The Faceless Ones

  “You’re in on it!” he screeched. “You’re all in on it!”

  He made it up and stood over her, the rock ready to smash down, but something hit him and he was flung off his feet.

  China sat up, dazed, and Valkyrie ran up to her.

  “Give me the Scepter!” the girl shouted. There was a Faceless One right behind her and it was running.

  China threw the Scepter and Valkyrie caught it and turned. The Faceless One stopped running and studied her with its blank face. It raised its hand to her slowly.

  China could see the panic on Valkyrie’s face, like she expected her body to explode or implode or, at the very least, twist. Then she raised the Scepter and fired.

  The crystal glowed and the black lightning crackled and shot out, hitting the Faceless One in the chest. It staggered, and even though it had no mouth, it shrieked, an inhuman scream of pain and rage. The black lightning curled around its body, and Valkyrie hit it again. The skin dried and cracked.

  China saw the god try to abandon its vessel, but it was too late, and the body erupted into a cloud of dust. China got to her feet as the wind took the dust away.

  Valkyrie realized she was still holding the Scepter straight out, and she tried to lower her arms, but they didn’t seem to want to go down.

  Skulduggery ran over. “What happened? Are you all right? What was that scream?”

  “That was the sound of a god dying,” China said.

  “Paddy!” Valkyrie blurted. “Paddy is Batu!”

  China didn’t know who this Paddy was, but Skulduggery tilted his head, and his fist clenched.

  “That’s how he got close enough to kill the Teleporters,” he said. “I doubt he even came to Peregrine’s mind when we asked him who he’d been talking to.”

  China could see that Valkyrie was barely listening. She pointed at the spot where the Faceless One had been standing.

  “It just looked at me,” she said. “It could have turned me inside out, but it didn’t. Why didn’t it?”

  “It must have recognized you,” China said. “It must have recognized the Ancient blood in your veins, marking you out as something different.”

  China wiped the blood from her forehead and glanced around for Crux, but he was gone. Her jaw clenched in anger, but she said nothing.

  “Now we can stop them,” Valkyrie said. “We have the Scepter—we can stop them. All I have to do is point and shoot.”

  “That’s right,” Skulduggery said.

  “Okay then, so where’s the next one?”

  China heard something in the trees behind her and turned.

  Forty-one

  THE MOMENT

  THE HAIR ON the back of Batu’s neck stood up. The Faceless One was above him. He could feel it. His god was gazing upon him at that very moment.

  Batu turned, spread his arms, and raised his eyes to his god, and as it rushed to fill him, he screamed with terror and exultation.

  And then Batu was gone.

  Forty-two

  BLACK LIGHTNING

  THERE WAS A sound like a stampede behind them, and the Faceless One that had taken over the body of Murder Rose crashed through the trees. It batted China away and slammed into Skulduggery. Valkyrie fell back and dropped the Scepter. The Faceless One reached for her just as an arm encircled her waist.

  Fletcher Renn said, “Hold on,” in her ear, and then they teleported.

  A blink.

  Then they were on the far side of the farmhouse, beside the burning van. Fletcher let go and she whirled.

  “You came back! ”

  “Naturally.”

  “Skulduggery!” she exclaimed. “We can’t leave them!”

  “Wasn’t planning on it.” He moved against her, and she hung on to him.

  In an instant, they were back in the field. China was still down, and the Faceless One saw them, picked up Skulduggery, and hurled him at them. Valkyrie dived and Skulduggery slammed into Fletcher.

  The Faceless One strode to her.

  She saw the Scepter and opened her hand, felt the air, and used it to tug at the weapon. It rolled slightly. The Faceless One was almost upon her.

  She held out both hands, clutching at the air and dragging it back, and the Scepter flew at her. She jumped to her feet, but the Faceless One snatched the Scepter from her grasp.

  Valkyrie tried to take it back, but the Faceless One shook her hand off with such force that she was sent sprawling. It took the Scepter in a two-handed grip, and she saw the anger in its stance, and the violence, like it was remembering what this weapon was, and what it could do, and what it had done, an eternity before. The golden rod began to crumple, began to break, and she saw the black crystal, glowing fiercely beneath the fingers that were tightening around it. It shattered, and lightning spilled out, and then the Faceless One was crumbling to dust.

  The Scepter fell, mangled and beyond use, and the fragments of crystal, which were dull and robbed of power, fell with it.

  Valkyrie got up, hurrying over to Skulduggery and Fletcher. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” Skulduggery said gruffly, but she ran by him and helped Fletcher to his feet.

  “I’m okay,” Fletcher groaned. “One more to go, huh? Not doing too badly.”

  “Actually,” she said, “we kind of are. The Scepter’s been destroyed.” She looked around at Skulduggery. “What do we do?”

  Skulduggery straightened his tie and buttoned his torn jacket. “The first thing we do,” he said, “is get over the fact that my well-being is obviously of less importance to you than Fletcher’s here.”

  “I’m already over that,” she told him. “Oh, good.”

  “What’s the second thing?”

  “The second thing is for Fletcher to reopen that gateway. Do you think you can do that?”

  Fletcher nodded. “Yes. I mean, I think so. I hope so.”

  Skulduggery stooped to help up China. “That fills me with such confidence.”

  “What’s to stop more Faceless Ones from coming through once it’s open?” Valkyrie asked as they all hurried back to the meadow.

  “Absolutely nothing,” Skulduggery said. “What we’re going to do is make a really big wish that they don’t notice.”

  “Seriously? Skulduggery, seriously?”

  “Seriously. The fact is, we stand a decent chance. The Faceless Ones that did get through were drawn here because of the markings the Diablerie wore. Now that there are no markings left, there is nothing to make them look over.”

  “That’s a plan that could fall apart in so many ways.” Had he forgotten Batu?

  “The fun ones are like that.”

  “But how do we get the last Faceless One to go back through?”

  “We’re going to let it chase us.”

  “Us?”

  “Well, I say us. I mean you.”

  “Terrific,” Valkyrie muttered.

  Forty-three

  THE GATEWAY

  SKULDUGGERY PLEASANT and Valkyrie Cain found the Faceless One that had once been Batu on the other side of the wood. Ghastly was suspended in the air before it, his back arched, his mouth open, trying to scream. Veins were popping out all over his body, as if the Faceless One was bringing each one to the surface with the intention of ripping them all out.

  “Hey!” Valkyrie shouted.

  It looked over at them, didn’t move for three or four seconds, then cast Ghastly aside and started to run toward them.

  “Okay,” Skulduggery said, “the moment it—” The Faceless One waved its arm, and Skulduggery was wrenched off his feet and sent flying through the air.

  Valkyrie cursed and spun, sprinting into the trees. The idea had been for Skulduggery to distract it if it got too close too fast, but now there was no one between them. This was already going badly.

  She darted between trees and jumped over fallen branches. She glanced back, saw trees uprooting and branches disintegrating, clearing a path for the Faceless One to run straight through.
r />   She saw it wave its arm, and she was thrown forward. She hit the ground and got a mouthful of dirt as she rolled.

  Something white blurred in her peripheral vision, and the White Cleaver jumped to intercept. He raked his scythe across the Faceless One’s torso, then spun to go for the neck. Any other enemy would have fallen, such was the speed and precision of the move, but the blade didn’t even penetrate the skin. The Faceless One slammed its fist against the Cleaver’s chest, and he hurtled back, quickly disappearing from view.

  The Faceless One strode toward Valkyrie. She spat out dirt and wiped her mouth, watching it come. She timed its steps and then splayed her hands. The air rippled, striking not the Faceless One but the loose ground just in front of it. Its foot touched down and its weight shifted onto it just as the ground shot backward, and the Faceless One fell.

  Valkyrie burst from the tree line, and to her left she saw Skulduggery running parallel. They raced to the top of the meadow, to where Fletcher was once again kneeling with his hands on the Grotesquery. The yellow gateway was opening.

  China was doing her thing with the symbols around the circle. Red and black smoke began to rise. “Where is it?” she shouted.

  “Behind me,” Valkyrie said breathlessly. A shadow fell and Skulduggery dived into her as the Faceless One landed where she had just been.

  She saw Solomon Wreath, riding a wave of darkness that spilled from his cane. He jumped to the ground beside them and pulled her up, and used the cane to drive a hundred needles of dark into the Faceless One’s chest.

  “Drive it back!” China shouted from the swirling column of smoke. “Get it close enough to the gateway so it’ll be sucked in! ”

  The gravitational pull from the yellow portal was immense. Even from where she stood, Valkyrie could feel herself slipping toward it. She forced herself back as Skulduggery joined Wreath in his efforts.

  She pushed at the air to dislodge the ground beneath the Faceless One’s feet, but she wasn’t rewarded. Its movements were solid as it battled, and its steps were impossible to predict.

  “Gateway’s as open as it’s going to get!” Fletcher shouted.

  Wreath suddenly started screaming. His right leg buckled and twisted and blood spurted, and Skulduggery snapped his hand against the air, throwing the Necromancer out of the fight before he was killed. Wreath landed and clutched at his leg, but now Skulduggery was the only one left.

  The Faceless One grabbed him, its fingers sliding between his ribs and gripping, and Skulduggery screamed as he was lifted off the ground.

  “Valkyrie!” Wreath shouted from behind. She turned, and he threw his cane at her feet. “Use it! ”

  “I don’t know how!”

  “Just use the damn thing!”

  She grabbed it, felt the dark power contained within. Shadows leaked from the cane and wrapped around her wrist. She knew instinctively that if Wreath hadn’t given it voluntarily, those shadows would tighten and turn her bones to dust.

  She turned the cane in her hand, feeling the drag, as though it was moving through water, and then she whipped it straight out, and a shadow sliced against the back of the Faceless One’s leg. The shadow didn’t break its skin, but it did get its attention. The Faceless One turned to her.

  Valkyrie rotated the cane by her side, like she was gathering cotton candy around a stick, then flicked it at the Faceless One. Instead of cotton candy, shadows flew, hit the Faceless One, and tried to wrap around it. It threw Skulduggery down and brushed the shadows away with one angry gesture.

  She ran up to it, swinging the cane. The Faceless One caught it and snapped it. An explosion of darkness hurled Valkyrie backward and sent the Faceless One staggering.

  Valkyrie thudded into Ghastly’s arms, and he grunted and let her down. She saw the Faceless One, standing just outside the gateway, struggling to escape its gravitational pull.

  It was almost in. It was almost through.

  “Hit it!” she shouted. “Somebody hit it!”

  Ghastly stepped forward and China left the column of smoke, but tentacles burst from the Faceless One’s chest, slammed into them, and tossed them back. The tentacles, made of entrails and organs, wrapped around trees and burrowed through the ground in a last-ditch effort, an effort that was destroying its host body to save the god within.

  Then Skulduggery stood, looked at the Faceless One, and stepped forward, sinking into the stance. He snapped his hands against the air, and the air rippled. The Faceless One hurtled back, disappearing into the portal, its flailing tentacles yanked in after it, taking branches and clumps of earth along with it. Immediately, Skulduggery whirled.

  “The Grotesquery!” he shouted. “Now!”

  Within the column of smoke, Fletcher slid his hands underneath the Grotesquery’s torso and heaved, and the torso rolled out of the circle. Skulduggery gestured, and the air caught the torso and brought it into his hands. He grunted and stepped back and launched it into the gateway.

  Now that the link was gone, the gateway started to rapidly close.

  And then a tentacle slid out and wrapped around Skulduggery’s ankle.

  It tugged and he fell. He clutched at the ground as he was dragged quickly back.

  “Skulduggery!” Valkyrie screamed, sprinting toward him.

  He looked up and reached out to her, but it was too late. He disappeared through the gateway.

  “Keep it open!” Valkyrie screamed to Fletcher.

  “I can’t! ”

  She was three steps away when the portal collapsed.

  “Open it!” she yelled.

  But Fletcher was standing, and through the swirling smoke she could see his stunned face. He shook his head.

  “No! Fletcher, no! You’ve got to open it!”

  “I don’t have the Grotesquery,” he said. “I can’t.”

  China was standing, and Valkyrie ran to her, grabbed her. “Do something!”

  China didn’t even look at her. Her blue eyes, so pretty, so pale, were on the empty space where she’d last seen Skulduggery. Valkyrie shoved her away, turned to Ghastly.

  “Come on!” she roared.

  “He’s gone,” Ghastly said, his voice dull.

  “He can’t be!”

  Valkyrie turned, turned again, looking for someone who knew what to do, someone who’d have a plan. She saw no one. No one knew what to do.

  And then she was on her knees. There were tears running down her face, and it was like a part of her had been cut out, somewhere in her belly, and her thoughts were frozen in her mind.

  It was quiet. The smoke had stopped swirling, and it drifted away in the afternoon breeze. It was still, and it was peaceful, and around them were the dead bodies of friends and colleagues and enemies, and the air stank of ozone and magic.

  Forty-four

  THE TASK

  PARIS HAD BEEN nice, apparently. Her parents had come home, and her dad had hugged her reflection and then gone to read the newspaper. Her mother had told the reflection all about their weekend as she unpacked. Long walks and fine food and romantic evenings. She’d asked how the reflection had got on staying with Beryl and Fergus, and the reflection had lied with accustomed ease and said it had been fine.

  Valkyrie absorbed these memories and didn’t bother examining them. In the weeks since her parents had got back, she hadn’t even spoken to them—not personally. She was afraid they’d see her and instantly know something terrible had happened. She couldn’t deal with that right now. She doubted she’d have even been able to come up with a lie.

  Now she stood in the graveyard and waited. It was raining again. It was always raining. She was getting sick of the rain.

  She didn’t hear him approach, but she knew he was behind her.

  “Thank you for coming,” Solomon Wreath said. “Have you spoken with Guild?”

  Valkyrie turned.

  “He called me into the Sanctuary last week. He said that I’m no longer a fugitive.”

  “That must be nice.”
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  “Did you know that he’s telling everyone that the victory is all down to him and Mr. Bliss? I’m sorry Bliss is dead and all, but he’s saying Skulduggery did nothing.”

  “I had heard that, but the people who matter know the truth.”

  “Everyone should know the truth,” she muttered.

  “How is your friend? The one who was hurt?”

  “She’s healing. Nothing can keep Tanith down.” Valkyrie looked at the headstones around her, then back at him. “Sorry I broke your cane.”

  Wreath shrugged. “When the power was released, it flowed back into me, where it bubbled and boiled until I channeled it into something new.” He showed her a cane, identical to the last one.

  “How original of you.”

  He smiled. “I was very impressed with how you handled it, by the way. You seem to have an instinctive grasp of Necromancy.”

  “Just blind luck, to be honest.”

  “Nonsense. It made me wonder, actually, if Elemental magic was the road you should be taking.”

  “You’re saying I should be a Necromancer?”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m an Elemental.”

  “You’re young. You can change your mind a hundred times before you settle on the discipline that’s right for you. Is Necromancy as elegant as Elemental magic? Perhaps not. Are Necromancers held in as high regard as Elementals? Definitely not. But as a student, you would have instant power at your fingertips, and I think you’re going to need as much power as you can get.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “Well, you want to get Skulduggery Pleasant back, don’t you?”

  Valkyrie’s eyes narrowed. “Skulduggery’s gone.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “The gateway is closed.”

  “Actually, I don’t think it is.”

  She shook her head. “If you’ve got something to say, just say it. I’m tired, and I want to go home.”

  “What made it possible for Fletcher Renn to open the gate?”

  “The Grotesquery was an Isthmus Anchor, and there’s a …” She sighed. “There’s this invisible, magical, wonderful thread that runs from an Isthmus Anchor to whatever it links to, which keeps the gate from closing for good. Fletcher used the Grotesquery to force the gateway open.”