RED GIANT, NASTY HABIT

RED GIANT, NASTY HABIT.

Jem couldn't believe it. Dad had asked him how he'd like to spend the
very last day of the holidays. Great. His mouth was already open, he'd
framed the words, before he realised he wasn't supposed to answer.
Plans had been made.

His father was in the middle of one of his mad obsessions. These ranged
from UFOs and crop circles to double-alternative medicine and selective
veganism. Mum said it was his hormones. She'd plotted a four week
cycle, she said, something to do with the full moon. At the moment it
was stone circles. Standing around in cow-mucky fields, then. Staring
at lumps of rock.

They'd done Stonehenge. That hadn't been too bad. Avebury was worse.
Much worse. For a start, the area was bigger, involving much more
walking and referring to guide books. Dad had gone round once to get
his bearings, then again to air his knowledge, throwing out remarks
about the Barber's stone and the Cove stones in loud ringing tones that
probably impressed anyone who hadn't shelled out for a guide book
themselves.

But today was the pits. Dad had discovered the existence of a little
known circle about thirty miles away. Right on the Welsh border. The
unpronouncable name, roughly translated as 'Stones of the Red Giant'.
And here they were.

It was a scorching hot day. Their thin clothes stuck damply to their
backs as they climbed the rough sheep track to the isolated site. Jem
snatched at ripe blackberries and thought bitterly about sea and sand.
A heat haze shimmered over the parched earth. In the west the sky
glowered leaden-yellow, promising a thunder storm.

There was nothing remotely dramatic about this circle. Although spread
over quite an area, the stones were either lying flat or were half
covered by turf. They stuck up like rotten tooth stump among the
scrubby gorse bushes. Jem watched his father scurry off clutching a
note-book and gratefull sank down into the shadow cast by the tallest
of the stones, set a little way inside the others.

It was so hot. Too hot for anything. A lorry laboured up a distant
hill. Someone deep in the valley rythmically knocked in fence posts. An
immense bumble bee alighted on his knee for a second, then blundered
drowsily on. Grasshoppers zithered in the long, dry grass. Wood pigeons
crooned lullabies in a nearby copse. Gradually all these sounds were
muted by the sleepy hum of insects homing in on the gorse
flowers.

And then there was silence.

Without warning the whole atmosphere changed. An icy wind blew out of
nowhere. Little tendrils of white mist lapped at the base of the
stones, growing more solid, closing in.

And still the silence deepened.

Jem felt ice cold sweat running down his back. There was no question of
running away. He was pinned to the spot by some unseen force.
Then the voices started: a weird discordant chant that swirled and grew
like the mist. It stopped. Everything waited.

Now he knew what it felt like to have your hair stand on end. And your
spine tingle with fear. His breaths were quick and shallow. His heart
was a clenched fist pounding against his ribs.

An enormous bellow shattered the stillness. It echoed and re-echoed
round the circle. Still Jem could see nothing. A second, louder, roar
of triumph followed. And the giant stood over him, legs atride, a
mighty axe held aloft, its well-sharpened blade glinting silver. He was
huge. Well over eight feet tall. Built like a leathery He-man and
nearly covered in matted red hair and filthy animal skins. And he was
grinning. To either side waited rows of almost transparent, white-robed
figures who flickered and rippled in the mist. Behind them all stood
the circle of stones, erect and much taller. The stone he had chosen
was still the biggest though, and he was also now lying on a large flat
stone at its base, which looked like, it looked like...

Jem had never moved so fast in all his life. With an almighty effort he
threw himself to one side. He only managed to get himself about
eighteen inches away from the stone, but it was enough. He heard the
terrific metallic thud as axe hit granite, and saw an arc of electric
sparks flash through the air. A massive bellow and roar of rage
followed.

Then it was over. After a moment's silence a pheasant shrieked defiance
from the cover of some ferns. The grasshoppers continued their gig. The
pigeons picked up where they'd left off. The sun shone.

Jem's father bent over him. "Dozing off, Jeremy? Look, I think we'd
better get going. WE're about to get caught in a real pig of a
storm."

White hot jags of lightning unzipped the distant sky. Thunder rumbled
up the valleys towards them. Great splats of rain began to fall, slowly
at first, then faster, turning the parched red clay into small rivulets
of mud as they ran for the shelter of the car.

"Damn nuisance," said Dad, "Didn't even get a chance to work out which
was the sacrificial stone."