by Derek Landy
“And do they make me ugly?”
“I don’t... I...”
“Well?”
“No. They don’t make you ugly.”
“So I’m not ugly? Am I handsome?”
Sean nodded quickly.
“Am I the most handsome man in the world?”
“Yes.”
“Just as I suspected,” Ghastly said to Elsie, “this guy doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about.”
A small smile flickered on Elsie’s lips, and Ghastly looked back at Sean.
“She’s trying to help you, you idiot. She asked to come in here, to talk to you, to try and get through to you. Because no one else wants to help. You hear an army of people outside this door, begging to be allowed to help you?”
“N-no.”
“No. Exactly. Because there isn’t one. But Elsie wanted to try, and this is how you repay her? She told us you were a good guy, Sean. That you were decent. Not like Doran. Doran’s a psycho. And not like Kitana. She’s... she’s something else. Elsie told us that you just got carried away a little. The power went to your head. Is that what happened?”
“Yes.”
“Did the power go to your head, Sean?”
“Yes.”
“Is that why you killed those people?”
“I’m... I didn’t...”
“You also killed a few of ours, outside that school. And another sorcerer, a man named Patrick Xebec. He had a wife, did you know that? I bet you didn’t. And you killed him.”
“No,” said Sean. “I didn’t. I didn’t kill anyone.”
“Where are your friends, Sean?”
“I don’t— I don’t know.”
“Where are they staying?”
“I don’t know, I swear.”
“Then where were you staying?”
Sean hesitated. “Please... I don’t want—”
Ghastly slammed his fist on the table and Sean jumped. “You don’t have your magic in here, Sean. In here, you’re just an ordinary boy. You’re an ordinary boy in an awful lot of trouble. It’s over for you. You’re caught. We have you. You’ve got to help yourself as much as you can, because no one apart from Elsie cares about you. Where were you staying?”
Sean swallowed thickly. “A friend’s house,” he said. “His name’s Morgan Ruigrok.”
“Don’t make up names, Sean.”
“He isn’t,” said Elsie. “I know him. His whole family’s got weird names. I know where he lives.”
Ghastly nodded. “Well, OK then. This is a good start.” He got up, walked to the door.
Sean licked his lips. “Am... am I going to get a lawyer?”
Ghastly opened the door and didn’t look back. “We have people who can read your mind, Sean. Why the hell would we need lawyers?”
Valkyrie and Skulduggery joined Ghastly and Elsie outside.
“Elsie,” said Ghastly, “this is Valkyrie Cain, Skulduggery’s partner.”
“Hi,” Valkyrie said, shaking her hand. “You know these Ruigroks?”
“Morgan goes to school with us,” Elsie said. “His family live in Stonybatter, but they’re all in Holland for a few weeks.”
Ghastly nodded. “We have a lead,” he said. “Better get going.”
Skulduggery and Valkyrie turned to leave, but stopped. Ghastly cursed. Ravel walked towards them, Quintin Strom and Grim right behind. Strom looked furious.
“You,” he said, jabbing a finger at Skulduggery. “I want to talk to you.”
“I really don’t have time.”
“You’ll make time,” Strom said, his lip curling, “because I am dying to hear why you went into that school without waiting for back-up.”
“Oh, come on,” Valkyrie said, her own anger rising. “If we’d waited ten minutes, who knows how bad things would have got? Yeah, stories are circulating on the Internet but no one’s dead. A teacher got a few bruises but that’s it. Isn’t that a win for us?”
“This is a disaster,” said Strom. “Pure and simple. With the technology available today, we have to be extra vigilant in blocking communications and stopping the word from getting out. This is exactly the kind of thing we were worried about.”
“The situation is being handled,” said Ravel.
Strom glared at him. “Handled? This is being handled? This? I have been treating you with great sensitivity and tact because I know that having a Supreme Council looking over your shoulder cannot be easy to accept. I’ve almost been embarrassed to be here. But now I see I have to be here. I need to be here.”
“Now just hold on a second—”
“No!” said Strom. “No, I will not hold on a second! You have been entrusted with the responsibility of running this Sanctuary and enforcing all of its laws and policies and you are failing, and failing spectacularly.”
The muscle in Ravel’s jaw stood out. “You’re still a guest here, Grand Mage Strom. Do not make me regret my decision to allow you to observe.”
“You didn’t allow me anything! I allowed you! I allowed you to fool yourselves into thinking you had a choice!” Strom took a breath. When he had his anger under control, he spoke again. “You are clearly unfit to serve as Grand Mage,” he announced, “and all three of you are unfit to serve on the Council of Elders. By the authority vested in me by the international community I am hereby taking command of this Sanctuary. You are relieved of your duties.”
Nobody moved.
Valkyrie was frozen to the spot, though her eyes darted from person to person.
Moving slowly, Grim reached for his jacket, and Skulduggery drew his revolver and pointed it into his face.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Skulduggery said.
The bodyguard raised his hands.
Strom’s eyes widened. “What you just did is illegal.”
“We’re in charge,” Ravel told him. “You think we’re going to roll over just because you tell us to? Who the hell do you think you are?”
“I am a Grand Mage, Mr Ravel, a title I earned because of hard work and dedication. Whereas you, on the other hand, are Grand Mage because nobody else wanted the job.”
“Whoa,” said Ravel. “That was a little below the belt, don’t you think?”
“None of you have the required experience or wisdom to do what is expected of you. I know you’ll find it hard to believe, but we didn’t come here to take control. We came here to help.”
“And now you want to take control anyway.”
“You have proven yourselves incompetent. And what are you doing now? You’re holding a Grand Mage at gunpoint?”
“Technically, Skulduggery is only holding a Grand Mage’s bodyguard at gunpoint. Which isn’t nearly as bad.”
“You all seem to be forgetting that I have thirty-eight mages loyal to the Supreme Council in this country.”
“And you seem to be under the illusion that we find that intimidating.”
“If I go missing—”
“Missing?” Ravel said. “Who said anything about going missing? No, no. You’re just going to be in a really long and really important meeting, that’s all.”
“Don’t be a fool,” said Strom. “You can’t win here, Ravel. There are more of us than there are of you. And the moment our mages get wind of what’s going on down here, the rest of the Supreme Council will descend on you like nothing you’ve ever seen.”
“Quintin, Quintin, Quintin... you make it sound like we’re going to war. This isn’t war. This is an argument. And like all arguments between grown-ups, we keep it away from the kiddies. You’ve got thirty-eight mages in the country? Ghastly, how many cells do we have?”
“If we double up we’ll manage.”
“Don’t make this any worse for yourselves,” said Strom. “An attack on any one of our mages will be considered an act of war.”
“There’s that word again,” said Ravel.
“This is insanity. Erskine, think about what you’re doing.”
“What we’re doing,
Quintin, is allowing our people to do their jobs.”
“This is kidnapping.”
“Don’t be so dramatic. We’re just going to keep you separated from your people for as long as we need to resolve the current crisis. Skulduggery and Valkyrie are on the case. When have they ever let us down?”
Ravel turned to them, gave them a smile. “You’d better not let us down.”
Skulduggery inclined his head slightly, and Valkyrie went with him as he walked away.
“Holy cow,” Valkyrie whispered when they were around the corner.
“Holy cow indeed.”
Before Kitana and her friends had made it their temporary home, this had been a perfectly nice house. But now there were holes blown – and punched – through walls. Valkyrie did not envy the family who were going to return to this mess. Ordinarily there would have been a clean-up crew hard at work already, but with everything that had been going on they just couldn’t afford to bother with the little stuff.
“No sign of where they moved on to,” said Skulduggery. “Ghastly’s going to try and get a little more out of our prisoner, but I don’t like his chances. I think if Sean had anything else to tell us, he’d have told us.”
“Are you worried?”
“Do I look worried?”
“You never look worried.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m not.”
“Are you worried about putting Quintin Strom in shackles?”
“Oh,” he said, “that. Hmm. I don’t know. It’s definitely a situation we have found ourselves in.”
“Could it lead to war?”
“Possibly.”
“But would they really go to war? I mean, war’s a pretty big deal. It’s huge, like. It’s war.”
“War is war,” Skulduggery admitted. “This is very true.”
“Would they really go to war over something so small as pulling a gun on a Grand Mage and imprisoning him and all of his bodyguards and sorcerers and stuff? It’s not like we killed him or anything. This isn’t Franz Ferdinand we’re talking about.”
“Hopefully, they’ll see the funny side of it.”
“There’s a funny side?”
“I don’t know. I’m hoping they’ll see it and point it out to us.”
“How long do you think we’ll have before Strom’s people start to get suspicious?”
“Ravel should be able to bluff his way through a few hours,” Skulduggery said, “so we’ll have to make the most of it. Do you realise that you’re holding your arm?”
Valkyrie looked down, suddenly aware of the dull throbbing. “Uh-oh.”
Skulduggery grabbed her shoulder and took out his phone. Valkyrie started texting. The room flickered.
“Ghastly,” Skulduggery said, “we’re about to shunt. We’ll be in touch.” He hung up.
Valkyrie’s thumb danced over her phone. Mum, phone battery almost dead! Staying at Hannah’s for extra studying and pizza!! Be home tomorrow xx
The throb in her arm was making her hand shake, but she pressed SEND and held her breath, waiting for the message to deliver.
And then the house vanished and they were outside and there was sunlight streaming through the trees. Skulduggery looked at her.
“Did it go through?”
She checked her phone, and nodded, breathing in relief. Even as she’d been writing it, she wondered if she was using too many exclamation marks, but she was glad she left them in. Nothing says “all is good with the world” like exclamation marks, after all.
“So,” Skulduggery said, “this is the alternate reality, then.”
Valkyrie watched him as he looked around. God, she was glad he was here.
“Right,” he said, “we need to get past the wall and into the City. We can’t fly in – they’ll have guards posted and all kinds of security systems, and we just don’t have the time to conduct reconnaissance. We’re going to need help. We need the Resistance.”
“If any of them are left,” she said. “The last time I saw them there was a whole lot of dying going on.”
“Then the best place to start looking would be the field where you last saw them.” He wrapped an arm round her waist, and they lifted off the ground. “You’ll have to direct me.”
“You realise,” Valkyrie said, “that China is the leader.”
“I do,” he replied.
“And you’re OK with that?”
“I am. Besides, there’s always the chance that she was among the ones who were killed by Mevolent’s forces.”
“Mr Bright Side,” she muttered.
hey flew for half an hour before they came to the field. Whole swathes of grass were scorched, others burned through entirely. Streaks of dried blood coated the ground. A ferocious battle had been fought here, of which Valkyrie had only glimpsed the beginning. She wondered if her reflection had survived, and her gut twisted with anxiety.
Skulduggery took her high into the air until the fields became a patchwork quilt of colours separated by ditches, trails and hedges. The closest village was to the south and that’s where they flew. But Skulduggery slowed as they neared.
Not content with attacking the Resistance, Mevolent’s forces had obviously felt the need to vent their anger on the local populace. The buildings were burned and smashed, and bodies lay rotting in the sun, covered in swarms of black-bodied flies. Skulduggery didn’t land. They just hovered above the streets until he was sure that there was nobody down there living. Men and women and children. Even dogs. Unbridled hatred had swept through this little village leaving nothing in its wake. Valkyrie wondered how many of those innocent lives had been taken by Lord Vile. She could tell by Skulduggery’s silence that he was thinking the same thing. She hugged him a little harder.
They followed the main dirt road that led out of the village. There was a farm a few miles further south and they touched down in the yard. A farmer and his sons gazed at them but didn’t move.
“You talk to them,” Skulduggery said. “A pretty girl is less scary than a walking skeleton.”
Valkyrie stepped forward, moving slowly. “Hi,” she said when she was close enough.
The sons were around ten or eleven, and they stood behind their father, a thin man with a hard face.
“We don’t want any trouble,” he said.
“That’s not why we’re here,” she told him. “The village up the road there – do you know what happened?”
The farmer looked at her, looked at Skulduggery behind her, and nodded.
“We’re not from the City,” she said. “We don’t work for Mevolent.”
“We don’t want any trouble,” the farmer repeated.
“Please, we need to get in touch with the Resistance.”
The farmer shook his head. “Don’t know anything about them. Please leave.”
“I understand that you’re scared...”
“Can’t help you.”
“Do you know anyone who could?”
“No. No one. Don’t know anything.”
“Sir, we don’t have a lot of time.”
“Please go.”
Skulduggery touched her elbow and she sighed. “OK. I’m sorry for disturbing you.” The farmer’s sons stepped out from behind their dad as Skulduggery and Valkyrie lifted into the air. She gave them a goodbye wave that they didn’t return.
“That was horrible,” she said as they flew. “Did you see how scared those kids were?”
“They can’t really be blamed,” Skulduggery responded. “They’ve just buried their mother.”
Valkyrie frowned. “How do you know?”
“There was a dress on the clothes line, but the father didn’t send the kids into the house so there’s no one in there to keep them safe. The cart had a blanket on it.”
Valkyrie closed her eyes. “She’d been in the village. They used the cart to bring her body home. Oh, God, and then we fly in, the exact kind of people they don’t want anything to do with...”
“This is some world you’
ve found.”
“Where are we going now? Off to find another family to traumatise?”
“Actually, I’ve worked out where we are, and back in our reality, the nearest town is Ratoath. Hopefully, they have a corresponding town here.”
“So we’re going to traumatise a whole town now? Oh, goody. They’re going to love us.”
Ratoath turned out to be a fair-sized town, the buildings a little bigger and a little sturdier than the villages they’d passed over to get there. Some of the houses were even nice, with gardens in the back, and there was a market and a pleasing bustle to the people. They still wore the dull browns that identified them as lowly mortals, but their backs were straight and their heads were up. These people had a confidence that others lacked.
They landed unseen behind a tavern. Valkyrie frowned, looked up at the building. That’s exactly what it was. It was a tavern. It was the twenty-first century in this reality, the same as it was in her own, but it wasn’t a pub they had landed behind, or a bar. No, it was a tavern. What an odd, backwards world this was.
Skulduggery stopped at the corner, and nodded to the large building across the square. “If anyone knows anything, that’s where they’ll be,” he said.
She nudged him, pointed to the building to their right. It was a church, its roof sunken, badly in need of repair. It had those familiar two circles carved above the door, and looked like a place that nobody visited.
“Each settlement has to have one, more than likely,” Skulduggery said. “But while you can make a town build a church, you can’t make them worship.”
“What do the circles mean?” she asked.
“The big one represents the Faceless Ones. All-encompassing, all-knowing. The little one is us, floating around the edge, barely intersecting. It means we’re little more than fleas, unable to even begin to comprehend the full majesty of existence. It’s very patronising, as far as religious symbols go, and somewhat self-pitying.”
“This reality’s version of Eliza Scorn goes around in chains.”
“They used to do that in our dimension as well. There’d always be one fervent believer who took it upon themselves to suffer for our sins. It was meant to be altruistic and selfless, but I generally found those people to be nothing more than attention-seeking martyrs. Hmmm... that’s interesting.”