At the sound of Nixie's screams, Henry dropped everything he was doing, grabbed his wand and ran upstairs to see if his daughter was alright. Bean seemed to have a similar idea as he raced up the stairs as well. Before Henry could call out to her, Nixie came barrelling out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around her body, and her wet hair plastered to the sides of her face. Her body was shaking as she was pointing in the direction of the bathroom, leaving Henry to investigate. But as he cautiously peered in, he didn't see anything besides a large amount of water on the floor and a filled bathtub. When he turned back to Nixie, he could see the fear prominent on her face.

"Nixie, what happened?" he asked her, still keeping his wand raised defensively. "You have to tell me what happened so I can help you. Are you alright? Did you get hurt?"

For a moment or so, Nixie didn't say anything to him but eventually, her eyes travelled down to her bare legs before she peered up at him.

"I...I was in the tub...I was in the tub. And I closed my eyes and when I opened them...when I opened them I had...I had a tail!"

Her voice only grew louder as she continued to explain that she had sprouted a fish-like tail, one that was covered in orange scales. She thought she had been dreaming but she knew she had been wide awake. Unsure of what she was supposed to do, she pulled herself out of the tub and made her way to the floor. It was only then, did the tail disappear and she found herself back with her usual legs. And while Nixie wallowed in a state of panic, Henry had yet to respond as he simply stared at the puddle on the bathroom floor.

"Dad, didn't you hear a word I said?" Nixie reached out one hand to tug his sleeve. "Dad, I had a tail! I'm not lying, I swear, I- "

"I know you're not lying, sweetheart," Henry said finally, "I know."

"So why aren't you screaming like me?! Why aren't you panicking?! Why- "

"Nixie," he spoke her name softly as he placed his hand on her shoulder to get her to stop yelling, "I need you to go to your room and get dressed. Once you're dressed, I need you to come downstairs. There's a lot we need to discuss."

She opened her mouth to protest but Henry left her with very little choice as he cleaned the water on the floor with a wave of his wand before he headed back down the stairs. His steps were slow and even when she tried calling after him, he didn't respond.

Although his movements were slow, Henry could feel his heart racing in his chest as blood pounded in his ears. There he was, trying to make a nice dinner, so he could sit down with Nixie and calmly explain everything he could about her seavish lineage. Already his plans had been altered as his fellow co-workers had decided to ruin his child's experience of receiving her Hogwarts Acceptance Letter and expose Nixie as a half-breed. She hadn't said anything about it though and Amelia said from what she had overheard that no specifics had been mentioned. So, it was very well that Nixie might have suspected that it was Remus who was the half-breed and not herself.

But all of that had gone to hell in a handbag as soon as she sprouted her tail in the bathtub.

"I don't understand," he muttered to himself as he approached the stove. "It's been years...YEARS!"

It was true, Nixie had often sprouted her tail when she was younger at random times, whether she was in the bathtub or if she was playing outside. At the time, it never seemed to bother her in the slightest, as perhaps she was too young to understand what was even going on. Henry, on the other hand, was sent in panic mode each time, believing he had to get her into the water, or she would become sick. But sometimes as fast as the tail would appear, it would also disappear, leaving the poor man to be running all over the place it seemed.

His parents had witnessed it too on the occasion when they had watched Nixie while he was at work. He knew their prejudices against the merfolk but since Nixie appeared "normal" to them, in the beginning, they were better about watching over her. However, he remembered coming home from work one day and finding his father standing on the front steps of the house. Edmond Dover looked positively disgusted as Henry approached and before Henry could ask if everything was okay, his father took to explaining that his granddaughter had sprouted a "heinous tail."

Fearing the worst, Henry was about to hurry inside and check on her, but his father stopped him, claiming that Nixie was with her grandmother in the back. She was fine, the tail had only appeared for a few minutes before vanishing. However, Edmond had plenty more to say.

"Do you realise what kind of life you have set that child up for?" he asked him in a harsh whisper. "What others are going to think about her when she ventures out into the world that is beyond this house? How is she supposed to have a normal life if she continues to sprout a tail at random? Hmm? Henry! You didn't even think any of this through! You should have listened to your mother and me when we warned you that there would be consequences to this! She will face those consequences!"

"Nixie will be fine," Henry told his father, "She will be. It's all new, but we can accommodate her. This world is not set in stone and just because she's the first, doesn't mean she'll be the last. The world has always been changing, perhaps sometimes slower than what we wish but it still has the potential to change. Don't talk about her like she's some sort of monster, Father. She's your granddaughter!"

"Yes, and as her grandfather, I have more common sense than her father to realise that she will face nothing but discrimination in this world! For Merlin's sake, Henry, you witnessed it yourself growing up. Children who share the blood of muggles being discriminated against and you thought that everything would be fine when she was born? This world is going to eat her alive! You need to find that mother of hers and send Nixie into the sea where she belongs- "

Growing up, Henry always looked up to his father, held the utmost respect for him, so he would have never believed that he would someday come to punch his father in the face. But there they were, Edmond on the ground, holding the side of his face while Henry stood in complete shock at what he had done.

"Father, I have always respected your opinion," he said, "but I am not going to stand here and let you speak ill of my child. I will not let this world eat her alive and I would think you wouldn't allow that either as her family. Nixie doesn't belong in the sea just because people will give her dirty looks. Sending her away is not solving the problem. Nixie isn't the problem!"

After the argument, Nixie's tail did make an appearance several times but then it stopped. Henry didn't know what to make of it and Nixie was too young to ever remember. He didn't mention it and he hoped that at one point, Meri would return, and she could be there for the discussion.

But time had run out and now it was up to Henry to explain everything.

Once dressed, Nixie headed downstairs and found her father seated at the kitchen table. His hands were folded in front of his face, and he appeared to be lost in his thoughts, not even looking in her direction until she pulled out the chair closest to him. As they made eye contact, she noted that Henry looked to be on the verge of tears, making her extremely nervous about the conversation they were about to have.

"Daddy," she whispered to him, "what's going on?"

"I don't even know where to begin, Nixie," he said, lowering his hands down to the table, "but before we get started, I can make you a plate."

He went to stand but Nixie gently pulled him back down to sit, she wasn't in the slightest bit hungry. She was sure if she tried to force herself to eat something, her body would just end up rejecting it and that wouldn't be a pretty sight for anyone. Henry was aware that there was no more delaying the discussion as he cleared his throat to begin.

"I thought by the time we had this conversation; your mother would be here. I assumed that she would have more answers to your questions. I'm going to do my best. Your mother, her name is-"

"Meri."

Henry's eyes widened and his head tilted to the side in surprise. "How did you-"

Looking down at the table, Nixie could feel the blush forming on her face. "When you left Remus and me at your desk, I was going through it, showing him pictures. And I saw one and it was a picture of The Woman. The one I see in my dreams. Her name was written on the back of it. It said Meri. She's my mother, isn't she?"

There was no sense in getting upset of her going through his desk and already, she was ahead of him in terms of information. He nodded his head to confirm.

"Yes, Meri is your mother, and she was...is a mermaid."

He paused for a moment as if Nixie was supposed to say something, but she simply stared at Henry, no emotion visible as she waited for him to continue.

"We were seventeen when we met for the first time," he said, "I had just started my job at the Ministry. I had studied Mermish during my time at Hogwarts, so when a case developed involving merpeople, I was called upon. There's always been a lot of tension between wizardkind and merfolk, the Ministry has done a lot of things that aren't right and well, that's a whole other thing to get into. But just for now, you need to know they just don't see eye to eye. When I met your mother, we got off to a bit of a rocky start. It was over fishing grounds, the Ministry wanted to push the merfolk out of their original hunting spots and that didn't go over well."

"So, what happened?"

"Well, it took several meetings and a few times of your mother calling me a "puppet" although that wasn't quite her wording, but the Ministry and your mother's colony came to an agreement. Neither side was exactly thrilled about it, but it worked for the time being. After that, I asked to visit with your mother a couple of times. She had insulted my Mermish accent, and I wondered if she could help me get better at the language. She was hesitant but she eventually agreed. And eventually, we fell in love. We had to keep our relationship hidden for the most part. Her colony would never approve and well, my parents didn't like the idea- "

"That's why Granddad and Nan don't like me?"

Henry quickly stood up while shaking his head as he walked over to where she was sitting and knelt down beside her.

"No, Nixie, it's not like that," he said, "they love you. They just...they don't think the world is going to treat you right and they're scared."

"But they're right, aren't they?" Nixie countered. "I heard what those men said at your office today. They were talking about me when they said nasty little half-breed. They don't think I should be allowed to go to Hogwarts! And how could I? How can I go with a tail?!"

"Nixie, calm down. You're going to be fine and you're going to go to Hogwarts. You wouldn't have gotten a letter otherwise. And you're not a nasty little half-breed. You're perfect, your mother and I thought it the day you were born."

"Perfect?" she repeated, there was a tone of disbelief to her voice. "If she thought so, then where is she? Why isn't she here? How come I haven't seen her?"

"You don't understand, sweetheart, if it was up to her, she would be here. I know it. She never wanted to leave you, but she had to. I told you earlier that tensions between wizardkind and merfolk were high. Members of her colony did not accept the idea of us having a relationship. Merchieftainess Galene, happens to be your mother's mother, and she disapproved the most."

Great, Nixie thought to herself, even the grandmother in the sea doesn't like me. Maybe I'll be lucky and have sky grandparents that want to have me around.

"Wait, this doesn't even make sense. How could you two have a relationship in the first place?" Nixie asked. "If she's a mermaid, she has to live in the water and you're on land, so would that even work?"

"Well, the merfolk are capable of coming onto land during full moons. They do so for mati...they have specific reasons as to why they need to come onto land. When the light of the full moon hits the water, they are able to form legs and walk on land. However, they have to return to the water while the moonlight touches it, or they will be stuck with legs until the next full moon cycle. Your mother decided to come out of the water during the full moon and stay on land with me."

"And then?"

"Then we had you," Henry smiled, "and you were the greatest gift to us. Your mother was so happy, but then you started getting sick. Your mother said you needed to be in the water and that's where she brought you. I went down with both of you, but then Galene and a few others came along. They wanted to hurt you, Nixie. But your mother wouldn't allow them to. But in order to get them to let you go safely, she had to go into exile. I keep hoping that one day she'll come back to us, but...I can't be certain that she will. I wanted to wait until she was back in our lives to talk about this. I should have told you sooner."

Nixie didn't say anything to him, instead she pushed her seat away from the table and left to her room. Henry was left in the kitchen, only to hear the door slam upstairs before the house fell completely silent.

From anger to sadness, Nixie wasn't sure how to feel after everything told her and she was sure that wasn't even half of what he wanted to discuss. She also had plenty of questions regarding her mermaid lineage but for the time being, she didn't feel like talking to anyone. Her thoughts were too wrapped around the idea that no one really cared for her existence. And while her father didn't put it that way and told her it wasn't true, she had a hard time believing otherwise.

It suddenly all made sense why her grandparents always came across as rather distant. They never mentioned anything, but they had known all along. And it wasn't just them, but an entire mercolony was against her birth, enough that they had been willing to hurt her. The words of her father's co-workers played over and over in her head "nasty little half-breed." Even they had known more about her lineage than she did before.

All too much to swallow at once, Nixie needed to excuse herself from her father's presence and sit quietly in her room until she no longer felt overwhelmed. Henry seemed to accept the fact that she needed space as he remained downstairs until the late evening hours. When he finally did come upstairs, he knocked on her bedroom door. She didn't answer, pretending to be asleep, only listening as he entered the room. Henry grabbed her duvet and pulled it over her body gently, he placed a kiss on the top of her head, muttering what sounded like "I love you and I'm sorry" before the lights went out.

She could feel Bean jump onto the bed, resting at her feet before the door closed over.

Rolling over, Nixie opened her eyes and found herself mostly staring into the darkness of her room. The only source of light was coming from the moon that poured through her window. Pushing herself up, she made her way over and looked up into the night sky. The full moon had come and gone as it waxed through another cycle. But another was to come in just a couple of weeks' time.

Over the course of the next several days, things were considerably awkward between Nixie and Henry. She couldn't remember a time where she had been upset with him over the years and while she didn't consider herself angry with him, she also didn't know what to say. Part of her wished he had mentioned the fact that she was half-mermaid sooner, but would it have made any bit of a difference? Would she have believed it if there wasn't a tail appearing as solid of evidence?

Speaking of the tail, she had yet to see it return since her time in the bathtub, even though she had taken many baths since then. Unsure of how to summon her tail form, Nixie looked through some of the books her father had in the home, regarding classified beasts but the information was very limited. Of course, there was no mention of any half-breed merfolk, making her wonder if she was the only one of her kind.

Henry worked from home and while he cooked breakfast, lunch, and dinner, he didn't force Nixie to speak with him, just waiting for her to speak with him again on her own time. She noticed him spending longer time by the edge of the water and then, one morning, he didn't go out to the water's edge at all. No matter rain or shine, whether it was hot or cold, he had gone out to the water and Nixie wondered if he had finally given up on the idea of her mother's returning.

For so long, he had held out on Meri coming back to him, to both of them, but perhaps having to tell Nixie the truth made him come to terms that Meri was possibly gone for good.

"Dad?"

Nixie found him working in his office that morning, scribbling something down on a scroll with his quill. When he looked up at the sound of her voice, Nixie noticed how tired he looked, or maybe that was the look of defeat.

"Yes, Nixie, what is it? Do you need something?"

"Um, I made some hot chocolate," she said, "I was wondering if you wanted some?"

"You made hot chocolate?"

"Yeah, I think I've watched you make it enough times to do it myself."

If Nixie wasn't mistaken it almost looked like a flash of fear had flickered across her father's face, but he quickly replaced it with a smile before pushing himself up and following her to the kitchen.

Henry grabbed one of the mugs and went to take a sip but within a split second, spit it out of his mouth onto the floor. Bean ran over and sniffed it before letting out a whining whimper and running out of the kitchen.

"What? What?!" Nixie asked alarmed. "Is it too hot?"

He didn't answer, placing the mug down and making his way to the sink to wash out his mouth. Looking down at her own mug, Nixie didn't understand why Henry was being so dramatic. But after taking a careful sip of her own hot chocolate, Henry's antics didn't seem as dramatic anymore. She pushed him out of the way to get some water from the sink as well.

"Nixie, what did you put into this?!"

"I did what you did! I melted the chocolate into the cream! I added a little pinch of salt. I don't understand what I did wrong!"

Suddenly, Henry started laughing, leaving Nixie even more confused. "What's so funny?"

"It seems you take after your mother in more ways than one, sweetheart, I'm so sorry. I always thought your mother was making up excuses when she said that merfolk couldn't cook...maybe there was some truth to it after all."

Since the Hot Chocolate Incident, Henry seemed to be in a much better mood and he and Nixie were on speaking terms again. However, he still didn't travel down to the water's edge anymore. One late morning when Nixie was finally awake, her father claimed that he had to head into the office for just a few minutes. He asked if she would be comfortable staying at the house while he was gone. Seeing as he wouldn't be gone for very long, Nixie told him she would be fine. But as soon as she left, she called Bean to follow her as she made her way down to the water.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary that morning, it was high tide, and the waves were crashing gently against the shore.

"What does he even do out here all this time?" Nixie asked Bean. "Does he just stand here? Doesn't he get bored?"

Bean barked at her, his tail wagging as he ran around her feet.

"Quiet, Bean, I'm trying to think here," she said. "I was thinking about what Dad said the other day. He said merfolk can come out of the water when there's a full moon. Maybe it'll do the opposite with me and give me my tail. But I don't know if I want to risk it, what if I get stuck!?"

Bean sat down and patiently watched as Nixie started pacing back and forth, going over her tail theories.

"How will I got to Hogwarts if I have a tail?! Am I just going to have to sit in a bathtub during all my classes?! Dad said the castle is massive, what if they have to install a water slide so I can get around- okay, I need to stop, I'm getting ahead of myself here."

"I think a water slide is a fantastic idea."

Nixie was just about to tell Bean to not interrupt her again, but Bean certainly didn't have a woman's voice and his speech was limited to barking. Turning around, Nixie spotted the woman she had seen so many times in her dreams, at the surface of the water watching her with an amused grin.

Meri had finally come home.