by Derek Landy
The Black Cleaver dropped his scythe.
He moved between two swipes and grabbed the head of the nearest Cleaver, twisting it as he spun behind him. He shoved the dead man into the path of his comrades and lunged at the one who darted clear. They traded elbows and knees while they grappled for the scythe, and then the Black Cleaver whirled with a kick that snapped his opponent’s head round so fast that Tanith heard the vertebrae pop.
But the two remaining Cleavers were already too close to avoid. One of them kicked the fallen scythe out of the Black Cleaver’s reach while the other swung his own scythe down. With frightening accuracy, the blade slid between the Black Cleaver’s helmet and collar, pierced his neck and buried itself deep within his torso.
The Black Cleaver dropped to his knees.
“His head!” Tanith shouted. “Take his head!”
The grey kept both hands on his scythe, pinning the Black Cleaver down, while his partner took an executioner’s stance in front. The executioner swung without ceremony, without wasting a moment to gloat or ponder, but he was still too slow. The Black Cleaver ducked and the scythe cut through the snaith holding him down. Still with a blade lodged within him, the Black Cleaver sprang at the executioner, got his hands on that helmet and wrenched it to one side.
Three Cleavers. Three broken necks.
The remaining grey attacked with fists and feet and elbows and knees. The Black Cleaver was a blur. He never tired, he never faltered. The grey made one mistake, responded to a feint when he should have backed off, and the Black Cleaver got his hands on him and added another broken neck to his tally.
He took hold of the blade sticking out of his neck, and pulled it from him. Black blood dripped, and he let the blade clatter to the ground as he picked up another scythe.
“Where’s Fletcher Renn when you need him?” China muttered as she helped Tanith to her feet.
“Go,” Tanith said, grabbing her sword. “I’ll hold him off.”
China stared at her. “You?”
“I’m your bodyguard, aren’t I? Besides, Ravel needs to be stopped and I don’t know the way down to the Accelerator Room. So it looks like a grand and noble gesture is called for.”
China raised an eyebrow. “I’m almost impressed.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not doing this for …”
She stopped. Someone was whistling. Ennio Morricone – the theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. The Black Cleaver looked round.
Billy-Ray Sanguine stood beneath the flickering light, whistling, one hand in his pocket, the other dangling by his leg, holding the God-Killer dagger.
China squeezed Tanith’s arm, and ran.
Sanguine came to the end of his little tune, and he raised his head slightly, and Tanith reckoned he knew damn well that he’d never looked so cool as he did right at that moment.
“You have one chance to walk away,” Sanguine said. “I were you, I’d take it.”
The Black Cleaver faced him, his scythe ready.
Sanguine shrugged, like he was disappointed, and started forward.
88
Darquesse didn’t laugh when Valkyrie fell. She didn’t mention it at all. In fact, she wasn’t even looking. Her eyes were on the man who was emerging from a broken doorway.
“Here he is at last,” she said. “My little traitor.”
“Oh, I’m no traitor,” Dexter Vex said, smiling. “I’m just someone who wasn’t seduced by the carnage you promised. I’m just someone who understands that our goals aren’t exactly … compatible.”
Darquesse shrugged. “Your fellow Remnants believed what they wanted to believe.”
“Yes they did,” said Vex, “and they almost doomed us all.”
Valkyrie forced herself up. Her legs were weak, but her strength was returning. Slowly.
“And you think you can save the day?” Darquesse said to Vex, strolling towards him.
“Me,” Vex said, nodding, “and a few friends.”
A Remnant swooped down, attaching itself to Darquesse’s face. She grabbed it, pulled it away, and another latched on to her back. She reached behind her and a third was suddenly in her hair, its little claws tearing at her scalp. A fourth Remnant flew at her, and a fifth, and they were at her face and prising open her mouth and Darquesse stumbled and cursed …
And when her mouth opened, the first Remnant slipped in.
Then the second. Then the third.
And then a stream of Remnants flowed down from above, straight into her open mouth, and her hands were at her bulging throat and her eyes were wide, but there was nothing she could do to stop the flow. Hundreds of Remnants – no, thousands – flying into her, faster and faster, overpowering her, taking control even as black veins started to rise beneath her skin.
Then the flow ended, and Darquesse gasped, staggered, and Vex watched the whole thing with his hands in his pockets.
“You’re going to deliver what you promised,” he said. “You’re going to give us a playground that will be ours forever.”
The black veins faded slightly. “You think you can … you think …”
She gasped again and the black veins rose. Her lips darkened.
“You’re one of us now,” said Vex. “It took practically all of us to do it, but I think it’s been worth it, don’t you? Now it’s time for you to do what you do best. Kill. Destroy. Have fun.”
Darquesse smiled, but the smile turned sour, and she frowned.
The veins faded again before rising. She was fighting it.
“Practically all of you?” she rasped. “Should’ve brought more.”
She stood up straight, eyes locked on Vex. “I’m killing your brothers and sisters.”
For the first time, Vex lost his confidence. “Impossible.”
“I’m killing,” Darquesse said slowly, “every last one of them. I’m burning them inside me. They want to … they want to get out …”
“Stop,” said Vex. “Stop!” Energy burst from his hand, but Darquesse caught it in her palm. Her skin sizzled, and healed.
“They’re making me stronger,” she said. “Every one of them I kill makes me that little bit … stronger.” The last of the veins faded. Her lips returned to their full, natural colour, and she smiled.
Vex launched himself at her and she batted his hands away and grabbed him by the throat. She forced her hand into his mouth, shoving it down his gullet.
“Come on now,” she said, “where are you? Don’t bother trying to hide. I can put you back together. You know I can. I can make you solid again. Ah, there you are … Come on out. Come on …”
She yanked the Remnant free and Vex sagged, and she threw him away. He hurtled through the air, landed and rolled. Dead or unconscious, with all that blood Valkyrie didn’t know. All she knew was that he’d landed in the street beside her.
The Remnant wriggled in Darquesse’s grip, but its struggles only made her widen her smile.
“Scared, are you? I bet you are. When you’re like this, you can’t form thoughts, can you? Not really. All you are is instinct. Emotion. Right now, all you are is fear.”
Valkyrie reached Vex without Darquesse looking round, and she tugged the backpack from over his shoulder. She wanted to check his pulse, to check he was still alive, but she couldn’t, she had to move, and so she sprinted for the other side of the street. Once safely behind a half-demolished wall, she put the bag on her back, fixing the strap across her chest, feeling the reassuring weight of the Sceptre. She peeked out as Darquesse let the Remnant go, and watched her laugh at the speed with which it flew off.
Valkyrie cut through the remains of an alley, started running.
89
She had to admit, she was impressed.
Sanguine wasn’t taking any chances fighting the Black Cleaver, but neither was he missing opportunities. The God-Killer dagger gave him confidence, but he wasn’t letting that spill over into cockiness. He attacked with skill, and timing, and patience, and he came close a few times. The Bla
ck Cleaver obviously knew what the dagger was, because he twisted and spun and danced just out of reach. There was a healthy respect at work here from both men.
Sanguine stumbled away from a swiping blade, into the wall. And he smiled.
The wall crumbled and he sank into it. The Black Cleaver turned, wary, stepping lightly and quickly.
Sanguine lunged from the opposite wall and the Black Cleaver blocked the slash, but the dagger cut through the scythe blade like it was paper. The Cleaver abandoned his weapon and flipped backwards, to the door of the Ops Room. He snatched a fallen scythe from the ground and whirled, but Sanguine was already gone.
The Black Cleaver was outmatched.
He turned his visored helmet towards Tanith, then broke into a sprint, and she readied herself.
As the Cleaver sprinted down the corridor, Sanguine leaped out of one wall and into the other, criss-crossing his path, slashing at every chance he got. The Cleaver flipped or jumped or whirled away from every cut. The closer he got to Tanith, the more desperate Sanguine seemed to become. Tanith tightened her grip on her sword, and bared her teeth.
The Cleaver was five strides from her when Sanguine tackled him. The dagger fell and the Cleaver’s elbow smacked into the Texan’s jaw, and he spun, ended up facing Tanith, the Black Cleaver right behind him, scythe whirling in his hands.
Tanith opened her mouth to shout a warning.
The scythe swung for Sanguine’s neck, but he was already turning, launching himself into a dive. Tanith had seen walls and floors crack before him, but never had she seen clothes and flesh. This was the moment where that changed. The Black Cleaver’s armoured coat frayed and the pale skin beneath split, almost too fast for it to register, and Sanguine dived through the Cleaver. He hit the ground behind and rolled to his feet, dripping with black blood. The Cleaver looked down at his ruined torso. Now Sanguine grinned, his cockiness returning to him. And he had a right to be cocky. Diving through the body would have killed just about any living creature.
But, of course, the Black Cleaver wasn’t living.
Sanguine was still grinning when the Black Cleaver twisted round, and the tip of the scythe blade whispered across his throat.
For a moment, he stood there, frowning. Then a thin line of red opened up above his collar. He coughed, and the wound opened further, and wider, and he stepped back, gagging, his hands up, trying to close the cut, to keep the blood in. He dropped to his knees, the front of his shirt turning red, his tie becoming sodden. Blood splashed on to the floor, soaking into his trousers. He toppled over sideways, dislodging his sunglasses. He lay there, mouth open, gasping for breath that wouldn’t come, choking on blood he couldn’t spit.
And then he died.
Something wrenched deep within Tanith’s chest.
The Black Cleaver turned to her.
He attacked and she blocked. Blades clashed. He was fast and so was she. Something burned inside her. Sanguine was dead. Did she care?
Some part of her did.
The burning gave her strength. Her wounds still bled and her head still spun, but she had found her centre now, and she sank into it and let her body do what it wanted to do. No longer was fear clouding her judgement. No longer were frightened thoughts obstructing her flow. She was an extension of her weapon, and her weapon was an extension of her.
She thrust her sword through the Cleaver’s ruined coat, then retracted it and spun away before the scythe reached her. She found an odd, detached satisfaction in noting the black blood she had drawn. But she could stab him in the chest all day and it wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference. He was a zombie. The only way to stop him was to take his head – but there was no way she was going to be able to do that while he wore that uniform.
She was reminded of something she’d once told Valkyrie, years ago, and she smiled thinly as they broke off.
The Black Cleaver watched her get her breath back, the way a lion would watch an injured gazelle.
“I suppose it’s fitting,” she said, “that it comes down to you and me, after all this time. Sometimes I feel like I should have died that day we fought in the Dublin Sanctuary. I think that blade of yours was meant to kill me six years ago. Now, maybe Fate was looking the other way, or maybe it just changed its mind, but I survived. I always survive. And I always will.”
Then she turned and she ran.
The Black Cleaver stayed where he was for a moment, probably expecting some cunning new attack. When he realised she wasn’t turning round, he gave chase. But instead of leading him towards people, towards sorcerers and Cleavers, she led him to the quieter parts of the Sanctuary.
He caught up to her outside the Cleaver Barracks. Blades clashed once more. She backed up through the doorway into the training arena. Whether or not the Black Cleaver guessed her plan, she had no way of knowing. Similarly unknown to her was whether or not her plan even had the slightest chance of working. She was about to pit the Black Cleaver’s training against his new master’s orders.
Tanith edged her way into the Combat Circle, defending all the while. Her arms were tired. Her muscles screamed. Her sword got heavier with each parry.
She broke off, skipped back a few steps, giving herself room, and the Black Cleaver looked down, noticing where they now stood. He looked at her, and she took one hand from the sword and started to pull off her coat. It was just like she’d told Valkyrie, and like Darquesse had repeated to her. When someone steps into the circle, the challenge has to be met. No armour. No clothes. That’s the rule.
Yet the Black Cleaver stayed where he was.
When the coat was off, she dropped it outside the circle. Then she knelt on one knee, slowly put the sword on the ground beside her, and started on her boots. When they were off, she stood, looked at the Black Cleaver, and said, “Come and have a go. If you think you’re hard enough.”
The Black Cleaver watched her for a moment, then laid down his scythe and opened his coat.
90
Valkyrie heard them. She crossed a ruined street, then another. Saw them coming. They looked tired. Frantic, scared, and tired. Her mum held out her arms, and her dad passed Alice to her. They were taking turns carrying her.
Valkyrie stepped back, out of sight. Her insides were cold. Her thoughts were jagged and awkward, and they fumbled around the options in her head, unable to come up with anything new, with anything better. She was locked on a course and for once she couldn’t think her way out of it.
She heard her parents call her given name. She looked at her hands. Her left hand, wrapped in dirty bandages. Her right, wearing that gauntlet. She frowned, and peered down at herself, her mind suddenly swimming with a tremendous sense of déjà vu.
“I’ve seen this,” she muttered. “I was watching from … there.”
Her eyes fixed on the space beside her. It was empty, save for some swirling dust. But she knew it wasn’t. In Cassandra Pharos’s basement, she was standing there watching this happen with Skulduggery at her side.
“Hi,” she said, because she could think of nothing else to say to her younger self. She remembered hearing the words she was to speak next, and the overpowering sense of guilt that came with them. “This is where it happens, but then you know that, right? At least you think you do. You think this is where I let them die.”
Her dad called her name. They were getting closer.
She remembered what was set to come next, Darquesse waving her hand and her family being consumed by black flames. She shook her head at the image. “I don’t want to see this,” she said. “Please. I don’t want this to happen. Let me stop it. Please let me stop it.”
From her pocket, Valkyrie took the device she’d stolen from the Medical Wing, and looked at it through her tears. “Please work,” she whispered. “Please let me save them.”
She stuffed it back in her pocket, wiped her eyes, and ran out to the middle of the street.
“Steph!” her mum cried, grabbing her and hugging her. Her dad rushed in
, embracing them both. Valkyrie fought to free herself.
“Mum, Dad, you have to get out of here.”
“Not without you,” her dad said. “We heard the explosion and we thought … we thought you might have been in the middle of it.”
“I was on the other side of the city,” Valkyrie lied. “You have to go, OK? It’s too dangerous.”
Her mum grabbed Valkyrie’s left arm. “What happened to your hand? Is it broken? Oh my God, Steph, you’re covered in cuts.”
“I’m fine,” Valkyrie said, pulling her arm away.
“We found your friend,” said her dad. “The poor girl.”
Valkyrie looked at him. “Melancholia?”
“She was lying in the street. She … Steph, she’s dead. I’m sorry.”
“I know. She … she didn’t deserve that.”
“Come back with us,” said her mum. “Please, let’s just forget about all this and leave. Stephanie, this is insane. You’re going to get yourself killed. Please, honey, please come back with us.”
“I can’t, Mum. You know I can’t.”
“I don’t know that. You have no reason to stay.”
“I have the only reason to stay. Darquesse is part of me.”
“Steph, please, I’m begging you …”
“Mum. Listen to me. I might be the only person who can stop her. I have to do it. Nothing you say will make me change my mind. I’m doing this for you, and I’m doing this for Alice, and I’m doing this for everyone. Everyone, Mum. If I don’t, they all die.”
Her mother’s face crumpled. “But we can’t stay with you. We have to protect Alice.”
“I know,” Valkyrie said softly. “That’s what I’m counting on you to do.” Bile rose in her throat as she held out her hands. “Let me have her. Just for a minute. I have a charm I can put on her.”
