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Despite knowing Mirella would undergo multiple changes, I couldn’t help the worry that gradually built within me. Her naturally pale skin grew even paler, almost translucent. Her body temperature cranked up another notch, and angry red splotches appeared in various areas, some of them with what resembled blue bruises. Was this normal or signs that Mirella was rejecting our bond?

Once again, I stupidly tried to make the comparison with how things had gone down with Lily. But she already had functional veris, so the two cases were completely different. Them both being off-worlders didn’t change the fact that they belonged to two different species. Even the fact that Lily was half human held little weight in the greater scheme of things as her Edocit heritage dominated.

As for the instruction given to me by both our healers and Maeve, I brought Mirella to the healing temple in the morning. As I crossed the beach to the water leading to the entrance of the temple, my fellow tribemates began singing a soothing melody of hope and joy as they realized we had finally completed the bond. While it didn’t erase the worry gnawing at me, it did soothe some of it as well as fill my heart with gratitude for their love and support.

Josey smiled at me with a mix of compassion and amusement at the concern plastered on my face when I approached the Great Mother healing tree. Following his instructions, I laid Mirella down at the base of the tree, where the roots formed a little arch.

I positioned her in such a way that her body would be covered by the healing water, up to the shoulders, including parts of her neck. Ideally, she would have been completely submerged. But we didn’t want her wearing her breathing mask or to have anything foreign touching her body while the Goddess reshaped her.

Tiny veris extruded from the roots of the Great Mother, sliding over my mate’s body, and then sinking under her skin to connect with the bluish spots that resembled bruises. I realized then the bruises were in fact Mirella’s own baby veris forming. As my woman didn’t naturally have a skirt or vines to hide her modesty, the tree extended a few more of its thicker vines to shelter her from view.

Some of the tension that had been torturing my back faded away, and my throat constricted with emotion. The calmness of the tree and of the healer confirmed that everything was normal, and that there was no cause for worry or alarm.

The next week dragged on forever. If not for the duties keeping me busy throughout the day, I would have likely gone insane with impatience. Still, I spent every night sleeping next to my mate in the temple.

Every morning and every night, I would inventory each new change she had undergone. I squealed and got stuck with the stupidest grin on my face for hours after I spotted the first vine poking its head through the golden strands of her hair. The veris on her arms and legs were also now more pronounced. But seeing the reddish welts of the delicate gills forming on each side of her neck was the highlight of that first week.

To my chagrin, it took my mate five days longer than Lily to complete her transformation. Although Kaya came from the Ungaro Tribe to spend a few days with us until Mirella’s awakening, she didn’t meddle with Josey’s tending to my mate’s care. As a Head Healer herself, my sister knew better than to undermine her counterpart, not that it was needed. I implicitly trusted our own healers. But it felt good having her support, including her confirming the similarities with when she oversaw Lily’s bonding mutation.

However, Kaya and the other healers mocked me mercilessly for how much I wouldn’t stop fretting. My bratty brother didn’t help the situation by nicknaming me Maseniaru—he who frets too much—which the entire tribe gladly adopted.

In truth, I no longer feared for Mirella’s welfare. The entire transition had gone smoothly. I’d even been able to connect with her veris and share my love for her through our connection. I just missed her, the sound of her voice, the mischievous glimmer in her beautiful eyes, and the way her mere presence made me happy.

The only thing that saddened me was how her skin had changed to match ours. I expected as much since it had been the case with Lily. In all the ways that mattered, it was a blessing as she would no longer need a wetsuit to go deep underwater or to remain there for extended periods of time. I would just miss the soft and foreign texture of her former human skin.

She even developed short, baby sized webbings between her toes and fingers. They didn’t go up high enough to allow her to fully use her hands as cups as we did, but they would help her with swimming as she did not develop a tail. Nor had Lily for that matter.

I was eating the evening meal with my family and tribemates on the beach before I would go watch over my mate when the tree started rustling their leaves. The joyous sound indicated good news. But the trees shaking their branches in turn in a pattern pointing towards the temple had my heart leaping in my chest.

I emitted a sharp cry that had everyone laughing and cheering as I raced towards the temple. If Josey hadn’t already started opening the heavy doors by the time I reached them, I probably would have rammed through the obstacle. I rushed to my mate’s side to find her eyelids fluttering as she slowly stirred.

A powerful emotion swept through me when she opened her eyes, and her gaze locked with mine. Although her eyes remained human, with white sclera and pupils, her irises had doubled in size. She gave me that mesmerizing smile I had missed so much.

“Someone sure took her sweet time to come back to me,” I said, my voice a little shaky.

Mirella’s smile broadened, and she opened her mouth to respond, inhaling as she did so. I instantly flinched, realizing her mistake half a second before she started coughing. Startled, she tried to jerk into a sitting position, only to be yanked back as she yelped in pain.

“Ouch!” she exclaimed between two bouts of coughing.

She reached for the back of her head, her hand settling on her veris still intertwined with the roots of the Great Mother. As Mirella hadn’t learned yet how to control her veris, the tree detached from her instead.

“There, there,” I said in a soothing voice, helping her to sit up.

“What the fuck was that?” Mirella asked, still coughing a little.

“You inhaled water through your gills,” I said in a sympathetic tone. “You need to close them when you’re partially submerged but breathe in regular oxygen.”

“Holy shit! I have gills?!” Mirella shouted, her hands flying to her neck.

Her face lit up as she excitedly pawed her gills and traced them with her fingers.

“Fuck yeah!” she exclaimed, making me chuckle.

“You will need to practice so that you can master both breathing methods,” I cautioned.

She nodded absentmindedly while raising her forearms to examine the veris adorning their sides. My woman looked both fascinated but also slightly unsettled. That uncertainty seemed to increase further as she ran a finger over the new texture of her skin.

Does she regret her transformation?