The Dying of the Light (62 page)

She darted suddenly, closing the gap between herself and Melancholia. Caught off guard, Melancholia tripped and Darquesse landed on top of her. She rained down punches. Melancholia’s shadow armour convulsed in panicked response. She wasn’t used to physical confrontations.

Valkyrie ran in, slipped her arm round Darquesse’s throat, hauled her off. Melancholia rolled over on to her hands and knees, regaining her bearings. Darquesse twisted, managed to hook a foot between Valkyrie’s. They fell, Valkyrie on the bottom. Darquesse turned into her, hit her with everything she had, but Valkyrie grabbed her wrist, threw her left leg over Darquesse’s head and straightened. Darquesse fell on to her back and Valkyrie yanked down on her arm as she raised her hips, and she heard the elbow break.

Darquesse screamed.

Valkyrie lost her grip and Darquesse rolled away, still screaming as she got up, clutching her dangling arm. Before she could heal, Vile sent a shard of darkness right through her torso.

Darquesse dangled there, off her feet, her eyes wide and blood running from her open mouth. The shard retracted and Darquesse stood, swaying. She was in shock.

They were going to win.

Darkness reared up around her, forming a Venus flytrap of shadows. It sprang closed, two dozen razored barbs skewering her body. The shadows started to melt and Darquesse stumbled through them, falling to her knees. She started to flicker. She was trying to shunt.

Valkyrie raised both her hands, white lightning flowing from her fingertips. The lightning hit Darquesse and she cried out and fell sideways. She stopped flickering.

Melancholia and Vile walked up behind her as she tried to crawl away.

Say this for her – she’s not going down without a fight.

Melancholia reached down, grabbed a fistful of hair, and she pulled Darquesse back up to her knees. Darquesse gasped, her face splattered with her own blood. Melancholia allowed her shadow armour to retract, and it lashed at the ground wildly, like a petulant child denied its plaything.

“This has been invigorating,” Melancholia said. “Truly invigorating. Finally, I’m realising my own potential. I can … I can sense life and death. I can see it. I can see it all around us. I see it in you, Darquesse. I see your life. I see how easy it would be to just … pluck it out.”

Darquesse reached up, tried to free herself, but the effort was feeble, and Melancholia slapped the hand down.

“I am the Death Bringer,” Melancholia continued. “I am the ultimate Necromancer. Who are you? You’re Valkyrie Cain’s dark side in the body of her reflection. You’re nothing but a collection of spare parts. And they were all scared of you? Really?” Melancholia laughed. Her eyes were black, and black steam rose off her. “It’s me they should have been afraid of. You thought you were a god? Maybe you are. But even gods can die. And I? I am death.”

“Melancholia,” Valkyrie said.

Melancholia looked up, blinking those black eyes. “Valkyrie,” she said, sounding dazed. She sharpened. “Yes. Sorry. Getting carried away with the whole power thing. Are my eyes black? They feel black.”

“They’re black.”

“Cool.” Melancholia glanced at Vile. “Let’s do what we came here to do.”

Their shadows moved like a thousand tiny snakes, burrowing slowly into Darquesse’s body. Darquesse screamed as blood ran. This time there would be no healing. This time there would be no surviving. They were going to kill her slowly, and make sure there was not even a sliver of life left behind.

Valkyrie’s hands started to tingle. She unzipped her jacket, pulled it halfway down her arm. The tattoo was pulsing. Not long now. She could almost feel her invulnerability about to slip away. It didn’t matter. Darquesse was done. Defeated. All they needed was another few seconds and then those shadows would split her apart, and it’d all be over.

Darquesse clasped her hands before her. Vile and Melancholia didn’t notice. Darquesse’s arms started to tremble. Silver light spilled from between her fingers.

Very, very bright light.

Valkyrie ran forward. “Stop her!” she screamed. “Don’t let her—”

But it was too late.

Darquesse opened her hands.

The silver light exploded outwards and consumed the world.

It swallowed Vile and Melancholia.

a deafening rush of air

the world filled with fragments

bricks and masonry

and glass and

wood and metal

Valkyrie thrown

    tossed

   and

        spun

buildings torn down.

folded

     like

   paper.

streets cr         d.

  um   e

    pl

lamp posts snap

p

e

d

And then everything was silent.

There was a wind.

Valkyrie didn’t know where it had come from. Just a moment ago it had been a still day.

A moment?

A minute?

An hour?

But now there was a wind, a strong wind, catching the clouds of dust and spinning them into little tornadoes.

She turned over

on to her back. Dust in her eyes. Dust in her mouth.

She was cold. She’d lost her jacket. The shockwave had yanked it away from her. Was she hurt? She wriggled her toes. Wriggled her fingers. No broken bones. Was she bleeding? She didn’t think so. She was OK. She was unhurt. Invulnerable? No, not any more. The tattoo had dulled. It had probably used up the last of its strength keeping her alive during the … what? What was that? That was more than an explosion. It had been like a small nuclear bomb going off.

Groaning, Valkyrie sat up.

Roarhaven was in ruins.

The eastern quarter had been obliterated. It was a flat, smoking landscape of rubble and wreckage. Fires raged in the southern districts. Some of the northern section still stood, from what she could see. Car alarms travelled to her on the wind. They sounded like people dying.

Valkyrie started walking. When she was sure her legs weren’t going to fail her, she ran.

Finding her way around Roarhaven when it stood tall and proud had been hard enough, but now the landmarks she’d used were flattened or gone altogether. She took a few wrong turns, had to double back, often climbing through demolished buildings to save time. She passed bodies and ignored them.

And then a rock flew at her, struck her across the temple, and she went tumbling down a small hill of debris.

She sprawled in a heap at the bottom, her elbows cut and bleeding, blood running from her forehead into her eye. There were footsteps, slipping and sliding through the broken mess in their eagerness to get to her. Valkyrie managed to get to her knees, her vision blurry. Figures approached. She saw hate in their faces.

“We hurt her,” one of them said.

“We can finish her,” said another.

Valkyrie raised her hands. “I’m not her,” she said. Her voice sounded weird. She sounded drunk. “I’m not Darquesse.”

She didn’t even see what struck her, but she felt the pain across her ribs and she cried out, fell on to her side. The figures crowded round, their boots seeking her, finding her, crunching against her. She covered up, yelled at them to stop. A rib broke jaggedly. A kick to her kidney sent new flashes of pain arcing through her. Someone tried kicking her skull and broke the fingers of her left hand. Again. They screamed and cursed and she heard their words. They knew who she was and they didn’t care. In their eyes, Valkyrie Cain was as much to blame for all this as Darquesse.

A kick found the side of her head and rolled her over, her body limp. Funny how this seemed to clear her eyesight.

She saw in perfect clarity the foot coming for her face. It was clad in a heavy, steel-capped work boot. Good, she decided. She would have hated to be killed by a soft little running shoe.

But the work boot never reached her. At the last moment, it vanished. There was another pair of boots there now. Brown boots. Well-made. Familiar. They stepped and pivoted and spun, and then all the other feet ran away. The brown boots bent, and a leather-clad knee came down, and gentle hands touched her face.

“Val,” Tanith said. “Val, can you hear me?”

Valkyrie felt her head being moved, and she tried focusing on Tanith’s worried face, but she couldn’t. Then she was being lifted, hoisted up over Tanith’s shoulder. A fireman’s lift, it was called.

Tanith started running.

She crossed the rubble smoothly, like she was skating on ice. She ran up the sides of broken buildings so that Valkyrie was looking straight down at the far-below ground. Tanith’s balance was impeccable. She crossed narrow beams in ruined houses, leaped from rooftop to rooftop, landing so gracefully Valkyrie could have been floating on a cloud. She blacked out a few times, but that wasn’t Tanith’s fault. That was just her approaching death.

And then they were inside, in the Sanctuary, and she was being laid out on a bed in the Medical Wing and a light was being shone in her eyes.

“Multiple fractures,” Synecdoche was saying. “Concussion. Valkyrie, can you hear me?”

There were people screaming. The Medical Wing was full of injured people. On the bed beside her, Valkyrie saw Saracen Rue hooked up to a respirator. She tried to sit up, but a pair of strong hands held her down. Tanith’s face swam into view.

“Steady on, OK? They’re helping you. Just stay there. Val, that explosion. Were you there? What was it? Is Darquesse dead?”

Synecdoche came back, shouldered Tanith out of the way and jabbed a needle into Valkyrie’s arm. Warmth flooded her body so suddenly it made her gasp, and the pain fell away.

“I need an X-ray,” Synecdoche shouted to one of her assistants as she lifted Valkyrie’s shirt. “We’ve got internal bleeding here.”

There was movement all around and someone was holding a scanner and there was a bright blue light, and Valkyrie lay there and looked up at the ceiling. She coughed suddenly, but it didn’t hurt. It didn’t even alarm her when she tasted blood. It should have, though. Coughing blood should have alarmed her.

She frowned. The warm feeling was nice. It was too nice. It wanted her to sink into it, to surrender completely. But she had things to do. She couldn’t lie here and bleed. What was it that guy said in that movie?

“I ain’t got time to bleed,” Valkyrie muttered, sitting up.

Synecdoche looked horrified. “Valkyrie, lie down, you have serious injuries.”

Now that she was sitting up, her head was starting to clear. She held out her left hand. Her fingers were swollen and purple. “Bandage me.”

“Lie down.”

“I’ll lie down when I’m done.”

Synecdoche clenched her jaw, but nodded to an assistant who hurried forward with a roll of bandages. While he wrapped, Synecdoche busied herself with applying a clear gel to the cut on Valkyrie’s forehead. Valkyrie looked around as best she could. Donegan Bane lay three beds away. She couldn’t see Gracious.

The door opened and China strode in. She was dressed in black. Her eyes were alive with worry. “What happened?”

“The explosion was Darquesse’s doing,” Valkyrie said. “There was a light, she was holding it, and then … I don’t know. I don’t know what it was. I didn’t see what happened to her.”

“I’ve heard reports that Lord Vile was seen in the area,” China said.

Valkyrie nodded. “He was working with Melancholia.”

“What about Skulduggery?” Tanith asked.

“I … I don’t know,” Valkyrie answered.

China’s face was anxious. “Vile,” she insisted. “What happened to Vile?”

Valkyrie looked at her. She knew. Somehow she knew.

“I don’t know that, either,” Valkyrie said. “He was closer to the explosion than I was. I don’t know what happened to him.”

China hesitated, her face no longer betraying any emotion, then nodded and walked out.

Valkyrie slipped off the bed as gingerly as she was able. She couldn’t move her left hand in its bandage, her right leg was stiff for some reason, and when she prodded her side, it felt rigid. She stifled another cough, tasting blood again.

“Chew these when the pain returns,” Synecdoche said, passing her a packet of leaves. Valkyrie nodded, stuffed them in her pocket and left before the doctor could find a reason to keep her here. With Tanith following behind, she glimpsed China talking with Cassandra and Finbar, and ran to join them, ignoring the ugly jolts that rang throughout her body with each step.

Cassandra had her eyes closed when Valkyrie reached them. “Darquesse is alive,” she said. “She’s weak, but recovering. At this rate she’ll be back to full strength in twenty minutes.”

“Fifteen,” Finbar corrected.

“What about Skulduggery?” Valkyrie asked before China could.

Cassandra shook her head. “We can’t sense him, but then we have
never
been able to sense him. His thoughts are constructed differently to ours, and this difference hides him from us. We were able to take a glimpse at Melancholia as the event took place, however – but I’m sorry to say that she didn’t make it.”

“She’s
dead
?”

“The girl means nothing,” China said. “Can you see Vile?”

Cassandra frowned. “Lord Vile is there? We’ve seen no sign of him. Are you sure?”

“What about anyone else?” China said, ignoring the question. “Any survivors?”

Cassandra nodded. “Some injured. Many scared. They’re running from the blast site … apart from …” She tilted her head, stayed quiet for a few moments, then, “Your parents, Valkyrie. Your parents and your sister.”

Valkyrie went cold. “They’re outside?”

“They’re running
towards
the blast site,” Cassandra said. Her frown deepened. “They’re looking for you. Someone’s … someone’s behind them, hunting them … It’s hard to see who it is, it’s hard to … a Remnant. It’s a Remnant.”

“Vex,” Valkyrie said. “He’s chasing them right into Darquesse’s hands. We need to go. I have to …”