it probably had been.  Debatably in the “for better or worse” part.  She’d reserve judgment as to which until they were back on dry land.
    Her husband waved them over, ignoring the three youngest who were still cavorting over the rocks.  He winked at Nat.  “Kenna’s going to love this.”
    She smiled back.  “Duh.”
    “Her magic’s not going to,” said Nell dryly.  “Only a brother of mine would have the bright idea to dump a fire witchling in the ocean in the dead of winter and call it fun.”
    Dev flashed her a grin.  “That’s what you and Jamie are for.  You make a nice bubble of warm water around her and Nat and Aunt Moira and she’ll have a blast, just like she does when we go to Costa Rica and swim with Uncle Matt and Téo.”   
    Lauren shivered.  The water in Costa Rica was several billion degrees warmer than the Pacific in December.  “And who’s gonna keep the rest of us warm?”
    “Me.”  Aervyn danced through the huddle, heat radiating from his hands.  “Are we ready to go yet?”
    Devin caught him and hung him upside down from his magically glamoured mermaid tail.  “Just about, superboy.”  He spoke around the rollicking giggles.  “Sierra and I will keep us all together and work the currents, and Kevin and Nathan will see if they can find a friendly turtle or two to swim with.”
    That was a compromise—Kenna had requested dancing crabs.
    Lauren grinned, knowing she would follow him just because, and asked anyhow.  “And I’m here for comic relief?”  She was easily the poorest swimmer in the group, with the possible exception of her almost two-year-old niece.
    “Nope.”  Devin’s smile got wider.  “We need you to mindread the words to all the mermaid songs and broadcast them.  Apparently Kenna knows fourteen of them.”
    Great.  She was the magical teleprompter. 
    It’ll be worth it, sent Dev, mentally nodding in the direction of his sister-in-law.
    Lauren looked at Nat, who was holding a very wiggly Kenna in her arms.  Read the exuberant anticipation in one mind, and the quiet joy in the other.  And knew she would have happily walked into the ocean with no heat source at all.
    She took her husband’s hand.  This gift had a whole lot of intended recipients.  “Let’s go be mermaids.”
    -o0o-
    She had always loved Devin Sullivan, her big, beautiful man with oceans of water power in his veins and pure gold beating in his chest.
    But watching the story unfolding on a cold California beach, Moira thought her heart would fairly burst.  He was a man who knew how to head to the very root of things, or to tumble through the world in absolute silliness for no reason other than the pure joy of it.
    Today, he was managing to combine them both.
    And it did her heart good to see Lauren join her hand to his.  His wife saw him so very well, all his flaws and strengths and his magnificent zest for life.
    Lauren’s voice laughed in Moira’s head.  Right now I’m focusing on his sexy tail and the fact that he swims well enough for both of us.
    You swim better than you think, my dear.  They all did, even if the waters were metaphorical ones.