Mermaid Magic (4 page)

He told Kai to swim one hundred of her tail-lengths straight out from the entrance to the sea-snake burrow, then turn right at a big bush of sea-kelp, then swim to the rock straight ahead that had a purple bush to one side.

“Come on,” said the twins excitedly. “Let’s go now.”

Rani suddenly spotted Kai’s shell-comb. “Here!” she cried out triumphantly, scooping it up just as Roscoe appeared with the message that Octavius was ready now.

“Ready for what?” Kai asked, carefully replacing her hair-comb.

Rani knew she couldn’t tell. Not yet anyway.

Kai looked hurt when Rani told her that it was a secret.

“Don’t be upset,” Rani pleaded. “I’ll tell you as soon as I can.”

“You don’t have to,” Kai replied huffily. “I’m going with the twins to find this oyster.” And she swam off after the twins, in the direction of the Deep Blue.

“Kai, don’t leave the reef!” Rani called after her anxiously. “If Mother and Father find out, you’ll get into trouble! And besides, it might be dangerous!”

But Kai didn’t stop.

“I wouldn’t worry about her,” Roscoe said, gruffly. “Where
you’re
going is far more dangerous!” And he gave her a nudge with his bony head in the direction of Octavius’s cave.

Chapter Five

“
I
can give you directions from here,” Octavius said, stopping as they reached the edge of the reef.

“You want me to go into the Deep Blue alone?” Rani said, shocked. Octavius had already insisted that Roscoe stay behind and they had left him at the octopus’s cave.

“I feel it is my duty not to put myself at undue risk,” Octavius explained gravely. “After all, my great brain is a very valuable asset to the whole community.”

Rani was sure that it was, but at the same time she was petrified by the idea of swimming off into the Deep Blue by herself. She had only been in the Deep Blue a few times before with her father who had made her stay very close by his side the whole time. Murdoch made many expeditions into the Deep Blue with the other mermen to collect medicine plants and food and other essential things and he had told them stories about the creatures that lived there. Rani knew that many were friendly like the dolphins and the whales but that others were dangerous, like the sharks and the giant sea-spiders who would catch you and eat you, and the Yellow-back jellyfish who would kill you with one sting.

“Don’t worry,” Octavius said. “I’ve sent a starfish to tell Morva you’re coming. She’ll be looking out for you. Now, listen carefully. I’m going to tell you how to get to the Secret Cave ...”

Octavius explained the secret route twice and made her repeat it after him. She was to look out for three landmarks: a craggy rock that was completely covered in limpets; a huge flowering sea-cactus; and a tall bush that pointed upwards in the shape of a needle.

“What if I can’t find them?” Rani asked.

“You will,” Octavius said. “And when you get there, I want you to give Morva this from me.” He handed her a little shell-container. “Hurry now.”

Rani looked out anxiously into the dark water of the Deep Blue. Plucking up all her courage, she thrashed her tail and propelled herself over the edge of the reef.

It was much darker in the deep water, and colder too. Rani shivered as she swam down deeper and deeper to reach the seabed. She saw the rock covered in limpets that Octavius had told her to look for and turned left straight after it just like Octavius had said. Then she started to look for a bushy sea-cactus with blue flowers. As she swam past it a shoal of rainbow fish scuttled out from underneath, making her jump.

“There’s a shark about,” they told her. “Watch out.”

Rani shivered, but it was too late to turn back. She thanked them for the warning and continued on her way.

After what seemed like a long time she saw the needle-shaped bush standing on its own in a sandy clearing on the seabed. She had to start swimming upwards now, Octavius had said. But how could a cave be situated
above
her? It had to be on the seabed or in a rock somewhere.

But since the bush was definitely pointing upwards she decided she had better do what Octavius had said. Then, all of a sudden, the way up was blocked. She stopped dead and looked above her.

In the water above her head was what looked like a huge flat rock stretching out in all directions as far as she could see. She started to swim downwards away from it, thinking that perhaps it wasn’t a rock but some huge sea-creature, when she heard a whispery voice calling, “
Look above you, Rani! “

She looked, and this time she spotted an opening in the rock. And from the opening, a rope of seaweed was dangling down.

Up and up the rope she climbed, through the dark vertical tunnel, until it finally came to an end and all of a sudden she was inside a beautiful underwater cave.

The water inside the cave was crystal clear and beautiful yellow and purple fish swam around playfully. In one corner, two bright orange lobsters were dozing, their large pincers draped lazily round each other. The walls of the cave were decorated with brightly coloured murals of different kinds of sea-creatures, including mermaids, swimming around amongst the pink and purple coral.

Rani turned to look at the wall behind her and gasped.

In the middle of the wall was a picture of a mermaid with red hair and an orange tail, swimming down into the centre of what looked like a burst of golden light!

Rani held in her breath as she swam closer to study the picture. Just as she was almost touching it she heard a noise behind her.

She turned to look. There, blocking the entrance to the cave, was the strangest mermaid she had ever seen.

“Hello, Rani,” the mermaid said.

“Are you? Are you
Morva
?” Rani stammered.

The mermaid had dazzling orange scales and red hair so long that it reached the tip of her tail. Rani saw that her eyes looked old and wise. But how could this be Morva? Old mermaids had white hair and wrinkled faces! And Morva wasn’t just old – she was ancient!

“Welcome to my floating cave,” Morva said, smiling.

Chapter Six

T
he shell-container Octavius had sent turned out to be a portion of his delicious stew. As Rani watched Morva heating up the stew on top of her hot-rock stove she tried not to think about a story her grandmother used to tell her, about a naughty little mermaid who ran off on her own into the Deep Blue and ended up becoming the tenderest ingredient in a sea-witch’s supper.

“I thought you’d look much older,” Rani said shyly. “Like my grandmother. She’s got white hair.”

“I expect I’m twice as old as your grandmother,” Morva said. “But one of the advantages of being able to use magic is that you don’t have to
look
older!”

Rani swallowed. “They said— They said you used
bad
magic.”

Morva stopped stirring her stew, which seemed to be bubbling up to ten times the quantity as she chanted over it.

“Let me tell you what really happened,” she said.

And Morva told her that she came from a different group of mermaids a long way away from here and that, when she was young, she had met a merman from Tingle Reef when she was out exploring in the Deep Blue. The merman had swum farther than usual because he was searching for a rare type of plant with healing powers. The plant was needed urgently because the baby of one of the community leaders was very sick. Morva had helped him to find the plant and they had returned to Tingle Reef together. Morva and the merman, who was called Murdoch, fell in love.