Skulduggery Pleasant

  “The mission is worth the risk,” Ravel said. “Obviously, I can’t order the rest of you to accompany us …”

  “Actually, you can,” said Saracen. “You’re Grand Mage. You’re in charge.”

  “Right, well, yeah, but the Dead Men have been disbanded. We’re no longer a military unit.”

  Vex held up his hand. “All in favour of the Dead Men getting back together, raise your hands.” Other hands joined his in the air. “There you go. We’re now a military unit again.”

  Ravel hesitated. “Very well. In that case, we’re going to break into the facility. We’ll have to make our way there the old-fashioned way – Fletcher Renn will be out of commission until tomorrow. Because the Supreme Council will be monitoring any private planes leaving Irish airspace, we’ll be travelling out of the country on a passenger jet.”

  Shudder looked displeased. “A passenger jet … with other passengers?”

  “Yes.”

  “Passengers who are people? Mortal people?”

  “Yes.”

  “I … see.”

  “Operational control in the field will rest with Skulduggery as always,” Ravel said, then turned to Valkyrie. “I’m aware that I take my life in my hands when I say this, but I think it would be best if you stayed behind.”

  She shook her head. “I’m going.”

  “We’ll be walking right into the enemy’s lair.”

  “The best place to find the enemy.”

  Ravel glanced at the others. There were many things Valkyrie could have said to fill that silence, but she stayed quiet. This wasn’t her decision. It was theirs. There had always been seven Dead Men – no more, no less. Originally it had been the six men standing around her and a seventh called Hopeless. When Ravel himself had been badly injured and needed time to recover, his place had been taken by Larrikin. But Hopeless and Larrikin were long dead, and the Dead Men didn’t have time to hold auditions.

  The last person Ravel looked to was Skulduggery. Valkyrie turned her head away, giving him the freedom to agree or disagree without judgement.

  “Well, OK then,” Ravel said at last, “it looks like we have a new Dead Man.”

  Valkyrie did her very best to stop the grin from spreading.

  “Should we change our name?” Saracen asked. “The Dead People, perhaps?”

  “The Dead Non-Gender-Specific Persons?” Vex suggested.

  “Dead Men and a Girl? Dead Men and a Little Lady?”

  “We’ll keep the name as it is,” Ghastly said, interrupting them before they got carried away. “Valkyrie, you’ll just have to get used to being called a Dead Man. I’m sure you can handle it.”

  Valkyrie gave him a nod, and looked up at Skulduggery. He wasn’t looking at her, though. His eyeless gaze still rested on Ravel.

  “This mission,” Skulduggery said. “Care to go into a bit more detail?”

  Ravel straightened up. “Of course. We’ll be flying into France, but we’ll have to make the rest of the journey by car and foot. In all, it’ll take us maybe two days. The facility is located due west of the sorcerer town of Wolfsong. It’s been over a hundred and fifty years since I was there last, but they’re one of the friendlier independent towns I’ve ever seen. It’s not like Roarhaven. Since we’ll be passing through on our way to the facility, we’ll have a chance to speak to them and hopefully rally them to our cause.”

  “You think they’ll turn against the French Sanctuary?” Shudder asked.

  “Grand Mage Mandat is not a popular man in Wolfsong. It’s a possibility. At the very least, there might be someone there who can get us close to the facility without being seen.”

  “And then?” Skulduggery asked.

  “Then we accomplish our mission.”

  Skulduggery looked at Ravel and Ravel looked back at him.

  Eventually Ghastly rolled his eyes. “Will you please just tell them?”

  Ravel scowled. “I was working up to it.”

  “Working up to what?” Vex asked.

  “The fact is,” Ravel said, “we’re not going to win this war alone. We need allies. We need the Sanctuaries of Africa and Australia to come in on our side. They’re teetering on the edge right now, we know they are – but it’s going to take something big to push them over and get them involved.”

  “Oh,” said Skulduggery. “I see.”

  “What?” Valkyrie said. “What am I missing?”

  Skulduggery looked at her. “We’re going to let the Supreme Council know that we’ll be going after the Engineer.”

  Vex laughed at the ridiculousness of the notion, but sobered when he realised Ravel had stayed silent. “You can’t be serious. You actually want to walk into an ambush?”

  “We let it leak out that we’re on our way,” Ravel said. “Our African and Australian friends hear about this and they know we’re walking into a trap … and so they spring into action and rescue us.”

  “You hope,” said Saracen.

  “I very much hope,” said Ravel.

  Valkyrie frowned. “But wouldn’t we be tricking them into fighting a war?”

  “Tricking?” Ravel said. “I wouldn’t call it tricking, no. Manipulating? It could possibly be seen as manipulating.”

  Ghastly looked at her. “You know what we did during the war with Mevolent. We took on the suicide missions. We did the jobs no one else wanted to do. Not all of these jobs were dangerous.”

  “Some of them,” Skulduggery finished, “were just distasteful. We need allies. This is an incredibly risky plan that might backfire and mean the end of our fight – but there are times when a huge risk is the only risk worth taking.”

  “Yay,” said Vex mournfully. “We’re walking into another ambush. I love it so much when we do things like that. So, while all this is going on, where are we meant to find the time to recover the Engineer?”

  “It won’t be easy,” Ravel admitted.

  “I’m astonished.”

  “The whole thing is a set-up,” said Ravel. “Even more than you think. Lamour, that lovably eccentric chief scientist, is luring us into a trap anyway. He thinks we think he’s a double agent, working for them but secretly working for us. He doesn’t know we know he’s a triple agent, working for them but secretly working for us but really he’s secretly working for them. Dexter, how’s your brain?”

  “Hurting.”

  “But in every lie there is a kernel of truth. The fact is, Lamour does have access to the Engineer, and he will be in the facility. He just won’t be where he says he’ll be. So while the rest of us are trying to avoid getting captured or killed, one of us will have to sneak off, track him down, get the Engineer and get back before our allies mount their magnificent rescue and whisk us all out of there.”

  “So who’ll be the one going after Lamour?” Vex asked.

  Everyone turned to look at Valkyrie.

  “I have an idea,” she said. “Why don’t I do it?”

  Vex got up and approached her. “Welcome onboard,” he said, and surprised her with a hug. She wasn’t surprised by how much she liked it.

  Saracen was next. “You’re going to make a wonderful Dead Man,” he said as they hugged. “I know these things.”

  Ghastly came over, and when he hugged her he whispered in her ear, “Your uncle would be so proud of you.”

  Ghastly stepped aside and then Shudder was standing there. Valkyrie blinked up at him.

  “In the past,” he said, “when welcoming a new Dead Man into the fold, the tradition was to hit them across the jaw, as hard as we could.”

  “Uh,” said Valkyrie.

  “Hugging is much nicer,” Shudder said, and hugged her so tight she thought her ribs might crack.

  Ravel’s hug was next. He smelled lovely. “You’ll do us proud,” he said. “And don’t take our name too literally. We actually do our best not to die.”

  He released her and she turned to Skulduggery and held out her arms. “Come here, you.”

  He tilted his
head. “My hugs are for special occasions only.”

  “Hug me.”

  “I prefer the old tradition.”

  “Hug.”

  “Would a handshake do?”

  “Hug.”

  “A pat on the back?”

  She stepped forward and wrapped her arms round him. “Hug,” she said.

  He sighed, and his hands settled on her shoulders. The others were warm and their embraces strong – with Skulduggery the hug was cold, and there were areas on his jacket that gave way beneath her fingers, and she could feel the emptiness within. She didn’t mind.

  hina slipped her feet from the stirrups and swung her right leg over the saddle, letting herself drop smoothly to the grass. Sable stayed where he was as she walked to the crypt. He was a good horse. Out of all the horses she’d owned throughout the centuries, he was by far her favourite. She undid the strap under her chin, took off the riding hat and hung it on the curved tail of one of the stone scorpions that guarded the crypt door. The hinges creaked when she entered. She hadn’t been to this corner of her land for over a year – hadn’t been through this door in twice that.

  Upon her entrance, sigils began to glow along the walls, casting a warm light on to the eight sealed stone coffins that lay before her. A ninth, in the corner of her eye, remained empty. She didn’t look at it. Instead, she concentrated on the coffin in the middle. Like the others, her family crest had been carved into the lid, a scorpion atop three circles. The circles were said to represent the blank features of the Faceless Ones, while the scorpion stood for the indomitable will and immutable nature of China’s bloodline.

  The arrogance of it all. China’s grandmother, a mere thirty years older than China’s mother but two hundred years older than China, had taken it upon herself to school the children of the family in the ways of worship. The majority of those teachings were nothing if not standard – the Faceless Ones are the true rulers of the world, the mortals must be extinguished, sorcerers exist to serve these wonderfully insane gods – the same rhetoric instilled in the minds of all disciples’ children.

  But China’s grandmother, who had in turn been taught by her grandmother, also passed down a particular addendum that was never spoken of to outsiders. The evenings China had spent with her brother Bliss, sitting by the fire while their grandmother explained the true realities of the Faceless Ones, that they were insane and they were unpredictable, and according to legend they could take over a sorcerer’s body to use as they saw fit. Other sorcerers, China and her brother were told, were mere fodder for their gods – vessels waiting to be steered. But China’s family believed themselves to be special. They believed they were different. They believed they were so strong and so clever that when the Faceless Ones took them over, they would retain control. A scorpion cannot change its nature, their grandmother always said. How right she was.

  Bliss never changed his nature. He was quiet and strong and so rarely resorted to violence despite his immense strength. When he walked away, they called him traitor, blasphemer, and said he was not a true scorpion. They were so blinded by the betrayal that they couldn’t see that he was the truest scorpion of them all. He had never been one to accept what he’d been told. He questioned. He doubted. He came to his own conclusions. And they condemned him for it.

  So did she, of course. Such a hypocrite. She’d never been as strong as he was. She returned to the fold and lost herself in her worship, buried her own doubts in among the prayers and the declarations and the hatred. After he had done so much to try to save her, to try to take her away from the madness, she had responded by trying to kill him on multiple occasions. And even after she’d seen the light and walked away from it all, her own pride and stubbornness had built a wall between them. For she was China Sorrows, and she would not apologise to anyone.

  The truth was she’d lost her brother long before a Faceless One had torn him apart, and it had been her own doing. Now here she was, the last of her line, standing over his coffin, one of the few possessions left to her after Eliza Scorn’s vendetta. She didn’t even know why she was here. Loneliness, perhaps? She smiled at that. If there was anyone who deserved a lifetime of loneliness, surely it would be her. And there she was again, feeling sorry for herself. Such a luxury. She positively bathed in it these days.

  She noticed a bit of mud on one polished riding boot, and put her foot up on her grandmother’s coffin to wipe it off. Such a venomous creature her grandmother had been and, like all venomous creatures, most dangerous when dying. China could still feel those fingers round her throat and see that burning hatred in those eyes. Her grandmother’s death hadn’t been quick and hadn’t been easy, but it had been a death, and that’s all that mattered.

  She left the crypt, put her riding hat back on, and the sound of motorbikes reached her. Frowning, she walked to the hedge. Beyond the twisted briars and tightly-packed leaves, she saw colour. Movement. Bikers on her land. Cold anger rose inside her. She walked to a gap in the hedge, looked over. Four of them, none of them wearing a helmet. Two average-sized males – one who looked like an accountant and one, the dark-haired, unshaven one, who was clearly the leader of the pack. The third man was big, with matted hair and huge arms. The woman had short spiky hair and a cruel laugh. These were not casual trespassers. These people were here for a reason.

  The accountant looked around, his eyes locking on to hers. In that simple movement alone, China knew everything about him that she needed to.

  Vampire.

  She spun, ran for her horse. On the other side of the hedge, engines were gunned. Foot in the stirrup, the other leg swinging, she was in the saddle and away, the ground moving with that fast, smooth rhythm.

  The bikers were in the field behind her. She pointed the horse straight ahead, gave it a squeeze and cleared the ditch. One of the bikers tried to follow and ended up flying through the air while his bike tumbled into the briars. The others swung around, looking for the gate. There was a shout, and they sped to the near corner.

  China galloped for the tractor trail, followed it up along the field. Behind her, wheels spun and muck flew. One of the bikes broke away from the rest, caught up with her before the others. The rider reached into his jacket, and China glimpsed the butt of a gun. Keeping one hand on the reins, she ripped her riding hat off and swung it down into his face. Blood burst from his nose and the bike reared up and flipped. She didn’t bother watching him fall.

  The other bikes were gaining. She galloped for the tangled hedge straight ahead, and slid both hands down the horse’s side, finding the patterns she’d slowly – and painlessly – carved into the skin. The patterns became suddenly hot, and began to glow.

  Two massive, beautiful, electric-blue wings sprouted from the horse’s sides and the bikers cursed and one of them crashed and the horse ran and leaped and lifted away from the ground, over the hedge, his great wings beating at the air. China hugged his neck as they flew, directing him across the fields and ditches. She looked back, saw the bikers turn, speeding back to the road.

  She took the horse in low, slowing as they reached the yard, and the ground came up beneath them and all at once the fast rhythm of galloping hooves replaced the beat of wings. She ran her fingers over the patterns and the wings dissolved, leaving streaks in the air. She took hold of the reins, pulled them up and slid off the saddle, calling for assistance. She kissed the horse’s neck and gave it a few heavy pats, then gave the reins to the stablehand and ran for her car. The engine roared, tyres spun, and she peeled out on to the road, the bikers right behind her.

  hen it came down to it, the Monster Hunters were really nice guys. Sure, Tanith was pretty certain they had orders to kill her and Sanguine if they stepped out of line, but apart from that things were going swimmingly. On the drive to the Midnight Hotel they joked and laughed, and only Sanguine was left out of the fun. He was sulking again.

  They parked by the side of the road, and crept through the trees. Little by little the joking stopped, un
til finally all four of them were creeping silently.

  Donegan held up a closed fist, then motioned to the rest of them to join him. Tanith moved low, dropping to the ground beside him. Sanguine lay on her other side.

  Ahead of them was a clearing in the woods. At the edge of that clearing, in a wide circle, armed men and women stood guard. About thirty of them.

  “Flip,” whispered Gracious. “That is just flippin’ great, that is. What are we meant to do now?”

  Donegan looked at his watch. “Seven seconds till noon,” he said. “Four. Three. Two. One.”

  In the clearing ahead, wooden beams sprouted from the ground, latched on to each other while bricks and concrete bloomed and grew walls and floors. Glass stretched in window frames and colour seeped into everything. The Midnight Hotel gave one final groan of growth, and settled into place. A moment later, the front door opened.

  Sorcerers filed out, each with a duffel bag over their shoulder. A dozen collected in the open space before the hotel, and they kept coming. Two dozen. Three. When the flow finally stopped, there were maybe fifty men and women standing there, talking quietly among themselves. Before the door closed over, Tanith glimpsed Cleavers within. Fifty plus the thirty standing guard, plus however many were still inside …

  “I think we may be slightly outnumbered,” Donegan said softly. “Unless Gracious has any new invention on his person that will even the odds …?”

  “Funny you should say that,” Gracious responded, “because no, I don’t. Unless you count a phone as a new invention. I vote we use that to call for reinforcements.”

  Tanith scanned the windows. “No reinforcements. They’d take too long, our forces are stretched thin as it is, and we are not going to ask for help. We were sent to do a job and that’s what we’re going to do.”

  “Four against eighty? We don’t even know how many more there are inside.”

  She shook her head. “We don’t have to fight them. That’s not our primary objective. Ghastly said we’re to deactivate the teleportation system to stop more of them coming. That’s what we focus on.”