The Dying of the Light (25 page)

Skulduggery continued giving CPR to Valkyrie’s dead body. Fletcher disappeared, arriving back a few seconds later with Synecdoche. The doctor went immediately to Valkyrie’s side.

“We need a Sunburst,” she said, checking for vital signs.

“We tried,” China told her. “It didn’t work.”

Synecdoche looked up, the colour draining from her face. She stopped checking for vital signs.

Stephanie felt sick.

“Finbar,” Vex said, “can you detect Darquesse’s presence?”

“She hasn’t come back,” Finbar said numbly.

“How long can she survive in her current state? Finbar? Finbar, I need you to focus.”

Finbar looked at him. “But Valkyrie …”

“We can mourn for Valkyrie later,” Vex said. “We need to make sure Darquesse won’t return.”

“Right,” said Finbar. “Yeah. Darquesse is … she’s what people call an untethered entity right now. She won’t survive long outside the … outside Val’s … um, outside the body.”

“Could she take over any
other
body?”

Finbar frowned. “Maybe a Sensitive, if they were willing or, I don’t know, taken by surprise. But if she did, she’d burn out that body within hours.”

“No ordinary sorcerer could withstand Darquesse’s level of power,” Synecdoche said. She stood up, reluctantly leaving Skulduggery on his knees alone. “Valkyrie is … was … a descendant of the Ancients – that made her special.”

“My family,” Stephanie said, her eyes widening. “They share the same bloodline. Darquesse will be going after them!”

China looked at her. “Your family is safe. I have my best Cleavers protecting them, each one armed with a new and improved Soul Catcher. If Darquesse even goes near them, she’ll be trapped. We’re not going to let her gain even the tiniest of footholds. Valkyrie will not have died in vain.”

“She’s not dead yet,” Skulduggery snarled without raising his head from the CPR, but of course she was. They all knew it.

The fact remained that Stephanie had
warned
them not to trust the miracle of Valkyrie’s communications, and they hadn’t listened. Maybe if they had, they’d have been able to plan a little better, maybe prepare a little more, and maybe Valkyrie would still be alive, Stephanie would not be crying these hot tears, these awful tears, maybe they would not have had to rely on some magical defibrillator, on the Sunburst thing that Gracious O’Callahan was still fiddling with, to bring her back to life.

Gracious closed the back of the Sunburst, screwed it shut with his penknife, and tossed it over to Skulduggery. “Try it now.”

Skulduggery pressed it into Valkyrie’s chest. It lit up. The symbols flashed red.

The Sunburst beeped.

And Valkyrie sucked in a deep breath and opened her eyes.

our days after Gant and Jeremiah Wallow had visited Danny’s store, Etta Faulkner comes in to convince him to protest against the plans for the proposed Starbucks. He listens and nods and murmurs where appropriate, but makes sure not to commit to anything. He knows how easy it is to get sucked into someone else’s struggle, and he’s determined to sit this one out. When she has exhausted herself of her righteous fury, Etta collects a few essentials into a basket and brings them up to the till to pay.

“Terrible thing, what happened in Giant’s Pass,” she says as Danny rings up her purchases.

Giant’s Pass is a small town about six hours north. It’s just like all those other towns that are just like Meek Ridge, except it’s even further from civilisation. Danny has never been there. “What happened?” he asks as he packs Etta’s things into a bag.

“You didn’t hear?” Etta says, her eyes glittering. “Killings. Murders. Whole family is what I heard.”

“Seriously?”

“Found this morning, they were. Parents and children, though the children were in their twenties, or close enough to them. It’s all over the news.”

“That’s awful,” says Danny. “They catch whoever did it?”

Etta shakes her head. “He’s on the loose, that’s what the reporters told me.”

“You talked to reporters?”

“Uh-huh. Down the street, not ten minutes ago. Asking me my opinion on it. I said it was shocking, that something like this could happen in such a quiet town like Giant’s Pass, where everyone knows everyone else. They liked that, I think. They’ll probably use it in their report. They said they’ll send a camera crew to talk to me. I might be on the news. They said it was something to do with anti-Irish racism or something.”

Danny closes the bag over, and freezes. “Anti-Irish?”

“First I’ve heard about something like that, but they seemed pretty sure.”

“Why would it be anti-Irish?”

“The family that was killed were the Fitzgeralds or the Fitzgibbons or something. They seemed really sure that the family was targeted because of their nationality. Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, but I guess I’m not in full possession of the facts.”

“What were they like, the reporters?”

“Don’t know which paper they’re from,” says Etta, “but one was tall, about my age, and the other was shorter, with a beard and long hair. Fat.”

In that instant, Danny knows what has happened. Gant and Jeremiah aren’t Feds or US Marshals or paparazzi, they are killers. They went to Giant’s Pass, asked around for anyone Irish. They found the Fitzgeralds or the Fitzgibbons or whoever they were, paid them a visit, expecting to find Stephanie. When they realised their mistake, they had to silence the witnesses, or maybe they were so annoyed at getting it wrong that they killed the whole family out of spite. Either way a family is dead, and suddenly the pressure is on to find their actual target before the police find them.

Danny hurries to the backroom, grabs his coat and pulls it on as he rejoins Etta in the store. “Did they ask if there were any Irish people in Meek Ridge?”

“Yes,” she says, sounding a little surprised that Danny has guessed correctly. “I said half of the families here could probably be traced back to Ireland, but there are no
Irish
Irish, apart from that Edgley girl.”

“You told them where she lives?”

“Yes. Told them how vulnerable she was, living up there all on her own.”

Danny’s car keys are in his hand and he’s running out the door before Etta can ask what’s wrong. He slips in the snow, but manages to reach his car without falling. The engine starts first try.

He drives to Stephanie’s place. The gate is open. He parks, carries on on foot. He feels stupid, moving like a soldier under fire, flitting from tree to tree like he’s being watched, but at the same time he feels this is an entirely fitting response to the situation.

The Cadillac is parked in the driveway beside Stephanie’s pickup truck. With the angle, with the cold glare of the sun and all that packed snow on the rear window, it is impossible to see if there’s anyone in it. Danny stays crouched down for another minute. No movement, no sound. The house is quiet, too.

He creeps forward, leaving deep footprints. If he suddenly has to run, there’ll be nowhere he can go where they couldn’t easily find him. He ignores the voice in his head telling him this is a bad idea. Of course it’s a bad idea. He doesn’t need a little voice to tell him that.

One more step and he’s close enough to peer through the rear window. It’s dark in the Cadillac, much darker than it has any right to be. He can’t see anyone in the gloom, but he can’t be sure, so he creeps up along the side, careful not to touch the car itself. It isn’t that he’s afraid an alarm might sound, alerting Gant and Jeremiah to his presence. It’s just that he doesn’t want to touch the car. He has the absurd notion that touching it will make him sick.

The back seat is empty. Lots of space in there. The front is empty, too. Tidy. Neat. No coffee cups or scrunched-up gas receipts. It is showroom clean. That Mr Gant sure knows how to take care of his automobile.

For the first time, Danny becomes aware of the footprints in the snow leading from the Cadillac to the house. Gant’s footprints are narrow and long and, judging by the depth, he’s a deceptively light man. Danny follows them up round the hood, where they’re joined by Jeremiah’s heavy footprints clumping alongside, drag marks between each one. Both sets of footprints lead up to the porch, and on the porch there’s freshly-shod snow all the way up to the front door.

He should kick the car. That’s what he should do. Kick the car, set off the alarm, get Gant and Jeremiah running out here, away from Stephanie. By the time they got outside, Danny would already be backing away. They might be able to track him easily, but they wouldn’t be able to catch him. One is fat and one is old. He’d get away. He’d probably get away. Unless Jeremiah has a gun, and he’s a good shot.

Kicking the car is Plan B, Danny decides.

He moves up to the side of the house. Peers through the kitchen window. He sees Gant pouring some orange juice into a glass. He drinks. It’s a tall glass and he drinks the whole thing. His Adam’s apple bobs up and down unpleasantly.

Jeremiah comes into the kitchen, says something to Gant that Danny can’t hear. They haven’t found Stephanie, though, and that’s all that matters. Gant folds his arms, taps a long finger against his chin, and before Danny can duck down, Gant’s head swivels and they lock eyes.

Coldness sweeps through Danny’s veins and freezes his heart.

Then Jeremiah goes one way and Gant goes the other and Danny falls away from the window, starts scrambling. He’s been afraid before in his life, but not like this. Never like this. This is real fear, and real fear jolts so much energy through his system that for a moment he forgets to stand, and he just crawls on his hands and knees through the snow. He’s breathing fast. Too fast. Hyperventilating. It occurs to him that running would be better than crawling and he rises like a sprinter from the blocks but awkwardly, his legs shaky. The jolt of energy passes and now he’s tired, he’s sluggish, doesn’t know what the hell is happening because all he wants to do is sit down and curl up, but of course he can’t, he has to get back to his car, he has to get away.

Jeremiah Wallow walks round the corner of the house.

“It’s Danny!” Jeremiah says. He holds a tyre iron in his hand. “Look, Mr Gant, it’s Danny!”

Danny backs away, turns and stumbles, sees Gant walking round the far corner. Danny slips on ice and falls, gets up, throws himself into a run. He ploughs deep furrows into the snow covering the garden. Already his legs are tired, but he can’t rest. He has to make it to the trees. He’s faster than they are. They can’t catch him. He glances back at Jeremiah, sees him plodding in slow pursuit, then glances over at Gant and Gant runs across the snow, barely making a dent, running like an athlete fifty years his junior, and he slams into Danny and Danny goes spinning through the air, goes rolling through the snow towards Jeremiah.

The tyre iron crashes into his shoulder and Danny cries out, twisting on to his back, and Jeremiah swings again and it hits Danny’s leg and this time Danny screams.

“Jeremiah, Jeremiah,” says Gant, like he was scolding him. Jeremiah straightens up, his face a little red from the exertion. Gant stands over Danny and smiles kindly. “Hello, Danny. I’m quite impressed with you, I am forced to admit. You had us fooled. Did he not have us fooled, Jeremiah?”

Jeremiah nods. “Had me fooled.”

“Hear that, Danny my boy? You had Jeremiah fooled, and Jeremiah is no fool, are you, Jeremiah?”

“No flies on me,” says Jeremiah.

Gant laughs. “Yes! Exactly! No flies on you, Jeremiah! And yet, you had us fooled, Danny my boy. That first day, we followed you right past this place, did we not? You must have seen us and, being the good guy that you are, the straight shooter, you didn’t want to lead us straight to the home of our quarry, so instead you led us to the house of some old-timer we wouldn’t be bothered with. That was some quick thinking, Danny. That was thinking on your feet. Aren’t you impressed, Jeremiah?”

“I’m impressed,” says Jeremiah.

“But only grudgingly,” Gant says with a chuckle. When the chuckle dies, Gant says, “Yet actions have consequences. They have repercussions. It is a sad fact of life. Jeremiah, I want you to take Danny into the house and tie him up. Then I want you to take the car to the old-timer’s place, and I want you to beat him to death with the iron bar in your hands.”

“No,” says Danny, still hissing in pain. “He didn’t have anything to do with it!”

“Sometimes the repercussions of our actions are not felt by us directly. Sometimes they’re inflicted upon the innocent and the ignorant. Bystanders, if you will.”

Danny tries to fight, tries to struggle, but Jeremiah Wallow is surprisingly strong for someone so flabby. He handcuffs Danny, and drags him into the house. When Danny tries to shove him back, he kicks Danny’s injured leg and Danny screams and falls back on to Stephanie’s sofa. Jeremiah gets two pieces of rope. One piece he ties round Danny’s neck, wraps the other end round a door handle behind him. That one keeps him upright. The other piece he ties round Danny’s ankles, then loops it round the chain of the handcuffs. That one keeps him sitting. Then he goes away to beat Eddie Sullivan to death, and leaves Danny in here with Gant.