Chapter 14

A few hours later...

Fred and Perry Jackson met outside the house that they believed was the Benjamin's. She greeted them warmly and led them inside where Jacob, Emma, Eric, Jennifer, Charlie, Leila and Rikki were waiting. Rikki and Emma looked at each other before Rikki went up to Bella and Fred who were chatting after Bella had introduced her friends to them.

"Bella, could we have a word with you, privately?" Rikki asked plastering an overly fake smile on her face while looking at Fred.

Bella nodded, "Excuse me Fred, I won't be too long."

Emma practically dragged Bella away, on the other side of the room Rikki and Emma both glared at Bella.

"What are they doing here? We want to leave remember!" Rikki said in a forced whisper

Bella put her hands up in defence. "Relax guys, they know."

Emma looked at her incredulously. "How does that make us relax? You told your colleague that we are mermaids?"

Bella still looked un-phased. "As I said don't worry. They are mermen."

This caused both Emma and Rikki to look back over at their guests.

"Seriously? You sure about that?" Emma asked.

"Positive. I think I know that he's telling the truth when he magically moves water out of a glass,"

"Mean cool!" Rikki said, now smiling. With this Bella went back to Fred. Perry was playing with the kids. They resumed chatting, Rikki and Emma joining in this time. After a while, Bella decided to tell him the truth.

"Okay Fred, to tell you the truth, we don't actually live here."

"What do you mean?" he looked at her quizzically.

"This is our house for human guests..."

"Oh." Fred understood where this was going, "But then, where do you actually live?"

"Mako Island." Rikki put in.

"Seriously?"

"Yup." Bella agreed, "We swim over there every day, hence the reason we can't take human guests – our houses aren't really...well, how about we show you."

"We? Oh! Does that mean all of you are mers too?"

"Yeah – don't breathe a word," Emma warned.

"You can count on that. So are we swimming to Mako Island?"

"Mhmm, just follow us," Rikki smiled.

Fred and Perry followed the group over to the moon pool.

"Wow, this place is amazing," Fred exclaimed.

"I know right?" Bella said.

"This is where we changed," Rikki said. Emma nodded.

"Were you as young as Bella?"

"No, but we still have been mermaids long enough to know what to do. We changed when we were fifteen." Emma said. Following the mermaid's lead, Fred and Perry rolled out of the moon pool where Rikki and her daughters 'Steam Dried' them all off. Perry's eyes were as wide as saucers; he had never seen any mermaids or mermaid powers other than his own and his dad's, which were the same. "That is really useful," Fred said. Rikki laughed and nodded in response.

"Definitely." Seeing Perry's expression Rikki turned to him. "Perry, this is just the start of the show," she laughed.

The group hiked up from the moon pool to the hidden entrance to the village. They passed a sign saying 'Private Property, Trespassers will be prosecuted!' Bella stopped outside the entrance.

"Fred, Perry, prepare to be amazed."

Emma pushed open the hidden gate and walked inside, the group followed. After a minute of walking the tops of the crystallised water houses came into view.

"How...?" Fred asked awestruck.

"Easily– with a bit of Cleo's, Anna's and Ben's mermaid magic to mould the structures, and mine to cure them, we made our houses." Bella informed them. "Five houses for the five mermaid families, and a dining hall for our meals," Bella gestured to them as they approached. "That is where we will be eating, that's of course if you want to stay for dinner?"

"That'd be great but I'd have to call my wife."

"She's invited." Bella smiled. "Unfortunately there isn't cell phone service here – well, not yet. Lewis, Cleo's husband is working on some sort of cell phone tower,"

"It's okay, I'll swim back and get her later - she won't have finished work yet."

"We'll see you soon," Emma said. Rikki, Emma, their children and Jennifer all departed the main group to go to their own living quarters. Will and Cleo were already back from work and Anna had been sitting the kids that day, the other men were still due to arrive.

Bella and Jacob led their guests to their house.

"Will, I'm home," Bella called. Will came into the room as soon as she called and kissed Bella gently. His smiled turned into a worried frown when he saw their guests.

"Bella, sweetie, what are they doing here?"

"Relax Will, be a bit more welcoming." She chastised.

"But here" he put emphasis on the word 'here'.

"Will, they are mermen, we found out about each other at work today,"

"Oh," he said and smiled again.

"Nice to see you again Will," Fred said and reached out to shake Will's hand. Happy with Bella's explanation, Will gave it a friendly shake.

"Jake, Perry, why don't you go and find the others and play together?" Bella suggested. They eagerly took the opportunity and left to the Bennett's house where most of the kids already were. After getting to know Fred better – now all barriers were down – Fred left to go bring his wife Kelly back to Mako, Will offered to drive his wife over, therefore they both left to go back to the mainland, Fred in the water, Will in his boat. An hour later Bella heard the familiar sound of Will's boat chugging through the water to the beach. She walked down to meet them.

"Hey, I'm Bella," she introduced herself to Kelly. "It's very nice to finally meet you,"

"Yeah, likewise, I've heard a lot about you from Fred, so you're a mermaid?"

"Yeah," Bella smiled.

"I never thought I'd meet other mers," Kelly muttered to herself.

Will and Bella led them again back up to the hidden entrance to their secret mermaid village.

"Bella, isn't this private property?" Kelly asked.

"Yeah it is, but it's okay Kelly, we own this area along with our other close friends – we own the whole island actually...you didn't tell her?" she turned to Fred.

"No..." he replied sheepishly, "I thought It'd be more believable if she actually saw it,"

"What exactly did you tell her?"

"He just said that we'd be meeting you and a couple of other friends out on Mako Island for dinner 'cos Perry was already here," Kelly put in.

"That wasn't much info Fred," Bella chastised. She then turned to Kelly. "Well, we live on Mako – you mustn't tell anyone about what you see here, come this way,"

"Kelly, honey, there is something amazing over that hill, don't freak out,"

"Okay..." she said before proceeding to follow Bella. As soon as Kelly glimpsed the crystal buildings, her mouth dropped and she gasped. "How on earth?" she mumbled the question. Bella laughed at her expression.

"It's all handmade - literally," she said. Seeing Kelly's confused expression she elaborated, "All of us here are mers – five families, we used our powers to create this place. That far building is where we will be having dinner. Our husbands are humans, except Ben who's a merman."

Kelly kept looking about her as they made their way to the dining hall. Rikki and Anna were already there cooking the food. This was going to be a very interesting dinner for the newbies.