Emily Windsnap and the Siren's Secret - Liz Kessler [7]
“We could never be sick of you!” Mom said.
Millie squeezed Mom’s hand one more time, then she reached out for me. “Come on you, give me a big hug.” She folded me into her arms and gripped me so hard, I thought I was going to suffocate.
Just then, Dad called from the water. He and Mr. Beeston were going to swim alongside us to begin with, just till we got out of the bay and through the edge of the Bermuda Triangle. After that, Archie had arranged for a group of Neptune’s dolphins to take us all back with Fortuna.
Archie was untying the ropes now. He was coming along for the first part, too. He gave Millie a kiss and gently wiped her cheek with his hand — getting mascara all over his palm. “I’ll be back soon,” he said.
And then we were off. Out on the open sea again. Heading home to Brightport.
I didn’t know what to expect as we approached Brightport. Half of me imagined it would have changed completely. The other half expected everything to be exactly as we’d left it. It had been more than six months since we’d left, and so much had happened in between. It was hard to believe we were really going to be back there at all.
But we were. I could see the town come into view in the distance as the dolphins pulled us toward the bay: the harbor where Mom and I used to live on our boat, The King of the Sea; the line of shops and guesthouses along the promenade; the pier with the amusement arcade that Mandy Rushton’s parents owned at the end of it.
Mandy Rushton. I hadn’t thought about her for a while, and I couldn’t hold back a queasy feeling in my stomach when I thought of her now. She’d bullied and taunted me for years. But when she ended up at Allpoints Island earlier this year, we became friends again, like we had been when we first knew each other. The only problem was, Neptune had put a memory drug on her and her parents when they left the island, because of all the things they’d seen. Now I didn’t know if she’d remember that we were friends again or if that memory had been wiped away, along with the mermaids and the sea monster.
I’d find out soon enough.
Aaron joined me on the deck. “What’s that?” he asked, pointing a little farther around the bay at an enormous tangle of hoops in the sky. I’d never seen it before, but Archie had told us about it.
“It’s the kraken,” I said.
Aaron’s eyes widened.
“Not the actual kraken itself, obviously.” I laughed. “It’s a roller-coaster ride, part of the new theme park Mandy’s parents built.”
“Cool!” Aaron said with a self-conscious glance at me. He’d picked up words like cool and swishy from Shona and me — except he hadn’t quite mastered the art of sounding natural when he used them. Having lived in a castle cut off from the entire world for his whole life, there were still things that he had never done before, like get excited about stupid things with other kids, or go on roller-coaster rides. So he didn’t quite have the language for them yet.
Just then, Dad poked his head out from the water. He and Mr. Beeston were pulling us into the bay. We all agreed it would be less conspicuous than a whole load of magical dolphins dragging a big, weird-looking yacht behind them. We didn’t want to attract too much attention before we’d even arrived.
“Nearly there now,” he called up to me. “Go tell your mom to get ready to land. We’ll be mooring on one of the far jetties off the pier — near where you used to live on King.”
With one last glance at the approaching coastline, I hurried indoors. Butterflies were chasing each other around and around in my stomach now. What would be in store for us here? Would things work out or would it be a massive disaster?
There was no turning back now. One way or another, we were about