Beast Quest 18 – Sting the Scorpion Man

Adam Blade's Sting the Scorpion Man is a dark, fast Beast Quest adventure for 7 year olds about an old enemy who turns into the most terrifying Beast yet.

What happens

Tom and Elenna are deep in Gorgonia, the red-skied kingdom of the evil wizard Malvel. They've freed five of Avantia's good Beasts from his prisons. Only Cypher the mountain giant is left, and nobody knows where he's being kept. This is the sixth and last Beast of the quest.

Then they find Seth lying by a black lake. He's one of Malvel's servants and he's tried to kill them more than once. Now he's badly hurt and begging to be left alone.

Tom can't walk past someone in pain, even an enemy. So he heals him. And that's exactly what Malvel was counting on, because Seth's punishment for failing is to become a Beast. A giant scorpion from the waist down, with snapping pincers and a huge whipping tail.

It's quite a moment. Tom's kindness is what makes him a hero, and here it goes horribly wrong. Is he right to have helped? Your reader will probably have an opinion!

From there it's a race to the Western City, with skulls set into its walls and WANTED posters of Tom and Elenna everywhere. A one-eyed gatekeeper lets them in. Tom sends his shadow off on its own to find a way into Malvel's castle. Underneath it are catacombs full of tombs, and one of them has Tom's missing father's name on it.

The magic powers Tom has collected are a big part of the fun. He can leap, see a long way and hear what the good Beasts are saying. He's very brave and he makes mistakes, which makes him easy to root for.

Worth knowing before you hand it over

This one is darker than some. Seth is found with six arrows in his chest, and while Tom pulls them out, Seth pushes one back in and begs Tom to let him die. In the big fight, Tom slices the end off Sting's tail and black blood spurts across the floor. Some children will find that grim. Readers who already love the series and like their monsters properly scary will be gripped.

What to read next

If they want to go back to where the Gorgonia adventure began, step through the Lion's Gate with Torgor the Minotaur.