Skulduggery Pleasant: Last Stand of Dead Men (61 page)

Vex looked at him. “You really think you can reach her?”

“I just need to get close enough to talk.”

“I hope you know what you’re doing.”

Skulduggery tilted his head. “Me too.”

“See?” Tanith said to Sanguine. “Now you take everything they said and you pretend we said it and you won’t be so mad at me any more.”

Sanguine looked unimpressed. “That ain’t how this works.”

“Excuse me for a moment,” Saracen said, walking out of the room.

“So is that it?” Donegan asked. “Are we finished arguing about this now? Because we still have to figure out what we’re going to do about Roarhaven. We intercepted the convoy, we’ve locked those shield experts away where no one can find them, so now the way is clear, right? Now that we have Fletcher back, we can just teleport in. Anything else we should take into consideration?”

“Things have been happening quickly over the last two days,” Skulduggery said. “Mantis still takes its orders from what remains of the original Supreme Council, but at the rate those original members are falling, those orders could stop coming at any moment.”

“Maybe Mantis will give up and go home and the war will be over,” said Fletcher.

“Maybe,” said Skulduggery, “but Mantis isn’t our primary concern. The Warlocks are. Once Charivari is dealt with and the Engineer has shut down the Accelerator, we can start looking for other people to hit – Erskine Ravel being number one on our list.”

There was a click behind Stephanie and she froze, and a soft voice said, “Turn around.” She turned, slowly.

Saracen stood there, finger on the trigger of the gun pointed at her. “Apparently you can heal gunshot wounds to the head. If you make any sudden moves, I’m going to let you prove it.”

She swallowed. “I’m not Darquesse.”

“If you’re Valkyrie, why are you spying on us?”

“I’m not Valkyrie, either. I’m Stephanie. I’m her reflection.”

“You’re not a reflection.”

“I am, I swear.”

Saracen frowned, and the gun dipped. “Good God. You’re not like any reflection I’ve ever seen. You’re practically … human.”

“I am human,” she said. “I’m Stephanie.”

He looked at her for another moment, then motioned to her. Taking a deep breath, she closed the hatch and followed him. He walked into the living room first, but she faltered just outside the doorway.

“We have a guest,” she heard him say. “And before any of you overreact, you need to know that even though it looks like the real thing, even to us, this is actually Valkyrie’s reflection. It calls itself Stephanie.”

Stephanie walked in. Fletcher looked surprised to see her, but Vex and the Monster Hunters looked astonished. They came over immediately, peering at her, stopping just short of prodding her. Behind them, Tanith and Sanguine stood watching, and Gordon frowned in puzzlement.

“Step away from it,” Skulduggery said.

Vex and Saracen went one way, Gracious and Donegan the other. Stephanie looked at Skulduggery and she felt afraid.

“I’m not an it,” she managed to say.

“You’re wearing her clothes,” said Skulduggery. “Just more things for you to steal. You got what you wanted, though. You made her run from her mother. You took her life and her family. So why are you here?”

“What was that?” asked Fletcher. “Val ran from her mum?”

“It tried to kill her,” Skulduggery said, and now Fletcher was looking at her like she was some kind of thing, some kind of inhuman creature. There was something else in his eyes, too. A kind of hurt.

“I can explain,” she said, but they were already starting to ignore her words.

“How did it get like this?” Vex asked. “Leaving aside the homicidal tendencies for a moment, how did it get so real?”

“This is fascinating,” said Gracious. “Did you alter the conjuring sigil? I always thought the sigil could be improved, but who has the time to focus on reflections? But this one. It’s magnificent.”

“I’m not an it!” Stephanie said sharply. “I’m a her! I’m a person! My name is Stephanie Edgley. My parents are Melissa and Desmond Edgley and my sister is Alice. I live in Haggard in County Dublin.”

“And you murdered Valkyrie Cain’s cousin,” Skulduggery said.

Stephanie went quiet. Fletcher collapsed into a chair.

“I did what I had to do,” Stephanie said, her voice brittle. “The only things I care about in this world are my parents and my sister. I care about them because my whole purpose was to pretend to be Valkyrie and pretend to care about her family. Only it stopped being an act. I stopped pretending and I started caring. I love them. I’d do anything to protect them. That’s why I’m here. You’re going to need all the help you can get to stop Darquesse.”

Skulduggery tilted his head. “You think you’re coming with us? You think you can take Valkyrie’s place?”

“We’re the same person.”

“You’re a thing who murdered Valkyrie’s cousin.”

“And she’s a thing who will murder the world,” Stephanie said, anger biting into her voice. “Skulduggery, you don’t want to hear it, I know you don’t, but I
am
her. I don’t have her magic, but I have everything else she had. And I have the Sceptre.”

“The Sceptre of the Ancients?” Tanith asked.

“That was destroyed,” said Donegan. “Wasn’t that destroyed? Didn’t I read that somewhere?”

“This is the Sceptre from the alternate reality,” Stephanie said, “the one Mevolent rules. It’s bonded to me. And correct me if I’m wrong, but we’re kind of lacking a few God-Killer weapons right about now, aren’t we? When Darquesse turns up, I’ll be the only one able to stop her.”

“Or we could kill you here and now,” said Skulduggery, “and take the Sceptre off your hands.”

“You won’t kill me.”

“You’re so sure?”

“You won’t kill—”

Skulduggery took his gun from its holster and Stephanie’s mouth went dry. He thumbed back the hammer and aimed right between her eyes.

“Skulduggery,” said Vex, “just hold on a second …”

“It’s not Valkyrie,” Skulduggery said. “It’s not a real person.”

Saracen took a small step forward. “You just can’t shoot her.”

“It’s not a her.”

“I think we should all calm down for a moment,” said Gordon.

“Please don’t kill me,” Stephanie said quietly.

Fletcher appeared between them. “Stop.”

Skulduggery’s voice was cold. “Get out of my way.”

But Fletcher held his ground. “What if Val doesn’t come back? You’re going to let her folks think she just ran away, or something horrible happened to her? The whole point of having the reflection in the first place was to step in when Valkyrie wasn’t around. Killing Stephanie wouldn’t be about justice or making the world a better place, it’d be about you and your anger. That’s all. Valkyrie would want us to think of her parents and Alice at a time like this, you know she would.”

Tanith brushed by Skulduggery and gestured at Fletcher to step aside. “Move it, hairdo. I’ll sort this out.” She looked Stephanie up and down. “Look at you. You’re a marvel, is what you are. You’re something to behold. And I’m not like these guys, I know what you mean when you say you are Stephanie. Of course you are. I happen to be very discerning when it comes to friends, and you? You are someone I could see myself being friends with. But the real question here, Stephanie, is not are you a person, or can you be trusted. No. The real question is—”

Tanith’s sword flashed from its scabbard and Stephanie barely had time to flinch before Skulduggery came crashing into them both. Stephanie hit the ground, tangled beneath all those arms and legs. The sword came to a rest on the carpet beside her. Saracen went to snatch it up when Sanguine hit him, sent him spinning.

Hands grabbed her, dragged her out from the scuffle. Fletcher, pulling her to her feet, and then in a heartbeat they were in a quiet apartment and it was dark outside.

“Thanks,” said Stephanie.

Fletcher said nothing. Without turning on any lights, he moved to the other rooms, checking them. He came back and she felt an irrational need to fill the silence between them.

“I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose,” she said. “Tanith was only part of the group to make sure Valkyrie stayed safe until Darquesse could emerge. Now that Darquesse is out, Tanith can go back to being the enemy. And, since I have the Sceptre, I’m the biggest threat to Darquesse. Stands to reason she’d try to kill me.”

Fletcher murmured something.

She looked around. “Are we in Australia? Is this your place?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Well, it was. Don’t know why I chose to come here.”

“Maybe you still think of it as home.”

“That’d be pretty messed up of me, then, wouldn’t it? So which one did you kill? Carol or Crystal?”

Stephanie looked away. “Carol.”

“Does Crystal know what happened?”

“They don’t know anything’s different. Carol’s reflection took over from her. I made sure.”

“Well, aren’t you nice?”

“I … I wish I could say that I didn’t want to have to kill her, but honestly … at the time I didn’t see it as being wrong. I mean, I knew it was a terrible thing to do, but I didn’t feel one way or the other about it.”

“And now you do?”

“Yes.”

“Why? Because you’re suddenly so close to being human? Isn’t that convenient? Just when we find out about it, you start to feel guilt. You poor thing.”

“Fletch …”

“You know what? I believe you when you say you’re not an
it
. I believe you when you say you’re a person.”

“Thank you.”

“No problem. And, as a person, I really don’t like you.”

“Yeah,” she said.

He vanished. She stayed where she was and a moment later he returned, took hold of her arm, and then they were back in Gordon’s living room. A small section of floor was cracked, and Gracious was in the process of pulling a rug over it.

Skulduggery looked at her. “Tanith and Sanguine have decided to spend some time away from us. You’re not going to be safe at home, so you’re coming to Roarhaven with us. You have the Sceptre with you?”

“It’s in her bag,” said Saracen.

“Then we can leave immediately,” Skulduggery said. “Fletcher, what is the remotest part of the Sanctuary you’ve been to that’s near the Accelerator Room?”

“Probably one of the bathrooms,” Fletcher said. “There’s one on the third level down that’s full of leaky pipes? It’s pretty horrible and it’s always cold.”

“Sounds perfect,” said Skulduggery, and his gun floated into his hand.

hey teleported into the bathroom. It was dark and smelled bad. Skulduggery held up his left hand, reading the air, then he moved to the door and peeked out. Stephanie sneaked out after him with the others. They got to the corner and Skulduggery went on ahead. Stephanie heard a strangled cry, and then silence. Moments later, she was stepping over the unconscious form of a Roarhaven mage, into the Accelerator Room. Skulduggery was already talking to the Engineer.

“Who are you loyal to?” he asked.

“I am loyal to myself,” said the Engineer. “And to the Accelerator.”

“Not to Erskine Ravel?”

“It is not possible for me to have loyalty to people, organisations, doctrines or beliefs.”

“Has the Accelerator been used recently?” Vex asked.

“It has not been used in six months, one week and two days.”

“That’s when it was used to boost Kitana’s power,” Stephanie said.

Skulduggery turned his head to her and she did her best to ignore him and keep her eyes on the Engineer.

“So there are no super-sorcerers running around,” said Saracen. “OK, that’s a good start. Engineer, we’d like you to deactivate the Accelerator now, please, before anyone can use it.”

“Very well,” said the Engineer. “It will take me fourteen days to initialise proceedings.”

“Fourteen
days
?” Fletcher said, staring. “We need it shut down
now
.”

“I am afraid that will not be possible.”

“But the Warlocks are on their way.”

“If you do not want them to use the Accelerator before it is deactivated,” the Engineer said, “you will have to hold them off for the next three hundred and forty-three hours and eight minutes.”

“Great,” Vex muttered. “Well, that’s that. Nothing we can do here. Let’s refocus on Ravel and get this done.”