Death Bringer

  Craven hadn’t realised it before, but he was thirsty. There was nothing in the world he wanted more right at that moment than a glass of water.

  “We’re going to walk out of here,” Pleasant continued. “We’re going to do it slowly. Your friends can back up against the walls. It’ll probably be safer for them if they do so, because if even one Necromancer stands between us and the door, we’re going to kill every last one of you. But you’ll be first, Craven. You keep that in mind. You’ll be first.”

  “Let them go,” said Craven, his voice a croak.

  Pleasant’s gun didn’t waver as he backed away, and Craven didn’t move. Even if he’d wanted to, his body seemed locked in position.

  The Sanctuary agents walked backwards to the stairs and he watched them climb. Pleasant stayed where he was until the doors above him opened. Daylight flooded the staircase, illuminating him as he stood there. His gun glinted. Beneath his hat, his skull was in the deepest, darkest shadow.

  “Good boy,” he said. He spoke quietly, but his voice easily carried across to Craven. “We’re going to be keeping an eye on things here, to make sure you don’t take Melancholia off on a nice holiday before we have a chance to speak with her. I’m sure you understand.”

  Craven said nothing, and Pleasant climbed the steps. A moment after he was gone, the doors slammed shut, cutting off the sunlight.

  Chapter 19

  Gods and Monsters

  he cops hadn’t been any use. Lynch’s death was reported on the news as a mere robbery. No one cared if another homeless person died. Just another piece of rubbish swept into the gutter of the city. Who was there to mourn for someone like that?

  Kenny would have liked to mourn, but in truth he was too excited. His run-in with the tall man who’d called himself Detective Inspector Me and the teenage girl had convinced him that something bigger was going on. Suddenly this article on modern urban legends had started to spiral into territories he would never have anticipated. What did the tall man and the teenage girl have to do with Lynch’s murder? Had they killed him? His stomach churned with happy nerves. This was a story now. A proper story.

  If his car hadn’t died on him, he would have tried to find Bernadette Maguire’s cottage and asked her what exactly Lynch had told her. There was the faint possibility that her life was in danger now that Lynch was dead, but he doubted it. Such things only happened in movies, unfortunately.

  Which meant that Kenny now had only one lead left to him – and that was the tattooist he’d heard about.

  It was a glorious Tuesday afternoon in Temple Bar. Kenny walked up cobbled streets until he found the brightly coloured building. Music played above. He climbed the wooden stairs, passing the photographs of tattoos and piercings and other works of body art. He had never been tempted to get a tattoo himself. It all seemed like a little too much pain.

  There was a skinny man in a Thin Lizzy T-shirt, his arms inked, a ring in his lips and his head shaved. He turned down the music when he saw Kenny. Damien Dempsey was playing – ‘Negative Vibes’.

  “Are you Finbar?” Kenny asked.

  “I am indeed,” said the skinny man. “Are you looking for a tattoo?”

  Kenny hesitated, then smiled. “Actually, no.”

  “A piercing, then? No need to be embarrassed. Just tell me what you want pierced and we’ll pierce it. I’ll pierce anything, me.”

  “Actually, I was hoping we could just talk.”

  “Oh,” Finbar said. “Oh, right. Well, I’m flattered, I am, but before you go getting your hopes up, I have to tell you – I’m married.”

  “Uh, that’s not what I meant.”

  “My wife’s in the other room, if you want to meet her. I’d call her in, but she’s not really speaking to me right now. Don’t know why. She was in a cult, you see, and she had to shave all her hair off. She left eventually, like, and came back to me, and we’re a family again, but her head’s having a little bit of trouble re-growing all that hair. She says I’m unsympathetic. I say she looks like a tufty bowling ball. Maybe if you see her, you can decide who’s right.”

  “I wouldn’t really be comfortable doing that.”

  “Ah, fair enough, I suppose.”

  “I heard you’re a psychic.”

  Finbar’s laugh was delayed by a split second. “Not me, mate. But there’s a Mystic Meg up the street there, she does a bit of tarot, that sort of thing. She’s good, you know, if you believe in it.”

  “I don’t want my palm read. You see the future.”

  “Who’s been filling your head with this nonsense?”

  “It’s the word on the street.”

  “And what street would that be? No, not me. Sorry.”

  “What do you know of the Passage?”

  Finbar didn’t move away. He stood there, his tongue pressed against his lip ring. “Who did you say you were?”

  “My name’s Kenny Dunne. I’m a journalist.”

  “And why would a journalist be asking about stupid things like the Passage?”

  “So you do know about it.”

  “Don’t know anything that could help you, sorry. You’d probably better go.”

  “I can pay.”

  “Then you have more money than sense, mate. Keep it, spend it on something worthwhile. Like a taxi.”

  “They say you’re a psychic who saw something so horrible that you haven’t been able to see any visions since.”

  “In that case I wouldn’t be any help to you, would I? But you don’t know what you’re talking about, and I haven’t a clue where you’re coming up with this stuff. I’m a busy man. I need you to leave.”

  Kenny indicated the empty room. “This is busy?”

  “Tuesday takes a while to get going.”

  “Finbar, you know what’s going on, don’t you? I’ve been hearing about the end of the world, ancient gods, super powers, strange people who can do amazing things… I’m pretty sure I’ve even met some of them. A tall man in a suit. A dark-haired girl. You know these people?”

  “They don’t ring any bells.”

  “I’m going to find out, sooner or later. You can help make sure I get the facts right.”

  “I don’t know any facts.”

  “Come on. I know you’re not a stupid man.”

  “I’m quite stupid. Ask anyone.”

  “Finbar, are there superheroes living among us?”

  Finbar snorted with laughter, and Kenny started to feel a little thick. “Superheroes? In tights and capes, flying around? If there were superheroes, Mr Journalist, don’t you think they’d be in New York or somewhere like that? There’s really not that many tall buildings for Spider-Man to swing from in Dublin, you know? He’d have maybe two swings and then he’d just hang there looking disappointed.”

  “These people don’t wear tights and capes, Finbar.”

  “So they’re naked superheroes? That’s grand for now, but when the good weather is over they’re going to regret it.”

  “They look like us. They dress like us. But they’re not like us. They’re different.”

  “You,” Finbar said, “are sounding very racist right now.”

  “I’m going to find the truth, with or without you. Either way, you’ll be seeing a lot of me in the next few weeks and months. I’m going to follow you wherever you go.”

  “I don’t go anywhere.”

  “I’m going to trail your friends.”

  “I don’t have any.”

  “I’m going to photograph every single person to enter and leave this tattoo parlour.”

  Finbar rolled his eyes. “And they’ll hate that, because people who get dragons drawn on their backs are normally so shy about other people noticing them.”

  “It doesn’t have to be this way, Finbar.”

  That tongue, pressing against the lip ring. “I can’t help you,” he said at last. “But I know someone who might be able to. His name’s Geoffrey.”

  “What does Geoffrey do?”

&nb
sp; “You can ask him yourself, if he meets with you. Three o’clock today, outside Bruxelles on Harry Street.”

  “How do I know he’ll be there?”

  “I’ll give him a call. If he wants to meet you, he’ll be there.”

  “If he doesn’t show up, I’m coming back.”

  “Well, if you come back, I might not open the door.”

  “The door’s always open.”

  “Then I’ll get the lock fixed,” Finbar retorted. Kenny waited to see if Finbar had anything to add, but he obviously didn’t, so he left him alone.

  Kenny had lunch in Milano’s, then walked up to Grafton Street. He wasn’t going to be late – not this time. He got there at half two and sat outside in the sunshine. At a little before three, a small man in khakis wandered up. He had a gentle face, beads in his beard, and hair the colour and approximate texture of wheat. He had many bracelets on his wrists and rings on his fingers.

  He joined Kenny at his table.

  “You’re Geoffrey?” Kenny asked.

  “Indeed I am,” said the man. “And you must be Mr Journalist.”

  “Kenny Dunne, hi, pleased to meet you.”

  “The pleasure is all mine.”

  “I really want to thank you for meeting with me. I’ve been having a hard time getting anyone to talk about this stuff.”

  “I can’t really blame them,” Geoffrey said with a chuckle. “This kind of talk gets people killed.”

  Kenny frowned. “You’re talking about Paul Lynch?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know who that is.”

  “He was a homeless man. He said he had visions of the apocalypse.”

  “Which one?”

  “Sorry?”

  “Which apocalypse? There are a few.”

  “Uh… there was one where these old gods came back…”

  “The Faceless Ones, yes. What about the Remnants? Did he foresee that? Last Christmas?”

  “The Insanity Virus thing? With all those slices of darkness? They’re called Remnants?”

  “Don’t worry about them, they’re all locked away, safe and sound. Did he foresee the Death Bringer?”

  “Who’s the Death Bringer?”

  “The Death Bringer’s the one who is going to initiate the Passage.”

  Kenny took out his notebook, started scribbling. “Death Bringer. One word or two?”

  “Either. I’ve always preferred two. What about Darquesse?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know what that is.”

  “He didn’t foresee Darquesse? Oh that’s interesting.” Geoffrey sat back, finger tapping the beads in his beard.

  “After every apocalypse passed without actually happening,” Kenny said, “he’d get a new set of visions.”

  “Ah, well, that explains it. He foresaw them one at a time. As each one was averted he’d see the next one. It’s a pity he didn’t see Darquesse, we’ve been trying to find out more about her.”

  “So it’s all real?” Kenny asked. “All of it? The visions, the gods, the superheroes?”

  Geoffrey chuckled. “Superheroes? They’re not superheroes, Mr Journalist. They’re sorcerers.”

  “Sorcerers, like… with magic?”

  “Like with magic, yes.”

  “So, the tall man and the teenage girl… they’re sorcerers too?”

  “Oh,” Geoffrey said, smiling. “You mean Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain. Those two, they’re the good guys. We’re all alive today because of them.”

  “They saved the world?”

  “They’ve saved the world a few times, indeed they have.”

  “This is amazing.”

  “Yes, it is. You don’t believe any of it, though.”

  Kenny smiled, and shrugged. “Well, I’m, I suppose I’m sceptical, but if you believe it, there must be something to it, right?”

  “But I’m a crackpot,” Geoffrey said, smiling broadly. “Finbar’s a crackpot. Everyone you’ve spoken to about this is a crackpot. You can see that, can’t you?”

  Kenny frowned. “You’re all nuts?”

  “Sadly, yes. You’re going to go home today and you’re going to look at all your notes and research and you’re going to realise that it’s all just nonsense.”

  “Nonsense?”

  “To be honest, you’ll be happy. You were never really interested in this stuff in the first place. The fact is, you found it kind of boring.”

  Kenny nodded. “It’s pretty dull, all right.”

  “The idea of people with strange powers is just ridiculous, isn’t it?”

  “It is, actually. It belongs in a comic book.”

  “That’s exactly where it belongs.”

  “I’ve been wasting my time,” Kenny said. “God, I’ve just been wasting my time…”

  Geoffrey nodded, and didn’t disagree.

  Kenny gave him a smile. “Listen, hey, sorry for being such a bother,” he said. “I really have to go, actually. I’ve got a story due tomorrow, and I need to work on it.”

  “Of course,” Geoffrey said. “Don’t let me delay you.”

  Kenny shook his hand and got up, started walking. He put his notebook away, glanced back to make sure Geoffrey wasn’t wandering after him. The last thing he needed was a crackpot like that following him home.

  When he got back to his apartment, Kenny started packing all that nonsense away. He couldn’t believe he had wasted so much of his time on this, couldn’t believe he had actually got excited about the possibilities. What possibilities? A group of nutcases who all subscribed to the same delusion? He would have burnt everything, shoved it in the bin, but that wasn’t his way. He never discarded his notes – not until the article was done. Everything was useful. He might not write a world-shattering exposé on a secret subculture of superheroes, but he could use what he’d learned if he was ever tasked to write about the homeless in Dublin, or the plight of the psychologically disturbed. Nothing, he knew, was ever wasted. Not really.

  He flicked through his notes. The Remnants. Darquesse. The Death Bringer – one word or two – the Passage. The tall man and the teenage girl: Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain. They were real, even if the identities they had given him were not. But that was to be expected, after all. Fragments of reality can be glimpsed through even the most fractured of window.

  He read back over it, battling the tide of boredom that swept over him. It didn’t stop him reading, of course. He was a journalist. Research was what he did, and oftentimes research was mind-numbingly boring, just like this was.

  He didn’t know why it was boring, though. He couldn’t put his finger on it. It didn’t sound boring. Super powers and the apocalypse and saving the world. But Geoffrey had known. For all his lunacy, he’d hit the nail right on the head with that one, and the moment he’d uttered those words, Kenny had felt it. The boredom. The dullness. It just seeped in, robbing him of his enthusiasm.

  Kenny frowned. Before Geoffrey had told him that this was all boring, Kenny had found it fascinating. He remembered that distinctly. But then it was like a switch had been flicked inside him, and all his interest had faded away. He sat on the arm of the chair, brow furrowed. How had that happened? How could it have happened?

  He remembered Geoffrey’s face. Smiling. Avuncular. A bit of an oddball, granted. A crackpot, even, as he himself had said. His voice was nice. It wasn’t as smooth as the tall man’s, but it had a quality that got inside your head. It was a warm voice. Comforting. It made you want to trust him. It made you want to believe him.

  Kenny’s notes dropped from his hand, scattered across the floor. His eyes were wide. His mouth was half open.

  He’d been hypnotised.

  He didn’t know how Geoffrey had done it, but he’d convinced him with a few short words that he didn’t think what he thought, that he didn’t believe what he believed.

  “Good God,” he said to his empty apartment.

  All of a sudden his enthusiasm came back to him, his interest roaring inside h
im like a furnace in his chest. Finbar had sent him to meet with Geoffrey so that Geoffrey could work his hoodoo on him, make him walk away from what might have been the biggest story of his career.

  Kenny grinned. You’re gonna have to do better than that.

  Chapter 20

  Riding Out

  hina gripped the reins and pulled, straining against the horse’s resistance. He was a wilful one, all right. Every turn they made, he tried to shake her loose. Every ditch they jumped, he threatened to throw her into. She’d been fighting him since she swung into the saddle. Her arms ached and her legs burned. Her jodhpurs were splattered with mud and her shirt stuck to her back. Her hands were raw from the reins.

  God, she loved him.

  A creature of fierce strength and beauty, and one that made her work to get him to do what she wanted. A challenge.

  She used to ride out all the time when she was younger, but as her friends fell away or died, or she betrayed them or they betrayed her, it had become a solitary pursuit – and for a while, she preferred it that way. Just her and the horse and the open countryside, the hoof beats that thudded through her body, clods of grass and mud kicked up behind them. No talk, no flattery, no professions of love.

  But people change, and she was as vulnerable to this phenomenon as anyone. Decades of solitude had hardened her, but isolation without end was a dangerous thing. Suddenly she didn’t want to be alone on these afternoons.

  Valkyrie would enjoy this, she knew. China had heard her talk of when she rode out as a young girl, before she met Skulduggery – just a beginner, but with a natural’s love for it. Maybe one of these days, as soon as Valkyrie got a break from saving the world, China would invite her to the stables. She even had the perfect horse picked out – strong and fast with a hint of mischief. The perfect way to get reacquainted with the saddle.

  Providing, of course, that China found a way to settle this Eliza Scorn business. It required not just a single strike against Scorn, or even a strike against Scorn and Prave together, but multiple strikes against multiple targets at the same time. The biggest problem with that, and this was truly the hold that Scorn had on her, was that China didn’t know who these targets might be.

  There may have been none, of course, Scorn may have been bluffing, but China doubted it. In order to build up the Church of the Faceless, Scorn would need a lot more than China’s resources. She had to have benefactors, secret backers and interested parties. She wouldn’t have told them what China had done in her misspent youth, but she would have worked out a way to get that information to them if something bad happened to her. Which meant that China needed to find out who these mysterious benefactors were, and take them all down at the same time.