Resurrection

  First published in Great Britain by

  HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2017

  HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd,

  HarperCollins Publishers

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  The HarperCollins website address is:

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  Skulduggery Pleasant rests his weary bones on the web at:

  www.skulduggerypleasant.co.uk

  Derek Landy blogs under duress at

  www.dereklandy.blogspot.com

  Text copyright © Derek Landy 2017

  Skulduggery PleasantTM Derek Landy

  Skulduggery Pleasant logoTM HarperCollinsPublishers

  Skulduggery Pleasant © TM Derek Landy

  Cover design © blacksheep-uk.com

  Cover illustration © Tom Percival

  Derek Landy asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of the work.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780008169022

  Ebook Edition © ISBN: 9780008219581

  Version: 2017-05-26

  This book is dedicated to Yve.

  Yve, our friendship is like a fine wine: it improves with age, is fragrant and ebullient, and it has aromas of mulberries and pencil lead and …

  No. No, that’s not it.

  Our friendship is less like wine and more like a journey. It has twists and turns and sometimes you lose the signal for the radio and find yourself driving around in circles thanks to the cheap sat nav you bought from that guy with the …

  No, that’s not it either.

  Our friendship is less like wine, and less like a journey, and more like a … a …

  Listen, Yve, they’re going to print in the morning and I have to get this dedication done in the next few minutes but I really can’t think of anything that adequately describes our friendship so it’d be much easier if we just weren’t friends any more.

  Really sorry.

  In the nothing before the beginning

  there was a thought. And the thought

  became the beginning.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Glossary

  Dramatis Personae

  Keep Reading …

  The Skulduggery Pleasant series

  About the Publisher

  1

  A new beginning.

  That’s what this was. A fresh start. He was going to deliver this one piece of information and then leave. He could go home, back to New York, or maybe Chicago, or Philly. Ireland didn’t suit him any more. He was done with it – and it, apparently, was done with him. He was OK with that. He’d had some good times here. He’d had some fun. He’d made some friends. But a new day was about to dawn. All Temper Fray had to do was survive the night.

  The wall up ahead cracked. By the light of the streetlamps, the cracks spider-webbed. Any last vestige of hope that he’d just be able to walk out of here vanished with those cracks. Temper had seen this trick before. A redneck psycho called Billy-Ray Sanguine used to jump out at people as they passed, kill them before they blinked. Temper had met Sanguine once. For a hillbilly hitman, he’d been all right. Whoever this guy was, he was no Billy-Ray.

  The wall spat out a skinny little runt who came at him with a big knife and a bigger snarl. Temper ignored the snarl for the moment, focused on the knife, batting it away and slamming an elbow into the runt’s mouth, dealing with the snarl almost by default. The runt went down, all flailing limbs and broken teeth, and Temper hurried on.

  Yep. Things were going badly. But of course they were. Nothing ever went well for Temper Fray.

  A motorbike came round the corner ahead of him, its single headlight sweeping the storefronts, and slowed almost immediately. Temper kept walking, keeping his head down, his hands swinging loosely by his sides. The guy on the motorbike wasn’t wearing a helmet, and he wasn’t looking at Temper. He was focused on the road, keeping his head straight. Just a guy on his bike, that’s all, going about his business. As he drew parallel, his right hand drifted into his jacket.

  Temper lunged, shoving him as he passed, and the bike toppled and the driver cried out as he fell. Temper kicked the consciousness right out of him and the guy flattened out. Bending over him, Temper reached into his jacket, found the gun and pulled it free. He checked it was loaded, then flicked off the safety. His own gun was on the kitchen table in the house he’d been staying in, alongside his phone. He’d have traded all the guns in the world for his phone right now. What he wouldn’t give for a chance to call in reinforcements.

  What he wouldn’t give to call in Skulduggery Pleasant.

  He hurried down a side street. There was a woman walking towards him, silhouetted by the lights, her shadow stretching long and thin over the cobbles. He couldn’t see her face. It could be Quibble or, worse still, Razzia, or it could just be another citizen of Roarhaven going for a late-night stroll through the city. Temper held the gun behind his back and kept walking.

  They drew closer. The gun felt slippery in his grip. He went left and so did she, and it was only when they passed each other that he glimpsed a face he didn’t recognise. She gave him a courteous nod and he returned it, and they walked on and he breathed in relief.

  “
Excuse me,” the woman said behind him, and he turned just as a shadow detached itself from their surroundings and snapped the woman’s neck. She crumpled and Razzia stepped over her body.

  “Thirteen,” Razzia said in her broad Australian accent. “Thirteen innocent bystanders. I’m not saying I’m breaking any records, but you gotta admit that’s impressive.” She looked up, smiling brightly. Beautiful, blonde, always dressed in tuxedos, Razzia was also completely and utterly insane. “You have been a naughty boy.”

  Her hand flashed up and Temper ducked, hearing tiny teeth snapping beside his ear. He glimpsed the black tendril retracting into Razzia’s palm like a nightmarish tape measure and fired at her, but she was already sliding back into the shadows. There was someone behind her, striding up. A bald woman with a gun. Quibble.

  She opened fire and he kicked a door open and fell inside, more bullets peppering the doorframe after him. Inside there was a man leaping off a couch and a woman with two mugs of coffee in her hands, staring at him in shock as he barged past her. Temper ran into the next room, saw two men through the window and turned back, took the stairs. The couple shouted and raced after him, and now he could hear a baby starting to cry. He ignored it, hurried to the master bedroom, and through the wide-open curtains glimpsed a young man on the rooftop opposite. Thin, with shockingly platinum hair. Nero. Temper blinked and the young man was gone.

  “Dammit,” Temper muttered.

  He sprinted to the window and then Nero was beside him, sticking his foot out, and Temper tripped and collided with the wall. He twisted, bringing the gun up, but Nero was suddenly right next to him, snatching the weapon from Temper’s hand before vanishing again.

  Temper had a full second to get to his knees before Nero teleported back into the room, gun aimed squarely at Temper’s chest. This time he’d brought a friend, dressed in black, a uniform of rubber and leather. The mask he wore covered his whole head. Not even his eyes were visible behind those tinted lenses.

  “Hey, Lethe,” said Temper, slumping back and offering a feeble wave. “What’s going on?”

  Lethe observed him for a long few seconds. When he spoke, his voice was that familiar hollowed whisper that picked over every word with undisguised relish. “I knew you were never truly one of us.”

  Temper shrugged. “Easy to say with hindsight …”

  “I could see it in your eyes,” Lethe said. “Despite your protestations, despite your wild claims, you didn’t hate the mortals nearly enough.”

  “Well,” Temper said, resting his back against the wall and crossing his legs at the ankles, “I’ve always had trouble hating people because they’re different than me. It’s a black thing; you wouldn’t understand. Or maybe you would. Could there be a brother hiding beneath that freaky mask of yours?”

  There was movement out on the landing, and Lethe stepped aside as Razzia sidled in. Memphis and Quibble shoved the young couple into the room behind her.

  “Look who we found downstairs,” Razzia said. “More innocent bystanders.”

  “Please,” the guy said. “I … I don’t know what’s going on, but we’re not a threat to you, I swear we’re not. I’m – listen to me, we’re both Arborkinetics. We have a child in the other room, please let us—”

  “What’s an Arborkinetic?” Memphis asked, his lip curling while he pressed his gun against the young woman’s head.

  “Plants,” said Quibble. “He talks to plants. Makes them grow.”

  Memphis laughed and said, “Man, that’s dumb,” which was rich coming from a guy who dressed like Elvis.

  “Plants,” said the young man. “Exactly. We can’t hurt you. If you let us go, we’ll—”

  Quibble raised her gun to shoot him in the head, but Lethe held up a hand. “Ah-ah,” he said. “They may talk to plants, but they’re still sorcerers. They’re still part of the family. We don’t kill family unless we absolutely have to.”

  “Thank you,” the guy said. “Thank you so much.”

  “Hey,” Lethe said, “we’re all on the same side.” The baby started crying again, and Lethe glanced at Quibble. “Kill the child.”

  The young couple immediately tried to break free, but Razzia hit the guy so hard his legs gave out and then grabbed the girl, held her in a choke.

  Lethe didn’t take his gaze off Quibble. “You’re still standing here. The child is annoying me. Kill it.”

  Quibble had now gone quite pale.

  “I’ll do it,” Razzia said happily, but Lethe shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “I instructed Quibble to do it, so Quibble will do it.”

  Quibble didn’t want to do it. “Please,” she said, her voice soft. “It’s just a baby.”

  Lethe observed her through the tinted lenses of his mask. “I see.”

  Tears in her eyes. “Lethe … come on, please …”

  “You, ah, are refusing to obey, Quibble?” Lethe asked.

  Memphis glanced away, refusing to meet Quibble’s eyes. Nero looked bored, while Razzia watched with growing enjoyment, completely oblivious to the fact that the young woman she was choking had passed out.

  “I can’t kill a kid,” Quibble said quietly.

  Lethe took a moment. “Oh, dear.”

  She was dead. She knew it. Temper had seen that look before, that doomed expression on a slackening face. In his experience, there were only three possible options open to her at this point. The first was to run, but Lethe had a Teleporter on his side, which kind of ruled that out. The second was to give up: to accept what was coming or start begging. But begging wasn’t Quibble’s style. Quibble was an Option Three kind of girl.

  She raised the gun, aimed it straight at Lethe’s face. Immediately, Memphis raised his, pressing the muzzle to Quibble’s temple.

  “Don’t,” Memphis whispered. “Don’t you do it.”

  “This is exciting,” Razzia said, and clapped her hands. The young woman slumped to the floor, unconscious.

  “This is unfortunate,” said Lethe. “Very, hugely, unfortunate.”

  “I can’t murder a baby,” Quibble said.

  “Babies are just people who haven’t grown up yet. You’ve killed loads of people. Loads.”

  “So let’s wait eighteen years and I’ll kill this one,” said Quibble.

  “Oh,” said Lethe. “Oh, this is one of those … principle things, isn’t it? That’s … that’s sad. I’m sad now. You’ve made me sad. Because now I’ll have to kill you, Quibble, and … and I would prefer not to.”

  His hands flashed, stripping the gun from Quibble’s grip and turning it back on her, pulling the trigger before she knew what was happening.

  Her body toppled backwards. The wailing from the other room got louder, and Lethe handed the gun to Razzia. She looked at it like it was a piece of rotting fruit, and tossed it away.

  “I’m sorry,” Lethe said to Memphis. “I know you were close.”

  “She was my sister,” Memphis said.

  “Oh,” said Lethe. “Didn’t know you were that close. I feel I have to ask, though, Memphis, and please, try not to take offence. Are you going to try and kill me for this? To exact revenge?”

  Memphis looked down at Quibble’s body. “No, I guess I’m not,” he said at last.

  “Good,” said Lethe. “That’s good. It’s best, after a family tragedy, that everyone tries to move on, and put the past where it belongs. In the past.”

  “Do you want me to kill the baby?” Razzia asked hopefully.

  “What baby?” Lethe said, and turned back to Temper. “You’re coming with us, Mr Fray. We have questions to ask.”

  Another man entered the room, a guy with a braided goatee. Temper tried to keep him away but one touch was all it took, and all the bad thoughts Temper had ever had swirled and swarmed and swamped his mind.

  2

  When the bad thoughts crept up on her, and they did, they came slowly and quietly, slipping in unbidden to the back of her mind, and there they waited, patiently, for her to
notice them.

  She viewed them as if from the corner of her eye, hesitant to acknowledge their arrival and powerless to make them leave. They stayed like unwelcome guests, filling the space they occupied and spreading outwards. They slowed her down. They dragged on her, made her heavy. When she walked, her feet clumped. When she sat, her body collapsed. It was hard getting out of bed most days. Some days she didn’t even try. She knew what was coming.

  She was going to die. And she was going to be on her knees when it happened.

  She couldn’t see her death, but she could feel it. Kneeling down to change a car tyre, she had felt it. Kneeling down to clean up after she’d dropped a plate, she had felt it. Kneeling down to play with the dog, she had felt it.

  This is how I’m going to die, she’d realised. On my knees.

  And always, always, after this had occurred to her there came another thought, the thought that it had already happened, that she was already dead, that her body was growing colder and her blood wasn’t pumping any more. She experienced moments of pure terror when she believed, believed with everything she had, that she was trapped in her own corpse, that nothing worked and that no one could hear her screaming.

  And then she moved, or she breathed, or she blinked, and with each new act of living she clawed her way back to the realisation that no, she wasn’t dead. Not yet.

  It was mid-afternoon, and it was cold. The cold meant something. It was the last bite of the beast called winter, a beast that had stayed too long already. She could feel it on her face, on her ears; she could feel it seeping through her clothes. It meant she still had a spark of life flickering inside her. That was good. She needed that. But it also signalled a loss of focus, as she found it increasingly difficult to summon the crackling white lightning to her fingertips.

  Eventually, she just sat on the tree stump on which she’d placed the tin cans she’d been using as targets. Three of them were scorched. Two were brazenly untouched. Still, three out of five meant that at least her aim was improving.

  She hugged herself. It was an old hoody, but she liked well-worn clothes. Her jeans were a state, and she’d forgotten what colour her trainers had once been, but they were comfortable, and more importantly they were her. Lately she’d needed reminding of just who that was.

  She looked at the trees. Looked at the sky. Got her mind away from her thoughts. Her thoughts weren’t kind to her. They hadn’t been for quite some time now. She looked at the twigs on the ground. They were dry. It hadn’t rained in two weeks. A rarity for an Ireland still locked in winter’s jaws. She watched a beetle scurry beneath a leaf, caught up in its own little life. To the beetle, she must be a vast, unknowable thing, a hazard to be avoided but not overly concerned about. If a god is going to step on you, it’s going to step on you. You’re not going to waste your little beetle-life worrying about something you have no control over.