Skulduggery Pleasant: Mortal Cole

by Derek Landy

  “It would really be much easier if you just gave it to me.”

  “Come on!” Dalrymple snarled. “Let’s be having you!”

  “I’d really rather not,” Skulduggery said.

  “If you can beat me, you can take the key from my blood-soaked corpse!”

  “Again, not entirely appealing.”

  “Take up your steel!”

  Skulduggery sighed, walked to the closest wall and chose a sword with a jewel-encrusted hilt. Dalrymple walked forward, and suddenly lunged. The blades clashed, and Dalrymple began circling.

  “We really don’t have to do this,” Skulduggery said. “I mean you no harm. None at all.”

  “I mean you acres of harm,” Dalrymple growled. “Untold quantities of harm. I will visit a whole continent of harm upon you before we are through.”

  “You are an odd fellow.”

  China watched Dalrymple come in with three quick jabs. Skulduggery parried the first two and sidestepped the third, responding with a riposte that Dalrymple blocked easily. They went at it again, blades flashing and singing together. Dalrymple kept his left hand held high behind him in a classical fencer’s stance. Skulduggery kept his free hand low and out in front – far less flashy, far more cautious.

  “You’re good,” Dalrymple said.

  “You’re too kind,” Skulduggery responded.

  “I haven’t faced anyone half as good as you in a hundred years.”

  “That’s very nice of you to say so.”

  “Not really. I just haven’t fought anyone in a hundred years.” Dalrymple pressed forward his attack, and Skulduggery retreated, barely keeping the slashing blade at bay. “I’m rusty,” Dalrymple continued. “Out of practice. My form is all wrong.”

  “It looks fine to me.”

  “It’s sloppy.” Dalrymple batted Skulduggery’s blade down and swiped at his head. Skulduggery jerked away and stumbled. “In my prime that would have taken your head off.”

  Skulduggery scrambled to his feet. “How embarrassing for you.”

  “There was a time in my life when swordplay was the only thing that meant anything.”

  “Everyone needs a hobby.”

  “But it was an empty time,” Dalrymple said, almost sobbed. “A lonely time.” Skulduggery moved in, trying to take advantage of the distraction, but couldn’t get through Dalrymple’s defence. “And then the Remnant came into me, and that loneliness went away.” Dalrymple slashed, cutting through the sleeve of Skulduggery’s jacket.

  Skulduggery backed off. “But you can’t remember any of it,” he said.

  “I don’t need to remember details. It was the feeling. The feeling of being whole. Being complete. That’s what I remember. That’s what I miss. That’s what I want back.”

  “And have you ever tried just making friends?”

  Dalrymple snarled again, and stepped in quickly, his blade seeking out Skulduggery, who was doing his best to remain elusive. “You mock me.”

  “I don’t,” Skulduggery insisted, on the retreat once more.

  “You laugh at me.”

  “I find it rude to laugh at a man with a sword.”

  The blades scraped together and Dalrymple flicked his wrist. Skulduggery’s sword flew from his grip, and he had to dive to the floor to escape. He rolled and came up, giving himself some room.

  “Burgundy,” China said, taking a rapier from the wall, “would you mind awfully if I replace Skulduggery for the remainder of this duel?”

  Dalrymple looked around, his eyes narrowed. “I’m not going to spare you just because I’ve fallen in love with you,” he warned. “I know about you. I know it’s not real love.”

  “But of course it’s real,” she said, flourishing the rapier. “All love is real love.” She sent out a light jab that he batted away. “Otherwise it’s not love, is it? Otherwise it’s pointless. A waste of time and energy. And I despise wasting either.”

  Now it was Skulduggery’s turn to watch as Dalrymple came back at China and she blocked, replied with a swipe that he blocked, the shrill taps of blade on blade settling into a rhythm as they moved around each other.

  “You’re trying to confuse me,” Dalrymple said.

  “I am trying no such thing. The love you’re feeling is a real and genuine thing. Just because it is not reciprocated in the slightest does not lessen its worth.”

  “You don’t love me,” Dalrymple sneered.

  “Isn’t that what I just said?”

  He neared. “You wouldn’t be fighting if you knew what it was like. When your body is a vessel for a Remnant, you don’t need tricks to make people fall in love with you. You don’t need their love.”

  China backed away, blocking and countering. She stepped up on to a chair, and then she was on the table, and he was following her up, the clashing of their swords only getting faster. It was dangerous up there, not much room to manoeuvre, and Dalrymple’s strikes were increasing in strength. China was impressed. Her wrist was already aching.

  She saw Skulduggery, out of the corner of her eye, retrieve his sword and walk towards them. “Burgundy,” he said, “I am a firm believer in fair fights. I really am. But we did not come here to lose. We came here to get the half of the key that you stole, and we won’t be leaving without it. So I’m afraid we must cheat a little.”

  While Dalrymple parried China’s thrust, Skulduggery poked at his leg – and Dalrymple’s blade clanged off his.

  China blinked, then defended, and Skulduggery tried again to injure Dalrymple. But once again, Dalrymple’s sword flashed down, faster than her eye could follow, and he batted Skulduggery’s attempt away and then resumed his attack on China. She would have thought it impossible if she had not been there to personally witness it.

  “Cheating against you isn’t easy,” Skulduggery murmured.

  Dalrymple jumped down from the far side of the table. China followed him to the floor while Skulduggery moved around. They closed in, their swords cutting towards Dalrymple while he defended with startling alacrity. China went left and Skulduggery went right, and still they failed to draw blood. The entire affair was becoming completely unacceptable. Any moment now, China was about to perspire.

  She leaned in with a deep thrust that was parried, but she responded with a flick that almost took Dalrymple’s hand off at the wrist. Now the master swordsman was on the back foot. Skulduggery went low and China went high, and then they switched, and switched again, robbing Dalrymple of a chance to anticipate their next move.

  “Surrender,” Skulduggery said.

  Dalrymple didn’t answer immediately, too busy defending. “You seem to have me beaten,” he said at last.

  “So it seems. But if this is true, then why are you smiling?”

  “Because,” Dalrymple answered, “I know something you don’t know.”

  “And what is that?” asked Skulduggery.

  “I’m not right-handed,” Dalrymple replied, and threw the sword into his left hand. China cursed and fell back under his renewed onslaught, and Skulduggery cried out as a sliver of bone was cut from his arm. China lashed out desperately to keep Dalrymple away, but his sword was moving much faster than her own, and she couldn’t find her balance. She fell to one hand, continuing the fight with her other while she tried to scuttle out of range.

  Skulduggery reared up behind Dalrymple and Dalrymple spun, thrusting through Skulduggery’s ribcage. Skulduggery froze, looking down at the blade that pierced his clothing. Then Dalrymple twisted the sword and dragged it out so that it scraped across Skulduggery’s sternum, and Skulduggery howled in pain and crumpled to the ground.

  China slashed her rapier at the back of Dalrymple’s neck, but he dodged, whirled, and his sword crashed against hers and suddenly her hand was empty. He kicked her in the chest and she went down.

  He stood over her with the tip of his blade at her throat. “There,” he said, panting a little. “You are defeated. Now it is you who will answer my questions. Where are they? Where are the
Remnants?”

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  The tip pressed against her skin. “Tell me or I’ll kill you.”

  Skulduggery was still curled up on the floor, his arms wrapped around himself. China sighed. “Fine. I’ll tell you. But if you switched on a television or a radio, you’d already know all this.”

  “I don’t trust modern technology,” he informed her.

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me? In that case, you’ve missed the countless stories of riots that are breaking out all across the city. All across the country.”

  Dalrymple’s mouth hung open. “They’re all out? The Remnants? All of them? That’s… That’s…”

  “That’s what you’ve been waiting for?”

  His eyes brimmed with tears. “Yes.”

  “For well over a hundred years?”

  He nodded quickly. “Yes.”

  “Then tonight is your lucky night, Burgundy. But you better hurry or else there’ll be none left to join with you.”

  “Yes,” he said, his eyes unfocused. “Yes, I… I have to go.”

  The tip of his sword wavered from her throat and China lashed out, the toe of her expensive boot crunching into his knee. He fell back and Skulduggery rose, grabbed Dalrymple’s sword-hand and wrenched it behind him, breaking it. Dalrymple screamed and the sword dropped, and Skulduggery threw him against the wall.

  “Give me your half of the key,” Skulduggery said, his voice cold, devoid of humanity.

  Dalrymple sobbed in pain. He tried to run for the door, but Skulduggery kicked his feet from under him. He stomped on Dalrymple’s broken arm and the poor man screeched until he passed out. China stood up as Skulduggery searched him, finally finding the key on a light chain around the unconscious man’s neck.

  “Are you OK?” Skulduggery asked China as he examined the flat piece of gold.

  “I’m fine,” she replied. “How are you? He hurt you, I see.”

  “Just a scratch.”

  “Just enough to make you lose your sense of humour?”

  He looked at her. “Only temporarily, I assure you. I’m right as rain now, though. We have one half of the key, Valkyrie has the other. We might actually win this, you know, even against overwhelming odds.”

  China shrugged. “Stranger things have happened.”

  44

  SIEGE AT THE

  HIBERNIAN

  Skulduggery and China arrived in Drogheda, and they all got into the nice warm van. Tanith immediately told them that Valkyrie had beaten up a priest and an old woman. China laughed, and Skulduggery handed Valkyrie the half of the key he’d recovered from Dalrymple. She pressed it against the half from the church and was unable to pry them apart again.

  They got on to the motorway and drove without seeing another car until they got to the slipway for Balbriggan. Two cars were stopped in the middle lane – the doors open and no one around.

  “A crash?” Tanith asked as they drove slowly by. Valkyrie could see no sign of collision, and she got the uncomfortable feeling that they were being watched.

  Skulduggery pressed down on the accelerator. “We don’t stop,” he said. “For anyone.”

  Neither Valkyrie or Tanith said anything.

  They reached the city centre and cut through the empty streets, ignoring traffic lights. At the entrance to Trinity College, a grit-spreader was pulled in to the side of the road with its lights on and its engine running, but there was no sign of the driver. They swung around St Stephen’s Green and saw a man running up to them, waving his arms frantically. Valkyrie looked away as they left him behind.

  The city was dead around them, killed by cold and fear.

  “Checkpoint,” Skulduggery said, as his façade flowed over his skull.

  Valkyrie peered out at the flashing blue lights of the Garda squad cars ahead of them. Four cops in reflective jackets waved them down.

  Valkyrie and Tanith lay flat in the back. Valkyrie’s heart was thumping wildly by the time the van stopped. She heard the window whir down, and a cop asking Skulduggery for his driver’s licence. China asked if there was a problem. The cop stammered a little when he replied that this was just a routine checkpoint, nothing to worry about. At least his love-struck reaction to China Sorrows was a normal response. That was a good start. But when Skulduggery told him that he didn’t have his licence on him, the cop ordered him to step out of the van.

  “Is there a problem?” Skulduggery asked.

  “Just step out of the van, sir,” the cop replied.

  “We weren’t speeding, Guard.”

  “Sir,” the cop said, irritation creeping into his voice, “I’m telling you to step out of the van. You can either do as I ask, or we’ll pull you out and arrest you.”

  “There’s no need for threats,” Skulduggery said. Valkyrie heard the door open, and Skulduggery got out. The door closed.

  “There’s four of them,” China whispered from the front. “One on my side. Three around Skulduggery.”

  There was a knock on the passenger side window. China wound it down.

  “Hello, there,” Valkyrie heard a cop say.

  “Hello,” China said back, a smile in her voice.

  Valkyrie noticed Tanith moving slightly. The streetlight glinted briefly across the steel of her sword. Valkyrie swallowed.

  There was a short cry from outside, then something slammed into the side of the van at the same time as China kicked her door open. The sound of the door hitting the cop’s head was unmistakable. China closed her door calmly as Skulduggery got back behind the wheel, and they sped on.

  “Trouble?” Tanith asked, sitting up.

  “Nothing I couldn’t talk my way out of,” Skulduggery replied.

  Valkyrie looked out the back window at the crumpled forms of the Guards. “Were they possessed?”

  “I don’t think so,” China said. “They didn’t seem especially strong.”

  “All it takes is one Remnant in a position of power,” Skulduggery said. “For all we know, they could have the entire police force on the lookout for us. Everyone hold on – we’re going to be moving a little faster.”

  He pressed his foot down on the accelerator, and the van roared.

  By the time they reached the Hibernian, Valkyrie was scared and depressed. She worried about her parents, and for the first time she worried about her cousins. She wondered how they were coping with what they’d learned over the past twenty-four hours. The events they’d witnessed, plus the madness breaking out all over the city, all over the country, would be enough to freak anyone out, let alone two highly-strung teenagers.

  According to the radio, the entire country was, understandably, panicking. The authorities were inundated with reports of missing people. Some commentators were saying this was a neurological virus, others said it was a biological attack, and still others were saying, and this was Valkyrie’s personal favourite, that this was God’s punishment for not going to church any more. Some of the attacks reported were genuine Remnant activity, but others were clearly down to Kenspeckle’s time-released thought bomb.

  Whatever the cause, the effect was the same. People were staying in, locking their doors and windows and isolating themselves from their neighbours. There were reports of scientists in hazmat suits walking the streets. The country was going crazy, and the rest of the world was just waiting for the sickness to spread to them.

  Skulduggery parked Ghastly’s van across the road from the Hibernian and out of sight. Making sure no one was watching, they hurried over to the locked door at the rear of the cinema. A hidden camera picked them up, and a few moments later the door clicked. They hurried inside and the moment the door closed again it locked, sliding steel bars into place and activating an alarm system that Kenspeckle himself had designed.

  “Ghastly called,” Kenspeckle said when he saw them. “He said they’re three hours away, if they’re lucky.”

  Skulduggery sent Tanith to check defences on the upper levels, and he took Valkyri
e with him as he checked the lower ones.

  “When do you think the possessed will get here?” Valkyrie asked as they walked.

  “Any time now. To be honest, I’m surprised they’re not here already.”

  “I don’t like waiting,” Valkyrie said. “I think too much. I think of everything that could go wrong with this dreadful plan of ours.”

  “Surely not everything.”

  “You are of no reassurance at all, do you know that? If you were any kind of a friend, you’d be telling me that in a few hours the Remnants will be gone and everyone will be back to normal.”

  “You mean if I was a true friend,” Skulduggery said, “I’d take this opportunity to lie to you?”

  “Pretty much, yes.”

  “In that case, this dreadful plan cannot fail. In a few hours, the Remnants will be trapped in the Receptacle and everyone will be back to normal. People can carry on arguing about who should be the two new Elders, I can get back to tracking down this Tesseract character, and you can continue your lessons in Necromancy while you go on another date with Fletcher, as Caelan seethes with jealousy on the sidelines.”

  He tested iron shutters that were sealing off an old doorway.

  “You notice everything,” she said.

  “Not everything, but a lot.”

  “He told me he loves me,” Valkyrie said. “Caelan.”

  They resumed their walk.

  “You don’t want a vampire loving you, Valkyrie.”

  “He’s not a bad person.”

  “Because he’s not a person.”

  “Don’t give me that,” she said irritably. “That’s all anyone ever says. He’s an animal. He can’t be trusted. That’s what he says, too. He calls himself an animal, for God’s sake.”

  “And what do you think he is? Troubled? Misunderstood? He’s a killer.”

  “Caelan is different from the others.”

  “Yes, he is.”

  Valkyrie frowned. “You agree with me?”

  “Absolutely. The other vampires are brutal, bloodthirsty animals barely held in check by their brutal, bloodthirsty code. But Caelan? He’s much worse.”