That notion appealed. The car was like a fun toy.

  The day after that Doris went to the hospital to birth the baby; this was also affordable thanks to the insurance. “This is weird,” Nerine said, looking around the busy building. “We have nothing like this under the sea.”

  “Gods don't need hospitals,” Doris agreed. “They don't suffer things like miscarriages or dangerous bleeding.”

  “We don't,” Nerine agreed.

  The delivery loomed. “Do you want palliative medication?” the doctor inquired.

  “No, none. I want a natural event.”

  “It will be ready if you change your mind.” He departed, clearly expecting her to do that once the contractions got serious.

  “The lucky charm—it ameliorated pain before,” Doris said. “I think I will need that now.”

  “It will make birthing easy,” Nerine promised.

  It did. By evening Doris was holding and nursing baby Neris. He might be half god, but right now he was all baby.

  Yet even as a newborn, there was something about him. The nurses remarked on it, calling him handsome. Nerine had to use illusion to mask his glory somewhat as Doris held him. Unfortunately it shone almost visibly when he slept apart from her. “I must go damp him down,” she said, and changed form.

  “You're sure no one else can see you?” Doris asked anxiously. “You look like a nude nymph, you know.”

  “I'm sure.” Indeed, the nurses ignored her as she put a hand on the baby's shoulder and used illusion to make him seem more ordinary.

  A nurse brought Doris a form to fill out for the birth certificate.

  “What is that?” Nerine asked.

  “There has to be a birth certificate.”

  “What, a piece of paper asserting that the baby is real? Ludicrous!”

  “We mortals have our peculiarities.” She wrote her name correctly, then paused when considering the father's name. “I can't put the truth,” she said.

  “Why not?” Nerine asked.

  “Mortals don't believe in gods of the sea.”

  “Mortals are ignorant in so many ways.”

  “Hell with it.” Doris filled in Nerius, sea god.

  The nurse took the form, checking only to be sure that everything was filled in. “You will be lucky with the filing clerk also,” Nerine said. “The charm will see to that. There will be no trouble.”

  There was no trouble. Soon Doris was home with her baby. “He is a darling,” she cooed. “There really is something about him.”

  “He is half god,” Nerine reminded her. She was no longer damping down his luster.

  Now Nerine had to become solid, as Doris could not do everything herself. She needed to nurse the baby, who had a ravenous appetite, and recover from the strain of giving birth, which was far more difficult for a mortal than for a goddess. Nerine learned to use the washing machine for the voluminously soiled diapers. She learned to drive the car and went grocery shopping herself so that Doris could sleep. She knew how to handle the vehicle, but it was weird doing it alone.

  The worst of it was that she had to make herself visible to others, and to wear clothing. That was awkward, because she was a very pretty girl and men noticed even though she wasn't nude. It was tricky using damping illusion on herself, and she normally didn't bother, so her beauty was all too obvious. One man even asked her for a date.

  “You can't afford to buy dates yourself?” she asked, perplexed. “They are not expensive.” Indeed, they were currently on sale at the store.

  He laughed, thinking it was a joke, then explained his meaning. It sounded intriguing, but she could not afford to leave Doris alone that long, so had to decline.

  Still, she was glad when Doris recovered enough to resume shopping for herself. It was much easier being a bracelet.

  Still, she wondered: what would it be like to indulge sexually with a mortal man? Maybe when this assignment was over she would try it once, before returning to the sea. Making it with a mortal would not really count against her virginity, and of course she could restore it anyway if necessary.

  Neris gained weight rapidly. Doris had to introduce him to solid foods earlier than was customary for mortal babies, lest he suck her dry. He took to them enthusiastically, and his piss and poop multiplied. There was no poop like godly poop! The washing machine could hardly keep up with the soiled diapers. It was time to toilet train him.

  They decided that demonstration was likely the most effective way. Now Nerine had to turn solid and eat plenteously, generating the necessary wastes. She and Doris made the boy observe each time they used the toilet, and in a few days he caught on. He was remarkably smart for a mortal, though not for a god. It helped that Nerine normally was nude, so there was no clothing to obscure the process.

  He was also quite sharp on learning to walk, and was doing it at six months. And on talking, and was doing that at a year.

  “But he needs to be socialized,” Doris said. “We need to put him in a nursery school.”

  But that promised to be awkward. Neris was only one, but he was already in the Terrible Twos, often defiant for no particular reason except to assert himself. He had learned the word “No” early and enjoyed its power. He might pass for two in a nursery school, but his attitude and his magic were dangerous.

  “We must teach him discipline,” Nerine decided.

  “Yes. But how? He minds me only when he chooses.”

  “I will sing to him.”

  “Sing? Lullabies do put him to sleep, but only when he's ready. We need to make him behave when he's awake.”

  “This is one reason I'm here,” Nerine said. “I will train him.”

  “I hope you know something I don't.”

  Nerine did. When Neris woke from his daily nap and demanded to go outside to tear up the yard, Nerine tackled the issue. “No.”

  He stared at her, unaccustomed to hearing her say the word. She had always done what he wanted. Even when she was solid, she remained invisible to others, so did not need to bother with clothes or propriety. She had often taken him to the enclosed garden so he could play in the dirt. He evidently regarded her as a useful fixture.

  “I'm going out,” he repeated.

  “No.”

  He swelled up visibly. “I'll throw a tantrum.” That was a serious threat, as he could move nearby objects telekinetikily, and make some explode. He did not do the magic well, but it was enough to make a bad scene if done in public. Much of it would fade as he got older, so they did not make an issue of it, but did have to be careful.

  Nerine did not argue with the brat. She sang dissonance.

  Doris cringed, but did not protest.

  The boy's mouth dropped open in surprise. He had never heard such a sound before. He put his hands to his ears, but could not shut it out.

  Nerine stopped singing. The boy considered, then started swelling again.

  Nerine resumed the song.

  Neris was a fast learner when it suited his convenience. He raised his little hands in surrender.

  “Now that we understand each other,” Nerine said gently, “We'll go out back. Hereafter you will behave.”

  “I wanna learn that song,” he said.

  “In due course, once you are civilized.”

  “Okay.”

  Now she sang a few bars of the joy song, flooding him with delight. She could reward as well as punish.

  They went out back, leaving Doris inside to unwind. Neris behaved perfectly, as he could do when he tried. He respected power. It was the beginning of the new order.

  They went to the beach when Neris was one and a half, looking three; it was a promised reward for his making it through a full week with no bad behavior. He absolutely loved the water. He waded right in with the two adults, now knowing not to talk to Nerine when in public, though she was close beside him; she was invisible and inaudible to all others. That was one reason she could go in public in her natural nudity: he had come to understand that she did not appear in public.

  He was a born swimmer. In moments he dived below the surface. Doris looked nervous, but Nerine sent her a glance of reassurance as she dived with him. It was quickly apparent that he could breathe water, as could she. She let him frolic among the fish, then signaled him to swim to the surface when other swimmers chanced near. When he hesitated, she made the first note of the dissonance, which she could do as readily in water as in air. He quickly stroked to the surface and resumed breathing air.

  It was a fine excursion. When they returned home Nerine instructed him on the protocol: when with ordinary humans, he would swim as they did, on the surface, breathing air. When alone (Nerine herself did not count as company) he could swim their way, like the fish. His magic always had to be concealed from normal folk. He must never join a swimming team.

  Now he was ready for the socializing of nursery school. They hoped. He was eager to go, as home had become insufferably (and he knew that word) boring for him.

  Doris enrolled him in a local class as a three year old, explaining to him that the others were older but no smarter or stronger than he, and without magic, so he needed to pretend they were his equals. If he liked the class, and the class liked him, he could continue; if either failed, then he would be out. Nerine would be there, so when in doubt he could check with her. There was no need to remind him that her presence was also to insure that he behaved.

  It worked reasonably well. Neris, unlike other small children, did not prefer boys to girls; in fact he was much taken with the girls, and did his best to impress them, pushing the limits of what Nerine allowed. They responded to his natural magnetism. It was his godly aspect, an inherent appeal to the opposite gender, regardless of age. Fortunately none of them knew what sex was, or they might have been trying for it.

  There was however a complication. Nerine saw it coming, and quietly advised Neris how to respond. The largest of the boys was something of a bully, and he did not like the competition Neris represented. So he tackled it the way a three year old did: he gathered some friends and lured Neris to an out of sight corner of the park with the promise of a cache of candy. Then he punched him in the head.

  Except that the punch, amazingly, did not strike Neris, but the bully's closest friend. “Hey!” the other boy protested, clapping his hand to the place.

  The bully stood bemused. He had not aimed for his friend. What had happened?

  “So where's the candy?” Neris asked.

  The bully tried again. “Hold him still,” he ordered, and two other boys grabbed Neris' arms and held him in place. Then the bully aimed carefully and punched again.

  And scored on the mouth of another of the friends. That friend, outraged, punched him back, and this time the blow scored on its intended target. In a moment the two were fighting, and the commotion brought a teacher who separated them. But nobody would explain how it started. Not that she would have believed it anyway.

  Later Nerine explained the episode to Doris. “A bully wanted to smack him, but I let him use his illusion and a little telekinesis, and the bully actually punched his friend. Twice. So Neris was not blamed.”

  Doris smiled. “As long as nobody caught on.”

  Next day the bully tried again, and socked another friend. This time a teacher saw him do it, and he was expelled from the class. After that nobody tried to bother Neris. They did not understand the manner of its delivery, but they got the message.

  The girls still adored him. They got him alone and soundly kissed him, and the kisses did not miss.

  It was also a useful lesson for Neris: he could avoid mischief by using subtle magic, making sure he was not observed doing it. It was all right as long as he kept the secret from adults. Other children believed in magic anyway, so accepted it.

  In this manner he learned his socializing skills. But his education was not nearly complete. Nerine knew that he would become more difficult to control as he aged, and that she would have to be constantly alert. If his nature were ever revealed, there would be real mischief.

  Neris

  “And that is my role in your story,” Nerine concluded.

  “Why did my father go to all that trouble to summon a mortal woman to have his child?”

  “He had fifty girls. He wanted a boy.”

  “Oh, phooey! What's so special about a boy?”

  That made the nereid pause for thought. “I don't know. Men just seem to want sons. It's women they constantly try to get their hands on, and their penises into, but it's sons they want. Maybe it was just a pretext for him to have at a different woman.” She said it without malice; she had had thousands of years to observe both male and female gods, and knew their natures.

  Neris also knew how men were about women. He felt that way about girls himself. When he got old enough he'd have a harem of them. But it wasn't expedient to mention that to his mother or nanny; they had hangups about such things, at least with respect to children. “There's gotta be more than that. He could've renamed some stray goddess 'Doris' to get around the geis, and had at her. She might have had a son, since the curse wasn't on her. Why'd he choose a mortal?”

  “That's a good question.” That meant she didn't know the answer. That was unusual for the nereid.

  “Well, I want to know.”

  She pondered briefly, then managed to come up with something. “If you behave for a full year, I will take you to see your father and mine, and you can ask him.”

  “Deal!” Because he knew that was her limit. He could push her only so far before she started singing.

  A year later Neris had not quite succeeded in behaving perfectly, but he had been clever enough to conceal his transgressions from his mother, and his half sister was tolerant, and that was good enough. Doris elected to remain to cover the home front, while Nerine accompanied him to the sea shore at night. He knew she had cleared the visit with their father, so that he would be expecting them.

  Neris stripped naked and hid his clothes in a water-tight box on the beach, and making the box invisible. His magic powers were coming along nicely, though he knew he had a long way still to go. He was as yet only a child god. Nerine of course was already nude. He was eager for the time when he would be mature enough to lasciviously appreciate her fine feminine figure, though of course he would never have any love interest in her. Gods who married their sisters were not his idea of romance. He would want a woman who had Nerine's shape but was totally unrelated to him. Maybe it was the mortal half of him that governed that preference.

  They entered the water and swam down into the deeps. Not only could he breathe sea water now, he could see in it regardless of the light. He could also talk in it. Magic was fun!

  A shark smelled them and swerved to intercept them. “Handle it, Neris,” Nerine said. She was giving him practice.

  He virtually leaped forward, counter-intercepting the hungry fish. He touched it on the nose, delivering an ugly electric shock. Surprised rather than hurt, the shark jerked away and departed. Sharks were appropriately wary of things they did not understand. That was just as well, because Neris could readily have killed it with a harder jolt. He had nothing against sharks; he had merely wanted to warn it away.

  “Nice,” Nerine said approvingly, and sent a bit of pleasure melody. He liked that; her approval was important to him, because it meant his father would probably also approve.

  “It would've been easier if I could have sung to it. When are you going to teach me that?” For of course the singing could be deadly, as she had demonstrated. But he was also interested in its other variants, such as irresistibly luring the opposite gender, as his father had done with his mother. He'd need that to assemble his harem.

  “That's for your father to decide.”

  Aha! That was no longer a full denial. It was progress.

  Now he thought of something. “The sea is big, thousands of miles across.” Doris had taught him some geography, and he had paid special attention to the world's oceans. “How come we're close enough to my father's kingdom to swim to it?”

  “Because he is expecting us,” she replied. “No one could ever find his kingdom if he didn't want to be found. Mortals don't even believe it exists. But when he wants it, he makes it feasible, as he did for your mother. We seem to be swimming a short distance, but we are actually covering thousands of miles, and venturing into a region few mortals even know about, let alone visit. Magic is marvelous.”

  “Magic is marvelous,” he echoed appreciatively. He knew how much he owed to it.

  But as they descended, the water grew cloudy. It tasted bad. Neris spat it out, but it was only replaced by more of the same. He made a face.

  “The operative word is Yuck!” Nerine said helpfully.

  “Yuck!” Neris agreed.

  “There was an oil spill in the vicinity, and its remnant remains. But there are many other sources of dirtiness. Some sections are dead zones, with no fish at all. We simply have to navigate them.”

  Fortunately the bad zone wasn't extensive, and before long they got through it.

  They came to the murky turrets of a splendid castle beneath the sea, and dived down to the sea floor. There was the main entrance, complete with a moat formed of mercury, an effective deterrent to intrusion. They crossed the drawbridge and found themselves in a courtyard.

  “My dear!” a lovely woman exclaimed, and went to embrace Nerine. “I haven't seen you in years!”

  “Mother, this is Neris, my half mortal brother,” Nerine said. “Neris, this is your aunt Doris, goddess of the sea.”

  “Don't hug me,” Neris said quickly. But Doris did. He was startled, as normally he could fend off any too-affectionate woman, but not this one. He was half god, but she was full goddess; he felt her power wherever she touched him.

  “My husband is expecting him,” Doris told Nerine.

  Nerine set her hands on Neris' shoulders and turned him to face a path that had just appeared, glowing in the sand. “That way. Return when you are done. Remember to be excruciatingly polite, lest he smack you down.”