The rehearsal! Ariel remembered. How had time gone by so fast?

With a flip of her tail and a wave to her old friends, Ariel was on her way.

Moments later, she reached the concert hall. Adella, Andrina, Arista, Attina,

Aquata, and Alana were already there, but they weren’t singing.

“I should do that solo,” Aquata was saying.

“No, I should,” Alana told her.

“No, me.”

“No, me.”

“I’m sorry I’m late!” Ariel interrupted. “But we still have plenty of time to rehearse.”

Adella gasped.

“Really,” Ariel insisted, puzzled by her sister’s reaction, “we have plenty of time.”

“It’s not that,” Adella whispered. “There’s a shark.”

Ariel turned her head slowly. She held her breath.

A shark hovered at the edge of the hall. His long tail whipped back and forth. His beady eyes stared straight ahead.

Ariel’s heart thumped loudly. She was sure the shark could hear it.

“What do you think we should do?” whispered Andrina.

Ariel knew they shouldn’t shout for help. That might make the shark attack.

Should they stay still? Maybe he’d get bored and swim away.

Ariel signaled her sisters. The mermaids froze in place. Seconds passed, then minutes. Time crawled by. After a while, Ariel’s muscles began to ache.

And then she felt a sneeze coming on.

A sneeze! Ariel groaned. Why did she have to sneeze right now?

Ariel pinched her nose and tried to hold back the sneeze. Just then, the shark opened its great mouth. Razor-sharp teeth glinted.

He reared up, then sped through the water…right past the mermaids, into the open ocean.

“Whew!” Ariel cried. Then she sneezed.

“Aa-aa-aaachoo!”

“That was way too close!” said Adella. She took a deep breath.

“I wonder how he got by the guards,” Andrina said.

“Anyway, it’s over,” said Aquata. “And it’s time for me to sing that solo!”

Alana glared at her, and Ariel wondered how they would ever make it through the rehearsal.

That evening, Sebastian paced back and forth in front of his music stand. He wanted everything to go well. “All right, everyone!” He tapped his baton. “The audience will be arriving any minute.”

The mermaids got in place. Soon, undersea creatures great and small filled the hall. It was showtime!

Ariel and her sisters performed song after song. The dolphins flapped their flippers, and King Triton tapped his trident against the floor.

“Now for the big finish!” Sebastian announced.

Onstage, Adella hovered above the others. She smiled down as they sang “Happy Birthday.”

Andrina sang a line, then Arista and Attina chimed in.

Aquata and Alana sang together since they hadn’t been able to decide who got a solo.

Then Sebastian pointed up. All the merpeople and sea creatures swam to the surface. The sun was setting. Blazing red and orange colors painted the sky.

Adella’s sisters sang the last line with a quick solo by Ariel.

Applause rang out. “Hear, hear!” cried the merpeople.

Ariel turned to her sister, smiling. “Happy birthday, Adella.”

“Oh, Ariel!” Adella said. “It’s so good to have you home. I wish you’d never leave.”

Adella’s words echoed around the shore. They bounced from rock to rock and hung in the air. A curtain of darkness fell. One moment, the sky was light. The next instant, it was black as midnight.

Fish scattered.

Ariel’s sisters held on to each other fearfully. Then, holding hands, they ducked below the surface, too.

Still at the surface, King Triton rose to his full height. Ariel was by his side.

“Father!” Ariel gasped. “The sun!”

The sun had turned into a black disk. A fiery ring of light circled it, like a sparkling crown.

Triton held his trident tightly. “Now I understand,” he murmured. “It’s so rare.”

“What is? What is it?”

“A solar eclipse.” Triton’s voice was strained. “The moon blocks the entire sun! It’s a dangerous, mysterious time. I don’t know what will happen,” he warned. “We need to be very, very careful.”

Suddenly, the water turned rough. Waves rose high, then higher still. The current grew strong. Ariel felt herself pushed and pulled.

“Father!” she cried. A giant wave rolled toward her, gathering merpeople, fish, driftwood, and plants with it. Then it tossed everyone and everything around.

Ariel tried to stay afloat. She looked frantically for her father and sisters. But the wave’s powerful force kept pulling her down.

Crash! Ariel landed on something hard. Ariel couldn’t see a thing. She couldn’t tell where she was. She tried to get up. But a hard object knocked her over, pinning her to the ground.

Ariel couldn’t move.