Darren Shan: The Vampire's Assistant

I was in charge of Madam Octa. I had to find food for her and exercise her and clean out her cage. I didn't want to — I hated the spider almost as much as I hated the vampire — but Mr. Crepsley said I was the one who'd stolen her, so I had to look after her.

I practiced a few tricks with her every now and then, but my heart wasn't in it. She didn't interest me anymore, and as the weeks went by I played with her less and less.

The one good thing about being on the road was being able to visit a whole bunch of places I hadn't been before and see a lot of cool sights. I loved traveling. But, since we traveled at night, I didn't get to see many of our surroundings — bummer!

One day, while Mr. Crepsley was sleeping, I got tired of being indoors. I left a note on the TV, in case I wasn't back when he woke up, then left. I only had a little money and had no idea where I would go, but that didn't matter. Just getting out of the hotel and spending some time by myself was wonderful.

It was a large town but pretty quiet. I checked out a few arcades and played some video games in them. I'd never been very good at video games before, but with my new reflexes and skills I was able to do pretty much anything I wanted.

I raced through all levels, knocked out every opponent in martial arts tournaments, and zapped all the aliens attacking from the skies in the sci-fi adventures.

After that I toured the town. There were plenty of fountains and statues and parks and museums, all of which I checked out with interest. But going around the museums reminded me of Mom — she loved taking me to museums — and that upset me: I always felt lonely and miserable when I thought of Mom, Dad, or Annie.

I spotted a group of guys my age playing hockey on a cement playground. There were eight players on each side. Most had plastic sticks, though a few had wooden ones. They were using an old tennis ball as a puck.

I stopped to watch, and after a few minutes one of the guys came over to me.

"Where are you from?" he asked.

"Out of town," I said. "I'm staying at a hotel with my father." I hated calling Mr. Crepsley that, but it was the safest thing to say.

"He's from out of town," the boy called back to the other guys, who had stopped playing.

"Is he part of the Addams Family?" one of them shouted back, and they all laughed.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked, offended.

"Have you looked at yourself in a mirror lately?" the boy said.

I glanced down at my dusty suit and knew why they were laughing: I looked like something out of Beetlejuice.

"I lost the bag with my normal clothes," I lied. "These are all I have. I'm getting new stuff soon."

"You should." The boy smiled, then asked if I played hockey. When I said yes, he invited me to play with them.

"You can be on my team," he said, handing me a spare stick. "We're down, six-two. My name's Michael."

"Hey. I'm Darren," I replied, testing the stick.

I rolled up the cuffs of my pants and made sure my shoelaces were double-tied. While I was doing that, the other team scored another goal. Michael swore loudly and dragged the ball back to the center.

"You ready to go?" he asked me.

"Sure."

"Come on, then," he said. He tapped the ball to me and moved ahead, waiting for me to pass back.

It had been a long time since I'd played hockey — at school, in gym, we'd usually had to choose between hockey and soccer, and I never passed up a chance for a game of soccer — but with the stick in my hands and the ball at my feet, it seemed like only yesterday since I'd played hockey.

I knocked the ball from left to right a few times, making sure I hadn't forgotten how to control it, then looked up and focused on the goal.

There were seven players between me and the goalie. None of them rushed to stop me. I guess they felt they didn't need to since they were five goals ahead.

I started running. A big kid — the other team's captain — tried blocking me, but I slipped around him easily. I was past another two before they could react, then dribbled around a fourth. The fifth player slid in with his stick at knee level, but I jumped over him with ease, faked the sixth, and shot before the seventh and final defender could get in the way.

Even though I hit the ball pretty softly, it went a lot harder than the goalie was expecting and flew into the top right-hand corner of the goal. It bounced off the wall and I caught it in the air.

I turned, smiling, and looked back at my teammates. They were still back near the other goal, staring at me in shock. I carried the ball back to the center line and set it down without saying a word. Then I turned to Michael and said, "Seven-three."

He blinked slowly, then smiled. "Oh, yeah!" he cheered softly, then high-fived his teammates. "I think we're going to enjoy this!"

I had a great time for a while, dominating play, rushing back to defend, picking players out with pinpoint passes. I scored a couple of goals and set up four more. We were leading 9–7 and coasting. The other team hated it. They made us give them two of our best players, but it made no difference. I could have given them everybody except our goalie and still kicked their butts.

Then things got nasty. The captain of the other team — Danny — had been trying to foul me for a while, but I was too quick for him and easily dodged his raised stick and stuck-out legs. But then he began to punch my ribs and stand on my toes and slam his elbows into my arms. None of it hurt me, but it annoyed me. I hate sore losers.

The last straw came when Danny pinched me in a very painful place! Even vampires have their limits. I yelled out and bent over, wincing from the pain.

Danny laughed and took off with the ball.

I got up after a few seconds, mad as hell. Danny was halfway down the rink. I sprinted after him. I knocked the players between us aside — it didn't matter if they were on his team or mine — then caught up behind him and swiped at his legs with my stick. It would have been a dangerous tackle if it had come from a human. Coming from a half-vampire…

There was a sharp snapping sound. Danny screamed and went down. Play stopped immediately. Everybody in the game knew the difference between a yell of pain and a scream of real agony.

I scrambled to my feet, already sorry for what I'd done, wishing I could take it back. I looked at my stick, hoping to find it broken in two, hoping that had been what made the snapping noise. But it wasn't.

I'd broken both of Danny's shinbones.

His lower legs were bent awkwardly and the skin around the shins was torn. I could see the white of bone in among the red.

Michael bent over to examine Danny's legs. When he got up, there was a horrified look in his eyes.

"You've cracked his legs wide open!" he gasped.

"I didn't mean to," I cried. "He squeezed my…" I pointed to the spot beneath my waist.

"You broke his legs!" Michael shouted, then backed away from me. Everyone around him backed away as well.

They were afraid of me.

Breathing hard, I dropped my stick and left, knowing I'd make matters worse if I stayed and waited for grown-ups to arrive. None of the guys tried to stop me. They were too scared. They were terrified of me… Darren Shan… a monster.

It was dark when I got back. Mr. Crepsley was awake. I told him we should leave town right away, but didn't tell him why. He took one look at my face, nodded, and started gathering our stuff.

"We didn't say much that night. I was thinking how much it stunk to be a half-vampire. Mr. Crepsley could tell there was something wrong with me, but didn't bother me with questions. It wasn't the first time I'd been grouchy. He was getting used to my mood swings.