Amelia Fang and the Naughty Caticorns Read online

  Amelia slumped on to the sofa, feeling very confused. Was having a baby brother or sister going to be this hard? She hadn’t meant to upset the caticorns. She really hoped Wooo would hurry up and arrive soon to help her out.

  ‘Amelia?’ said Tangine. ‘Are you okay?’

  She stood up quickly. ‘Yes!’ she said, not entirely sure if this was the truth. ‘Maybe the caticorns are hungry,’ Amelia wondered out loud. ‘Everyone gets a bit cranky when they’re hungry, right?!’

  ‘Oh yes, my Mummy Maids HAVE to meet my demands when I need food,’ Tangine declared.

  ‘ONLY WHEN YOU NEED FOOD?’ Florence said with a smirk.

  Tangine put a hand to his chest and gasped. ‘I don’t know WHAT you’re suggesting, Florence, but it offends my delicate soul.’

  Amelia ran to the kitchen as fast as she could and rummaged around in the deep, dark cupboards. Since Wooo had been away, and her parents had been so busy with baby preparations, keeping the place clean and tidy hadn’t been top priority. There was now a rather unwieldy amount of creepy crawlies amongst the various food packages and even the odd cupboard troll lurking in the shadows.

  Amelia eventually tracked down a few packets of assorted chilli scabs, cheese and bunion crisps and fried warts.

  ‘That should do it!’ she said to herself.

  But then the sound of a faint moan stopped her in her tracks.

  ‘Heeeeeeeeeeeelp . . .’

  At first, Amelia thought it might be another pesky cupboard troll, but the voice sounded like it was coming from the freezer. The Fang Mansion had some weird quirks, but a talking freezer wasn’t one of them.

  Amelia waited in silence.

  ‘Heeeeeeeeeeeelp . . .’ came the voice again.

  Unsure what else to do, Amelia replied, ‘Hello? Who’s there?’

  ‘OoooooOOOOooooooooooo.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘OoooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooo!’

  Amelia edged towards the freezer slowly and leaned in. Feeling a bit silly, she said, ‘I don’t quite understand. Can you please repeat –’

  ‘W O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O !’

  ‘Woooooooooooooo?’Amelia muttered, scratching her head. Then she gasped.

  ‘WOOO!’

  Amelia pulled open the freezer door as fast as she could and there, inside a glass jam jar, were two eyes and a mouth complete with a cracked monocle and a squished top hat.

  It was Wooo. And he was frozen solid!

  ‘Pottering pumpkins! Wooo, you poor thing!’ Amelia shrieked, pulling the jar out of the freezer.

  She unscrewed the lid and held the jar upside down above the kitchen table, but the solid block of ice-cold Wooo was very, very stuck.

  ‘Y-y-young Amelia-a-a,’ stuttered Wooo. His voice was muffled because of the glass and the fact he was frozen solid.

  ‘What happened? I thought you were still travelling back,’ said Amelia, placing the jar of Wooo on the kitchen table.

  Wooo blinked a few times, then stuttered. ‘I used a sh-sh-short cut to get here as f-f-f-fast as I could after your dad called me so that you w-w-wouldn’t be left alone for t-t-t-too long.’ Wooo’s words created a small cloud of mist. ‘I c-c-c-came in via a door on the t-t-t-top floor, and that’s when I saw three c-c-caticorns riding around on the v-v-vacuum cleaner.’

  Amelia felt her tummy twist. ‘Oh no,’ she said.

  ‘I was v-v-vacuumed up before I had a chance to d-d-do anything, and then I w-w-woke up inside this j-j-j-j-j-j-jar in the freezer unable to m-m-move.’

  When temperatures fell, a ghost lost their ability to pass through solid objects and would eventually turn into a block of paranormal ice. Which is exactly what had happened to Wooo.

  Wooo looked like he was trying to smile. ‘I m-m-must look very s-s-strange.’

  ‘Oh, Wooo, how do we make you normal again?’ asked Amelia.

  ‘I j-j-just need to d-d-defrost, so b-b-best to leave me here in the warm and d-d-dry for a while,’ said Wooo. ‘I’m s-s-sorry I can’t help you l-l-look after the c-c-caticorns.’

  ‘I’m sorry you’ve been frozen!’ said Amelia. ‘I can’t believe the caticorns did this to you! Aunt Lavitora told me they wouldn’t be a problem. But they’ve been quite the opposite.’ Amelia suddenly felt worried. ‘Unless . . . unless they’re only being naughty because of me. Maybe they don’t like me?’

  Just then Squashy and Pumpy appeared in the kitchen doorway. They were covered from stalk to bottom in multi-coloured paint. Squashy now had fat black eyelashes and a painted-on glittery beard. Pumpy looked very silly indeed, with a big red tomato stuck to the middle of his face and a LOT of lipstick around his mouth.

  Squashy did NOT seem impressed by his new look. Pumpy, on the other hand, seemed to be embracing it, pouting at every opportunity. Squashy pa-doinged up and down and squeaked at Amelia frantically.

  ‘What the bats has happened to you two?!’ gasped Amelia. Although she knew exactly who was responsible for this. She turned to Wooo. ‘I’d better go and see what’s going on,’ she said.

  ‘G-g-g-go!’ urged Wooo, who had begun to melt a little inside the jar.

  Amelia’s feet pounded along the corridor as she followed the freshly painted pumpkins back to the unliving room. What she saw next stopped her in her tracks.

  Florence, Grimaldi and Tangine were bound together by a pink and black stripy rope, unable to move, and their faces were also covered in paint.

  CHAPTER 6

  STOP!

  ‘WE GAVE ’EM ANOTHER PRESENT,’ said Florence, who had stars painted all over her face. ‘IT WAS A SKIPPING ROPE,’ she continued. ‘BUT THEY DIDN’T USE IT FOR SKIPPING . . . AS YOU CAN SEE.’

  ‘They used it against us,’ said Grimaldi, who had the word BUM painted across his forehead. He wriggled around, trying to break free from the rope.

  ‘The one with the spiky collar – Gerald, is it? Well, he danced around us with the rope until we were dizzy just watching him,’ said Tangine, wide-eyed. His eyes were painted to look like two huge flowers, with bright pink petals, he had a glittery splodge on his nose and two leaves on his cheeks. ‘Then the other one with the little cape played a tune on a strange flute that made us all feel sleepy!’

  ‘Next thing we knew, the skipping rope was wrapped around us,’ Grimaldi continued.

  ‘AND THEN MO PAINTED THE PUMPKINS!’ Florence added.

  ‘Um, the pumpkins aren’t the only ones they painted,’ Amelia said hesitantly.

  Tangine yelped. ‘Please tell me they haven’t ruined my beautiful face?!’

  Amelia bit her lip. ‘It’s not completely ruined . . .’

  Tangine let out a strange noise in despair.

  ‘But that’s not important right now. Let me untie you guys. We need to go and find the caticorns. Which way did they go?’ asked Amelia, fiddling with the tricky knots of the skipping rope.

  ‘THEY RAN OFF !’ said Florence. ‘AN’ THEY DIDN’T EVEN BOVVA TO TAKE UNCORNELIUS PINE WIV ’EM!’ She shook her head in disapproval. ‘I’LL JUST ’AVE TO KEEP ’IM.’

  ‘Hey, I thought we agreed that I’d have him,’ said Grimaldi. ‘You know how much I love Unicornelius Pine!’

  ‘FINE! YOU CAN ’AVE ’IM AT WEEKENDS,’ said Florence.

  ‘Who CARES about Unicornelius Pine? You should be more concerned about my ruined face. MY PRECIOUS FACE!’ wailed Tangine.

  Amelia put her head in her hands. ‘AARGH!’ she cried. ‘This is no good!’

  Florence, Grimaldi and Tangine fell silent.

  Amelia sighed. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘It’s just . . . the rope is knotted too tight, Wooo is frozen inside a jar and the caticorns are on a rampage. I don’t know what to do!’

  ‘Sorry, Amelia,’ said Grimaldi. ‘I would hug you, but it’s a tad tricky right now.’

  ‘RIGHT,’ Florence said, with a look of determination. ‘I KNEW THIS MOMENT WOULD COME EVENTUALLY.’ She took a deep breath. ‘AMELIA, STEP BACK
. GRIMALDI, TANGINE, BRACE YERSELVES.’

  ‘I would, but I’m TIED UP,’ said Tangine sarcastically.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ asked Grimaldi, looking nervous.

  ‘WHAT I SHOULD ’AVE DONE AGES AGO,’ said Florence. With one massive grunt, she tensed every muscle in her body so that they bulged and expanded. The skipping rope eventually snapped under the pressure, setting the friends free.

  ‘THAT’S ’OW IT’S DONE!’ said Florence proudly. ‘NOW LET’S FIND THOSE KITTIES.’

  ‘GERRAAAAAARD!’ called Amelia.

  ‘BUTLEEEEER!’ yelled Grimaldi.

  ‘Jo!’ bellowed Tangine. ‘Or is it Flo? Wait, what’s the third one called?’

  ‘MO!’ said Florence, running for the door.

  ‘Gerrard, Butler, Mo! Where are you?! Please come back here, all of you! ’ Amelia called out to nowhere in particular, in the hope that the caticorns could hear her. ‘Otherwise, I’ll have to tell Aunt Lavitora how naughty you’ve all been! I reeeeally don’t want to have to do that!’

  Amelia, Florence, Grimaldi and Tangine set off around the Fang Mansion on the hunt for the caticorns.

  Squashy and Pumpy joined in the pursuit, pa-doinging and PA-DOOFING behind them, checking the nooks and crannies Amelia and her friends were too big to fit into. The two pumpkins sniffed around behind the cabinets, checked under the dressers and rolled into the deepest depths of Frivoleeta’s many shoe closets. Pumpy, however, got distracted in the guest bathroom when he saw his own reflection in the toilet lid and began pouting at it lovingly.

  ‘Pets really do resemble their owners,’ Amelia muttered to herself.

  The gang searched behind door after door, rummaged inside the cobweb-ridden kitchen cupboards (much to the disapproval of the cupboard trolls who were having a delightfully awful picnic); peered around every corner, explored shelf upon shelf, and even checked beneath the old fancy rugs.

  ‘I can’t find them anywhere!’ said Tangine. ‘I DID find a sad slug under the kitchen sink though. He said his name was Trevor and he is looking for his twin, Tina.’

  Ameia was starting to think she really wasn’t up to this big-sister business.

  CRASH!

  ‘I FINK,’ said Florence, ‘THAT CAME FROM DIRECTLY ABOVE US.’

  Amelia’s cold heart fell into her toes. ‘My bedroom is directly above us,’ she said.

  The friends sprinted up the spiral staircase and along the cavernous corridor, stopping dead outside Amelia’s stripy bedroom door. Giggles and meows rang out from behind it. Amelia swung the door open and was almost hit with a great big SPLAT of glittery paint in her face.

  Mo cackled with laughter and carried on painting the wall with glitter paint.

  Butler had stretched a pair of Amelia’s stripy tights from one side of the room to the other. He now stood there in deep concentration plucking the taut material, making a satisfying TWAAAAAAANG each time.

  Gerrard was dancing around the room with the grace of a professional prancing yeti, which was very elegant indeed. He was holding one of Amelia’s favourite ornaments – a delicate china pumpkin that her mum and dad had bought her for doing so well at Pumpkineers Club. He twizzled the precious object around, juggling it from one paw to the other.

  ‘No, no, no! Put that down!’ urged Amelia, trying to grab the shiny pumpkin.

  But the little caticorn cleverly weaved his way around Amelia, dodging her swipes and hopping lightly on to a bookshelf. Amelia’s large collection of POSITIVELY PUMPKIN magazines went tumbling to the floor, narrowly missing Squashy.

  Mo lathered paint across the stripy wallpaper. Splodges of glitter were flying through the air as the artistic caticorn focused on her masterpiece.

  Butler was still thrumming at the taut tights, with the musical TWAAAAANG getting louder and louder.

  Amelia gasped as Gerrard dangled from the edge of the bookshelf with the pumpkin ornament precariously balanced in one of his paws.

  ‘Gerrard. Listen to me!’ said Amelia, beginning to lose her patience. ‘If you don’t get down from there right now, I’m going to have to tell Aunt Lavitora how naughty you’ve been. She won’t be happy!’

  But Gerrard wasn’t listening. Whilst balancing on one paw, he slowly raised both back legs so that he was in a handstand position. He then tossed the pumpkin ornament up to his feet and, to Amelia’s horror, began to juggle it!

  Butler carried on thrumming at the tights.

  THRUM THRUM TWAAAAAANG

  THRUM THRUM TWAAAAAAAAAAANG

  THRUM

  THRUM

  TWAAAAAAAAAAAAAANG!

  Amelia’s breathing got faster and shallower.

  Gerrard continued juggling with his feet. The little model pumpkin bobbed around in the air like a tormented tangerine.

  Amelia had had enough. She clenched her fists tightly and shouted at the top of her voice.

  ‘STOP!’

  Mo jumped in surprise. Her paintbrush soared through the air, spreading glitter across the ceiling, and landed with a SPLAT on Tangine’s mop of white hair.

  Tangine shrieked, causing Butler to twang the tights a bit too hard. They ripped, snapped and then smacked Florence right between the eyes.

  And in amongst all of the chaos, Gerrard got his paws in a twist, and the little pumpkin ornament tumbled to the floor with a very definite . . .

  SMASH.

  CHAPTER 7

  WORN OUT AND HOPELESS

  Amelia stood in the middle of her bedroom, staring at the shiny orange fragments scattered across the glitter-speckled floor.

  ‘Amelia?’ asked Grimaldi, touching her arm gently.

  ‘I can’t believe it,’ Amelia said quietly, picking up a piece. ‘This wasn’t just any old ornament. It was special.’

  ‘MAYBE WE COULD TRY FIXIN’ IT FOR YOU?’ suggested Florence.

  ‘I’m quite good at fixing things,’ said Grimaldi. ‘I’ve had to glue my scythe together enough times!’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Amelia sadly. ‘It looks pretty broken to me.’

  Gerrard, Butler and Mo sniffed and whimpered.

  ‘I DON’T KNOW WHY YOU’RE SNIFFLIN’. THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!’ said Florence with a frown.

  Gerrard started to cry.

  ‘It’s okay, Florence,’ said Amelia.

  ‘BUT THEY WERE BEING REALLY NAUGHTY,’ said Florence. ‘AND NOW THEY’VE RUINED ONE OF YOUR SUPER SPECIAL FINGS!’

  ‘Florence does have a point,’ Grimaldi agreed.

  ‘I know,’ said Amelia.

  Tangine shuffled awkwardly in the bedroom doorway. He was twiddling his thumbs. ‘I think that we should all go downstairs and calm down a bit.’

  Florence furrowed her eyebrows and reluctantly nodded. ‘FINE,’ she said.

  Amelia and Grimaldi ushered the caticorns downstairs to the unliving room, where the friends sat on the sofa feeling worn out and hopeless.

  ‘’ERE,’ said Florence, tossing Unicornelius Pine in the direction of the caticorns. ‘PLAY WIV YOUR EXPENSIVE TOYS AND FINK ABOUT WHAT YOU’VE DONE.’

  ‘I think perhaps . . .’ Tangine began, then hesitated.

  ‘WHAT?’ said Florence.

  Tangine made a face. Amelia noticed he looked kind of sad. ‘Never mind,’ he said, quietly fiddling with his sleeve.

  ‘I’m going to pop to the kitchen to make us some warm sour milk,’ said Amelia. ‘It might help everyone to relax.’

  ‘Need a hand?’ asked Grimaldi.

  ‘No thank you,’ said Amelia quietly. ‘I won’t be long.’ She managed a small smile.

  In the kitchen, Wooo was well on his way to being fully defrosted. His top half was in normal transparent ghost form, but his bottom half still resembled a gooey, ghostly puddle. He’d also managed to slide his way out of the jar.

  ‘Hi, Wooo,’ said Amelia, pulling out a chair and sitting down.

  ‘You seem glum,’ said the ghost butler.

  Amelia let out a long sigh. She could feel a lump rising in h
er throat. ‘The caticorns ran riot and ended up smashing my favourite pumpkin ornament,’ she said. ‘I lost my temper, and now they’re really upset.’

  ‘Little ones can be a challenge sometimes,’ said Wooo. ‘But you’re doing your very best.’

  ‘Wooo, I don’t think I’m ready to be a big sister yet,’ Amelia said suddenly. ‘What if the caticorns are being naughty because they don’t like me? What if my own baby brother or sister doesn’t like me?’

  ‘Well, that’s a preposterous thought,’ said Wooo kindly.

  Amelia found the words tumbling out of her mouth. ‘I wanted to prove that I could be a responsible big sister so that Mum and Dad would be proud of me,’ she said in a wobbly voice. ‘But the house is a complete mess and the caticorns probably hate me for shouting at them. I didn’t mean to. I just . . . I just . . .’ Amelia’s voice broke and she began to cry.

  ‘Oh, Amelia,’ said Wooo. ‘Please don’t be upset. There will be tricky times as your new baby brother or sister grows up, and some nights will be harder than others. But that’s all part of being a big sister. You’ll figure it out, I promise.’

  It was at times like this that Amelia really wished you could hug a ghost. She also wished Wooo wasn’t still half-puddle.

  ‘Thank you, Wooo,’ she said, feeling a bit better. ‘I should probably warm up the sour milk and get back to the unliving room, before the caticorns embark on another smashing adventure!’

  ‘Oh, hoo hoo!’ Wooo chortled. ‘I see what you did there.’

  CHAPTER 8

  ATTENTION

  As Amelia walked into the unliving room, she thought something odd had happened to her ears. She couldn’t hear a thing. But then she realised why.