Kingdom of the Wicked

by Derek Landy

  “Shut up. All I’m saying is, it’d be nice if there were a base or a headquarters of something that had big windows and a nice view and maybe even a little sunshine every now and then.”

  The old man wandered back. “The warden is ready for you,” he said. “You ever been to Hammer Lane before? The only tricky bit is getting through that front door there. The important thing is not to touch the sides as you walk through. For slender people such as yourselves, this should pose no particular problem. But for other people …” He shook his head, like he was remembering a personal tragedy.

  “What happens if we touch the sides?” Valkyrie asked, but he was already walking away. She looked at Skulduggery, and motioned to the open door. “Age before beauty.”

  “So kind,” he said, and walked through. He looked back at her. “Well? Are you coming?”

  Valkyrie hesitated. The doorway shimmered. She licked her lips, then turned sideways and inched forward into the house.

  Skulduggery stood watching her. “What are you doing?”

  “Being careful,” she said under her breath.

  “You walk through doorways every day and manage not to bounce off one side or the other.”

  “Stop distracting me.”

  “You could walk in with your hands on your hips and you still wouldn’t touch the sides.”

  She took a deep breath and took the last step as a hop, then gasped in relief.

  “You puzzle me,” Skulduggery said.

  It was a one-room house. There was a tattered armchair and a tattered rug and peeling wallpaper. Something beeped, and the floor started to descend.

  “Cool,” Valkyrie whispered.

  They left the peeling wallpaper above them and descended through a brightly lit steel shaft, picking up speed as they went. Just as Valkyrie was beginning to enjoy the experience, it was over, and a door slid open to reveal a man in a suit and tie and a smile.

  “Hi,” he said. “I’m Delafonte Mien, I’m the warden here. Can I get you folks some lemonade?”

  Their tour through Hammer Lane Gaol took them through gleaming corridors and steel doors. The main body of the prison was a vast cylinder, at the base of which was the mess hall and social area. There were five levels of cells built into the walls, each one with a circular perimeter walkway that was bordered with a clear material that sounded like glass when Valkyrie knocked on it. They were standing on the Observation Deck, the sixth and highest level, allowing them to overlook the whole structure.

  “It sounds like glass,” Mien told her, “because it is glass. Reinforced, of course. It’d take a rocket launcher to even make a crack in one layer of this thing – and it’s four layers thick. Impenetrable.” He waved his hand along the metal barrier, and a section of glass retracted. They leaned over, looking straight down. Valkyrie felt a touch of vertigo.

  “Your prisoners are very well behaved,” said Skulduggery. Far below them, the convicts sat in their bright orange jumpsuits at their tables in perfectly ordered groups.

  Mien chuckled. “Ah, I wish I could say they’re always like that, but any minute now one of the inmates is going to be rejoining them from a month in solitary confinement. He’s a bit of a troublemaker, so I have extra security down there to deal with any messing.

  “You know, before I came here, this was the worst gaol in Europe. Disruptive behaviour, riots, inmates escaping … I was assigned here seventeen years ago, I looked around at what we had at our disposal, and I made changes. Within two years, this place had become a fortress. No prisoner has escaped in fifteen years. Even attempted breakouts have dropped to almost zero.”

  “How did you manage it?” Skulduggery asked, stepping back from the barrier, casting his eyeless gaze to the pipes that ran in crazy zigzags across the high ceiling.

  Mien waved his hand again, and the glass sealed over. “You may have noticed a slight flickering on your way in. That was the entire building oscillating between dimensions.”

  Valkyrie looked at him. “I’m sorry?”

  “As we’re talking here,” Mien said, “we’re travelling through eight dimensions a second. Forty dimensions in all, and then back again. A continuous loop. If anyone were to breach the walls, they’d be torn to pieces and scattered through half a dozen realities. There really is no escape except through the front door. The inmates know this. They know it’s hopeless. Because of that, I’ve been able to cut back on the amount of sorcerers and Cleavers needed to run this facility. We operate with a skeleton staff, if you’ll excuse the expression, Detective.”

  “Expression excused,” Skulduggery murmured. “So how do you do it?”

  “Ah,” Mien said, laughing, “I’m afraid I can’t tell you.” They started walking back the way they’d come. “Every warden of every gaol around the world has tried to find out, but I’m keeping it to myself for now. It won’t be long before I’m assigned to one of the bigger prisons, though, and maybe then I’ll share the secret of my success.”

  Skulduggery looked at him. “An ambitious man, are you, Mr Mien?”

  “I suppose you could say that. Nothing wrong with ambition, is there?”

  “Absolutely nothing,” Skulduggery said, “so long as it’s channelled the right way.”

  “I assure you, all of my ambition is channelled to enable me to better perform my duties.”

  They passed through another steel door, and a uniformed man handed Mien a touch-screen device the size of a brick.

  “Excuse me for a moment,” Skulduggery said, taking out his phone and stepping away.

  Mien took the opportunity to show Valkyrie the device in his hand. “I control the entire building with this,” he said, his fingers tapping and sliding over the screen. “My own design, actually. I hope to get it smaller, but with the amount of power it has to generate this is the best I can do at the moment.”

  “Isn’t that dangerous?” she asked. “To have everything centralised in something someone could run away with?”

  Mien smiled. “I’m the only one who can operate it, and it’s kept here, within the confines of the main facility. I never bring it outside that door. Security is my business, Detective Cain. I know a thing or two about it.”

  Skulduggery came back. “It all looks very impressive, I have to say. It’s certainly a unique set-up. Were you told which prisoner we’re here to see?”

  “I wasn’t,” said Mien, “but it doesn’t matter. With the protocols I’ve installed, any inmate can be accessible within minutes. Just give me a moment to call up the proper screen … OK. Name of prisoner?”

  “Silas Nadir.”

  Mien’s fingers hesitated over the device.

  “N,” he said. “N … where’s the N? I can’t … can’t find the … Oh, here we are. Nadir. And what was the first name?”

  “Silas,” said Skulduggery.

  Mien nodded, tapped the name in, and waited.

  “Oh,” he said.

  Skulduggery tilted his head. “Oh?”

  “I’m terribly sorry, it looks like you’ve had a wasted trip. Silas Nadir died two years ago.”

  Skulduggery stopped walking. “What?”

  “Oh, this is awful,” said Mien. “I’m terribly sorry. He had a heart attack. The staff here weren’t even aware he had a medical condition. He died in his sleep.”

  “So why wasn’t his death reported?”

  Mien blinked. “It was. I … I’m sure it was. It would have had to have been. Our Chief Medical Officer would have been required to process all of the appropriate paperwork.”

  “Can we speak to him?” Valkyrie asked.

  Mien looked sheepish. “I’m sorry. Doctor Taper no longer works at this gaol. Can I ask why you wanted to speak with Nadir? Maybe someone else could help you?”

  “We needed Nadir,” Skulduggery said curtly. “Do many prisoners die while in your custody, Mr Mien?”

  Mien’s look of embarrassment faded quickly as his mouth set into a straight line. “No, Detective Pleasant. They do no
t.” He started walking again. Skulduggery and Valkyrie kept up.

  “How many prisoners have died here in the last year?” Skulduggery asked.

  “None. The inmates may be convicted criminals but they are nonetheless entitled to the best care we can provide.”

  “How many prisoners have died here in the last ten years?”

  Mien bristled. “Three. Nadir and two others – Evoric Cudgel and Lorenzo Mulct. Should I have personally informed you of their deaths as well?”

  “Mulct and Cudgel,” Skulduggery said. “Never heard of them. What were they in for?”

  Mien turned to them, jabbing irritably at the device. “Mulct was … Mulct was found guilty of multiple counts of robbery. Cudgel was one of Mevolent’s men. Just another low-level sorcerer.”

  “And yet,” said Skulduggery, “you remembered the names of these unexceptional inmates without a problem. But when you heard the name Silas Nadir, a notorious serial killer with murders in the double digits, you had to look him up.”

  “After a hesitation,” said Valkyrie.

  “Indeed,” Skulduggery nodded. “After a very telling hesitation that seemed for all the world like you were frozen for a moment at the mere mention of his name.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Mien, “I have no idea what either of you are talking about.”

  “What happened to Silas Nadir, Mr Mien?”

  “I told you what—”

  “And I think you’re lying.”

  “This is preposterous. Why would I lie? I’m not a criminal. The criminals are the ones in the cells.”

  “The prisoners are the ones in the cells,” Skulduggery corrected. “Criminals can be anywhere.”

  “I’m very sorry but I can’t help you,” Mien said, his voice tight. “If you’ll excuse me, I have a gaol to run. The way out is just ahead of you, but I’ll have the Cleavers escort you just to be sure.” Mien turned, started walking away.

  “What happened to Nadir?” Skulduggery asked after him.

  “Good day, Detectives.”

  “Where is he, Mr Mien?”

  “Good day.”

  “How about the Summer of Light?”

  Mien froze. Turned. “How do you know about that?”

  “You know what it is?”

  “No. No, I don’t have the first idea what it is. But the inmates … Our more psychologically disturbed inmates have taken to screaming about a man named Argeddion. They say he comes to them in their nightmares. Some of them have written his name, in their own blood, on the walls of their cells, along with that phrase. The Summer of Light.”

  “What do they say about Argeddion?”

  “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Just his name and that he appears in their dreams.”

  Skulduggery considered the gaoler. “We’d like to speak to one of these inmates, if you wouldn’t mind. Preferably one of the more lucid ones. Do you have the list there?”

  Skulduggery walked up to him, Valkyrie following behind.

  “What does any of this have to do with Nadir?” asked Mien.

  Skulduggery didn’t get a chance to answer. An alarm rang out, so sudden and so loud it made Valkyrie jump. She looked around, looked back, and a wall of glass slammed down in front of her, sealing her off from Skulduggery and Mien. At that moment, sigils faded up along the walls, and she felt her power dampen. On the other side of the glass, Skulduggery looked at her, then spoke to Mien, who was clearly agitated. Valkyrie couldn’t hear a word of what they were saying. Mien hurried away, and she raised an eyebrow at Skulduggery.

  His jaw moved up and down. She pointed at her mouth.

  His hand went to his collarbones, and a false face spread over his skull. This time, she could read his lips.

  Don’t panic, he said.

  I’m not, she mouthed back.

  He knocked on the glass. We can’t break through this. We’ll get you out in a second.

  Cool.

  Mien appeared behind Skulduggery. He looked even more agitated than before. Skulduggery exchanged words with him. A lot of words. Still the alarm rang out. Finally, Skulduggery turned back to her. Good news, he said. You can start panicking now.

  She glared. He took out his phone and rang her.

  “It seems that a riot has broken out,” he said when she answered. “That prisoner who was released back into the general population evidently started some trouble. Now, before you begin to worry, the section of the gaol that I’m standing in is completely secure. No problems here. I’m not in any danger whatsoever.”

  “And the section I’m standing in?”

  “Well,” he said, “the important thing to remember is that I’m perfectly safe.”

  Valkyrie sighed. “I’m stuck in here with the bad guys, aren’t I?”

  “Or you could be glass-half-full about it and say that they are stuck in there with you. Which might make you feel better.”

  “It really doesn’t.”

  “Mien’s working on a way to isolate this corridor from the rest of the gaol in order to get the door open, but it might take – oh, do you mind holding on for a moment? I have another call coming in.”

  She stared. “What?”

  The line went silent, and she watched Skulduggery talk into his phone. She knocked on the glass. He held up a finger as he spoke.

  She stood there and fumed.

  Finally, he nodded to her, and she raised her phone to her ear.

  “You look angry,” he said.

  “You put me on hold.”

  “For a very good reason.”

  “You put me,” she said very, very slowly, “on hold.”

  “And judging by the look on your face, and what a pretty face it is, I’m going to be very sorry about that later on. Back to now, though, that was Ghastly. A few moments ago I called him, asked him to get a Sensitive to run a remote scan of the facility, just out of curiosity. I wanted to know where the power was coming from to keep this place oscillating between dimensions. It’s coming from deep down in the lower levels.”

  “Yay,” Valkyrie growled, still glaring.

  “Before his apparent demise, Silas Nadir was a Dimensional Shunter. He could move himself, or other people or objects – such as the bodies of his victims – into different realities. They call it shunting.”

  “I gathered that. You think he’s still alive and he’s being kept in the basement, where he’s constantly shunting this whole building around.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “And you can’t get to the basement, can you? But I can. And that’s where you want me to go. You want me, a seventeen-year-old girl without any magic or protection, to wander through a prison while the convicted murderers and God-knows-whats are running around having a riot. Is that what you want me to do, Skulduggery?”

  “It is.”

  “And is this a safe thing for me to do, Skulduggery?”

  “It isn’t. But there are two very good reasons why you should do it anyway. Reason number one, it’s our chance to look around without Mien’s interference. Reason number two, the corridor you’re standing in will soon be filled with convicts.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You heard Mien. The front door is the only exit. This is the only corridor to the front door. There are bound to be some convicts who are going to try and take advantage of the distraction the riot provides.”

  “So I should go now, before they get here.”

  “Indeed you should. Keep your phone to your ear, I’ll guide you.”

  “How do you know the way?”

  “I glanced at the schematic on the way in.”

  “You memorised it?”

  “Glancing, memorising, it’s the same thing. You should really, really go now.”

  She took a deep breath. “Get this door open and come after me.”

  “Count on it.”

  Valkyrie looked at him, then turned, ran down the corridor and round the corner.

  “At the junction,” Skulduggery said, “t
urn right. Can you see anyone?”

  “No,” she said, moving fast, “not yet.”

  “Hopefully, we’ll be able to keep you out of sight. You won’t be in the prison area as such – but then neither will the prisoners, so …”

  “I have to admit,” she said, “I’m worrying.”

  “Perfectly understandable. I’m heading to the security room. I’ll be able to see you on the monitors soon enough. You should be seeing three doors ahead of you.”

  “Yeah, I’ve just reached them.”

  “Take the second one to your left.”

  She tried it. “It’s locked.”

  “Kick it open.”

  “It’s a sturdy door, Skulduggery.”

  “But it’s not reinforced. It’s not designed to keep any prisoners in or out, it’s designed to keep unauthorised personnel from going places they don’t have clearance for. It’s just a simple door with a simple lock. And you’ve got very strong legs.”

  She looked at the door. “See, this is where a gun would come in really handy.” She kicked. “Ow! Oh, God!”

  “Are you OK?”

  “Kicking doors hurts! Even with Ghastly’s boots!”

  “Put your weight behind it. Pretend the door is someone who has really annoyed you recently.”

  “Can I pretend it’s you?”

  “I really don’t see how that would—”

  She kicked it, and the door burst open. “I’m in,” she said, closing the door behind her. “And that really hurt my foot. I’m in a room with machines along the walls. Lots of blinking lights.”

  “Do you see the ventilation duct along the floor?”

  She froze. “Please tell me I don’t have to crawl through that.”

  “I’m afraid you do.”

  “No. I can’t. It’s too small.”

  “The measurements are—”

  “I get claustrophobic! You know I do! Especially after the caves last year, with all those things and I couldn’t move my arms and they were in my hair and—”

  “Calm down.”

  “I’m not getting in there, I’m just not.”

  “You’ll be able to fit,” he said, his voice gentle. “You will have space to move. You won’t be trapped.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Valkyrie, listen to my voice. I know you don’t want to, I know you don’t think you can, but you don’t have a choice. I’m in the security room now and I can see the monitors. The prisoners are swarming the building. You can’t let them catch you.”