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Kingdom of the Wicked
“I’m assuming we just take off the helmet.”
“Just like that? Will he be harmed?”
“If we’re lucky, it might sting him a little. If we’re unlucky, it might cause irreversible brain damage. I’m feeling lucky, though, aren’t you? It’s a Saturday. Saturdays have always been lucky for us.”
“I hadn’t noticed. Look, we should probably find someone who knows what they’re doing.”
“Probably,” Skulduggery murmured. “However …”
His gloved fingers skipped lightly over the helmet, then gripped a wire and yanked it from its slot.
Valkyrie’s eyes widened. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“I think I’ve worked it out,” he said. “I just need to disconnect the Emergency Valve Regulators one at a time. Once that’s done, removing the helmet shouldn’t result in any significant trauma.”
“Emergency Valve Regulators,” she repeated. “So you do know what you’re doing?”
“Not really,” he said, yanking another wire. “I made that term up to keep you happy. I’m just pulling all the red wires because they’re the pretty ones.”
Before she could protest, he’d yanked another three, then nodded. “That should do it.”
“Oh, dear God.”
He started undoing the helmet straps. “If this works, you’re going to be mightily impressed with me.”
“And if it doesn’t work, you could kill him.”
“For the chance to see the look of sheer awe on your face, Valkyrie, I’m willing to risk it.” He removed the helmet and let it fall. Nadir’s head lolled back and his eyes closed.
Valkyrie frowned. “When will we know if he’s OK?”
“When he wakes up, I should imagine. Help me unstrap him.”
They worked together to free Nadir of the wires and cables holding him off the ground, and together they laid him on the floor.
Valkyrie stood quietly for a few seconds, and asked, “Can we wake him now?”
“Patience has never been your strong suit, has it?” He slapped Nadir’s face. “Excuse me. Excuse me, could you wake up now, please?”
Nadir moaned, and frowned, and Skulduggery slapped him again. His eyes snapped open and he looked at them, glared at them, and scrambled up.
“Mr Nadir, my name is Skulduggery Pleasant, and this is my partner Valkyrie Cain. We’re here to—”
Whatever those cables were they must have been exercising his muscles as he slept, because there was no sign of atrophy as he lunged forward. He grabbed Valkyrie’s arm and she cried out and he tried grabbing Skulduggery but Skulduggery just punched him. He staggered into the wall and Skulduggery cuffed his hands behind his back, then looked at Valkyrie as she rubbed her arm. “Are you OK?”
“Fine,” she growled. “Just static electricity, gave me a little shock.”
“What the hell is going on?” Nadir raged. “What is this? What are you doing to me?”
“We’re actually helping you,” Skulduggery told him. “You’ve been napping down here for the last fifteen years, Mr Nadir. You must be well rested.”
“Fifteen years? What are you talking about with your fifteen years? I was just in my cell this morning!”
“I don’t generally have much time for serial killers, so I’m going to explain this to you once and then immediately move on. You were sentenced to seven hundred years for multiple counts of murder. You were sent here, to this pretty shoddy gaol. When Mien took over as warden, he connected you to the building and began using you to shunt the entire facility through dimensions. It’s the ultimate security system. No one can break in or break out because the prison travels to eight different realities every second, and it’s all thanks to you. Are you with me so far?”
Nadir gaped at him. “Fifteen years?”
“Indeed. Now then, we are here for an entirely different reason – but if you help us, we will ensure that you spend the remainder of your prison sentence, all six hundred and seventy-eight years of it, in the comforts of your duly-appointed cell. Understand?”
“Fifteen years?”
Skulduggery looked at Valkyrie. “Oh, dear. I think he might be brain-damaged.”
The door burst open again and Mien ran in.
“You!” he cried. “What are you doing? You can’t be here! This is a restricted area!”
“Valkyrie,” Skulduggery said.
She walked up to Mien, and the prison warden turned his attention to her. “This is my gaol and when you are here you operate by my rules, and this is not—”
Valkyrie smacked her palm into his jaw and he went backwards, his legs giving out. He crumpled to the floor where she cuffed him, binding symbols glowing on the narrow shackles. “Mr Mien,” she said, kneeling on his back, “you’re under arrest for, uh …” She looked to Skulduggery for help.
“Improper use of inmates,” he suggested.
“There you go,” she nodded. “You have the right to remain unconscious.”
Mien did not respond.
“Very well done,” said Skulduggery. “What do you think, Silas? Do you think that was well done? How does it compare to the way you were arrested all those years ago? Tyren Lament, wasn’t it, the man who arrested you?”
“Lament,” Nadir said, and spat. “It’s his fault I’m here. His fault I’m—”
Skulduggery interrupted him. “Actually, it would be your fault. You know, for killing all those people. Speaking of Lament, as we were, I need to know the names of his associates.”
Nadir glared. “Go to hell.”
“Silas, now really. Is that any way to speak to the person who has just liberated you from the void? Lament’s colleagues. Who were they?”
Nadir licked his lips. “And what if I tell you? What do I get?”
“You get unhooked, Silas.”
“You say I’ve been here for fifteen years? The last thing I remember is being in my cell. OK. OK, I’ll help you, but in return you hook me back up.”
Skulduggery tilted his head. “I’m sorry?”
“You hook me back up to this thing. Let me serve my sentence here. If you do that, I’ll help you.”
“See?” Mien said from beneath Valkyrie, his voice shaky. “He wants to be here …”
“Shut up,” Valkyrie said. “He wants to be here because fifteen years went by and he didn’t even notice it. But he wasn’t sent to prison just so it could pass in the blink of an eye. He has to suffer.”
“That’s my condition,” Nadir said. “I know a few of Lament’s buddies. He called in three or four of them when he was hunting me. I can help you. I know what you need.”
“OK,” Skulduggery said, “you have a deal. Give me the names.”
Nadir laughed. “Call me cynical, skeleton, but I don’t trust you. I want this deal on paper and signed by the Grand Mage himself – by the end of the day. And I want it on that special Sanctuary paper I’ve heard about, the kind that can only be written on by the Elders. You’re not going to cheat me out of this.”
Skulduggery was quiet for a moment. “We’ll see what we can do,” he said.
Nadir was sitting behind a desk when a Cleaver escorted them in three hours later. Skulduggery slapped the page down in front of him. Smirking, Nadir ran his finger along the embossed header.
“Official Sanctuary paper,” he breathed, then laughed as he started reading. Valkyrie watched him. His lips moved, forming the words. When he’d finished, he looked up.
“It’s already signed,” he said. “I wanted the Grand Mage to sign this in front of me.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Skulduggery said. “He’s a busy man. Too busy to be visiting prisons. You know it’s genuine – only the Grand Mage can write on that paper.”
Nadir tipped a finger to his lips. “And what about dear old Delafonte Mien? How is he going to be punished for his blatant abuse of power?”
“Mien is already in a cell in the Sanctuary. His punishment is yet to be decided.”
“You be sure to throw the book at him, you hear me? I feel violated, Detective. Violated.”
“I’ll throw this table at you if you don’t give us the names we’re looking for.”
Still smirking, Nadir lounged back in his chair. “Lament was a scientist, so he never went anywhere without his muscle to back him up – Vernon Plight. That woman was with them too sometimes, the small one, the psychic. Lenka Bazaar, that’s her name. And someone else.”
“Who?”
“Can’t remember.”
Skulduggery reached for the contract but Nadir snatched it back. “Kalvin Accord! That was it! That’s all I know.”
Skulduggery looked at Valkyrie. “Vernon Plight is missing presumed dead. Same with Kalvin Accord, and I’ve never heard of this Lenka Bazaar.”
Nadir shrugged. “That’s not my fault. I fulfilled my side of the deal.”
“Yes, you did,” said Skulduggery. “There’s no one else you remember? No one else they mentioned?”
“I wasn’t really taking much notice of what they were saying in between hitting me. Those are the names I’ve got for you. That’s all.”
“OK. It’s something to go on, at least. Cleaver, could you escort Mr Nadir to his cell, please?”
Nadir stared. “What? You said you’d hook me back up. You said you’d take me back to that contraption!” The Cleaver hauled him to his feet and shackled his wrists. “We had a deal! We have a contract!”
“Yes, we do,” Skulduggery said, picking it up off the desk. “Unfortunately for you it’s not binding.”
“But the Grand Mage signed it! Eachan Meritorious himself signed it!”
“The Grand Mage did sign it,” Skulduggery nodded, “but Eachan Meritorious is dead – which you wouldn’t have heard about, what with being hooked up to that thing for the last fifteen years. And unless Erskine Ravel, the current Grand Mage, signs this contract with his own name, well … It can hardly be considered a legal document, now can it?”
“You cheated me!” Nadir screeched as the Cleaver dragged him to the door.
“You’re a serial killer, Mr Nadir,” said Skulduggery, tearing up the page. “You deserve to be cheated.”
Valkyrie didn’t like murder scenes. The more she’d visited, the less she’d liked. If they were more along the lines of the murder scenes that her gran watched on TV, where elderly detectives tut-tutted around beautiful countrysides and manor homes, she might have changed her opinion. But the murder scenes she tended to visit belonged in horror movies or police procedurals, where the emphasis was on blood splatter and defensive wounds and, occasionally, finding the head.
Skulduggery had warned her that this morning’s murder scene contained blood, and lots of it. But that was ages away. Skulduggery wouldn’t be picking her up for another half an hour or so. If she were a mayfly, that would be practically a lifetime away. So here she was, in a nice bright coffee shop in town, standing in line like a normal person.
She gave her order, paid and stepped back to wait. A middle-aged woman in the queue behind her stopped rooting through her handbag long enough to look at the selection available and annoy the people behind her by taking ages to make a choice. She smiled at Valkyrie and Valkyrie smiled back politely. She looked like a nice enough person. She probably had a nice enough name, like Helen, or Margaret. Seven people stood behind Margaret, getting increasingly irritated. An eighth person walked in, joined the queue at the end. A big man in a long coat with a shaven head, looking straight at Valkyrie.
She met his gaze and he looked away. He was broad-shouldered. Looked strong. Margaret finally handed over her money and then stepped away to let the next person place their order.
“I always take so long,” she said.
Valkyrie took her eyes off the big man. “I’m sorry?”
“To choose,” Margaret said. “I always take so long to choose.”
“Oh. I wouldn’t worry about it.”
“And I can always feel the daggers being stared into my back,” said Margaret, chuckling. “I suppose I’m just not cosmopolitan enough for somewhere like this.”
Valkyrie gave her another polite smile, then took her coffee from the girl behind the counter and went to an empty table by the wall. Weird woman, being all chatty to a complete stranger. She blew on the coffee to cool it down and let her eyes drift. The big man wasn’t looking at her any more. Margaret was now chatting to the girl at the till. Music played. A young man sat by the window. He was dark-haired, heavyset, wearing a suit. Bad tie. He smiled at her. What was this, Be Nice To Strangers Day? She gave him a curt nod, which he mistook for an invitation. She groaned silently as he picked up his coffee and his pastry and approached.
“Mind if I sit?” he asked, a twinkle in his eyes.
“Something wrong with the table over there?”
“It’s a lonely table. All the beautiful girls are at the tables over here.” His smile widened and he sat. “Hi. I’m Alan.”
“Hi, Alan.”
“Can I get your name?”
Valkyrie. “Stephanie.”
“Beautiful name for a beautiful girl. So, Stephanie, what do you do?”
Catch bad guys. Save the world. “I’m still in school, Alan.”
He laughed. “No, you’re not. Seriously? Wow. How old are you?”
“I’m seventeen.”
“Seventeen. Wow. You look older. I don’t mean you look old. You don’t look old. Oh, God, I’ve probably insulted you now, haven’t I?”
He really did like to laugh, this Alan.
“I just saw you sitting here,” he continued, “dressed all in black, standing out from the crowd, looking like a girl who was worth getting to know. Are you a girl worth getting to know, Stephanie?”
“Nope,” she said, “not me.”
“I think you’re being modest.”
She took another sip of coffee.
“Well,” he said, “in case you were wondering, I’m twenty. I work in Boyle Solutions, around the corner there. It’s a pretty good job. Pays well.”
“Good for you.”
“I only started a few months ago but already my boss is lining me up for a promotion. I mean, here I am on a Sunday, on my way in for a few hours when everyone else is at home. They appreciate that kind of dedication, you know? In fact, there’s this office thing, some kind of get-together, next week, and I was wondering if maybe, if you’re not doing anything, you’d like to accompany me? It’d only be for an hour or two, but we could grab something to eat afterwards if you’d like.”
“I don’t think I’ll be available.”
“But I haven’t told you what day it’s on.”
“That really doesn’t matter.”
Alan laughed. “Oh, I like you. I like your style.”
“Excuse me,” she said when her phone beeped. She took it out. She didn’t recognise the number, but she read the message.
ONE OF THESE PEOPLE IS HERE TO KILL YOU.
She put the phone away, took another sip of her coffee. Alan sat there and smiled. Six people standing in line, the big man at the till. Margaret sitting in the corner. Another five people sitting around the shop. Four coffee shop employees behind the counter. Seventeen people in all.
“Good news or bad news?”
She looked back at Alan. “Sorry?”
“The text message. Good news or bad news?”
She shrugged. “Just news.”
He leaned closer. “Really? You’re not going to say it’s from your boyfriend or something? Maybe use it as an excuse to get me to go away?”
“I don’t have a boyfriend, Alan.”
“Now that is a crime.”
The big man passed behind Alan and Valkyrie tensed, but he walked on and sat at a table without making any suspicious moves. His boots were slightly scuffed, his jeans worn. The coat had seen better days but had character because of it. He wore a thick watch. No jewellery.
Now that the conversation had stalled, Alan hid his awkwardness by taking a drink and looking at something interesting on the wall. Valkyrie glanced at him. Out of shape but not obese. Soft hands, though. A watch that looked expensive but wasn’t. Off-the-rack suit, badly ironed shirt, bad tie. She leaned back, her eyes flickering to his shoes. No laces, no grips.
“Don’t you just love awkward silences?” he asked, and she smiled as he chuckled, and looked over his shoulder at Margaret. Her coffee lay untouched on the table before her. Her bag lay open, within easy reach. Anything could be in that bag. She was casually watching the people queuing up, like she was keeping her eyes away from Valkyrie’s side of the room on purpose.
And those were only the three people who had paid attention to her. There were over a dozen more in here who hadn’t even glanced her way. There were the men in suits and the harried-looking women and the dude in the jeans and the idiot in the—
Margaret glanced at her and looked away immediately. Valkyrie settled her gaze. Another few seconds passed and their eyes met again. Margaret gave a cheerful smile, and when Valkyrie didn’t return it, that smile faded into a straight line.
They stared at each other across the coffee shop.
Alan was saying something and the people to her left were laughing, and a new song came on the radio and Valkyrie looked at Margaret and Margaret looked at her. She watched her right hand slip into the bag. Valkyrie’s own left hand raised her coffee cup to her lips. Her right hand flexed.
Alan was still talking. About what, Valkyrie didn’t have the slightest idea.
“Alan,” she said softly, without taking her eyes off Margaret, “would I be unforgivably rude if I asked you to go back to your table?”
He didn’t answer right away. “No,” he said. “Not at all. You’d be honest. And I appreciate that.”
“Thanks for understanding.”
He gathered up his pastry and his coffee. “It was very nice to meet you, Stephanie.”
“Same here,” she murmured.
She didn’t watch him as he walked away. Margaret gave her a nod of acknowledgement. Valkyrie nodded back.
Moving very slowly, Valkyrie stood up. So did Margaret, who took her hand from her bag. She wasn’t holding anything. Three chatting teenagers passed between them.
Valkyrie stepped towards the door and Margaret stood in her way.
“Leaving?”
Valkyrie nodded.
“But you haven’t finished your coffee.”
“My friend’s waiting for me outside.”
Margaret smiled. “I don’t think so.”
Margaret took a step towards her. She was wearing a ring she hadn’t been wearing before. She grabbed Valkyrie’s arm. Valkyrie tried to pull away but Margaret wouldn’t let go. Margaret was smiling. And then she frowned, looked down, looked at Valkyrie’s jacket.
In the movies, spies killed other spies by jabbing them with poisoned spikes concealed in rings. Valkyrie grabbed Margaret’s wrist, pulled her hand away, saw the spike that had failed to puncture her sleeve. Margaret twisted, locking Valkyrie’s elbow, tried to grasp her bare hand. While people chatted and laughed around them, Valkyrie manoeuvred to the side, teeth gritted, trying to turn the ring away from her. They were being noticed now, conversations dying down. The spike drew closer to her bare skin.
Valkyrie bit Margaret’s face and Margaret turned and dragged Valkyrie across her hip and flipped her. Valkyrie slammed down on to a table, people jumping back and shouting, but all Valkyrie cared about was keeping that spike away from her face. Margaret pressed down. She was stronger than she looked.
The big man stepped in, tried to separate them, and Margaret jabbed him in the eye with her free hand. He fell back, cursing, and Valkyrie tried to get a knee between them. Margaret raised her up then slammed her down again, the table almost toppling, the spike almost nicking her chin, but now Valkyrie had one leg wrapped round Margaret’s head. She dragged the hand with the ring to one side, then hooked her other leg over her foot, caught Margaret in a triangle choke. People stood and stared. The only sounds were the music, the table rocking on its struts and the older woman’s strangled grunts.
Margaret heaved herself to one side and they both fell to the floor. But Valkyrie kept the choke on. Margaret’s face was bright red. She was sweating. Spittle flew from her lips. She was close to passing out. She brought her legs in, got her feet under her. Any second now. Any second now she was going to pass out. Margaret lifted Valkyrie off the ground. Any second. And then this frumpy, dowdy, middle-aged woman straightened her back, lifted Valkyrie high in the air, turned around, and dropped face down. Valkyrie hit the ground and her legs flew apart and Margaret rolled out, sucking in lungfuls of air.
Valkyrie focused on a shocked face staring at her. Poor Alan, frozen where he stood, probably vowing not to chat up another girl in a coffee shop ever again.
Still trying to get her breath back, Margaret grabbed Valkyrie’s leg, going for the ankle. Trying to find bare skin. There was a commotion, and then two men in luminous yellow jackets were there, pulling Valkyrie and Margaret to their feet. Guards.
Even as the Guard holding Valkyrie was telling everyone to just calm down, Margaret swung an elbow into her cop’s throat and ran, barging through the onlookers.
“I’m really sorry,” Valkyrie said as she turned and drove her knee between the legs of the cop holding her. He doubled over and she let him fall. The crowd parted for her as she hurried to the girl behind the counter. “Where are the security logs? I don’t have time to argue, just tell me where they are.”
“Backroom,” said the girl, her eyes wide. “To your left.”
Valkyrie rushed in, found the monitor hooked up to the CCTV. She clicked her fingers and fried the hard drive. Then she ran out into the street, scanning the faces of the people passing by until she saw Margaret’s scarf by an open door. Obviously a trap.
She crossed the street, passed through the door into what had once been a shop. Now it was just empty, with a ladder and a few tins of paint. There was a sound behind her and she turned. Margaret stepped in, a gun aimed directly at Valkyrie’s head.
“Do not raise your hands,” she said. “Keep them by your sides, away from your face. Those clothes of yours are bulletproof, I take it? Pretty fancy, but I suppose I should have expected that. Only the best for Skulduggery Pleasant’s favourite little pet.”
“Who are you?” Valkyrie asked, backing away slowly.
“You won’t care what my name is when you’re dead. I just want to say that I had planned to do this low-key. You wouldn’t have felt even the tiniest of pinpricks. And the poison? It wouldn’t have hurt. You’d have gone to sleep tonight and just not woken up in the morning. Painless. Subtle. But what happens instead? A fight in a coffee shop in front of dozens of witnesses. And cops! There were even cops!”
Wherever Valkyrie moved, that gun tracked her. “And you’re blaming me for this?”
“Yes, actually, I am. I’m a professional. I fly under the radar. A fight in a coffee shop is not under the radar. I have a reputation to maintain, for God’s sake. If I can’t take care of one teenage girl, what use am I?”
“Funny,” said a voice behind her, “that’s exactly what I was thinking.”
Margaret turned and a blade flashed. She dropped the gun, took a step and crumpled face down. Her last breath escaped her body and then she was completely still.
The woman standing over her wore boots, brown leather trousers and a brown leather waistcoat. She was blonde and pretty and her arms were strong, her shoulders wide. Tanith Low wiped the blood from her sword and smiled. “Hey, Val. Missed you.”
