“You dare question my knowledge of my own kingdom? The insolence!” The king waved his trident. A wide circle of water rose around Finn and closed at the top like the peak of a teepee, trapping Finn inside.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Finn cried out.
“Speak into the water!” the king hollered. As he lowered the trident, the peak of water lowered as well, about to drown Finn.
Finn slipped his head off the board and bubbled water as he said, “Sorry! Sorry!”
The water funnel collapsed, smashing into Finn and knocking him off the board. He struggled back atop and held on for dear life.
“‘Starfish wise, starfish cries,’” the king repeated. “We will do everything in our power to assist or rescue you and your crew if summoned.”
“My friends,” Finn said.
“Our powers are not inconsiderable.”
“And what do you want in return?” Finn asked.
The giant blinked for the first time, spraying Finn with excess water.
“I mean, isn’t that the way it works?” Finn asked. “You offer protection in exchange for something?”
“You mock me?”
The waters churned as if a strong wind were blowing.
“No! I just thought…I mean…if you’re willing to protect us, well, I thought you must want something from us.”
“Indeed! It is true. It is often the way as you say.”
“Like Ursula’s necklace or something.”
“Do not mention—!”
But it was too late. Finn wished someone would tell him the rules before he messed things up. Wayne always left too much to chance. Apparently by just speaking the name of Triton’s nemesis, Ursula, Finn had done something wrong. Very wrong.
The water boiled at Triton’s tail. It bubbled and—this seemed impossible—steamed, and the random churning of the choppy waves began to take form. First the surface smoothed. Then it formed into concentric ridges, as thick and wide as the back of a coiling sea serpent. The surfboard spun clockwise; for a moment Finn faced the guard shack, then the high wall, then the beach and the park entrance in the distance. He spun ever faster, his rotation increasing. The back of the serpent rose wider and higher; the water beneath the surfboard took the shape of a funnel. Now Finn saw what was actually happening. A hole opened beneath him and a whirlpool formed.
The king hoisted the trident and shook the hair off his wide neck.
“Away from this place!” he shouted.
Finn thought he had to be talking to him, but in the middle of being sucked down some drain, he was in no shape to reply. The whirlpool’s walls were now twelve feet high, his surfboard spinning as fast as a pinwheel in a hurricane.
“Do…something…” he mumbled, feeling green. Then he stuck his face into the water. “Help!” he gurgled.
The surfboard spun even faster.
A purple-skinned, fat-lipped ugly the size of two side-by-side tractor-trailer trucks stood on end, with jowly upper arms, rose out of the pool and faced Triton. There was nothing cartoony about her. Instead she looked like the result of an octopus breeding with a cow. Her skin wasn’t so much purple as it was translucent, revealing a tight spiderweb of veins pumping rust-colored blood on top of muscle tissue the color of eggplant. The skin looked gooey. Her face sagged and bulged and re-formed with each little movement. Her body was considerable. If you took all the Jell-O in the world and shaped it into a sand castle of the ugliest woman you could ever imagine, you’d have the second-ugliest woman ever imagined. The first was occupying a space in the pool a few yards from Triton.
These two were not strangers to one another. They were more like divorced husband and wife.
“You called?” the big blob said.
“Your presence is unwanted,” Triton said.
“But I didn’t bring you any presents,” Ursula said, twisting his words. She chuckled at her own joke, throwing three-foot waves off her belly.
Finn was now nearly at the bottom of the whirlpool spout, spinning like a propeller. Through the silver walls of water he saw squidlike creatures with the same strange translucent skin as Ursula’s. Their heads were like manatees, but with puckered fish lips and bulging eyes. Inside the fish lips, rows of razor-sharp teeth showed. They circled the whirlpool like hungry alley cats on the other side of a wobbly fence. One poked its head through the shimmering wall of water and snapped at Finn. It missed, but caught the whirling surfboard and bit off a chunk, spitting it out immediately but leaving a few teeth behind. It retreated through the wall. But others took its place, snapping at Finn and then retreating. If he fell off the board he was chum for the making.