Skulduggery Pleasant

Cadaverous didn’t know where the Darklands were, but he doubted this was appropriate attire for their princess. And that was another thing that annoyed him, this lack of a straight answer. She’d been calling herself that for years, back when she’d been a voice in his head as he lay on that operating table, guiding him back from death, giving him a purpose. A focus. His mortal life had ended with that heart attack, and it had come crumbling down around him with that illegal search warrant, but he had seized the focus her voice had given him right when he’d needed it most.

His old life was nothing. His career in academia had been a waste. Those young people he’d killed mere practice. The sharpening of a blade. The loading of a gun. Preparation for what was to come.

The magic that had exploded within him had altered his perceptions in ways no mortal could possibly comprehend. Suddenly his life was so much bigger. He no longer needed his old house of traps and dead ends — now he could transform the interior of whatever building he owned into whatever environment he could imagine.

His newly found magic allowed him to distort reality itself.

If only he’d experienced it as a younger man. If only he’d grown up with magic, cultivated it, the possibilities could have been infinite. Who would he have been? he wondered. What would he have become?

He would have stayed young. That he knew for certain. The magic would have rejuvenated him. Instead of looking like a seventy-eight-year-old man, he would have looked twenty-two. He would have stayed strong and healthy. His back wouldn’t have twisted; his shoulders wouldn’t have stooped. He’d still be tall and handsome and his body wouldn’t ache and fail him.

The others around him were far older, but looked a third of his age. Razzia, the tuxedo-wearing Australian, as beautiful as she was insane. Nero, the arrogant whelp with the bleached hair. Destrier, the little man, fidgeting in his ill-fitting suit. They were all damaged, in their way, but the faces they showed to the world hid the worst of it behind unlined skin.

For all his irritations, he did appreciate Abyssinia for opening his eyes to a world beyond his old one. The question that weighed heaviest on his mind, though, was why she had taken so long.

She stood at the floor-to-ceiling window of Coldheart Prison’s control room, looking down at the tiers of open cells as the convicts – the ones who had elected to stay – huddled in small groups. Discontent had been spreading through this floating island like a slow-moving yet incurable virus. It was not an easy thing to keep hundreds of people fed on a daily basis, and it had fallen to Cadaverous to somehow deal with the problem.

“Do you think my little army is plotting against me?” Abyssinia asked.

“Probably,” Razzia answered.

“They wouldn’t dare,” said Nero.

“That’s what I would do,” said Abyssinia. “I would lead a charge and overthrow the people standing right where we’re standing. Then I’d take this flying prison and use it like a pirate ship, plundering whole cities around the world.” She sounded almost wistful.

“We freed them,” said Nero. “They owe us. And they could have left with the others, but they chose to stay. That shows loyalty.” He looked around. “Right?”

Destrier was too busy muttering to himself to reply, and Razzia just shrugged.

“Cadaverous,” said Abyssinia, “you’ve been unusually quiet of late. What do you think?”

He chose his words carefully. “I think they are unhappy.”

“Because we have failed to feed them?”

She didn’t mean we, of course. She meant Cadaverous.

“That is undoubtedly part of it, yes.”

She turned to him. “And what is the other part?”

He could have said anything. He could have demurred. He could have made it easy on himself in a hundred different ways. Instead, he said, “When we freed them, we made promises. We promised them purpose. We promised them revenge. We promised them power. We have yet to deliver on any of these things.”

He didn’t mean we, of course. He meant Abyssinia.

“You think I have been distracted by the search for my son,” she said.

Before he could respond, the door opened and Skeiri and Avatar strode in. Skeiri was a slip of a girl, dark-skinned and serious, while Avatar was muscle-bound, handsome and eager to serve. They had emerged from their cells all those months ago, and Cadaverous could see a time in the not-too-distant future when Avatar, in particular, was the one issuing the orders, much like Lethe and Smoke had done, and Cadaverous would have to obey. Again.

They held someone between them, a man with blood dripping on to his shirt, his wrists shackled, his magic muted. Avatar and Skeiri stepped back as Abyssinia approached.

The prisoner narrowed his eyes. They were remarkably piercing eyes. “I’ll never—”

“Shush,” said Abyssinia. “Listen to me. I want you to resist. I’m going to enter your mind and find out where you’re keeping Caisson. And I want you to try to stop me. You’re one of Serafina’s top people – you’ll know how to keep a psychic out of your head. Use all your training. Use all the tricks. Give me a challenge.”

The prisoner’s jaw clenched. It was a remarkably square jaw. “You won’t get anything from—”

“That’s the spirit,” Abyssinia said, and the prisoner’s face contorted. He clutched his head and let out a whine, his knees buckling. He dropped to the ground, face still stricken, and then, as soon as it began, it was over, and he sagged.

“My son is in a private ambulance,” Abyssinia said. “They’re keeping him sedated and moving. Right now they are somewhere in Spain. He’s accompanied by five of Serafina’s sorcerers.” She looked down at the prisoner. “You disappoint me. That was far too easy.”

He shook his head, the colour returning to his face. He murmured something and Abyssinia hunkered down.

“Pardon?” she said. “What was that?”

He met her eyes. “I wasn’t ready.”

“Oh!” she said. “I do apologise. Are you ready now?”

He cried out, face twisting, hands clutching at his head.

“You’re three hundred and fourteen years old,” Abyssinia said. “You watched your childhood friend die in a freak accident. The smell of tequila makes you physically sick. You’ve had a song you hate running through your head for the last three days, a song called ‘Uptown Girl’.”

The prisoner gasped and fell forward, and Abyssinia placed her hand on him. “Were you ready for me then?”

She drew the life out of his body, his skin cracking, his bones creaking, and his strength flooded her and she stood, kicking the empty husk of him to one side. She took a moment, shivered with her eyes closed, and calmed herself. She looked at Avatar. “Find this ambulance. Do not act until I say so.”

“Yes, Abyssinia,” Avatar said, bowing.

She walked back to the window. “Cadaverous.”

She had a task for him. He was surprised. He straightened. “Yes?”

She waved a hand. “The body.”

He frowned. “Yes?”

“Get rid of it.”

7 (#ulink_34af56fa-f70a-5e39-beb2-f433416f04ca)

“Chicken or fish?” the man in the hairnet asked, tongs hovering.

Omen pursed his lips, looking closer at the options available. The dining hall was filling up. There was a queue of students waiting behind him. He knew they were getting annoyed, but he couldn’t help it. Lunch was one of the most important meals of the day – he had to get it right.

“What kind of fish is it?” Omen asked.

“The dead kind,” said the man in the hairnet.