Midnight

  “Damn. Omen’s a good kid.”

  “Who cares about the Darkly boy?” Abyssinia snapped. “He isn’t even the important one! No one will mourn for him! We have to focus on what matters – finding Cadaverous before he kills Caisson. Everything else is an irrelevance.”

  Skulduggery opened the cupboard under the sink. “Nothing is irrelevant,” he said, stepping back to let them see the body curled up against the pipes.

  “A clue!” Abyssinia cried.

  Skulduggery pulled the body out. Now little more than a skeleton, it crumpled to a pile of bones on the kitchen floor.

  “This must be kinda weird for you,” Temper said.

  “Not really,” Skulduggery replied, picking up the skull. He tilted his head. “I think I know him.”

  Temper frowned. “How can you tell?”

  “I recognise him from somewhere.”

  “I don’t mean to be … uh, whatever … but how can you recognise him when he’s … like this?”

  Skulduggery looked at Temper. “You don’t think all skulls look alike, do you?”

  “Kinda, yeah.”

  “You do?”

  “Of course.”

  Skulduggery started searching its clothes. “Did I ever tell you that I lost my skull once?”

  Temper sighed. “Yeah, you did. Goblins ran away with it.”

  “And for years afterwards I wore a replacement skull. For years, I walked around with a different head. The jaw was different, the cheekbones were different, the nasal aperture was hilariously off – I’m still surprised people recognised me at all.”

  “Maybe the fact that you were a skeleton …”

  Unable to find any ID, Skulduggery tore off a large strip of the deceased’s shirt. “The point is, a skull is as unique as the face that sits upon it.”

  Skulduggery laid the cloth over the head, and manipulated moisture out of the air to dampen it until it clung to the skull. Then he put both hands up under the jaw and ever so gently the air began to flow, filling out the cheeks and the eye sockets from beneath.

  “No,” Skulduggery murmured, “that isn’t it …”

  Temper watched as the cloth face billowed slightly, somehow giving the corpse lips, lending it the appearance of substance. Every so often, Skulduggery would give another murmur. He was like a sculptor: happy with one part of the face, he’d move on to the next, until it became something definite.

  “Satrap Beholden,” Skulduggery said, removing the cloth from the corpse’s skull as he stood. “I haven’t heard from him in years. Haven’t seen him in a decade.”

  “You sure it’s him?”

  “There’s no mistaking Satrap.”

  “Who was he?” Abyssinia asked. “And why is he dead in Cadaverous’s apartment?”

  “He would have told you himself that he was nobody of consequence. He stayed out of the war, he didn’t bother anyone …”

  “How did you know him?”

  “I met him when he was going out with Anton Shudder,” Skulduggery said. “The relationship lasted five or six years. He helped Anton run the Midnight Hotel before they broke up.”

  “When was this?” Temper asked. Skulduggery turned his head like he was listening to something, but didn’t answer. “Hello?”

  “The Midnight Hotel,” Skulduggery said softly. “When Anton died, it would have been passed on to his next of kin. Anton didn’t have any family. If he’d named Satrap in the will, he mightn’t have had time to change it before his death.”

  “So Satrap here inherited the Midnight Hotel,” Temper said. “And Cadaverous killed him for it?”

  “What is this Midnight Hotel?” Abyssinia asked.

  “It’s a building that moves,” Skulduggery said. “Every twelve hours, it grows in another location around the world, and everyone inside goes with it. For someone whose power is rooted in where they live—”

  “A moving house is a dream come true,” Abyssinia finished. She held up the white card. “He thought he would lead me on a treasure hunt that would take me forty-eight hours. Instead, we can go straight there.”

  “And catch him off guard,” Skulduggery said.

  “To the car!” Abyssinia announced, tearing the card in two. “I call – what’s the phrase? – shotgun.”

  She walked out.

  52

  All the lights were on in the Midnight Hotel.

  Valkyrie drove up slowly, the tyres crunching on gravel and twigs. A two-storey building. Faded white plaster. Dark wooden door and windowsills.

  “Are we here?” Omen asked quietly.

  “Keep your head down,” Valkyrie said, gently pressing the brake.

  Her eyes flickered to the clock on the dash. An hour and thirty-five minutes until midnight. Alice was still alive – providing Cadaverous Gant could be counted on to keep his word.

  “What’s wrong?” Omen asked.

  “His last home looked completely normal on the outside, too, but the inside was all metal walkways over a lake of fire. The moment I go in there,” she said, “he’s got all the power.”

  “Well,” Omen responded, “and I don’t want to be mean, but doesn’t he have all the power anyway? He’s got Alice and he knows you’re coming. This is a huge big trap that you have no choice but to step into. The only advantage you’ve actually got, and I know I’ve said this before and you’re probably getting sick of it, but the only advantage you’ve got is that he thinks I’m dead.”

  “You’re not coming with me, Omen. Now that I’m here, you’ve got to find your way to a phone and call Skulduggery.”

  “Cadaverous will kill you.”

  “Not immediately he won’t.”

  “I’m not going.”

  “Yes, you—”

  “You were going to shoot me!” he blurted. “I mean, I know now that you weren’t really going to do it, but I didn’t know that then, did I? So I stood there and thought you were going to kill me, and I was going to let you do it. I was willing to die, Valkyrie, because I thought it would get Alice back and also, kinda, because it was my fault she was taken. Valkyrie, please. You don’t owe me anything, but you sort of owe me this. Let me help.”

  “Omen …”

  She stopped. Cadaverous Gant stepped from the shadows at the side of the house. He waved to her, smiling, then turned and walked away.

  “Stay down,” she said, and eased off the brake.

  She started to circle the hotel, giving it a wide berth.

  At the rear of the building was a garage. Cadaverous stood in front of the roller door, waving to her. His smile was a rictus grin. The door started to open.

  “Seatbelt,” Valkyrie snarled, gunning the engine and spinning the wheel, the car fishtailing slightly, and now she was looking at the old man straight down the bonnet. The roller door behind him had risen to waist-height.

  “Brace yourself!” she shouted, and stomped on the accelerator.

  Cadaverous ducked under the door and Valkyrie followed right after, her eyes tightly shut as the car hit the door and crashed through, the windscreen cracking, the airbag exploding, knocking her back in her seat as she braked.

  Her foot still on the brake, she reached out, put the car in neutral. She sat there for a moment, her eyes still closed, the engine’s low growl the only sound.

  When she was like this, the windscreen could have cracked because either the roller door had hit it, or because Cadaverous had. When she was like this, the old man could either have been injured and alive in front of the car, or dead beneath her wheels. Anything was possible, so long as she stayed like this. Like the cat in Schrödinger’s box, the old man was both alive and dead. Until she opened her eyes, she was both a good person and a killer.

  Alice. She had to find Alice. Alice was the only thing that mattered.

  Omen groaned behind her.

  She pushed the deflating airbag to one side, squinting against the harsh garage light as she kicked the door open. She was halfway out when her eyes adjusted.
r />   The light wasn’t coming from a bulb. It was coming from a blazing sun. It wasn’t a garage floor she had stepped out on to. It was hard-packed dirt.

  She stood, and looked back the way she’d come. The garage door was still open, and through it she could see the trees and the small road and the dark sky, could still make out the tracks her car had made in the mud – but the door was cut into a vast wall of rock. It was a cliff face, wide enough to vanish into distant horizons on either side, tall enough to reach the sky.

  She stepped back, craning her neck. It did reach the sky, and then it folded back, became the sky. The sky, rather than an infinite expanse, was a ceiling as high as a cathedral’s, with drifting clouds and its own sun – brilliant but not blinding – directly overhead.

  And on the surface of the sun: clock hands, counting down to midnight.

  The sheer impossibility of Valkyrie’s surroundings – an environment much too big for its walls to contain – made her dizzy and she almost stumbled, had to lean against the car for support. A hot breeze stirred.

  She was on a dirt road on a hill. The dirt road led down, becoming a real road a few miles further on. The road swerved through a forest of dark trees and then narrowed, became the main street of a small town on the edge of water. The water was black, the reflection of the sun on its waves sending splinters of a migraine deep into Valkyrie’s brain.

  Beyond the town was a bridge to a small island. It was too far for her to make anything out, but she knew that was where her sister was.

  Her eyes widened and she jumped away from the car. The bonnet, though scraped, was clear of any dead man’s body. She dropped to her belly. The underneath was clear also. No corpse. No Cadaverous.

  She got up again, slowly, brushing the dust off automatically.

  A phone rang. A payphone, right there on the side of the dirt road. She looked at it while it rang. Let it ring a good long time. Then she walked over. Slowly. She reached out to pick it up, and it stopped.

  “Real mature,” she murmured.

  She kept her eyes on it. A minute went by. She turned to go back to the car and it rang again.

  She answered.

  “Welcome,” Cadaverous said, “to my humble abode.”

  53

  “I’m here,” Valkyrie said. “I made it. Give me my sister.”

  “Ah-ah, you haven’t made it quite yet,” Cadaverous responded. “Just a little bit further, that’s all. The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But you have promises to keep—”

  “And miles to go before I sleep,” Valkyrie finished. “Yeah, I know a few poems, too. Wanna hear one? There once was a man from Nantucket—”

  Cadaverous cut her off with a laugh. “You are proving to be every bit the adversary I had been hoping for, Valkyrie. This wouldn’t be nearly as satisfying if you weren’t up to the task.”

  “I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself. I’ll be interested to see if you’re still having a good time when I drag you out of here.”

  “Now, now, we both know that’s not going to happen. This is my home, Valkyrie. Granted, it’s a little different from my last one, but I needed a change. Do you like it? I knocked down a few walls to make more room.”

  “I can see that.”

  “I spent a long time on this place, Valkyrie. Five years, in fact. I poured my heart and soul into it. I constructed every pebble, every speck of dust. That breeze you’re feeling? That took two weeks to get just right.”

  “Once again, you prove yourself the master of hot air.”

  “Master of my domain, Valkyrie. Remember that. In here, I am God.”

  “So why don’t you strike me down? Huh? I’m standing right here. Come get me.”

  Cadaverous chuckled. “No, no, no, Valkyrie. That’s not how this is going to work at all. Your journey isn’t over yet, and time is still counting down.”

  “Bull,” Valkyrie snarled. “You said get to your house by midnight. I’m here with an hour and a half to spare.”

  “But that’s not the house I meant,” Cadaverous said. “The house I meant is at the end of this road. You’d better hurry. Your sister is waiting.”

  He hung up.

  Valkyrie slammed the phone back on to its cradle. Picked it up and slammed it back down again. A shout of frustration welled up inside and escaped, and she kicked at one of those pebbles that Cadaverous had designed and watched it skip across the road, raising little puffs of Cadaverous-designed dust as it went.

  “Valkyrie?” Omen said from the car.

  “Stay there!” she snapped, and stormed back to the car, pulling the deflated airbag from the steering wheel. She got in and slammed the door, put the car into gear. She glared into the rear-view mirror, hoping Cadaverous was watching, and gave him the finger.

  The car shot forward.

  54

  The Bentley pulled up outside the Midnight Hotel and they got out.

  Skulduggery stopped at the front door and drew his gun. “OK,” he said. “When we go in—”

  “Enough talk,” Abyssinia said, marching past him and into the hotel.

  Skulduggery muttered something and followed, and Temper came last.

  They were suddenly in the mountains somewhere, and it was daytime. The air was crisp, the sky blue, the trees tall. Temper looked back. The doorway was the mouth of a cave. Through it, he could see the dark sky and the Bentley.

  “This is like the TARDIS,” he said.

  “I don’t know what that is,” Abyssinia responded, still looking around. “We’re in the Carpathian Mountains.”

  “You recognise this?” Skulduggery asked.

  “I recognise it from the trips I took into Cadaverous’s head. This is where he spent the first eight years of his life before moving to America. He’s replicated it exactly. Even the …” She trailed off.

  “Abyssinia?”

  “My son is here,” she said, and started walking, away from the path and into the woods.

  Temper started after her, then turned to Skulduggery. “You coming?”

  “The sun,” Skulduggery said, looking up. “There’s a clock in the sun.”

  55

  The road was wide and smooth and there were signs everywhere, all with Alice’s name on them, all pointing straight ahead.

  “How fast are we going?” Omen asked from the back seat.

  “Shut up,” said Valkyrie.

  “OK.”

  Her foot eased up on the accelerator, though. Just a little. She’d be no good to her little sister if she crashed before she got to her.

  She passed a sign different from the others – small, sticking out of the ground by the side of the road. It had Help scrawled on it.

  There was a similar sign ahead, beside a bigger one that had Alice’s name in lights. Again, it said Help.

  The road turned slightly, then straightened out again. More big signs, goading Valkyrie on. But more small signs, too, this time with arrows, all pointing left. A minute later, Valkyrie came to a left turn.

  She slowed. The big signs told her to go straight on, told her that Alice was waiting ahead. But the small signs, the ones written by hand, told her to go left, down a narrower road.

  “Is everything all right?” Omen asked, and Valkyrie ignored him.

  She turned left.

  They drove for five minutes, until a city rose up in the windscreen. Cars passed and people walked. Valkyrie pulled into the kerb and waited. Her fingers tapped the wheel, gently but quickly.

  “Can I sit up?” Omen asked.

  “No.”

  “It’s not very comfortable like this.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Are we there yet?”

  “I don’t know where we are, or who these people are.”

  A car turned towards her. She resisted the urge to duck down. It slowed as it approached. It was an old car. Boxy. It belonged in the eighties. It passed and she got a look at the driver.

  “Cadaverous,” she said.

  “Wh
ere?” Omen asked.

  “He just passed.” She put the car in gear, prepared to make a U-turn, maybe smash into the back of him, drag him out and kick his head in, but right before she stomped on the accelerator she glimpsed a man in an overcoat out for a walk.

  Cadaverous. Again.

  Valkyrie turned in her seat, watched the boxy car drive away, then looked back at the other Cadaverous.

  “What’s wrong?” Omen asked. “Valkyrie?”

  “There are two of them,” she muttered, then turned off the engine and got out.

  “Give me my sister,” she said, striding up to Cadaverous.

  He blinked at her. “I’m sorry?”

  She slapped him, the heel of her hand slamming into the hinge of his jaw. Cadaverous fell backwards, unconscious before he hit the pavement. Valkyrie frowned. She hadn’t expected it to be so easy.

  “Hey!” someone yelled from across the street. A woman, in a flowing skirt and heels, ran over. “Get away from him! I saw what you did! That’s assault!”

  The woman got closer and Valkyrie jumped back. It was Cadaverous, in lipstick and eyeshadow, with long hair, wagging his long, bony finger at her.

  “I’ll call the police! I saw everything!”

  Valkyrie stared at him. “What are you doing?”

  Cadaverous knelt down beside the other Cadaverous. “This poor man! What did you do to him?”

  Three people hurried closer – a businessman and a couple in jeans and jackets. All three of them were Cadaverous Gant.

  “She attacked him!” the Cadaverous in the dress said. “An unprovoked attack!”

  Valkyrie backed off.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” said the Cadaverous dressed as the businessman.

  “I’m calling the cops,” said one of the Cadaverouses wearing jeans. “Where’s the nearest payphone?”

  Valkyrie ran.

  She ducked into an alley, sprinted its length, splashing through a puddle and nearly falling over an old-fashioned dustbin, the galvanised steel kind she’d only seen in movies. A trash can, really. Crossing the next street she came to, she hurried down another alley. She got halfway through when she stopped. There was a puddle ahead of her. Beyond that, an old-fashioned, galvanised trash can. The kind she’d only seen in movies.