Bad Mermaids Make Waves Read online

  “Well, that’s some thing to look forward to when we get home . . . bad mermaids and fish napping aside,” Zelda muttered. “Plus, I can play shockey again!”

  Shockey was the number-one mermaid sport, and Zelda was one of the Lagoon’s best players.

  She mimed a shockey throw and dive and then turned to Mimi, who was swim ming with her eyes closed, arms outstretched.

  “What are you doing, Mimi?”

  Mimi peeked out of one eye. “Swimming.”

  “With your eyes closed?” Zelda said.

  “It’s still swim ming.”

  Beattie snort-laughed as Mimi sailed on and smacked straight into a rare squid.

  They swam for hours before Beattie spotted the sign. The sign that all mermaids knew marked the secret entrance to the Hidden Lagoon.

  Carved on a rock and peppered with shells were the five famous words:

  4

  No Legs Beyond This Point

  I’m afraid it really is no legs beyond this point. Readers are advised that unless they under stand Mermaid they will not be able to read any chapters after this one. Apologies for any inconvenience caused.

  5

  Carp

  Fintalbout mansoot belfun wattle wop senn um litlin runu fof carp! Carp! CARP! Timbuttlebot suntet belfun goort wendle ben finalot sonter buddy finfin carp! CARP! Gottlered fishhat bramble brumble bubble no arkle fin carp. Swottle mesh tro fastlebred gree squentle squee finfon finfo tinmo binboo. Finaltleyup otter gluppletop glup ting drip finlop troplefin grunny fundlewup CARP! Suntet helfun carp ottlementlegon sand buster castlefin wottlemot greepletea mosspot gree truuuub carp sonterbuddy wattle senn carp um. Squeefin dolptin mupple carp. Swottle, carp sentle rump olfig tyleish grup. Squee carp. Mestermantle grup oltermag drump tap carp sottle bud. Carp, finlop troplefin grunny, you arkle starting tro get the hang fof mermaid words CARP!

  6

  To the Secret Entrance

  Fish darted from left to right, all wearing eye-popping colors and their best scales.

  “We’re almost there!” Zelda cheered as she wound her way through the reams and reams of seaweed. “I’m so happy! I feel like a bread ham!”

  Beattie stopped and stared at her. “Hamburger. You mean hamburger.”

  “That’s what I said,” Zelda insisted.

  Beattie swam past the no legs beyond this point sign and crouched by the rock shelf. Covered in shells, the shelf dropped down deeper into the sea and didn’t look suspicious at all. But mermaids knew better. A little to the left, hidden in a shell less sparkly than all the others, was a keypad made of pearly buttons.

  Beattie sighed at the thought of home, of gliding down into the Hidden Lagoon through the opening in the rock face, past all the sculptural shell rooftops to the bustling city streets below. But they couldn’t go the normal way. They had to take the secret pipe entrance Arabella Cod had told them about in the crabmail.

  “It seems very quiet down there,” Zelda said loudly, lifting one of the shell peepholes.

  “Shhh,” Beattie whispered as she floated over, nudging Zelda out of the way so she could peep through. She could just make out some of the rooftops. It seemed darker than usual. She swiveled a little to the left to where she could see what looked like a grand, sculpted, shell-covered caterpillar. That was the Crabbyshell Highway, stretching out toward a tiny red dot in the distance, which was Lobstertown. And below, off the crystal tunnel exit, she could just make out pinpricks of lights from Oysterdale.

  “The secret entrance must be down that rock face,” Beattie said, pointing toward the dark depths.

  “Let’s just go the usual way,” Zelda said. “I can’t see a single bad mermaid down there. I can’t see anyone. Now, is the code still Ihavenolegs?”

  Beattie shook her head madly, her purple plaits getting stuck in her mouth, stray bits of hair floating up her nose. “But Arabella Cod said—”

  “Oh, Old Coddie won’t care,” Zelda said, punching in the code.

  The rock began to inch open, groaning as it did so. Little bubbles streamed from the gap, engulfing the three little mermaids waiting anxiously outside. It wasn’t until the bubbles cleared that Beattie could see what was waiting for them. She gasped and rolled back ward.

  Row upon row of razor-sharp teeth.

  “Piranhas?! But . . . it can’t be,” Beattie said, transfixed by the sight of such an impossible thing. “Piranhas are banned in the Lagoon.”

  Thousands of them tried to wriggle through the widening crack in the rock face. Beattie’s stomach flip-flopped like a human trying to climb into a hammock as the rock split open further, groaning even more loudly than before. There was a deafening squeaking sound as the piranhas tried to push through, their jaws snapping.

  “No,” Beattie went on. “Piranhas are definitely banned, remember? Because one of them ate all the mermaid combs? Not that we ever really used them, although humans seem to think all we do is comb our hair. In their paintings of mermaids, we’re all sitting on rocks, combing our hair and smiling, which is nonsense because no one can comb wet hair without doing the AAARGH KNOTS face. Wet hair is really hard to comb. And I think—”

  “RUN, BEATTIE!” Zelda screamed as hundreds of the chomping things shot up high out of the crack in the rock face, scattering above their heads.

  “She means swim,” Mimi said, casually yanking Beattie out of the way as the piranhas came thundering toward them.

  “Well, what a welcome home this is!” Zelda shouted.

  “If only someone hadn’t typed in the code!” Beattie said, shaking her head.

  She was almost at the secret entrance, a rusty old pipe deep down the steep est side of the rock face. But the piranhas were almost at her fin.

  Beattie dared to glance back.

  “I think when Arabella Cod mentioned bad mermaids, she actually meant bad piranhas,” Mimi said. She was rooted to the spot, holding her arms high in a fin-fu pose. Fin-fu is a little like human kung fu, only with fins.

  “Mimi!” Zelda pleaded. “Don’t try to fin-fu them! I really don’t want to watch some piranha eating your face—it’ll put me off food for life!”

  Beattie wasn’t listening. Everything was a blur of frightened fish, multicolored mermaid hair, and the slow and sludgy noise of the deep. It felt like everything was going in slow motion, apart from the piranhas.

  “MIMI!” Zelda cried. “Oh, hamster wheels, our parents are going to kill me if they eat her . . .”

  “THE CODE FOR THE SECRET PIPE ENTRANCE!” Beattie roared, desperately trying to remember Arabella Cod’s crabmail. “TYPE IT IN! IT’S . . . FLIPPLEFLOPPLEFISH.” She didn’t dare take her eyes off the piranhas and Mimi, who was doing a weird single-finger chopping move and pinging them away. Beattie knew an awful lot about a lot of things, and one thing she knew for certain was that piranhas were the only creatures that would want to eat a mermaid.

  “SINGLE OR DOUBLE P?” Zelda shouted.

  “DOUBLE P!” Beattie roared as a piranha lunged for her. She squeezed her eyes shut, annoyed that her last words would be FLIPPLEFLOPPLEFISH DOUBLE P.

  She could feel its breath on her—cold puffs filtered through rough, razored jaws.

  “Weird,” she heard Zelda say, followed by the earsplitting sound of the rusty secret pipe entrance opening. She dared to peek.

  The piranhas were heading back to Swirlyshell! It was as if they hadn’t seen them at all! “How peculiar,” Beattie said as a dark, mermaid-shaped figure appeared above them. “Quick,” she said, hastily shoving Zelda head first into the pipe.

  “OUCH, MY BRAIN!” Zelda cried as Beattie lunged for Mimi and stuffed her in there too.

  “We have to go,” she whispered, heaving herself into the pipe. “There’s someone at the rock face.”

  THE SCRIBBLED SQUID

  It’s all about the Anti-Piranha Jacket

  Mermaids, do you fear piranhas? Of course you do! Snappy little snap persons they are. But chances are, if you live in our lagoon, you�
�ll have to get used to having them around now, and you’ll probably want to avoid them and also make sure you don’t die in their jaws.

  That’s a lot of piranharelated stuff to be thinking about every day. So with that in mind, meet the ANTI-PIRANHA JACKET! So reflective, so bright, so brash, even piranhas will want to avoid you. Tested on piranhas.*

  GET YOUR ANTI-PIRANHA JACKET TODAY!

  *Not yet.

  7

  The Mermaid with the Lobster Tail

  Down in the Hidden Lagoon, a young mermaid with a large lobster tail floated with purpose along one of Swirlyshell’s old rock alley ways that wove around the grand Periwinkle Palace like a maze.

  Her hair was fixed in two cool buns, each decorated with little red cone-shell clips. She pulled an ornate cart covered in shells. On its roof an older mermaid with a lumpy tail was snoring loudly. The usually bustling main street, Periwinkle Boulevard, was empty, the shop signs swaying sadly, the lights switched off.

  “INCOMING!” Zelda yelled as the three of them came flying out of the pipe and crashed into the cart, sending an almighty explosion of shells shooting in every direction.

  “MY SHELLS!” came a roar as Beattie tumbled across the pristine pearly pavement. The mermaid who had been snoring emerged from the wreck age sporting a theatrical frown. She wore a hairnet dotted with shells. “I was napping away and then this racket! I nearly shed my scales!” She wiggled her way out of the cart and surveyed the mess.

  “I’m so sorry, Shelly!” the mermaid with the lobster tail said as she peeled herself off the wall and readjusted the little shell clips in her hair.

  Shelly Shelby, the snorer, was the owner of Shelly Shelby’s Shell Shop. It was known as the shop with the best shells and the worst name. Mermaids who said it too quickly ended up saying “Shelly Shelby’s Shell Slop.”

  “Rachel Rocker!” Zelda cheered as she untangled her tail from Mimi’s and swam eagerly over to the mermaid with the lobster tail.

  Rachel Rocker was one of the coolest mermaids in all the Lagoon. She was origin ally from Lobstertown (hence the tail), but she’d moved to Swirlyshell with her dad, who made hats and liked to paint whales. She always wore her hair in arty buns and worked every weekend at Shelly Shelby’s Shell Shop. She also happened to be ridiculously good at shockey.

  “Oh, am I glad to see you!” Rachel Rocker said, lunging forward and scooping Beattie, Zelda, and Mimi into a hug. The four of them were friends, as they all lived near the palace. The twins actually lived in the palace. Periwinkle Palace was the most import ant building in all of Swirlyshell Lagoon because it was the home of Arabella Cod and all the mermaids who worked for her.

  It was built by the Periwinkle family, who were eventually ousted by the Ruster dynasty, many, many years ago, when mermaids were quiet things who rarely did belly flops against rocks or burped bubbles for the fun of it. Or at least not in public, anyway.

  Mimi and Zelda’s parents worked as import ant minister mermaids—their father invented gadgets for the Mermaid Queen and was responsible for making her famous shell-studded cart and the elaborate shell armor for the dolphins that pulled it. Their mother was the Minister for Not Mermaids—she mostly had to deal with any potential human invasions.

  “How was land?” Rachel Rocker asked. “How do you make the toes move?”

  “What’s happened to this place?” Beattie said, her eyes wide. She was looking up at the magnificent palace peppered with sinister clouds of squid ink and teaming with eels and piranhas.

  All four of them huddled in the shadows, the eerie sound of slow swirling water and empty streets echoing in the back ground. There was a loud crack above their heads as the rock entrance opened again. Beattie looked up. A mermaid in an elaborate hat stalked back and forth, back and forth, up there among the swarm of piranhas. She noticed one of the piranhas was on a leash, following obediently beside the mermaid. The sparkles from the collar and lead glowed in the moon light.

  “Who is that?” Beattie asked.

  “That,” Rachel Rocker said, lowering her voice and leaning in closer, “is one seriously bad mermaid.”

  She handed Beattie a copy of Clamzine. One of the sloppy seaweed corners was folded over. “Read it,” she said, not taking her eyes off the mermaid at the rock face.

  CLAMZINE

  By order of Ommy Pike, Piranha Army Chief

  MAKE SHELL TOPS FOR OUR NEW QUEEN, THE SWAN, OR ELSE!

  The shell sellers below will be using carts to hand out free shells in each region:

  • Shelly Shelby’s Shell Shop in Swirlyshell

  • The Grumpy Dolphin in Lobstertown

  • Shellzilla’s in Hammerhead Heights

  • Just Shells in Anchor Rock

  • Sheltini’s & Co. in Oysterdale

  A SHORT HISTORY OF TRADITIONAL SHELL TOPS

  In the olden days all mermaids (and the occasional sea lion and trout) wore traditional shell tops—just two shells on a string. Fashions have evolved over the years—from small clam shells and big clam shells to more experimental materials like live crabs. (That didn’t end well.)

  Top Three Mermaid Tops in Hidden Lagoon History

  1. The rise in popularity of the Clippee cartoon meant many young mermaids started wearing T-shirts stamped with images of Clippee the lobster in a dress.

  2. Tops with added chunky shell shoulder pads dominated in the last century, but are now considered ridiculous.

  3. Finally, the most famous mermaid shell top on record is the Ruster Shells top, created by Mary Ruster, who also sank the Merry Mary ship (still in the Lagoon today). Just two shells on a string and decorated with beautiful carvings of crocodiles, the Ruster Shells were rumored to be magic but have been missing for hundreds of years.

  8

  Piranha Nails

  “So that mermaid up there is Ommy Pike?” Beattie said as they edged cautiously along Periwinkle Boulevard and toward the palace’s grand, shell-studded wall.

  Rachel Rocker nodded. “But he’s just the henchman, from Oysterdale—he works for a mermaid called The Swan, the new queen. It’s the strangest thing. No one has seen her.”

  “She sounds like a disease,” Zelda said. “I’ve got the Swans.”

  “Why is she called The Swan?” Beattie asked.

  Rachel Rocker shrugged. “Someone told me she made it up to sound fancy. Because swans are, apparently, fancy.”

  “Only on the surface of the water,” Mimi said knowingly. “If they try to swim deep, they look like soggy monsters.”

  “Everyone is being forced to make shell tops. Day in, day out. No one knows when it’ll end. It’s horrible,” Rachel Rocker whispered as a mermaid popped up from the window of Weedbee’s the book shop and began to sing:

  “Last night I tried to glue this shell

  to that one over there.

  Instead I glued my eyelids shut,

  which gave me quite a scare.”

  Beattie floated on past the Flat Crab Café. Another mermaid popped up.

  “I tried to add some nice details

  to make mine look less drab.

  Instead I accidentally used

  a very angry crab.”

  A crab was hanging from her armpit, looking furious. Beattie bowed sympathetically and swam on past Sandberg’s, the department store. A little mermaid sporting a grin popped up.

  “MY SHELL TOP WAS PERFECT AND PURPLE!

  AND THEN I SAT ON IT!

  AND IT WASN’T ANYMORE!”

  The Weedbee’s mermaid leaned out of her window. “That’s not in keeping with the song, Judith,” she hissed.

  “We tried to make ours EXTRA BIG—” sang a mermaid enthusiastically in the window of Sinkers! the joke shop—

  “And pointy, just for fun.

  But we put them on and almost died,

  Because they weighed A TON!”

  Rachel Rocker sighed. “You get the idea . . .”

  “Why does every mermaid have to make shell tops for The Swan?�
�� Beattie asked as they reached the palace wall.

  “Who knows,” Rachel Rocker said. “Maybe she just really likes shell tops.”

  “And no one in the palace cares that Ommy and The Swan have taken over, do they?” Zelda said.

  Rachel Rocker bowed her head. “The palace is completely empty—well, apart from Ommy. I sneaked in the other day. Most mermaids aren’t allowed out of their shops or houses, but me and Shelly have to take the cart around the city every day, handing out shells. I took my chance and sneaked into the palace, but I couldn’t find anyone. No one knows where the palace mermaids are, and we can’t just zip over to Lobstertown and look for them. The whole Lagoon is on lock down, apart from the mermaids from Oysterdale, who are allowed to do whatever they want! They’ve been looting cities.”

  “They looted my glasses!” Shelly Shelby shouted as she lugged her broken cart over to them and swam straight into a rock.

  “Life has never been better for the Oysterdale mermaids, but as for the rest of us mermaids,” Rachel Rocker said, “the piranhas track our every move—in all the cities, not just Swirlyshell. You can’t travel far before they catch up with you and snap until you turn back. The palace mermaids could be anywhere by now, and so could Arabella Cod. They say mermaids are sneakily searching all the cities, if and when they can, hoping they’ll find her. So far, nothing in Swirlyshell. I got a secret crabmail from Klara Kunkle in Lobstertown, and they haven’t found Arabella either.”

  Shelly Shelby threw her arms in the air. “And I have to give away my shells for FREE!”

  “What’s that?” Mimi asked cheerily, pointing at a locket swinging around Shelly Shelby’s neck. She always wore weird human treasures. Beattie floated closer. “Ray R” was scrawled on it.