by Derek Landy
Jack crashed on to the bonnet and Skulduggery muttered a curse, craning his neck to see around him. Valkyrie watched Tanith step off the roof. She kicked Jack and he rolled off the side of the car, but as he fell, his fingers found purchase, and for a moment he clung on to the door, his malformed face pressed against Valkyrie’s window.
And then he hauled himself up out of sight and Tanith joined him, their feet heavy on the roof.
“Please stop standing on my car,” Skulduggery said softly.
There was a moment of sudden silence and then Tanith’s boots passed over the windscreen, kicking. Jack followed. He stepped from the roof to the bonnet, his right hand closed around Tanith’s throat, lifting her up and holding her out before him.
Valkyrie watched in horror as Jack held Tanith over the side of the car, the ground rushing beneath her. He looked down at Valkyrie and as he did so, he let go.
Valkyrie screamed Tanith’s name as Tanith dropped, but the Bentley sped on and she didn’t see Tanith hit the road.
Skulduggery put his hand out of the window, his fingers moving, and ahead of them the air started to ripple. Jack turned, realised what was happening, but was unable to prevent it. The Bentley passed through the wall of air, but Jack slammed into it and it knocked him back.
Valkyrie spun in her seat, and managed to see him land on both feet in the middle of the road, but the Bentley was already rounding another corner.
“She’ll be all right,” Skulduggery said, not even waiting for Valkyrie to ask. “Tanith Low has fallen off more cars than you’ve ridden in.”
He wrenched the wheel to the right and the Bentley fishtailed a little, then the tyres found their grip again.
The car in front wasn’t doing so well. It veered off the road and pedestrians jumped from its path as it mounted the kerb and crashed through an iron gate. The car jolted and spun, and the gate pinwheeled over it and hit the ground. Skulduggery slammed on the brakes.
The car ahead had stopped, its bonnet crumpled and thick grey smoke billowed from its engine. Valkyrie saw movement.
“He’s getting out,” she said, unbuckling her seatbelt and kicking open the door. Instantly she heard the siren.
She ran by a teenage boy, his eyes wide and his mouth open, raising his phone to take a picture, and she snatched the phone from his hand and leaped over the mangled gate. She ran to the ruined car, pushing at the air to clear the smoke from her sight, but the car was empty. She glimpsed Sanguine, dragging Kenspeckle around the corner of a building.
She grabbed Fletcher’s hand and pointed. “There!”
And then a Garda squad car braked sharply behind them.
They froze. She could tell that Fletcher was fighting his natural instinct to teleport. Her eyes flickered to Skulduggery. They all had their backs to the Gardaí, but Skulduggery had lost his scarf. If he turned, they’d see what he was.
“Get down on the ground!” one of the cops shouted. She watched them out of the corner of her eye as they advanced cautiously. They weren’t armed.
“Put down any weapons you are carrying and get down on the ground!” the second cop ordered.
Valkyrie didn’t move. Skulduggery raised his hands above his head. She heard the clink of handcuffs. She saw the first cop reach for Skulduggery and Skulduggery spun, grabbing the cop’s hand and twisting it. The one behind Valkyrie suddenly had a baton in his hand, but she whirled, kicking his feet from under him as he went to help his colleague.
Skulduggery wrapped an arm around the first Garda’s throat and applied the choke. Valkyrie pushed the air and the second Garda went skidding along the ground. He hit Sanguine’s car and groaned.
There were more sirens, getting louder.
Skulduggery laid the unconscious cop on the ground and all three of them walked quickly to the car. Valkyrie took the battery from the teenage boy’s phone and tossed the phone back to him. They got in the car and sped away – pulling in sharply to the side of the road as three squad cars passed. They got back to where they had last seen Tanith and slowed. The street was empty.
Valkyrie pulled her phone from her pocket and called Tanith’s number. After a few rings, the call was answered.
“‘Ello, my lovely,” Springheeled Jack said, a smile in his voice. “Tanith can’t come to the phone right now, on account of her bein’ so unconscious. If you’d like to leave a message—”
“Let her go,” Valkyrie snapped.
“—I’ll make sure she gets it. ‘Ave a nice day.”
The phone went dead.
27
WHEN KENSPECKLE MET SCARAB
Scarab laid the Desolation Engine on the worktable in front of Kenspeckle Grouse. It was relatively small for such a destructive weapon, resembling a stone hourglass about the length of Scarab’s hand. There were two glass vials within the stone frame, both of them half-full of a calm green liquid.
Professor Grouse’s voice was strained when he spoke. “And what do you expect me to do with this?”
“I want you to fix it,” Scarab said.
“So you can use it to kill thousands of innocent people? No.”
“Professor, I’m not going to waste our time. I’m not going to tell you that I was framed and imprisoned for a crime I didn’t commit. I’m not going to tell you how I watched my youth slip away from me while I was in that cell. I’m not going to tell you about the anger or the need to see my enemies suffer. I’m not going to tell you any of that.”
“Really?” Grouse asked. “Because it sounds like you just did.”
“You’d die before you’d help me, Professor. I know that full well. But you have the skills, the talent and the knowledge I need, and the only thing that’s stopping you from doing what I ask…is you.”
“And so your plan is…?”
“It’s quite simple. If you won’t change you mind, I’m going to change it for you.”
28
THE MIDNIGHT HOTEL
Guild narrowed his eyes at their approach. “I’m
starting to regret my decision,” he said. “A car chase? In broad daylight? Maybe Marr was right. Maybe you should all be locked up.”
“Maybe you should give Detective Marr something worthwhile to do,” Skulduggery said. “Right now Ghastly is checking out every castle within a two-hour drive of here. I’m sure he’d appreciate the help.”
“Oh, yes, because a source you will not divulge told you that Scarab’s base is probably a castle. That’s all you have to go on?”
“We work with what we have, Thurid.”
“Well, do you have anything else?”
“We have motive,” Valkyrie said. “Scarab wants revenge on the people who framed him.”
Guild looked at her. “What are you talking about?” he said at last.
“You guys killed this Esryn Vanguard bloke,” Fletcher told him. “You didn’t want him weakening your side or stopping the war or whatever it was you were scared he was going to do.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
Valkyrie held his gaze. “You had one of your Exigency Mages assassinate Vanguard, and then you framed Scarab for it and locked him away without a proper trial.”
Guild snarled at Skulduggery. “You’re supposed to be investigating Scarab, not me. You’re wasting valuable—”
“If we want to anticipate Scarab’s moves,” Skulduggery interrupted, “we need to know the truth. Is he coming after you, or both of us, or everyone? If he did kill Vanguard, then all we have to do is put you in protective custody for a year or so. He’ll get bored, or die, and it’ll all be over.
“But if he didn’t kill Vanguard, we have bigger problems. And we need to know what they are now.”
“Well, why don’t you work on the assumption that we have bigger problems and take it from there?” said Guild.
“Did Scarab kill Vanguard?”
“This is not—”
“Did Scarab kill Vanguard?”
“No,” Guild snapped.
“Mer
itorious ordered the assassination,” Valkyrie pressed.
“It was a necessary move to make,” Guild said.
“Vanguard was on your own side.”
“Vanguard was on no one’s side but his own.”
“That didn’t make him an enemy.”
“I’m not going to stand here and explain our actions to you. We did what had to be done and if there are ramifications, I’ll deal with them when this particular crisis is over. Are we agreed? Excellent. So now that you know all of Scarab’s grievances, you’re going to catch him, yes?”
“It brings us a step closer,” Skulduggery said. “But our main concern is that Desolation Engine.”
“It’s deactivated,” Guild said. “Useless. Why would that be of concern to us?”
“Because there’s only one man alive who could possibly fix it and Scarab’s just kidnapped him.”
Guild paled. “Grouse could repair the Engine?”
“The man’s a scientific genius. He could do anything. The question becomes, of course, will he repair it? And I really don’t think he will. I think he’d rather die than be responsible for hurting people.”
“You had better be right.”
“But we don’t want him to die,” Valkyrie said angrily. “If anyone dies, it should be…”
Guild looked at her and she shut up.
“Will he be tortured?” Fletcher asked, his voice quiet. “I know you people do a lot of that kind of stuff…But the Professor’s an old man. He won’t be able to take it. It was bad enough he was in a car crash.”
Valkyrie frowned, the thought suddenly striking her. “Why was he in a car crash? Why were they in a car at all? Sanguine could have just grabbed him and tunnelled away with him. Why did they take a car?”
“I was wondering that myself,” Skulduggery said. “The only explanation I can think of is that maybe he was trying to lead us somewhere.”
“A trap?”
“That’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Then it’s a good thing he crashed.”
“It has been reported on the news,” Guild snapped. “It is in no way a good thing any of this happened. If the worst comes to pass, if Grouse does repair that Engine, what will Scarab use it for? To kill me?”
“If he just wanted to just kill you, he could have done it when Dusk came in with his vampires. He might see the Sanctuary, as a whole, as being responsible for his imprisonment.”
“Then that is why he wants the Engine. He wants to destroy this place.”
“Maybe,” Skulduggery said, then looked up suddenly. “I know why they stole the Soul Catcher.”
“You do?”
“I know how they’ll make Professor Grouse help them. I even know where at least one of them will be tonight.”
“And you figured all that out while we were standing here talking?”
“I am a detective.”
“So what do they want with the Desolation Engine?”
“It’s probably what we think – they want to destroy this place. But I don’t know that for sure.”
“When you do know something for sure,” Guild sighed, “would you be kind enough to tell me? I’m quite looking forward to the day when you become useful.”
They walked to the Bentley.
“Fletcher,” Skulduggery said, “I want you to help Ghastly find the castle we’re looking for.”
“What are you two going to do?”
“Never mind that,” Valkyrie said. “Why did Sanguine steal the Soul Catcher?”
Skulduggery unlocked the car. “Have you ever heard of Remnants?”
“Are they a band?” Fletcher asked.
“Remnants are dark spirits, beings infused with absolute evil. They lost their bodies long ago, so when they’re able, they possess the living – sharing their memories, absorbing their personalities and hijacking their bodies. They are a plague. The last time they struck, in 1892, they took over an entire town in Kerry and burned it to the ground. The Sanctuary asked the Necromancers for help in constructing what would basically be a giant Soul Catcher inside a mountain in the MacGillycuddy’s Reeks. The Necromancers didn’t want to help so the Sanctuary did the best they could. The townspeople were led there, the giant Soul Catcher somehow, miraculously, worked and the Remnants were torn out of them.”
“Where are the Remnants now?”
“Trapped. Hundreds of them, it’s impossible to say exactly how many, were then transferred to a room they can’t escape from. If they ever got out, they would ravage this world, moving from host body to host body, building up their strength, building up their army.”
“If Sanguine traps one of them in the Soul Catcher,” Valkyrie said, “could he put it in Kenspeckle, use it to take over his mind?”
“I think that’s his plan,” Skulduggery said. “The Remnant will have all the Professor’s memories and skills, but it wouldn’t be him– not really. It certainly wouldn’t have his conscience.”
“Where’s this room then?” Fletcher asked. “I can probably get you there faster.”
“Not this time, Fletcher. You can only teleport to places you’ve already been, and this room in particular has a tendency to move around a lot.”
Valkyrie frowned. “What does that mean?”
Fletcher went off to help Ghastly, and Skulduggery and Valkyrie drove out of the city. As they drove, he told her all about the Midnight Hotel.
It was run by a sorcerer named Anton Shudder, an old friend of Skulduggery’s who fought alongside him during the war with Mevolent. Dissatisfied with the various Sanctuaries around the world, which he felt had grown too powerful and bureaucratic, he had built the hotel as a refuge for those who operated outside of official boundaries. His guests were often outcasts or outlaws or sometimes even out-and-out criminals, but as long as they obeyed the primary rule of the hotel, all were welcome.
The primary rule, Skulduggery said, was simple: no violence against any guest. If a fight did break out, Shudder himself would fight on behalf of the victim, whoever it happened to be. And no one, apparently, wanted to go up against Shudder.
“He must be pretty good,” Valkyrie said, “if everyone’s afraid of him. Is he Elemental or Adept?”
“Adept,” Skulduggery said. “If you’re lucky, you’ll never have to see what he can do.”
They drove on and Valkyrie tried to pin down something that had been bugging her for the past few hours – a nagging feeling in the back of her mind that wouldn’t go away. They arrived at a clearing in woodland, but she still had no idea what this stray thought might be. Skulduggery parked the car and they got out.
“You had better hold on to me,” Skulduggery said.
She clung to him and they rose up off the ground, away from the road and into the air. They passed over the tops of the trees, her feet rustling the branches lightly. Skulduggery kept them on course, and every so often she thought she heard him talking to himself, words that the wind whipped from his lipless mouth before they reached her ears.
They drifted down to a clearing, landing gently.
“What are we doing?” Valkyrie asked. “Where’s the hotel?”
“Any second now,” he answered, checking his pocket watch. He put it away.
A moment later the ground in the clearing rumbled and a building grew.
Wooden beams sprang from the earth and concrete seeped from the grass and hardened. The walls blossomed around the foundations, and inside Valkyrie saw rooms being born and tables flowering. A second storey grew and then a third, and the walls sprouted a roof that joined in the middle. Glass dripped from the tops of windows and formed panes, and doorways grew doors. The last thing to grow was a sign that said The Midnight Hotel.
“Every twelve hours it grows in another location around the world,” Skulduggery said, “and everyone inside is transported with it. He could have called it the Midday Hotel, I suppose, but Midnight sounds so much better, don’t you think?”
“I do,” Valkyrie sai
d, a little stunned. She followed him inside.
There was a reception desk and maybe two dozen hooks on a board behind it for the room keys to hang from. Beside the board there was an open door that led to a backroom. There was a lamp and a ledger on the desk, and a single pen.
They walked through into the common room. A couple of old chairs, a sofa and a low table were arranged around the fireplace, for guests to come down to in the evening and relax. There was a bookshelf along one wall and a door that led somewhere, possibly the kitchen or the dining area. A woman came down the stairs, ignored them and walked out. They went back to the reception desk. A man stood there now – tall, with long black hair, dressed like a funeral director. He smiled gently.
“Hello, my friend,” he said to Skulduggery. “Providing you are not here to bother my guests, it is good to see you.”
“Likewise. Valkyrie Cain, this is Anton Shudder, the owner and manager of the Midnight Hotel.”
Shudder bowed his head to her. “It pleases me to meet you, Valkyrie. I’ve heard stories.”
“Good stories or bad stories?”
“All stories are good stories,” he smiled, “even the bad ones. What can I do for you?”
“We’re here to check on the Remnants,” Skulduggery said.
Shudder took a moment to react. “I see,” he said eventually. “Are you here to count them?”
“We just want to make sure they’re still where they’re supposed to be.”
“You have reason to believe they wouldn’t be?” Shudder asked, stepping out from behind the desk.
“Dreylan Scarab is out of prison,” Skulduggery said as they followed him up the stairs. “He’s got himself a little gang of like-minded killers and we think they want to set a Remnant free.”
“And you think they have managed this without my knowing?”
“I don’t underestimate my enemies.”
“And yet you seem to underestimate your friends.” Shudder looked back at Valkyrie. “Twenty-four rooms, the walls, doors and windows reinforced physically and magically. There are seals around the perimeter, guarding against certain types of undesirables. I make it a point of offering the best protection to my guests. There is one room, however, that is different from all the others.”
