Mermaid Magic

Gwyneth Rees is half Welsh and half English and grew up in Scotland. She went to Glasgow University and qualified as a doctor in 1990. She is a child and adolescent psychiatrist but has now stopped practising so that she can write full-time. She is the author of the bestselling Fairies series (
Fairy Dust
,
Fairy Treasure
,
Fairy Dreams
,
Fairy Gold
,
Fairy Rescue
),
Cosmo and the Magic Sneeze
,
Cosmo and the Great Witch Escape
and
Mermaid Magic
, as well as several books for older readers. She lives in London with her two cats.

Visit www.gwynethrees.com

Also by Gwyneth Rees

Fairy Dust
Fairy Treasure
Fairy Gold
Fairy Rescue
Cosmo and the Magic Sneeze
Cosmo and the Great Witch Escape
The Magical Book of Fairy Fun

Look out for

Fairy Secrets

For older readers

The Mum Hunt
The Mum Detective
The Mum Mystery
My Mum’s from Planet Pluto
The Making of May

MACMILLAN CHILDREN’S BOOKS

Mermaid Magic
,
Rani’s Sea Spell
and
The Shell Princess
first published 2001 by Macmillan Children’s Books

This edition first published 2003 by Macmillan Children’s Books

This electronic edition published 2008 by Macmillan Children’s Books
a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
Basingstoke and Oxford
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com

ISBN 978-0-330-50392-1 PDF
ISBN 978-0-330-50391-4 EPUB

Copyright © Gwyneth Rees 2001

Illustrations copyright © Annabel Hudson 2001

The right of Gwyneth Rees and Annabel Hudson to be identified as the author
and illustrator of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or
otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form,
or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written
permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized
act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal
prosecution and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library.

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www.panmacmillan.com
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Mermaid
Magic

Chapter One

R
ani swam down through the turquoise water until her belly was flat against the sandy bottom of the seabed. Then she did a quick flip with her tail so that she somersaulted upwards again.

“Show-off ! “
she heard, as she flicked her hair out of her eyes.

She looked suspiciously at her pet sea horse, Roscoe, who had been perched on a nearby rock with his mouth shut the whole time, looking innocently in her direction. Strange things had been happening to Rani recently. She kept hearing odd, whispery words when nobody near her had spoken. At first she had thought it was just Roscoe playing tricks on her but the little sea horse had denied it.

Before she could give it any more thought, the conch sounded. That meant it was time for them to go back into the school cave for more lessons. Rani swam over to where her sister, Kai, was sitting on a rock twisting her long blonde hair into a tight spiral. Rani hadn’t told Kai about the strange whispers. For some reason she felt that she should keep them secret. Which was strange because she and Kai always told each other everything.

“School is boring, boring, boring,” complained Kai loudly, letting go of her hair so that it swished out into a gold mass that enveloped her. She flicked herself off the rock and kicked up a load of sand with her tail, nearly bumping into Marissa and Marina, the twins, who swished their golden tresses outwards proudly as they swam by.

Rani sighed. She wished she had beautiful golden hair like all the other mermaids. Her mother kept telling her that her red hair was beautiful too, but Rani didn’t think so.

The conch sounded again just as a whole shoal of rainbow fish swam past, heading towards the reef at top speed.

“What’s the hurry?” Kai called out after them.

“Our babies are hatching!” one of the fish called back.

“Wow!” exclaimed Kai. “I’ve never seen baby fish hatching before. Let’s go and see!”

And before Rani had time to protest that they really should go back to school, Kai had set off after the fish.

“I suppose we could always say we didn’t hear the conch,” Rani muttered doubtfully, as she followed her sister.

Rani loved Tingle Reef. The water was warm and crystal clear and the reef was full of friendly sea-creatures who all lived happily together in their colourful underwater home. It was the only home Rani could remember. She had been found as a baby by Kai’s parents inside a Giant Clam-Shell at the edge of the reef. No one knew where Rani had come from and it was a mystery how she had got there. Kai’s family had adopted Rani as their own. Rani felt that Murdoch and Miriam were the best parents she could wish for and that Kai was the best sister. The only time she ever felt different was when anyone commented on her appearance.

Rani looked very different from the other mermaids. It wasn’t just her hair. Her scales were a deep orange colour whereas all the other mermaids had green tails. Instead of having eyes that were sea-blue or sea-green, Rani had goldy-brown eyes.In fact, Rani’s mother often joked that Rani didn’t look like she came from the sea at all.

Kai suddenly stopped dead in mid tail-flip and Rani crashed right into her. She was looking at the rainbow fish, whose pink and yellow stripes made them the most colourful of all the fish in the reef.