Hamish X Goes to Providence Rhode Island by Sean Cullen Page B

ended in a metal door. It might have originally been shiny, but years had coated it with a thick layer of black tarnish. The carvings on the surface were still clear: tangled fronds of seaweed intertwined in complicated relief covering the entire surface and two dolphins leaping over a giant shell in the centre. The door was vast, more than ten metres high.
    â€œThe mighty Dolphin Gate!” Xnasos and the others caught up with Mimi and Xnasha, gathering beside them. He sighed sadly while running his hand over the ornate metal. “Cast in a single slab of silver. Beautiful, isn’t it? We really knew how to build in those days. We really ought to give it a good clean one day …”
    â€œWhy bother?” Xnasha said irritably. “No one ever sees it. We never leave this place and no one ever visits.” Mimi sensed frustration in the little woman, as if the isolation of Atlantis was a bone of contention often picked over between brother and sister. Xnasos stared daggers at his sister. Sensing his displeasure, Xnasha shrugged. “Frankly, I don’t think there’s enough silver polish in all of Atlantis to make it shine as it once did.”
    â€œDoesn’t mean we shouldn’t try,” Xnasos said under his breath. Shaking his head, he reached up with his staff and tapped the centre of the shell. “Fendictus Blort!” The door split down a previously invisible seam, its two halves swinging silently inward. The children gasped.
    â€œOh, that’s nothing,” Xnasos chuckled. “Don’t just stand there with your mouths open like a bunch of groupers! 45 Come in! Come in!”

    He strode forward through the mighty gate. After a moment’s hesitation, Mimi and Cara followed him, leading the rest of the Hollow Mountain refugees.
    Mimi stepped through the gate, blinking in the sudden glow of sunlight overhead. She stopped short and let her eyes adjust, but when they had, she almost refused to believe them.
    Considering all the amazing adventures Mimi had enjoyed up to this point in our story, you might not credit that she could still be amazed. Sadly, you would be underestimating the human capacity for wonder. She had never seen anything so beautiful in her short life. Granted, her early experiences had been severely limited: she grew up in a tiny Texas town and then travel led straight to the remote and miserable wasteland that was Windcity. Still, she had trekked across the Arctic ice and witnessed the glory of the northern lights. She had soared via airship across the North Atlantic and watched the sun rise over the grey ocean waves. She had lived within the Hollow Mountain, the product of centuries of brilliant human engineers.
    None of those sights could have prepared her for the majesty of Atlantis. She found herself standing in a huge paved square. The flagstones were fashioned from the same stone as the corridor, irregular in shape and fitted together with painstaking precision like a giant jigsaw puzzle. The musical rush of water drew Mimi’s eye to the centre of the square, where a fountain towered above her. Crystal-clear water gushed up towards the sky in a single, graceful column to then fall in glittering drops into a circular pool below. A mist of cool droplets moistened Mimi’s upturned face, gently caressing her skin. At the base of the fountain, a stone cluster of dolphins, octopi, shellfish, andmermaids sheltered under the broad arms of a man with a giant fork in his hand pointing high at the ceiling. The statue’s face was grim and bearded, a layer of grime darkening the recesses of his features, making him seem dour and serious.
    â€œHettakarus,” Xnasha said. “You know him as Neptune, god of the sea!”
    â€œMy great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather,” Xnasos said, puffing out his chest. “He was a mighty king in his day. Built most of what you see around you.” He spread his arms wide to