Emily Windsnap and the Siren's Secret - Liz Kessler [37]
Amara smiled. “And where do we find her?”
“You tell me!” I cried. “We came out here together. We were looking for —” I stopped, and looked around at the mermaids, all staring intently at me. I’d been right earlier. A mysterious place, hidden in the deeps of the ocean, miles from anywhere. I swallowed down a mixture of fear and excitement. “I think we were looking for you,” I said.
Nerin, the first mermaid, joined Amara and me. “Never mind that,” she said. “Tell us more about Shona.” I could tell she was trying to sound all friendly and nice, but her voice came out desperate and rasping. “Where is she? Where can we find her?”
“I don’t know! I’ve told you. We came here together. We were looking for —” I felt my cheeks heat up and I stopped.
Nerin nudged me. “Go on.”
“We were looking for the lost sirens,” I said, looking down at the sand as I spoke, so I didn’t have to see their shocked expressions, and I could pretend I hadn’t noticed the gasps at what I’d said. I guess they didn’t know they were a well-known ocean myth that mermaids studied at school.
Two long, thin, bright yellow fish wove in between us all, as though having a slalom race with each other. “We decided to go in different directions and meet up again in ten minutes,” I went on. “But then I got dragged down this kind of underwater waterfall and couldn’t get out again.” I looked up at Nerin. “Then you found me and brought me here.”
Nerin turned to the others. “We need to find this Shona,” she said ferociously, the nice act all but gone now. “We must have her!”
Amara pursed her lips into a frown. She glared into my eyes. “Try, anyway,” she said.
“Try what?” I asked.
“Sing,” she said simply. “Do it.” She turned to the others. “You never know, she might just be over-modest, after all. It’s worth a try.” She turned to Nerin. “Go to the place,” she said. “Hurry. And come back immediately if anything changes.”
Nerin hurried away and we waited in silence.
What was she talking about? What place? And what were we waiting for?
Before I had time to ask, she’d turned back to me. This time there wasn’t even a pretense of a smile. She waited for a minute or two, and then her lips rolled into a snarl. “Come on, child,” she said. “Sing.”
I had no choice. Anyway, what harm could it do to try? Except that my mind seemed to have gone completely blank. I couldn’t think of a single song.
“Sing!” Amara repeated impatiently. “What are you waiting for?”
My mind grasped the only thing it could think of. A nursery rhyme.
“Twinkle, twinkle, little star,” I began. It didn’t come out how I’d hoped. I cleared my throat. “How I wonder what you are.”
I stopped. The mermaids were all looking at me, their faces an identical picture of horror.
Amara was the first to speak. “What in the ocean’s name was that?” she spat.
“I told you I can’t sing,” I protested.
Moments later, Nerin swam back into the clearing and joined Amara. “Nothing,” she said. “The force is just as strong. We need to find the other one. This Shona. If the two came together, she must be nearby.”
“And if they really are such good friends, surely she’ll come looking when she realizes her best friend has gone missing,” Amara added. “We need to find her.”
“You’re right,” Merissa said, her voice dripping with desperation. “She can’t be far away. We should split up and go in search of her.”
The five of them talked among themselves at the other side of the clearing, hatching a plan to find Shona. I could hear snatches of their conversation, but none of it made any sense to me.
“We have to find her!” one of them was saying. “Maybe she will have the voice that can get us out of here. We need to hear her sing.”
“This is our best chance in years,” another replied.
“Our best chance ever, you mean,” the third added. “Find this siren and it could all be over.”
“As long as she came in.”
“We need this siren to get out of here.”
I swam toward them. “What are you talking about?” I asked. “I’ve got a right to know!”
Amara threw her head back and laughed. “A right? You want to talk about rights, do you? Ha!” She swam