Ariel wanted legs. She had wanted them since she pulled the drowning prince from the wreck and left him breathing on the sand. A mermaid could not walk beside him. So she swam, tail cutting through cold water, hunting the one person who might trade a tail for feet. She followed a story, not a map. Someone had whispered of a witch who granted wishes for a price. Ariel did not know the witch's name or her door. She only knew she had to find her before the prince forgot the girl who saved him. Her sisters floated near a coral shelf, laughing. Ariel slowed and hid behind a rock. Two of them braided kelp. The eldest talked with her hands. "The sea witch," the eldest said, "isn't of the sea at all." Ariel held still. "She's a forest witch. Baba Yaga. Her house walks on chicken legs while she sleeps. It carries her somewhere new every night." The youngest sister shivered. "I heard she gives you what you ask for. But you have to work for it." "And if you won't work," the eldest said, "she eats you. She's still waiting on the next fool to knock." They laughed again and swam off, trailing bubbles. Ariel stayed behind the rock long after they left. A witch who walked on land. A house that moved every night. Ariel's plan had a shape now, and the shape frightened her. She told herself the fear did not matter. The prince mattered. She pushed off the rock and swam toward the shallows, where the water thinned and light broke the surface. Hours later she found a cottage at the tide line, weathered wood, barrels rotting by a broken fence. It sat still on the ground. Ariel dragged herself onto the wet sand and stared at it, breathing hard, tail useless in the open air. The cottage's legs unfolded. Two great yellow chicken legs lifted the whole house from the mud. It turned to face her. The door opened. A short woman stood inside, purple hair wild around a scowling face. She held a golden staff and leaned on it. Her eyes were yellow, like the sisters' warning made real. Ariel's throat went dry. She had found her. "You're the sea witch," Ariel said. "Baba Yaga." The woman looked down at Ariel's tail. "You crawled here on that." "I want legs. I want to walk." Baba Yaga did not blink. "For a boy." Ariel flinched. "For me." "You'll work for it." Baba Yaga stepped back from the door. "Or you won't leave." The threat sat plain between them. Ariel remembered the eldest sister's words. Work, or be eaten. She pulled herself another length up the sand, toward the walking house and the witch in its door. "Then tell me the work," Ariel said. Baba Yaga smiled. It was not kind. She turned inside, and the chicken legs bent low, lowering the open door to Ariel's reach.

Ariel pulled herself into the walking house. The chicken legs straightened under her. The floor tilted, then held. Barrels lined the walls. A cold fire burned green in the hearth. Baba Yaga set her golden staff against a beam and turned to face the mermaid on her floor. "Name the work," Ariel said. "I brought gold. I can pay." Baba Yaga snorted. "Gold." She waved a hand at the barrels, the beams, the whole strange house. "I have gold. I eat off gold." Ariel's chest tightened. "Then what?" The witch crossed the floor. She was short, barely taller than Ariel stretched on the boards, but the room seemed to lean toward her. She crouched. Her yellow eyes came level with Ariel's. "Your voice." Ariel drew back. "My voice?" "Legs cost a voice." Baba Yaga tapped Ariel's throat with one nail. "That is the price. Not gold." Ariel thought of the prince on the sand. She had sung to him while he lay half-drowned. He had opened his eyes to her song. That song was the only thing he knew of her. Without it, how would he find her? How would she tell him who she was? "There must be another way," Ariel said. "More work. Years of it. Anything but that." "No." Baba Yaga stood. She picked up her staff. "Voice or nothing. Choose." The threat sat behind the word. Ariel remembered the sisters' warning. Refuse the witch, and the witch eats you. The green fire popped in the hearth. The chicken legs shifted, and the whole house swayed like a ship. Ariel could keep her voice and die here. Or lose it and walk. She thought of the prince's face. She thought of never seeing it again. Her fear did not matter. It had never mattered. "Take it," Ariel said. Baba Yaga did not smile this time. She raised the staff. Its golden head glowed. She spoke three words Ariel did not know. The air pulled tight. Something tore loose in Ariel's throat. It did not hurt. It felt like a held breath leaving. A pale light rose from her open mouth, curled, and slid into the staff. The gold drank it. Then the light was gone. Ariel gasped. No sound came. She pressed her hands to her neck and tried to speak. Her lips moved. The house creaked. Nothing else. Baba Yaga leaned the staff against the beam. "Done." Ariel looked down. Her tail shimmered, then split. Scales peeled back. Two legs formed where the fin had been, bare and pale on the wooden floor. Her toes curled against the boards. She had legs. She had no voice. Baba Yaga turned back to her hearth. "Now the work. You stay until it's paid." Ariel opened her mouth to ask what work. Only silence came out. She closed it again and stared at her new feet, trapped in a house that walked, mute, a stranger to the surface she had bled to reach.

Ariel gripped the beam and pulled herself up. Her new legs shook. She set one foot forward and dropped hard to the boards. The witch watched from the hearth and did not help. "Stand," Baba Yaga said. Ariel tried again. She got both feet under her. She wobbled, arms wide, and stayed up. She looked at Baba Yaga and grinned. She had done it. "Walk to me," the witch said. Ariel lifted her right foot. The moment it touched the floor, pain shot up her leg. It felt like she had stepped into fire. Her mouth opened in a scream, but no sound came. She fell to her knees and clutched her foot. She stared at the sole. No burn. No blister. Only skin. Baba Yaga crossed the floor. She crouched. Her yellow eyes came level with Ariel's. "The pain is part of the spell," she said. "Every step. Fire. Always." Ariel shook her head. She pressed her hands flat to the boards and begged with her eyes. Take it back. Make it stop. "It does not stop," Baba Yaga said. "There is more." Ariel went still. "You walk to reach the prince," the witch said. "If he marries you, you keep the legs. If he marries another, you die. You melt into seafoam at dawn." Ariel's chest went tight. She touched her own throat, where her voice had been. She could not sing to him now. She could not tell him she was the girl from the sand. She had to win his heart with silence and a smile, and every step toward him would burn. Baba Yaga stood. She went to a barrel by the wall and lifted out a folded gown. Pink, with red apples stitched down the skirt. She dropped it on the floor beside Ariel. "You cannot go bare," she said. "Put it on. Then walk. Ten steps across this floor." Ariel stared at the dress, then at the door. The house swayed on its chicken legs. Somewhere past the tide line, the prince slept in a warm house. She would never reach him crawling. She pulled the gown over her head. The cloth settled to her ankles. She braced against the beam and rose. Her legs held. She took a step. Fire tore through her foot. She bit down and did not fall. Second step. Third. Tears ran down her face. She counted with her lips, silent. The pain never faded. Each step burned as sharp as the last. Ten steps. She reached the far wall and pressed her palm to it, shaking. Baba Yaga watched from across the room. "Good. You can walk." She turned back to her hearth. "Now the work." Ariel stood in the borrowed gown, on legs that burned, mute, with a life that would end at the prince's wedding if the groom was not her. She had traded everything to reach the surface. Now she knew the true cost of walking it.