Mortal Coil

“Don’t be absurd. You’ve been studying Necromancy for just over a year. I’ve been studying death magic since I was four years old. You’re nothing compared to me, or anyone like me.”

“And yet,” Valkyrie interrupted, “I’m the one they’re all making a fuss of.”

Melancholia scowled. “You’re nothing but an Elemental playing at being a Necromancer.”

“And you’re a Necromancer, through and through. You’ve wanted to be nothing else your entire life. And yet, I’ve been invited to all the important meetings and you get to stay out here and mind the car. I’ve been told things about your art and your religion that you won’t be told for another year or two.”

“Ridiculous.”

“Is it? When were you told about the Passage?”

Melancholia hesitated. “I learned about the Passage when I was ready, when I had completed my studies on over three dozen—”

“It was pretty recently, wasn’t it?”

Melancholia gritted her teeth. “Yes.”

“See, I was told about it ages ago. Now, I’m not saying I’m an expert. In fact, I have loads of questions about the whole thing. You must have noticed that some of it just doesn’t seem to make any sense. Your religion is based on the idea that when you die, your energy passes from this world to another one, right?”

“It’s not an idea,” Melancholia said tersely. “It’s a scientific fact.”

“It’s little more than a theory,” Valkyrie countered. “But I’m OK with that. So you guys are waiting for the Death Bringer to come and collapse the wall between the two worlds, so the living and the dead can exist in the same place, at the same time, meaning that there will be no more strife, no more war, and everyone will live, or at least exist, happily ever after.”

“Yes,” Melancholia said.

“And yet, no one has told me how this is possible.”

“You can hardly expect to understand the advanced stages of our teachings, if you do not have the patience or the skill to master the basics.”

“Do you know how it’s possible?”

“I will. Soon. Once I experience the Surge, once I am locked into Necromancy for the rest of my life, all of its secrets will be laid open for me.”

“Oh, that’ll be nice. I still don’t know if it’s for me, though. I really don’t want to draw my power from death, and that’s basically what Necromancy is. I’d rather not have to rely on other people’s pain to use magic.”

“I hardly think it will be up to you. The sooner the Clerics realise what a mistake they’re making, wasting their time on you, the better. Then you can run along with your skeleton friend and have lots of fun together, and you can leave the important stuff to us.”

“Sometimes I get the feeling that you don’t like me.”

“Trust your feelings.”

“So we’re not going to be friends?”

“I’d rather gouge my own eyes out.”

Valkyrie shook her head sadly, and started to walk back to the Bentley. “Your leaders are looking to me to be their saviour, Melancholia. You might have to learn to love me.”

Melancholia’s voice was laced with venom. “You are not our saviour.”

Valkyrie looked at her over her shoulder, shot her a smile. “Better start praying to me, just in case.”

ack when Vaurien Scapegrace was alive, he had briefly owned a pub in Roarhaven that catered, almost exclusively, for sorcerers. That had been before he’d found his true calling as a Killer Supreme and, later, as the Zombie King, but he’d enjoyed it nevertheless. He knew there were pubs and clubs and bars around the country, around the world, whose clientele were magical, but he liked to think that his pub offered something a little different. A home away from home perhaps. A refuge from the pressures and stresses of modern living.

But now that some time had passed, now that he was viewing it all with a more objective eye, he realised what it was that his pub had really offered. It had offered dim lighting, bad drinks, grumpy bar staff and a toilet that smelled of wet cabbage. There was absolutely nothing to take pride in. Nothing to feel good about. But that, of course, was the whole point. Sorcerer pubs were bad pubs by necessity. If they were good pubs, everyone would be going to them.

Sitting in this particular sorcerer pub in Dublin, Scapegrace reflected on the trials and tribulations he had gone through as a living man, and hoped that by the time this night was done, he would be a step closer to being a living man once again.

Thrasher came through the sombre crowd, spilling someone’s drink and apologising profusely before arriving at Scapegrace’s table. “Some men are here,” he said urgently. “They say they know you.”

Scapegrace leaned back in his chair. “Let’s see them.”

Thrasher nodded, turned, but the crowd was already parting for the six newcomers. Scapegrace did indeed know them. Lightning Dave sidled up on Scapegrace’s right, playing with a bright stream of electricity that crackled between his fingertips. His hair stood on end, and his features had settled into a permanent smirk.

Beside him was Hokum Pete. Hokum Pete had been born in Kerry, but harboured a well-known and widely ridiculed desire to be seen as a Wild West outlaw. He liked to wear cowboy boots and long duster coats, and today he had a six-gun holstered low on his right leg. His hand flashed and the gun cleared the holster. He started to spin it around on his finger, like that was going to impress anyone.

Thrasher gave a delighted “Oooh”, and Scapegrace fought the urge to hit him.

To Scapegrace’s left was a pair of sorcerers who had never managed to garner much of a reputation for themselves. They weren’t powerful and they weren’t smart, and Scapegrace could never remember their names.

Brobding the giant, bringing up the rear, had to hunch over to even fit in here, and the man who stood right in front of Scapegrace was Hieronymus Deadfall. Deadfall had been a mercenary, had fought in a few wars, both magical and mortal, before returning to Ireland and settling down in Roarhaven, where he had stolen Scapegrace’s pub from under him. Not that Scapegrace held a grudge or anything.

“Hello, moron,” said Scapegrace.

“My God,” Deadfall responded. “It’s true. Everything they said is true. You’re a shambling pile of decomposition.”

Hokum Pete sniggered, and Scapegrace sat up a little straighter. “I am the living dead, if that’s what you mean, yes. What can I do for you, Hieronymus? I assume you’ve heard about the auction.”

“We heard,” Deadfall nodded. “So you know where the Skeleton Detective lives?”

“Yes, I do. You want revenge, for the time he smacked you around your own pub? This is how you do it. Catch him unawares. Or you can sell the information to someone else. His little partner will probably be there too.”

“Cain,” snarled one of the sorcerers whose name Scapegrace couldn’t remember.

“This information is worth a lot,” Scapegrace continued, “but all I’m looking for is information in exchange. Kenspeckle Grouse. I want to know where to find him.”

It was all going so perfectly, and Scapegrace had to resist grinning in case any more teeth fell out. He’d give up the Skeleton Detective’s location, and in return he’d find Kenspeckle Grouse and get himself fixed. It was, he had to admit, one of his more brilliant plans.

“Grouse …” Deadfall said. “The scientist? How the hell would I know that?”

“If you don’t know it, you’re of no use to me. Next! Anyone know where Kenspeckle Grouse is?”

Deadfall smiled. “Tell me, Vaurien, what’s to stop us from just pulling you apart, limb from limb, until you tell us the skeleton’s address?”

Scapegrace didn’t really have an answer for that one.

There were mumblings and mutterings in the crowd as a large man in a long coat passed Deadfall and approached the table. He had his hood up, and beneath it Scapegrace could see metal, like a mask.

“I need to know where Skulduggery Pleasant lives,” the big man said with an accent. Eastern European maybe, or Russian. Scapegrace decided on Russian. It was, like many sorcerer’s accents, one that came from a lot of places over the years.

“Do you have what I need in exchange?” Scapegrace asked, ignoring Deadfall’s scowl.

The head beneath the hood shook. “I have heard of this Grouse person, but I do not know where he lives.”

“Then why are you wasting my time?”

The Russian didn’t answer for a bit. Then he placed both hands on the table, and leaned in. “Because I’m giving you a chance to avoid bloodshed. Tell me where the Skeleton Detective lives and we can all walk out of here. You are a dead man, but there are ways to kill even dead men.”

The conversation had tilted wildly out of Scapegrace’s control in a remarkably short amount of time, with an astonishingly small amount of words.

It was the tone the big Russian was using, a tone that implied that violence was a mere afterthought. Scapegrace didn’t like that one bit. Anyone who did not give violence its careful and rightful due was someone to whom violence was an old pair of shoes – slip on, slip off, think nothing more about it. That wasn’t Scapegrace’s style at all.

“Maybe,” he said, “we can reach a compromise.”

“No way,” Deadfall said to the mysterious Russian. “Listen, pal, a funny accent and a funny mask don’t scare me. We were here first, so you, take a hike.”

The big man turned to him slowly. “You do not want to make trouble with me.”

Deadfall actually chuckled in disbelief. “Scapegrace, take note. After we deal with the funny man here, you’re next.”

Hokum Pete was still showing off with his six-gun. His finger in the trigger guard, he spun it until it blurred, then flipped it, reversed it, slid it into the holster. It barely had time to settle before it flashed out again. He tossed it into the air and caught it as it spun, tossed it to his other hand, still spinning. He threw it over his shoulder and caught it, reversed the motion and that was when the Russian reached back, snatched it from the air, and shot him point-blank.

Hokum Pete flew backwards, there were screams and yells and cries, and suddenly everyone was moving.

Lightning Dave snarled and electricity burst from his fingers. The Russian dodged behind the giant, and Brobding shrieked as the stream hit him instead. Scapegrace toppled backwards over his chair, saw Thrasher dive to the floor. Panic spread, and there was a stampede for the exits.

The Russian shot Lightning Dave twice in the chest. Deadfall, his fists already turning to hammers, knocked the gun from the Russian’s hand and swung for his head. The Russian ducked under the swing and moved past him, towards the two sorcerers with the forgettable names.

The first of them had glowing hands, ready to discharge a blast of energy. The second had opted for the up-close-and-personal approach, drawing a long dagger from his sleeve. Scapegrace watched as the Russian bent the second sorcerer’s arm back, stabbing him with his own blade. The poor, unmemorable fool gurgled in astonishment, and the Russian took the dagger from him and whipped it across the throat of his friend. Then he turned, saw Brobding coming for him and flicked the dagger to the ground. It impaled itself through the giant’s foot, pinning it to the floor. Brobding shrieked.

Deadfall came at him. The Russian swayed back out of range, watched the hammer swing uselessly by his face, then leaned in. His knuckles met the hinge of Deadfall’s jaw, and Deadfall’s legs gave out from under him.

Brobding pulled the dagger from his foot with a self-pitying squawk of pain. He fixed his face with a snarl, and charged. He didn’t have far to charge, but he did have to keep himself stooped, so it resembled more of a stumble. Still, the intent behind it was unmistakable.

The Russian ducked under the giant’s arms. Brobding’s great fist came around, but the masked man avoided it easily. Brobding lunged and the Russian snapped out a pair of jabs that broke the giant’s nose and split his lip. Brobding bellowed and the Russian kicked his knee. The bellow became a howl, drawn-out and horrified, his huge hands clutching at his leg.

The Russian tapped a single fingertip lightly against Brobding’s chest. There was a terrible crack of bone, and Brobding fell, dead. It was like a great oak falling in a forest.

Deadfall was up again, preparing to swing his hammer-fists, but the Russian just stepped close and pressed his hand against him. Every bone that comprised the skeleton of Hieronymus Deadfall gave a slight tremor, and then came apart with a violence that ruptured his body. Bone shards burst both organs and skin, spraying blood into the air. His corpse dropped, contorted and disfigured beyond recognition. The Russian turned to look at Scapegrace, his eyes red beneath his mask.

“I’ll tell you,” Scapegrace said, hands high above his head. “I’ll tell you where Skulduggery Pleasant lives. Just please, don’t explode me.”

he closer you got to Roarhaven, the sicker the trees looked, the browner the grasses, the blacker the lake. Its streets were narrow, its buildings hunched, their windows squinting. Paranoia and hatred, seething resentment and bitter hostility – these things leaked through the town like its lifeblood. It was a creature, a mangy, diseased dog, afflicted with fleas and ticks and lice, kept alive by its own loathing.

The man with the golden eyes stood by the stagnant lake, his coat buttoned up against the cold. “Marr?” he asked.

“Still alive,” said the old man behind him.

The veiled woman in black spoke quietly. “I thought we hired the best.”

The old man didn’t bother to keep the irritation out of his voice. “We did.”

“She needs to die,” said the woman. “She’s far too dangerous to be languishing in chains.”

“Tesseract assures me she will be dead soon.” The old man looked away from the woman. “Do they still think the Americans are to blame?”

The man with the golden eyes shrugged. “Who knows what Skulduggery Pleasant thinks? We can only stick to the plan. If he begins to suspect us, we’ll deal with him then. For the moment, though, we’re on schedule. This town will hold the new Sanctuary. From here, we’re going to change the world.”

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