Lilly and Fin: A Mermaid's Tale Read online

  DISCOVER ALL OF CORNELIA FUNKE’S ADVENTURES FOR YOUNG READERS!

  Emma and the Blue Genie

  The Pirate Pig

  Ruffleclaw

  Lilly and Fin: A Mermaid’s Tale

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Text and interior illustrations copyright © 2004 by Cornelia Funke

  Translation copyright © 2017 by Oliver Latsch

  Cover art copyright © 2017 by Vivienne To

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. Originally published as Lilli und Flosse by Dressler Verlag GmbH, Hamburg, in 2004.

  Random House and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

  Ebook ISBN 9781524701031

  Trade Paperback ISBN 9781524701017

  This book has been officially leveled by using the F&P Text Level Gradient™ Leveling System.

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  Contents

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  About the Author

  Once upon a not too long time ago, there was a couple named Snorkel.

  Mr. and Mrs. Snorkel were very rich. Quite unbelievably rich.

  They owned a factory for licorice, and a factory for matches, and a lot of oil rigs. And a bank. And a zoo. And their own TV station. And there were thousands of other things they didn’t even remember they owned.

  You’re probably thinking, Wow! What did they do with all that money? Did they spend it on their kids?

  No. The Snorkels didn’t even have kids.

  But they had a hobby. A very expensive hobby. An aquarium.

  Not just any aquarium. No! It was the biggest aquarium on earth, and it was stuffed to the brim with fish, crabs, sea serpents, and countless other underwater creatures. And the Snorkels had caught every single one themselves.

  Even though some of the creatures ended up being eaten by others, the aquarium still became so crowded that the smaller animals had to be moved into jam jars, and those jam jars ended up all over the Snorkels’ house—on the stairs, on the bookshelves, on the breakfast table, and even in the refrigerator. (Those were the fish from the North Pole.)

  And the Snorkels kept going hunting, and they kept bringing back new creatures for their aquarium.

  But there was one kind of sea creature they’d been hunting for years in vain. Their collection was still missing a genuine rainbow-scaled, green-skinned, fluorescent mermaid.

  Mrs. Snorkel could barely think of anything else. And Mr. Snorkel was obsessed about this, too. They searched the seven seas with their lightning-fast submarine, the Sea Devil, and kept bringing back countless new creatures, but the mermaids eluded them.

  Mr. Snorkel had even hired dozens of underwater detectives, but they couldn’t find any mermaids, either.

  The Snorkels were desperate. So desperate that Mrs. Snorkel had chewed the sea-green nail polish off her fingernails, and Mr. Snorkel had a stomach ulcer. Until one fine day…and with that day, our story begins….

  On that beautiful morning—I think it was the first of July—the doorbell rang at Villa Snorkel. A few moments later, the maid led a tall, thin man into the dining room. That was because Mr. and Mrs. Snorkel were just having their breakfast.

  “Mr. Ignatius Harkenear!” the maid announced.

  “The most famous underwater detective in the world!” Mr. Harkenear added, taking a deep bow.

  Mr. Snorkel almost scalded himself with his hot coffee, and Mrs. Snorkel dropped her spoon into the marmalade.

  “Oh, does that mean you have…?” she cried.

  “Yes, indeed, I have,” Mr. Harkenear answered triumphantly. “I found mermaids.”

  “Where?” the Snorkels shouted simultaneously.

  The detective went to the giant map of the world hanging on the wall and put his finger on a particular spot.

  Where that spot was is top secret, of course.

  “Here!” Mr. Harkenear said. “Right here is the city of the mermaids. Very well hidden, I have to say. But not well enough for the best underwater detective in the world!” Ignatius Harkenear showed them his most satisfied shark grin.

  “Fabulous!” Mr. Snorkel cried out. “We’re leaving at once. Harkenear, you’re coming with us.”

  “I’m always ready,” the detective said, kissing Mrs. Snorkel’s hand.

  In no time at all, the Snorkels’ servants packed the Sea Devil with everything one might need for hunting mermaids. The enormous submarine was moored in the basement, in a water basin that was as large as a football field. From there it could go through an underwater tunnel straight to the ocean.

  Mr. Snorkel personally oiled the gripper arm with the pincers, which were big enough to grab a small whale.

  After everything, absolutely everything, had been stowed on board, Mr. and Mrs. Snorkel climbed into their “Snorkel Special” diving suits. Then the submarine’s hatch closed itself automatically with a loud bang, and the Sea Devil, gurgling and blubbering, sank into the water.

  The hunt for mermaids was on!

  Deep, deep down, at the bottom of a huge coral reef, was the city of the mermaids. This was no normal city. It had no houses or huts like humans would build. No, this city was made up of ships—ships that had been shipwrecked on the big reef and had sunk to the seafloor. It was in the bellies of all these ships that the mermaids lived.

  Not a single ray of sunlight had ever reached this deep.

  Now you’re probably thinking, Oh dear! It must have been pitch dark down there! But it wasn’t, because swimming in and around all these ships were glowing fish of all sizes that lit up the water day and night. Many mermaid families even kept their own glowing fish as pets—pet lamps, you might say.

  For hundreds of years, the mermaids had lived in these sunken ships. In the past, the mermaids used to swim up to the surface quite often, but at some point, there got to be too much traffic. Mermaid parents began forbidding their children to swim up there.

  Even the smallest mermaids heard stories about the dangerous and terrible fishing nets and ship propellers—and the terrifyingly ugly Two-Legs who had invented all these awful things. Sometimes mermaid teachers took the older children up for a field trip so they could see that the grown-ups hadn’t just been trying to scare them.

  The very smallest of the mermaid children, however…well, they didn’t really believe all those horror stories of Two-Legs and nets and propellers.

  Nothing but scary stories, just like the tale of the giant kraken who lived in a cave and only came out to eat naughty mermaid children.
/>   Some of the really naughty merpups sometimes even left the city. They sneaked past the guards who kept an eye out for herds of sharks, gangs of moray eels, and other dangers. The merpups loved to go where the ocean was at its darkest. They played hide-and-seek or catch and only swam back home when they got really, really tired. Their parents would have gone crazy with worry if they’d known where their kids were.

  This happened every day. But they had no idea. The mermaid parents also had no idea that a Two-Leg named Ignatius Harkenear had discovered their city. And they would never have guessed that a lightning-fast submarine called the Sea Devil was on its way to their city to catch one of them and put him or her into an overcrowded aquarium. After all, how could they?

  Today they know, but back then all mermaids believed that Two-Legs could only drive their ships up on the surface of the sea. None of the mermaid teachers taught their mermaid pupils that the Two-Legs had invented machines that could also go under the water.

  They didn’t know.

  And that was bad. Very bad. Really bad.

  Though it was, of course, quite handy for the Snorkels.

  “How much farther is it, Harkenear?” Mr. Snorkel asked impatiently. He’d been standing all day by a large porthole of the Sea Devil, staring out at the green water, but he’d seen no sign of mermaids.

  “Nothing but a bunch of stupid sea horses!” Mrs. Snorkel muttered as she chewed on her fingernails. “We’ve got at least twenty jam jars full of those.”

  “Patience!” Mr. Harkenear answered. “Not far now. Can you see that big coral reef there?”

  “Yes, yes,” Mr. Snorkel growled. “And? I’ve seen hundreds of those. Where are those mermaids, darn it?”

  Ignatius Harkenear made a sour face. “Their city is right behind that reef. There’s really no reason to get impatient.”

  “You keep talking about some city, Harkenear. I still don’t believe it!” Mr. Snorkel barked.

  “Who ever heard of fish living in a city?” Mrs. Snorkel chimed in.

  “Mermaids are not fish!” Mr. Harkenear corrected them.

  “Well, but very much like fish,” Mrs. Snorkel replied angrily.

  The detective shot her an insulted look. “Please stop the submarine as soon as we’ve circled that reef,” he said. “The mermaids have posted guards around their city.”

  The Snorkels exchanged a glance and shook their heads.

  “Guards…right!” Mr. Snorkel muttered.

  He steered the submarine around the reef and stopped. The Sea Devil floated among the corals like a giant predatory fish. Beneath it lay the city of the mermaids. “But that’s nothing more than a miserable ship graveyard!” Mr. Snorkel burst out angrily.

  Then he fell very, very silent.

  “There they are!” Mrs. Snorkel whispered, smooshing her big nose against a porthole.

  Harkenear nearly burst with pride. “What did I tell you?” he asked. “Nobody has ever been able to find them, but I, Ignatius Harkenear, found them!”

  “And I, Herman Snorkel, am going to catch one!” Mr. Snorkel announced.

  His wife frowned. “Herman,” she said. “Herman, look! There really are guards. There! In those crow’s nests.”

  “Hmm!” her husband said, now also squeezing his nose against the porthole. “You’re right! How annoying.”

  “And there’s so many of them!” Mrs. Snorkel sounded quite worried. “How are we going to catch one without all those others becoming a problem?”

  “Don’t worry!” Mr. Harkenear said. “Absolutely no problem. We’ll just catch ourselves a merpup.”

  “And what, I beg you, is a merpup?” Mr. Snorkel asked.

  “A mermaid child. I have noticed there are always some of them hanging around outside the city. One quick snatch with the Sea Devil’s claws and you got yourself a mermaid. It’ll be a small one, but it’ll last longer…ha-ha-ha!”

  Ignatius Harkenear nearly choked laughing at his own wittiness.

  “Perfect!” Mrs. Snorkel exclaimed, clapping her hands. “Then we’ll keep our little merpup with our baby squid and boxfish—they’ll look darling together!”

  “Absolutely!” Mr. Snorkel nodded happily. “That is a fabulous idea, Harkenear. Let’s get to it. I’ll steer the sub behind those rocks there, and then we just wait for one of those merpups to swim past.”

  Most merpups are quite sassy, and smart, and not scared of anything, especially when they’re small. And the sassiest, smartest, and bravest merpup was named Lilly.

  She was eight years old and just about as big as your arm is long. Lilly had many friends, but her very best friend was Fin.

  Fin was just one month older than Lilly, and two inches taller, and nearly as smart as she was. He had blue hair, and Lilly really liked him a lot.

  Together they played almost every day, out in the wide ocean. And together they had discovered a cave behind a few big rocks, where they hid their treasure and played grown-ups.

  The cave was absolutely one hundred percent secret, and it was the most beautifully gloomy cave in the whole wide ocean.

  Whenever Lilly and Fin wanted to play in their cave, Lilly would tell her parents that she was going to Fin’s, and Fin told his parents that he was going to Lilly’s. It always worked.

  That day, as the Snorkels were maneuvering their submarine into hiding, Lilly and Fin were on their way to their cave. And why wouldn’t they be?

  They had absolutely no idea of the horrible thing floating out there.

  Merpups can smell a shark or a moray eel from at least a thousand fin flaps away. But a submarine? How should Lilly and Fin be on the lookout for something they didn’t even know existed? And they didn’t believe in Two-Legs anyway, or giant kraken.

  On that momentous day, Lilly’s father had baked his delicious conch cookies and had packed a huge batch of them into Lilly’s large seaweed bag. “There you go. Now you can have a nice picnic!” her father had said, adding a bottle of kelp juice to the bag as well.

  Lilly gave him a big kiss on his big green nose. “I’m going to Fin’s,” she said. “We’re going to play treasure hunt. But I’ll be back for dinner, okay?”

  “Ah, treasure hunt. I used to play that myself!” her father answered. He lay down on his hammock to recover from all the cookie baking.

  “I’ll take Lamps with me,” said Lilly. Lamps was one of the lantern fish they kept to light their home.

  “Fine!” her father mumbled sleepily.

  Lilly often took Lamps on her expeditions, as a sort of flashlight. And the little lantern fish liked going along. After all, just lighting up an old captain’s cabin day and night was not very exciting.

  Lilly put Lamps on his leash (a real gold chain she had found in an uninhabited wreck). Then she slung the seaweed bag over her shoulder and swam out.

  As usual, Lilly and Fin met in the wreck of a big old clipper right on the edge of the city.

  Fin was already waiting on the deck when Lilly arrived.

  “I brought cookies!” Lilly called as she paddled toward him. “And kelp juice!”

  “Great!” Fin patted Lamps. “Listen, how about we play here for a change?”

  “Why?” Lilly’s ears started to twitch. They always did that when she was getting annoyed.

  “Because my scales are itching like crazy,” Fin muttered. “And that means bad luck.”

  “Oh, you and your itchy scales!” Lilly swatted her tail angrily at him. “Nonsense! You probably ate too many fish eggs again, that’s all.”

  “Really?” Fin frowned angrily. “Last time my scales itched, the morays nearly got us. And you didn’t want to believe me back then, either.”

  “That’s because I had a cold and couldn’t smell them.”

  “And the time before that? You nearly got bitten by that nasty skate!”

  “Puh! Just bad luck!” Lilly shrugged. “Come on, now. We’ll be extra careful. I really want to swim to the cave. And if you’re that scared, then I’ll swim with
out you. And I’ll eat all the cookies myself.”

  “That’s mean!” Fin muttered, scratching his scales.

  “Right. See ya!” Lilly turned around and swam away.

  “Hey, wait!” Fin called. He slid off the deck. “I’m coming.”

  “You’ll see. Nothing is going to happen,” Lilly said when he caught up with her. But she was going to be very wrong about that. Their troubles began just beyond the city’s boundary.

  Have you ever heard of Neptune, the king of the seas?

  No?

  Well, you’d better pay attention, because you’re about to meet him.

  Lilly and Fin had no problem getting past the guards. They were, of course, mainly there to look out for sharks and other predators, not to keep an eye on adventurous merpups.

  But Lilly and Fin had gotten just a few flaps of a tail fin away from the city’s boundary when the sea around them began to tremble with mighty sighs and sobs. They exchanged a knowing look.

  “Oh dear. You hear that?” Lilly asked, grasping Fin’s arm.

  “Of course. I’m not deaf.” Fin groaned. “It’s the fatso. I was right. Today will bring nothing but trouble. Let’s turn around. We can swim to the cave tomorrow.”

  “But I want to go today!” Lilly replied stubbornly. Her ears were flicking back and forth with excitement. “Maybe he won’t notice us.”

  “Pfft!” Fin exclaimed. But he still swam after his little friend.

  “He’s down there!” Lilly whispered.

  A big, fat merman was sitting on the bottom of the sea, crying bitterly. The tears were bubbling up his cheeks. (Sea creatures, of course, don’t cry tears, but little bubbles of air.) The giant’s nose was red and swollen. On his head sat a large crown, crusted all over with shells.

  “Aaaaah!” he sobbed, pressing his big fingers in front of his face. “Oi weeeh!”

  “Now or never!” Lilly whispered, and she dashed off.