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all lessons at Quicklime’s, you didn’t have to go to Gristleball classes unless you wanted to. The only student who had no choice was Orkward Warlock. Orkward spent his entire life at the school, including holidays, weekends, half-term and even Christmas Day, and because he was a naturally lazy boy, Professor Throat had decided he should play Gristleball to get some exercise.
    Unlike other sports, there were no different leagues for boys and girls. In fact, when the players weredressed in their protective clothing, you couldn’t tell who was a boy and who was a girl.
    Gristleball was not played on the normal school playing field. Because of the frequent accidents, it had its own special place away from the rest of the school in a one-hundred-metre deep three-sided pit carved into the rock. This helped to muffle the sounds of agony that accompanied every game. At the bottom of the pit sat the playing field. There was no soft girly grass and mud down here, just smooth slippery marble. On each side of the field there was a goalsimilar in shape and size to a football goal, except the goals were alive and could change size. Radius Leg and the players were lowered into the Gristleball pit in a wicker basket.

    â€˜Right,’ said Radius Leg. ‘Misery House side one, Leech House side two, and Gored House side three.’
    Orkward Warlock, who was in Misery House, took up his usual position of creeping off the field and hiding in the toilets, which were in a little cave near one of the corners. He always pretended he was in there in case the gristleball came flying through the window, but everyone knew he was just scared.
    Radius Leg moved to the boundary and blew his whistle. In the centre of the triangle, the ground began to shake. The marble cracked from side to side, rose up and suddenly burst open as the ballworm reared up out of its tunnel. It tipped its head back, heaved, opened its mouth wide and spat a massive ball of slimy gristle embedded with nails into the air. As the ball shot up into the clouds, the ballworm slid back into its burrow, pulling the rocks and marbleback down behind it. The players stood looking up into the sky, waiting for the gristleball to reappear.
    Three minutes went by as the gristleball hovered above the clouds, waiting for the moment when the players would drop their concentration for a split second.
    Merlinmary Flood loved Gristleball. Round the walls of her bedroom in Acacia Avenue she had photographs of all the greatest teams and players Quicklime’s had ever produced. If it had been up to her, she would have played Gristleball every day, but it was only played once a week to allow the players time to re-grow the bits of their bodies that had broken off during the game. With her incredibly thick hair crackling with electricity, she was the only player in the history of the school who had played the gamewithout protective clothing. Those few minutes when the ball hid in the clouds were the most exciting moments of her life. The anticipation was almost too much to bear and it was all Merlinmary could do not to give herself a serious electric shock.

    The seconds ticked by as the ball hovered. The seconds became another minute and still the gristleball waited. And then, at the very moment when the players least expected it, it came screaming down, heating up as it did so until it was glowing red. If a team was ready and in the right place, they grabbed the gristleball in their asbestos gloves and threw it into the nearest goal.
    If it was their own goal they got ten points. If it was either of the other two goals they scored five. For every other player the ball crashed into, seven points were added. If it hit Radius Leg and threw him against the boundary wall, the team got fifteen points plus one extra point for each broken rib.
    That day, the ball flew straight down towards Merlinmary, but she was ready. She grabbed it and, ignoring the smell of her own fur beginning to