Lord Loss

Lord it up with Darren Shan in the shadows of the web at

www.darrenshan.com

For:

Bas — my demon lover

OBEs (Order of the Bloody Entrails) to:

Caroline “pie chart” Paul D.O.M.I.N.I.C. Kingston Nicola “schumacher” Blacoe

Editorial Evilness:

Stellasaurus Paskins

Agents of Chaos:

the Christopher Little crew

Lord Loss sows all the sorrows of the world

Lord Loss seeds the grief-starched trees

In the centre of the web, lowly Lord Loss bows his head

Mangled hands, naked eyes

Fanged snakes his soul line

Curled inside like textured sin

Bloody, curdled sheets for skin

In the centre of the web, vile Lord Loss torments the dead

Over strands of red, Lord Loss crawls

Dispensing pain, despising all

Shuns friends, nurtures foes

Ravages hope, breeds woe

Drinks moons, devours suns

Twirls his thumbs till the reaper comes

In the centre of the web, lush Lord Loss is all that’s left

Rat Guts

Demons

Dervish

The Grand Tour

Portraits

Spleen

Carnage in the Forest

A Theory

The Cellar

The Longest Day

Arooooo!

Family Ties

The Curse

The Challenge

The Choice

The Summoning

The Battle

A Change of Plan

Spiral to the Heart of Nowhere

The Change

Other Books by Darren Shan

Credits

Copyright

About the Publisher

→ Double history on a Wednesday afternoon — total nightmare! A few minutes ago, I would have said I couldn’t imagine anything worse. But when there’s a knock at the door, and it opens, and I spot my mum outside, I realise — life can always get worse.

When a parent turns up at school, unexpected, it means one of two things. Either somebody close to you has been seriously injured or died, or you’re in trouble.

My immediate reaction — please don’t let anybody be dead! I think of Dad, Gret, uncles, aunts, cousins. It could be any of them. Alive and kicking this morning. Now stiff and cold, tongue sticking out, a slab of dead meat just waiting to be buried. I remember Gran’s funeral. The open coffin. Her shining flesh, having to kiss her forehead, the pain, the tears. Please don’t let anyone be dead! Please! Please! Please! Ple–

Then I see Mum’s face, white with rage, and I know she’s here to punish, not comfort.

I groan, roll my eyes and mutter under my breath, “Bring on the corpses!”

→ The head’s office. Me, Mum and Mr Donnellan. Mum’s ranting and raving about cigarettes. I’ve been seen smoking behind the bike shed (the oldest cliché in the book!). She wants to know if the head’s aware of this, of what the pupils in his school are getting up to.

I feel a bit sorry for Mr Donnellan. He has to sit there, looking like a schoolboy himself, shuffling his feet and saying he didn’t know this was going on and he’ll launch an investigation and put a quick end to it. Liar! Of course he knew. Every school has a smoking area. That’s life. Teachers don’t approve, but they turn a blind eye most of the time. Certain kids smoke — fact. Safer to have them smoking at school than sneaking off the grounds during breaks and at lunch.

Mum knows that too. She must! She was young once, like she’s always reminding me. Kids were no different in Mum’s time. If she stopped for a minute and thought back, she’d see what a bloody embarrassment she’s being. I wouldn’t mind her having a go at me at home, but you don’t march into school and start laying down the law in the headmaster’s office. She’s out of order — big time.

But it’s not like I can tell her, is it? I can’t pipe up with, “Oi! Mother! You’re disgracing us both, so shut yer trap!”

I smirk at the thought, and of course that’s when Mum pauses for the briefest of moments and catches me. “What are you grinning at?” she roars, and then she’s off again — I’m smoking myself into an early grave, the school’s responsible, what sort of a freak show is Mr Donnellan running, la-di-la-di-la-di-bloody-la!

BAWring!

→ Her rant at school’s nothing compared to the one I get at home. Screaming at the top of her lungs, blue bloody murder. She’s going to send me off to boarding school — no, military school! See how I like that, having to get up at dawn each morning and do a hundred press-ups before breakfast. How does that sound?

“Is breakfast a fry-up or some cereally, yoghurty crap?” is my response, and I know the second it’s out of my mouth that it’s the wrong thing to say. This isn’t the time for the famed Grubbs Grady brand of cutting-edge humour.

Cue the enraged Mum fireworks. Who do I think I am? Do I know how much they spend on me? What if I get kicked out of school? Then the clincher, the one mums all over the world love pulling out of the hat — “Just wait till your father gets home!”

→ Dad’s not as freaked out as Mum, but he’s not happy. He tells me how disappointed he is. They’ve warned me so many times about the dangers of smoking, how it destroys people’s lungs and gives them cancer.

“Smoking’s dumb,” he says. We’re in the kitchen (I haven’t been out of it since Mum dragged me home from school early, except to go to the toilet). “It’s disgusting, antisocial and lethal. Why do it, Grubbs? I thought you had more sense.”