DARREN SHAN - Shan, Darren - Cirque Du Freak 12 - Sons of Destiny

"It was just a joke," I mutter defensively before the accusations fly.

"I hate you!" Gret hisses, then bursts into fresh tears and flees dramatically.

"Cal," Mum says to Dad,freezing me with an ice-cold glare. "Take Grubitsch in hand. I'm going up to try and comfort Gretelda." Mum always calls us by our given names. She's the one who picked them, and is the only person in the world who doesn't see how shudderingly awful they are.

Mum heads upstairs. Dad sighs, walks to the counter, tears off several sheets of kitchen paper and mops up some of the guts and streaks of blood from the floor. After a couple of silent minutes of this, as I lie uncertainly by my upturned chair, he turns his steely gaze on me. Lots of sharp lines around his mouth and eyes � the sign that he'sreally angry, even angrier than he was about me smoking.

"You shouldn't have done that," he says.

"It was funny," I mutter.

"No," he barks. "It wasn't."

"I didn't mean anything by it!" I cry. "She's done worse to me! She told Mum about me smoking � I know it was her! And remember the time she melted my lead soldiers? And cut up my comics? And �"

"There are some things you should never do," Dad interrupts softly. "This waswrong . You invaded your sister's privacy, humiliated her, terrified her senseless. And the timing! You�" He pauses and ends with a fairly weak "�upset her greatly." He checks his watch. "Get ready for school. We'll discuss your punishment later."

I trudge upstairs miserably, unable to see what all the aggro is about. It was a great joke. I laughed for hours when I thought of it. And all that hard work � chopping the rats up, mixing in some water to keep them fresh and make them gooey, getting up early, sneaking into her bathroom while she was asleep, carefully putting the guts in place � wasted!

I pass Gret's bedroom and hear her crying pitifully. Mum's whispering softly to her. My stomach gets hard, the way it does when I know I've done something bad. I ignore it. "I don't care what they say," I grumble, kicking open the door to my room and tearing off my pyjamas. "It was a brilliant joke!"

�

Purgatory. Confined to my room after school for a month. A whole bloodyMONTH ! No TV, no computer, no comics, no books � except schoolbooks. Dad leaves my chess set in the room too � no fear my chess-mad parents would takethat away from me! Chess is almost a religion in this house. Gret and I were reared on it. While other toddlers were being taught how to put jigsaws together, we were busy learning the ridiculous rules of chess.

I can come downstairs for meals, and bathroom visits are allowed, but otherwise I'm a prisoner. I cant even go out at the weekends.

In solitude, I call Gret every name under the moon the first night. Mum and Dad bear the brunt of my curses the next. After that I'm too miserable to blame anyone, so I sulk in moody silence and play chess against myself to pass the time.

They don't talk to me at meals. The three of them act like I'm not not there. Gret doesn't even glance at me spitefully and sneer, the way she usually does when I'm getting the doghouse treatment.

But what have I done that's so bad? OK, it was a crude joke and I knew I'd get into trouble � but their reactions are waaaaaaay over the top. If I'd done something to embarrass Gret in public, fair enough, I'd take what was coming. But this was a private joke, just between us. They shouldn't be making such a song and dance about it.

Dad's words echo back to me � "And the timing!" I think about them a lot. And Mum's, when she was having a go at me about smoking, just before Dad cut her short � "We don't need this, certainly not at this time, not when �"

What did they mean? What were they talking about? What does the timing have to do with anything?

Something stinks here � and it's not just rat guts.

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