Not Quite a Mermaid (3 page)

He took the spoon in his mouth and whizzed round in a circle. The cake mix flew everywhere.

‘Stop, Splash!' Electra giggled, ducking as some cake mix flew at her head.

Splash stopped and looked into the bowl. ‘At least it's all mixed up,' he said.

Electra nodded and tipped the gloopy mess into the cake tin. ‘There we are.' She patted the mixture down. ‘Now, we just need to put it in the oven.' She carried the tin over to the oven. She knew that to make a
mermaid oven work you had to put in some mermaid fire. Ronan, like all merpeople, kept some mermaid fire in a large container beside the oven. But how much should she use? Electra didn't have a clue. Guessing wildly, she reached in and took a large ball of glowing green mermaid fire out of the pot. ‘This'll do!'

‘That looks quite a lot,' Splash said doubtfully.

‘It'll be fine,' said Electra, sticking the fire inside the oven. ‘Come on. Let's go and see how the twins are doing with the banner and the streamers!'

The twins had made a big banner on which they had painted the words ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRAN!' They had hung it on one wall and were in the middle of making lots of streamers.

‘Oh, wow! The banner looks great!' Electra said.

‘Come and help us with these,' Sam said, pointing to the streamers.

They had great fun shaking glitter on to the streamers then hanging them up from rocky hooks on the cave walls. By the time they had finished they all had glitter in their hair.

‘It looks wonderful!' Electra said happily.

Sam frowned. ‘Everywhere is very messy, though.'

‘Dad's not going to like it,' Sasha said, looking round at the paint and
glitter on the floor and all the open paint pots and dirty brushes.

‘We'll clear up later,' Electra said airily. ‘Right now we need to think about presents! What shall we…' She broke off as a smoky smell hit the back of her throat. ‘What's that smell? Oh, no!' she gasped as she realized what it must be. ‘It's the cake! It must be burning!'

Electra raced to the kitchen with the others following. Black smoke was billowing out of the oven.

‘Oh!' Electra said, opening the oven door.

The cake had grown, puffing up
over the sides of the tin. It had also turned black.

‘It's burnt!' Sasha exclaimed.

Electra grabbed some oven gloves and took the cake out of the oven. ‘It's not that bad,' she said as she put it down on the table. ‘We can just cut the burnt bits off. I'm sure it'll taste OK.' She prodded it with a finger. It was as

hard as a rock. ‘I…um…I think,' she added doubtfully.

‘We can't give Gran a burnt cake,' Sam said in dismay.

Electra's eyes fell on some tubes of icing sugar in the open cupboard. ‘I know!' she exclaimed. ‘Leave it to me! Why don't you go and finish the birthday cards and I'll sort the cake out.'

‘Are you sure you can?' Sasha said dubiously.

Electra nodded.

‘OK then,' Sam said, and he and Sasha swam off.

‘What are you going to do?' Splash asked Electra curiously.

‘This.'

Electra picked off the burnt bits on top of the cake. Luckily the cake seemed a bit softer right in the middle. She picked off the burnt bits on the sides too. By the time she had got rid of all the burnt bits the cake was very small – only big enough for one person – and it was a bit lopsided.
Maybe it
will look better with icing
, Electra thought hopefully.

She iced the cake pink and finished by writing ‘Happy Birthday' in swirly letters on the top. ‘There!' she said. ‘It looks much better!'

‘I guess,' Splash said, not sounding convinced.

‘Well, it will have to do!' Electra

quickly swept the burnt remains of the cake into her bag so that no one would see them. ‘Come on, let's go and get the others. We've got to get a present sorted out.'

Sam and Sasha were just finishing their cards.

‘We need to think about a present for Gran. What shall we get her?' Electra asked.

‘A box of chocolates,' Sam suggested.

‘But we haven't got any money,' Sasha pointed out. ‘Why don't we get some anemones and put them in a pot for her?'

‘I guess,' Electra said doubtfully. It sounded a rather boring present.

‘Or we could make a shell necklace for her,' Sasha suggested.

‘There must be something more exciting we can get her than that.' Electra stroked Splash. ‘If only we knew what she really wanted.'

‘I know!' Splash whistled suddenly. ‘A sea mouse!'

Electra stared at him. ‘Of course!' she cried. ‘Gran said that a sea mouse was the best present she'd ever had and we can get one for free if we go to the deep caves and find one!'

‘We can't go to the deep caves!' protested Sasha.

‘No! It's much too dangerous. There might be a giant sea snake there!' Sam exclaimed.

‘We'll be very quick,' Electra said.

‘And it'll be an adventure,' said Splash.

‘We could just whizz to the caves, get a sea mouse and whizz back,' Electra said. ‘And even if the snake has got into the caves, well, it's only a baby one.'

The twins looked very doubtful.

‘We'd be doing it for Gran,' Electra told them persuasively. ‘Think how happy she would be. I bet a sea mouse is the only thing she's wanted for years