The Vampire's Assistant and Other Tales from the Cirque Du Freak

by Darren Shan

  Kneeling, I placed the fingers of my left hand on Sam’s red neck. “I’m sorry, Sam,” I moaned, then dug my sharp nails into his soft flesh, leaned forward, and stuck my mouth over the holes they’d made.

  Blood gushed in and made me gag. I nearly fell away, but with an effort I held my place and gulped it down. His blood was hot and salty and ran down my throat like thick, creamy butter.

  Sam’s pulse slowed as I drank, then stopped. But I went on drinking, swallowing every last drop, absorbing.

  When I’d finally sucked him dry, I turned away and howled at the sky like the wolf-man had. For a long time that’s all I could do, howl and scream and cry like the wild animal of the night that I’d become.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Mr. tall and a bunch of others from the Cirque Du Freak — including four Little People — arrived a little later. I was sitting by Sam’s side, too tired to howl anymore, staring blankly into space, feeling his blood settle in my stomach.

  “What’s the story?” Mr. Tall asked Mr. Crepsley. “How did the wolf-man get free?”

  “I do not know, Hibernius,” Mr. Crepsley replied. “I have not asked and do not intend to, not for a night or two at least. Darren is in no shape for an interrogation.”

  “Is the wolf-man dead?” Mr. Tall asked.

  “No,” Mr. Crepsley said. “I merely knocked him out.”

  “Thank heaven for small mercies.” Mr. Tall sighed. He clicked his fingers and the Little People chained up the unconscious wolf-man. A van from the show pulled up and they bundled him into the back.

  I thought about demanding the wolf-man’s death, but what good would it have been? He wasn’t evil, just naturally mad. Killing him would have been pointless and cruel.

  When they’d finished with the wolf-man, the Little People’s attention turned to Sam’s shredded remains.

  “Hold on,” I said, as they bent to pick him up and cart him away. “What are they going to do with Sam?”

  Mr. Tall coughed uncomfortably. “I, ah, imagine they intend to dispose of him,” he said.

  It took me a moment to realize what that meant. “They’re going to eat him?” I shrieked.

  “We can’t just leave him here,” Mr. Tall reasoned, “and we don’t have time to bury him. This is the easiest —”

  “No,” I said firmly.

  “Darren,” Mr. Crepsley said, “we should not interfere with —”

  “No!” I shouted, striding over to shove the Little People backward. “If they want to eat Sam, they’ll have to eat me first!”

  The Little People stared at me wordlessly, with hungry green eyes.

  “I think they’d be quite happy to accommodate you,” Mr. Tall said drily.

  “I mean it,” I growled. “I won’t let them eat Sam. He deserves a proper burial.”

  “So that worms can devour him?” Mr. Tall asked, then sighed when I glared at him, and shook his head irritably.

  “Let the boy have his way, Hibernius,” Mr. Crepsley said quietly. “You may return to the Cirque with the others. I will stay and help dig the grave.”

  “Very well.” Mr. Tall shrugged. He whistled and pointed a finger at the Little People. They hesitated, then backed away and crowded around the owner of the Cirque Du Freak, leaving me alone with the dead Sam Grest.

  Mr. Tall and his assistants left. Mr. Crepsley sat down beside me.

  “How are you?” he asked.

  I shook my head. There was no simple answer to that.

  “Do you feel stronger?”

  “Yes,” I said softly. Even though it hadn’t been long since I’d drank Sam’s blood, already I noticed a difference. My eyesight had improved and so had my hearing, and my battered body didn’t hurt nearly as much as it should.

  “You will not have to drink again for a long time,” he said.

  “I don’t care. I didn’t do it for me. I did it for Sam.” “Are you angry with me?” he asked.

  “No,” I said slowly.

  “Darren,” he said, “I hope —”

  “I don’t want to talk about it!” I snapped. “I’m cold, sore, miserable, and lonely. I want to think about Sam, not waste words on you.”

  “As you wish,” he said, and began digging in the soil with his fingers. I dug beside him in silence for a few minutes, then paused and looked over.

  “I’m a real vampire’s assistant now, aren’t I?” I asked.

  He nodded sadly. “Yes. You are.”

  “Does that make you glad?”

  “No,” he said. “It makes me feel ashamed.”

  As I stared at him, confused, a figure appeared above us. It was the Little Person with the limp. “If you think you’re taking Sam ...,” I warned him, raising a dirt-encrusted hand. Before I got any further, he jumped into the shallow hole, stuck his wide, gray-skinned fingers into the soil, and clawed up large clumps.

  “He’s helping us?” I asked, puzzled.

  “It seems like it,” Mr. Crepsley said, and laid a hand on my back. “Rest,” he advised. “We can dig faster by ourselves. I will call you when it is time to bury your friend.”

  I nodded, crawled out, and lay down on the bank beside the quickly forming grave. After a while I shuffled out of the way and sat, waiting, in the shadows of the old railroad station. Just me and my thoughts. And Sam’s dark, red blood on my lips and between my teeth.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  We buried sam without much talk — I couldn’t think of anything to say — and filled in the grave. We didn’t hide it, so he’d be discovered by the police and given a real burial soon. I wanted his parents to be able to give him a ceremony, but this would keep him safe from scavenging animals (and Little People) in the meantime.

  We broke camp before dawn. Mr. Tall told everybody there was a long trek ahead. Sam’s disappearance would create a fuss, so we had to get as far away as possible.

  I wondered, as we left, what had become of R.V. Did he bleed to death in the forest? Did he make it to a doctor in time? Or was he still running and screaming, “My hands! My hands!”?

  I didn’t care. Although he’d been trying to do the right thing, this was R.V.’s fault. If he hadn’t gone messing with the locks on the wolf-man’s cage, Sam would be alive. I didn’t hope R.V. was dead, but I didn’t say a prayer for him, either. I’d leave him to fate and whatever it had in store.

  Evra sat beside me at the rear of the van as the Cirque pulled out. He started to say something. Stopped. Cleared his throat. Then he put a bag on my lap. “I found that,” he muttered. “Thought you might want it.”

  Through stinging eyes I read the name — “Sam Grest” — then burst into tears and cried bitterly over it. Evra put his arms around me and held me tight and cried along with me.

  “Mr. Crepsley told me what happened,” Evra mumbled eventually, recovering slightly and wiping his face clean. “He said you drank Sam’s blood to keep his spirit alive.”

  “Apparently,” I replied weakly, unconvinced. “Look,” Evra said, “I know how much you didn’t want to drink human blood, but you did this for Sam. It was an act of goodness, not evil. You shouldn’t feel bad for drinking from him.”

  “I guess,” I said, then moaned at the memory and cried some more.

  The day went by and the Cirque Du Freak rolled on, but thoughts of Sam couldn’t be left behind. As night came, we pulled over to the side of the road for a short break. Evra went to look for food and drinks.

  “Do you want anything?” he asked.

  “No,” I said, my face pressed against the window-pane. “I’m not hungry.”

  He started to leave.

  I called him back. “Wait a sec.”

  There was a strange taste in my mouth. Sam’s blood was still hot on my lips, salty and terrible, but that wasn’t what had started the buds at the back of my tongue tingling. There was something I wanted that I’d never wanted before. For a few confusing seconds I didn’t know what it was. Then I identified the strange craving and managed
to crack the thinnest of smiles. I searched Sam’s bag, but the jar must have been left behind when we left.

  Looking up at Evra, I wiped tears from my eyes, licked my lips, and asked in a voice that sounded a lot like that smart-ass kid I once knew, “Do we have any pickled onions?”

  TO BE CONTINUED . . .

  TO SAVE A LIFE, DARREN SHAN MUST RISK HIS OWN BY FACING A CREATURE OF EVIL IN THE

  TUNNELS OF BLOOD

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2002 by Darren Shan

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Hachette Book Group

  237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017

  Visit our Web site at www.hachettebookgroupusa.com

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  First eBook Edition: August 2008

  ISBN: 978-0-316-04182-9

  Contents

  Copyright

  Also in the Saga of Darren Shan

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  A Preview of "Vampire mountain"

  Also in the Saga of Darren Shan:

  CIRQUE DU FREAK (Book 1)

  THE VAMPIRE’S ASSISTANT (Book 2)

  For:

  Granny and Grandad — tough old fogeys

  OBEs (Order of the Bloody Entrails) to: Caroline “Tracker” Paul Paul “The Pillager” Litherland

  Heads off to:

  Biddy “Jekyll” and Liam “Hyde”

  Gillie “Grave Robber” Russell

  The hideously creepy HarperCollins gang

  and

  Emma and Chris (from “Ghouls Are Us”)

  Prologue

  THE SMELL OF BLOOD is sickening. Hundreds of carcasses hang from silver hooks, stiff, shiny with frosty blood. I know they’re just animals — cows, pigs, sheep — but I keep thinking they’re human.

  I take a careful step forward. Powerful overhead lights mean it’s bright as day. I have to tread carefully. Hide behind the dead animals. Move slowly. The floor’s slippery with water and blood, which makes progress even trickier.

  Ahead, I spot him . . . the vampire...Mr. Crepsley. He’s moving as quietly as I am, eyes focused on the fat man a little way ahead.

  The fat man. He’s why I’m here in this ice-cold slaughterhouse. He’s the human Mr. Crepsley intends to kill. He’s the man I have to save.

  The fat man pauses and checks one of the hanging slabs of meat. His cheeks are chubby and red. He’s wearing clear plastic gloves. He pats the dead animal — the squeaky noise of the hook as the carcass swings puts my teeth on edge — then begins whistling. He starts to walk again. Mr. Crepsley follows. So do I.

  Evra is somewhere far behind. I left him outside. No point in both of us risking our lives.

  I pick up speed, moving slowly closer. Neither knows I’m here. If everything works out as planned, they won’t know, not until Mr. Crepsley makes his move. Not until I’m forced to act.

  The fat man stops again. Bends to examine something. I take a quick step back, afraid he’ll spot me, but then I see Mr. Crepsley closing in. Damn! No time to hide. If this is the moment he’s chosen to attack, I have to get nearer.

  I spring forward several feet, risking being heard. Luckily Mr. Crepsley is entirely focused on the fat man.

  I’m only three or four feet behind the vampire now. I bring up the long butcher’s knife that I’ve been holding down by my side. My eyes are glued to Mr. Crepsley. I won’t act until he does — I’ll give him every chance to prove my terrible suspicions wrong — but the second I see him tensing to spring . . .

  I take a firmer grip on the knife. I’ve been practicing my swipe all day. I know the exact point I want to hit. One quick cut across Mr. Crepsley’s throat and that’ll be that. No more vampire. One more carcass to add to the pile.

  Long seconds slip by. I don’t dare look to see what the fat man is studying. Is he ever going to rise?

  Then it happens. The fat man struggles to his feet. Mr. Crepsley hisses. He gets ready to lunge. I position the knife and steady my nerves. The fat man’s on his feet now. He hears something. Looks up at the ceiling — wrong way, idiot! — as Mr. Crepsley leaps. As the vampire jumps, so do I, screeching loudly, slashing at him with the knife, determined to kill. . . .

  Chapter One

  One month earlier . . .

  MY NAME’S DARREN SHAN. I’m a half-vampire.

  I used to be human, until I stole a vampire’s spider. After that, my life changed forever. Mr. Crepsley — the vampire — forced me to become his assistant, and I joined a circus full of weird performers called the Cirque Du Freak.

  Adapting was hard. Drinking blood was harder, and for a long time I wouldn’t do it. Eventually I did, to save the memories of a dying friend (vampires can store a person’s memories if they drain all their blood). I didn’t enjoy it — the following few weeks were horrible, and I was plagued by nightmares — but after that first blood-red drink there could be no going back. I accepted my role as a vampire’s assistant and learned to make the best of it.

  Over the course of the next year, Mr. Crepsley taught me how to hunt and drink without being caught; how to take just enough blood to survive; how to hide my vampire identity when mixing with others. And in time I put my human fears behind me and became a true creature of the night.

  A couple of girls stood watching Cormac Limbs with serious expressions. He was stretching his arms and legs, rolling his neck around, loosening his muscles. Then, winking at the girls, he put the middle three fingers of his right hand between his teeth and bit them off.

  The girls screamed and fled. Cormac chuckled and wriggled the new fingers that were growing out of his hand.

  I laughed. You got used to stuff like that when you worked in the Cirque Du Freak. The traveling show was full of incredible people, freaks of nature with cool and sometimes frightening powers.

  Apart from Cormac Limbs, the performers included Rhamus Twobellies, capable of eating a fullgrown elephant or an army tank; Gertha Teeth, who could bite through steel; the wolf-man — half man, half wolf, who’d killed my friend Sam Grest; Truska, a beautiful and mysterious woman who could grow a beard at will; and Mr. Tall, who could move as fast as lightning and seemed to be able to read people’s minds. Mr. Tall owned and managed the Cirque Du Freak.

  We were performing in a small town, camped behind an old mill inside which the show was staged every night. It was a run-down junkyard, but I was used to that type of venue. We could have played the grandest theaters in the world and slept in luxurious hotel rooms — the Cirque made a ton of money — but it was safer to keep a low profile and stick to places where the police and other officials rarely wandered.

  My appearance hadn’t changed much since leaving home with Mr. Crepsley almost a year and a half before. Because I was a half-vampire, I aged at only a fifth the rate of humans, which meant that though eighteen months had passed, my body was
only three or four months older.

  Although I wasn’t very different on the outside, inside I was an entirely new person. I was stronger than any boy my age, able to run faster, leap farther, and dig my extra-strong nails into brick walls. My hearing, eyesight, and sense of smell had improved vastly.

  Since I wasn’t a full vampire, there was lots of stuff I couldn’t do yet. For example, Mr. Crepsley could run at a superquick speed, which he called flitting. He could breathe out a gas that knocked people unconscious. And he could communicate telepathically with vampires and a few others, such as Mr. Tall.

  I wouldn’t be able to do those things until I became a full vampire. I didn’t lose any sleep over it, because being a half-vampire had its bonuses: I didn’t have to drink much human blood and — better yet — I could move around during the day.

  It was daytime when I was exploring a garbage dump with Evra, the snake-boy, looking for food for the Little People — weird, small creatures who wore blue hooded capes and never spoke. Nobody — except maybe Mr. Tall — knew who or what they were, where they came from, or why they traveled with the Cirque. Their master was a creepy man called Mr. Tiny (he liked to eat children!), but we didn’t see much of him at the Cirque.

  “Found a dead dog,” Evra shouted, holding it above his head. “It smells a little. Do you think they’ll mind?”

  I sniffed the air — Evra was a long way off, but I could smell the dog from here as well as a human could up close — and shook my head. “It’ll be fine,” I said. The Little People ate just about anything we brought.

  I had a fox and a few rats in my bag. I felt bad about killing the rats — rats are friendly with vampires and usually come up to us like tame pets if we call them — but work is work. We all have to do things we don’t like in life.

  There were a bunch of Little People with the Cirque — twenty of them — and one was hunting with Evra and me. He’d been with the Cirque since soon after me and Mr. Crepsley joined. I could tell him apart from the others because he had a limp in his left leg. Evra and me had taken to calling him Lefty.