The Dying of the Light (55 page)

Skulduggery looked back at the Validator. “How is this part of the test? What does this prove? People I’ve known have died? I’ve lived for over four hundred years. A lot of people die in four hundred years.”

“These are your dead,” said the Validator.

“Did you bring them here? What gives you the right to hold them in this place?”

“We’re not just here,” said Ghastly, “we’re everywhere. At all times. We’re with you when you are a boy. We’re with you on your wedding day. The day you die. The day you die again. We see you laughing, and screaming. We see you whole and we see you broken. We see you when the worlds collide and when the darkness falls. We see you surrounded by blood, and fire, and rotting flesh.”

“You see my future,” Skulduggery said, “so you know I have one. I don’t go with you today, Ghastly. But if you want to help me, if you really want to help me, you can tell me how to beat Darquesse.”

“She can’t be beaten,” said Shudder.

“I don’t believe that.”

“It does not matter what you believe,” his wife said.

Her hand closed round his arm, and Ghastly seized his hand. Skulduggery tried pulling back, but now Shudder was gripping him, and someone else, and then another, and they were pulling him towards the hole, and they were losing their faces, their forms merging into one blurred mass that was sinking beneath the surface. Skulduggery cursed and twisted, but could do little as more hands emerged to grab hold. One pulled at his ankle and he went down, and they dragged him, kept dragging him, and he lost his hat and now it was just him, clinging on while dozens of hands reached for him, gripped him, and all of a sudden he slid under and the hole closed up.

Skulduggery was gone.

Fletcher stared. “What … what does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” said Wreath. He sounded genuinely stunned.

“Is he OK?” Fletcher asked. “Where is he?”

Wreath shook his head. “I’m not entirely sure what just happened.”

Fletcher watched the Validator step forward, looking down at Skulduggery’s hat. He reached down to pick it up but froze.

The hole opened and Skulduggery lunged upwards, his jacket torn, his tie wrenched to one side. An unholy chorus of anguished cries followed him, and all at once there were a hundred hands reaching up from the darkness. Skulduggery rolled, got to his feet so he was standing beside the Validator.

“So this test is about facing your personal demons or something?” he asked. “Well, how about you face them instead?”

And he pushed the Validator, and the Validator toppled and the hands grabbed him and he vanished into the hole.

The hole closed up once again, and silence descended.

Skulduggery fixed his tie and buttoned his jacket, then he picked up his hat, dusted it off, put it on.

ventually, Valkyrie stopped hiding.

The Remnants knew they were there. Of course they knew. They couldn’t not know. So with her parents behind her, Valkyrie walked to the town square, where all the people were. Black lips. Black veins. They stood silently, watching her. Hundreds of them. Above their heads, more Remnants flitted. Thousands. But they didn’t swoop. They didn’t attack.

The crowd parted. Valkyrie and her parents walked right through. The path led to a restaurant. The door was held open by Dai Maybury. He didn’t say anything as they passed him.

Vex sat at a table in the corner, cutting into a bloody steak. The strap of the Sceptre bag crossed his chest. On the table beside him, within easy arm’s reach, was Alice, sleeping in her car seat.

Valkyrie’s parents started forward immediately, but Vex glanced up, black veins rising beneath his skin, and they froze. The veins faded, and Vex went back to his dinner. He speared a ragged bit of steak with his fork, popped it into his mouth, and chewed with his eyes closed.

“I was a vegetarian once,” he said, “for about two years, back in the late sixties. I’d met this girl, Sally, who you’d probably—”

“Give us Alice back,” Valkyrie said.

Vex opened his eyes. “Let me finish,” he said. He took a sip of wine, put the glass down, and continued.

“So, Sally – she was a nice girl, what you’d probably call a hippy. This was in San Francisco during the Vietnam War – and I went on peace marches with her and I grew my hair and I thought, this might be it. She got me into eating rice and lentils and green beans and for a while, hey, life was good. But we went to the airport this one time, to pick up some friends of hers flying in from New York, and there was this GI walking past, this soldier back from the war in his army greens with his bag over his shoulder, searching the crowd for his wife or his girlfriend or his folks … and Sally doesn’t even think, she doesn’t even hesitate, she just spits on him. Spits on him and calls him a baby-killer.

“Now let’s be clear, I did not agree with what the Americans did in Vietnam, but even if you object to the war, you respect the warrior. That’s always been my feeling on the subject. So I cut my hair, and two days later I was in the Congo, tracking down the head of a death cult. You don’t stay vegetarian for very long when you’re hiking through the jungle.”

He chewed another piece of steak, savoured it, and swallowed.

Valkyrie looked him dead in the eye. “What do you want?”

“Well, that’s the thing, you see. I am a mess of conflicting desires. The man in me wants to help you. The Remnant in me wants to tear you apart. But the two together simply want a compromise.”

“Give Alice back and we’ll compromise,” Valkyrie’s dad said.

Vex held up a finger to silence him. “Hush now, Desmond, the adults are talking. When we first heard about the glimpse into the future, where Darquesse would decimate the world, we were positively giddy with delight. That’s the world for us, we said. What we’d like, what we’d really love, is a future with, maybe, a tenth of the world’s current population left alive. Enough for us to play with, but not enough to cause us any problems.”

“Darquesse is not going to leave
anyone
alive,” said Valkyrie.

“Exactly,” said Vex. “When we started to realise the full extent of her plans, our giddiness faded. Only Foe and his crazy bunch of nihilists would find Darquesse’s ultimate aim attractive, because not only do they want to die, but they want the world to die with them. And, to be honest, we also saw how she treats Remnants when they’ve served their purpose. Let’s just say that they hold no special place in her heart.”

“So now you’re scared of her.”

Vex smiled. “The same as everybody else.”

“So I’ll ask again. What do you want?”

“We wish to offer you our support. Sorcerers and Remnants, working together in perfect harmony. Can you think of anything more beautiful?”

“Problem is, Remnants can’t be trusted.”

“Normally I’d agree with you,” said Vex. “In fact, even now I agree with you. But we promise to be good.”

“How exactly do you see this working? Are you going to join our army? So you’ll either possess hundreds of sorcerers or thousands of mortals? Do you really think anyone would agree to that?”

“Do you really think you can pass up this opportunity?” Vex asked. “As you say, there are thousands of us, each with a vast personal collection of knowledge and talents just waiting to be shared.”

Valkyrie pulled up a chair, and sat. “If your accumulated wisdom is so great, then how come you haven’t figured out a way to stop Darquesse without our help?”

Vex smiled at her. “Darquesse is tricky.”

“There’s no way China will agree to this. But if you let us leave with Alice, I’ll do my best to convince her.”

“Why are you so worried about the baby?” Vex asked. “Look at her. She’s fine. She cried a bit earlier, but I changed her nappy, fed her, and she went right back to sleep.”

“Then I’ll stay,” said Valkyrie. “Let my parents take her and you can keep me.”

“That won’t do, I’m afraid. I’ll need Alice if I want to activate the Sceptre.”

“What do you mean?” Valkyrie’s mum asked, and Valkyrie went pale.

But Vex looked at her mum, and instead of opting for the cruel option, instead of explaining that Alice would have to die, he simply said, “For reasons too complicated to go into, your baby is the only one who can charge a very powerful weapon. I need her close to me if I have to use it.” Then he looked back at Valkyrie. “Do we have an understanding?”

The truth would damage her parents. It wouldn’t just shock them, wouldn’t just horrify them, it would actually damage their ability to move forward. To be useful. If they were insisting on accompanying her, Valkyrie needed them to at least be able to function. Which meant the full truth would have to be kept from them.

“Just you,” she said at last. “Your friends can stay here. I’ll take you into Roarhaven and ask China to hear you out. That’s the best I can do.”

“I reluctantly agree to your conditions,” Vex said, smiling, and Valkyrie knew this was what he had wanted all along. He dabbed at the corners of his mouth with a napkin, and stood. “Shall we leave? I assume your parents will be coming with us?”

“We’re not letting Alice out of our sight,” Valkyrie’s mum said.

“That’s the spirit.” He picked up Alice’s seat and went to carry it past Valkyrie, but she blocked his way, and looked over her shoulder at her parents.

“Can you give us a second?” she asked. “Please?”

Her mum frowned at her, concerned, but allowed Valkyrie’s dad to move her back a few steps.

Valkyrie turned back to Vex and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Doctor Nye had a warehouse,” she said. “You go in there, you’re dead. Living bodies die, but they’re still … aware. They can still move and think. Let me take Alice in. She’ll be dead, technically she’ll be dead, and you can take ownership of the Sceptre and then I take Alice back outside and she’ll be alive again. I don’t want to do it, I don’t want to expose Alice to that horrible, cold feeling, I don’t want her to experience that, but if it’ll make you let her go …”

“Nye’s warehouse was raided,” Vex answered softly. “All enchantments, such as they were, have been dismantled. It’s just an ordinary building now.”

“Then the coach,” said Valkyrie. “The coach the banshee calls, with the headless driver—”

“The Dullahan doesn’t do favours, Valkyrie. If he takes your sister, you’ll never get her back.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “Besides, as long as I have her, you’ll do exactly as I say. Because if you try anything, I’ll kill her without a second thought.”

He moved by her, exposing his back, leaving himself open and vulnerable, daring her to test his resolve.

But Valkyrie sagged, and simply followed Vex and her parents outside, where the crowd of black-veined people parted to reveal a sky-blue minivan.

“Behold our battle wagon,” Vex said as the side door slid open. There were two rows of seats, plus the two seats up front. Vex climbed into the very back, clicking Alice’s seat into place beside him. “Melissa,” he said, “you can sit in the middle there, and Desmond, you drive. Valkyrie can sit up front with you. She knows where we’re going. If anyone needs to pee before we leave, you better go now. We’ve got an hour’s drive ahead of us and we won’t be stopping.”

hey drove to Roarhaven.

Valkyrie was all out of leaves and the pain from her broken hand was making her sweat. She wiped her forehead and looked back. In the rear of the minivan, Vex sat with his head down. It was too dark to see his eyes, but his breathing was regular. She was sure he was sleeping. Even so, she didn’t make a move. She’d been around the Dead Men enough by now to know that they never sank into deep sleep. If she tried anything, he’d be wide awake, fully alert and back in control in an instant.

She glanced at her mum, making sure she wasn’t about to do anything desperate, but for once her mum’s attention wasn’t on Alice. She was frowning, looking out of the window.

“Mum?” Valkyrie said softly.

Her mum’s frown deepened. “Do you hear something?”

Valkyrie peered out into the darkness, where the black shapes of trees and hedgerows blurred and melted together. She listened to the minivan’s engine, to the rock and roll of the tyres over the poorly maintained road, to the sound of the heater blasting out warm air … and behind all that, what? What was that? Another engine?