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- Herausgeber: Little Tiger Press
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015
Join Stitch Head, a mad professor's forgotten creation, as he steps out of the shadows into the adventure of an almost-lifetime… The Spider's Lair is Book 4 in the Stitch Head series by award-winning author Guy Bass (Dinkin Dings and the Frightening Things). When Arabella lands up in the orphanage, Stitch Head leaves Grotteskew and its creatures behind and sets out on a daring rescue. But a far more gruesome monster awaits, and soon Stitch Head is trapped in its web with no chance of escape…
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Seitenzahl: 87
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CONTENTS
ODE TO THE SPIDER
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee for thy venom
And thy stony-hearted gaze.
How do I love thee? Let me count thine eyes.
All eight of them, to match your legs
That no one can disguise.
How do I love thee? Let me count thy fangs.
Oh dear! It seems I’m bitten,
You must have hunger pangs.
How do I love thee? Let me end my rhyme,
Your venom’s started working
And I’m running out of time.
How do I love thee? Let me drift away…
To dream again of spiders,
’Tis a fitting final day!
PROLOGUE
“Gadsbodkins! Look out!” The carriage trundled quickly through the rain-beaten street, the horse’s breath puffing out in rhythmic clouds as the whip struck its flank. Atop the carriage, an old man cried out as the townsfolk scattered in terror.
“I’m terribly sorry! I do beg your pardon! Please, do mind out of the way! My most sincere apologies! Coming through!” he shouted as the carriage ploughed through the town.
An old lady cradling a baby leaped out of the way into a deep puddle on the side of the road. “Mucky rotten goat! You near squished me granddaughter!” she bellowed. She checked on the baby and plucked a sodden doll out of the puddle.
“A thousand pardons, madam!” called the old man, as the carriage sped out of town.
“Shove it up yer nostrils!” cried the old woman after him. She shook her head and handed the baby its doll. “See, Arabella? That’s the problem with folk these days – they ain’t got no respect. Which is why you should always kick first, shout abuse later.”
“Kick!” squeaked the baby.
“Awww, your first word,” cooed the old lady.
The carriage made its way up the hill through the driving rain. The old man peered into the darkness. Ahead loomed a dark, forbidding shape – the castle.
“There it is!” he cried. “We made it!”
He leaped down from the carriage and hurried to the castle’s Great Door. He hammered on it with both hands, crying, “Erasmus! Erasmus! It is I! Open this door, I beg of you! In fact, I politely insist!”
The pause that followed was longer than you would have expected, from even the most unapproachable of castles. Then, at last, a cry rang out from inside.
“No visitors!”
“Please be so kind as to let me in! It is I!” the old man replied.
“I?” said the voice.
“Me!”
“Me?”
“Not you, me!”
“You? You who?”
“Yoo hoo to you, too! Gadsbodkins, it is Edmund! Let me in!” the man insisted.
The silence that followed was finally broken by the voice behind the door. “What do you want?”
“I am in dire need of your help! Now please be a good fellow and kindly open this door or by my frozen undergarments, I shall be forced to knock again!”
“Help? I don’t help!” hissed the voice, as if trying to divine the meaning of the word. “I’m a mad professor! There’s nothing mad about helping!”
“What I ask of you is most assuredly mad!
Madder than mad! Madder than a dog with ten legs!” insisted the old man. “Now I beg you, in the name of all that is good and holy, do please open this door!”
Another pause followed, as the old man shivered in the rain. Finally, he heard the CLUNK and KRONG of the Great Door and it swung open. A spindly lizard of a man in a white coat took a single step into the moonlight, wringing his hands madly.
“I actually made a ten-legged dog last week,” he sneered. “Now what do you want? Out with it! I am at a crucial point in my mad experiment – you have ten seconds before I close this door in your face. AhaHA!”
“I need only five,” replied the old man, disappearing behind his carriage. He re-emerged moments later, stumbling back through the rain and carrying something in both arms. It was wrapped in a blanket and was almost as large as the old man himself.
“What do you have there?” hissed Professor Erasmus. The old man held out his arms. It took the professor a moment to realize he was carrying a dead body.
“I wish for the impossible,” replied the old man. “I wish for you to bring the dead back to life.”
The professor’s eyes grew wide. The old man shivered silently in the rain. Finally, a jagged, maniacal grin spread across the professor’s face.
“Well, why didn’t you say so before? Come on in … I’ll put the kettle on! AhahaHA! A-hAAHAAA!”
THE FIRST CHAPTER
Stitch Head made his way through the ruined, blackened corridors of Castle Grotteskew. A bitter wind whistled through the windows and snow fell through holes in the ceiling. Stitch Head wrapped his tiny, mismatched arms round him to keep warm.
“Stitch Head…”
All at once, a dozen hideous, unnatural creatures emerged from the shadows, each more impossibly freakish than the last. Before long, Stitch Head found himself surrounded by a terrifying assortment of monstrosities. A slithering serpent with a human head … a giant eyeball with tentacle feet … a part-dog, part-cat, part-bat … a steam-powered skull … it was the stuff of nightmares.
“Stitch Head!” cried the skull, puffing across Stitch Head’s path. “A thousand thanks for that extra dose of Lunacy Lotion. I feel a hundred per cent less demented!”
“No problem, Godfrey,” said Stitch Head.
“Stitch Head! That Blood Succor tonic completely cured my vampirism!” said the dog-cat-bat. “I owe you one!”
“You’re welcome, Bertram,” replied Stitch Head.
“Your Savagery Salve worked a treat, Stitch Head,” hissed the man-serpent. “I haven’t savaged anyone in ages!”
“Glad I could help, Quentin,” Stitch Head said.
So it was, through corridor after corridor, that Stitch Head found himself confronted by grateful creations.
“Thank you so much for the eyedrops – I can finally see where I’m squirming!”
“Thanks for finding my phantom limb – I knew I’d left it around here somewhere…”
“Great work unblocking my toilet!”
Indeed, despite the creations’ near-impossible monstrousness and stomach-wrenching ugliness, each one was more pleasant than the last. Stitch Head simply nodded humbly and carried on through the castle.
At last he arrived at the charred remains of a thick door, all but hanging from its hinges. He pushed it open and stepped into the fire-blackened shadow of a once great hall. Inside, a dozen or so creations were busily carrying out repairs. In one corner, a massive, many-tentacled octo-monster patched up holes in the wall. In another, a colossal lizard-beast chewed up and swallowed mounds of rubble in its great jaws.
“Uh, excuse me,” said Stitch Head, as a wheel-footed wolf-woman rolled past him at speed. “Have you seen the—?”
“Look out BELOW!”
Stitch Head looked up to see a huge chunk of wood tumble towards him. He leaped out of the way as the timber CRRASSH!-ed to the floor inches from where he’d been standing.
“Not AGAIN! Did I SQUASH anyone THIS time?” said a familiar voice. Stitch Head got to his feet and looked up. His best friend, the Creature, clung precariously to a scorched timber frame – all that was left of the roof.
“STITCH Head!” hollered the Creature, clambering down from the ceiling. The Creature was one of Professor Erasmus’s most impressive creations – a huge, hulking monstrosity with a breathtakingly terrifying combination of unpleasant elements, including a tail and a spare arm.
“So what do you THINK?” it asked. “Pretty IMPRESSIVE work, eh? The EAST WING will be back to its GRIM, DEPRESSING self in NO time…”
“You’re doing a great job, Creature,” replied Stitch Head. “Near-death experiences aside…”
“I KNOW! I think I’ve found my CALLING – I LOVE being a BUILDING FOREMAN! The pressure, the responsibility, the YELLING…”
The Creature began striding around the room, shouting things like, “YOU there! More FLICKER in the lamp! More CREAK in that DOOR!”
“Actually, I don’t think you have to yell…” began Stitch Head.
“It’s GREAT! I’m TELLING you, Stitch Head, you should BURN down the castle more OFTEN…”
“It was an accident,” sighed Stitch Head, blushing a slightly darker shade of ash-grey than normal. “Actually, it’d be nice if everyone stopped going on about—”
“No one holds it AGAINST you – it’s not EVERY day you get POSSESSED by an evil GHOST and try to DESTROY everything,” boomed the Creature. “Anyway, the CREATIONS are all DELIGHTED to FINALLY have something to DO around here! Between that and all the HELP you’re DISHING out, you COULDN’T be more POPULAR! It’s like you’re KING of THE CASTLE!”
“I don’t know about that…” said Stitch Head, blushing again. It still felt strange to be out of the shadows. He had spent most of his almost-life locked away in a small room in the castle. Part of him missed that peace and quiet.
“At THIS rate,” continued the Creature, leaning down to Stitch Head and whispering in his ear, “you MIGHT even get a CELEBRITY VIP INVITE to the castle Christmas PARTY!”
“Wait, aren’t you organizing the castle Christmas party?” asked Stitch Head.
“YEP! It’s going to be GREAT! Haven’t had MY invitation yet, though … fingers CROSSED!”
“Do I get an invite?” said a voice.
Stitch Head and the Creature turned to see Arabella leaning against one of the many statues of Professor Erasmus that littered the castle. Arabella Guff was a girl from Grubbers Nubbin. She was fierce, fearless and the only human Stitch Head had ever met (except for Professor Erasmus) who wasn’t terrified of the castle and its inhabitants.
“ARABELLA!” the Creature cried. “We haven’t seen you in AGES! Where have you BEEN? We’ve MISSED you!”
