The tunnel got narrower and her claustrophobia kicked in. She kept her arms bent, hands at her chest. Her shoulders scraped the tunnel walls. A sudden fear flashed through her, that she’d get jammed in here, unable to move. She let the fire go out and covered her face with her hands. She was sweating. Breathing fast. Close to panic. Her progress slowed, the creatures working to get her through. The tunnel walls were tight against her shoulders. Her arms were forced down by her sides. It was too small. The space was too small. Too narrow and too low. She wanted to scream and lash out, flail and kick, but there was no room for that. She had to keep it together. She had to. She had to remain calm. She had to keep control.
The creatures were all over her. All she could hear were their scuttling legs and her own breathing. Another sound escaped her. A sob. Was she crying? No, not yet. But close. Very close.
“Please,” she whispered. “Please please please please.”
The creatures gave another determined shunt, and her head banged painfully off the tunnel ceiling and her shoulders jammed and she came to a sudden, jarring halt.
She was stuck.
Her arms were trapped by her sides. She could open and close her hands, and she could kick her feet a few inches, but that was all.
Valkyrie opened her eyes to complete blackness. She heard the creatures scuttling away to either side, which meant the tunnel had opened to something wider. She just had to get her shoulders through this last narrow bit, and she’d have room.
She started wriggling. She couldn’t bend her knees much, but she tried her best, tried to gain a foothold and push off from it. Her fingers scraped the rock. Her hips squirmed as much as they could.
Her shoulders wouldn’t budge, though. Nothing she was doing was moving her further on.
Closing her eyes, she forced herself to take deep breaths. Her hands were slick with sweat, and the air felt cold against her skin. She could feel the air against her feet, too, even through the boots. It was faint, very faint, but it was there, that space where it all connected. All she had to do was push off from it, then fly like a torpedo from a launch tube. Easy. It was going to be easy.
Her heartbeat slowed. She took another breath. Let it out. In control again. In control.
She pushed off hard, felt the air rushing around her body, felt it shoot up through the gaps and blow her hair off her face. But she didn’t move. She didn’t move, not one inch.
She tried to kick, banged her knee. She clawed at the rock, felt a fingernail break. The fear and panic and fury built up inside her, rose from her belly and swelled in her chest and burst from her mouth in a long, raw scream tinged with terror.
A shaft of light appeared overhead.
“Help!” she shouted. “Help! I’m down here! I’m stuck!”
She got no shout in return, save for her own echo. Another shaft of light hit the rounded wall of the small chamber. It was like a chimney, leading up, and she was at the bottom.
“Hey!” she shouted. “I need help!”
Another shaft of light, and another. Another patch of light, and another. Salvation, slowly being revealed. But it wasn’t like an escape route being uncovered, with rocks and debris being cleared away from the other side. Instead, it was like there was something on this side of the escape route, slowly uncurling. Something that had been blocking it, maybe sleeping beneath it. Something that she had woken up with her screams.
Something that those rock creatures had maybe been feeding.
Chapter 56
Panic
he could move her right shoulder slightly. She tried forcing it down, but it was just too tight. She scraped her left hand across her belly, fingers scrabbling for the sleeve of her right arm. She grabbed it, tugged as hard as she could. A few flecks of rock fell on to her neck as a reward. She tried again, snarling as she did so. Her shoulder popped free. She could move it now. Not much, but she could move it. She squirmed into the newfound space until she could move her left shoulder. Both hands pressed against the top of the tunnel and her heels dug in. More shafts of light were revealed, and others were momentarily blocked off as whatever it was made its way down towards her. Valkyrie gritted her teeth, fingers and legs straining, and heaved herself a few inches back inside the tunnel.
Her fingers flattened, her heels dug in and she heaved. Another few inches, this time. And then another few more. Her chin was almost inside the tunnel now. Her feet kicked around until she found a good place of purchase. Heaved again.
Inch by inch, with agonising slowness, Valkyrie got her whole body back inside the tunnel. Sweat stung her eyes and she couldn’t wipe it away. She kept going. She had to. She didn’t know if the thing behind her had arms or tentacles, but she couldn’t stop.
She had more space now. She could heave herself a greater distance.
There was a sound above her. She cracked open an eye against the sweat, saw a blurry shape filling the tunnel behind her head.
She didn’t waste her breath cursing. She just went faster, splintering another nail, banging her head. More space above. She squeezed one hand past her face, wiping her eyes as she did so, grunting in exertion. Finally, it broke through, and then she did the other. It got stuck halfway and Valkyrie suddenly started crying. She twisted and squirmed, felt the rock rip the skin on the back of her hand as it burst through to join the other. Now both hands were over her head, and she felt the air, felt the creature closing in, and she pushed.
She shot away from the creature, yelling in pain. Her jacket rode up over her chest, leaving her back bare against the sharp rocks beneath. She stopped and screamed, but didn’t let herself pause. She pushed again, cracking her head against the wall, feeling the skin rip all the way up her back.
She had space now, space to hug herself, space to bend her legs and raise her head. The exit was in sight.
“Melancholia!” she shouted. “Hey!”
There was no movement out there in the larger tunnel, and Valkyrie screamed her curses. She brought her legs in towards her, twisted sideways, cursing and grunting and sobbing, and managed to turn her body so that she could crawl the rest of the way.
She got out, got to her hands and knees, tried to stand, but she was trembling so much she collapsed. All she wanted to do was stay curled up like this. But she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t even rest. She opened her eyes, looked around. Melancholia wasn’t even there to help her up.
Her hands were cut raw, fingernails on both hands cracked and broken. The back of her jacket was soaked with blood. Every movement made her whimper.
She got up. At least her legs were OK. She could still run.
Holding her hands close to her chest, her fingers curled protectively, Valkyrie hurried on. Melancholia wouldn’t have been able to get that far, not with how badly she was limping. Valkyrie didn’t know what she was going to do when she caught up with her. Melancholia hadn’t even helped. She’d just stood there while Valkyrie was carried away. Valkyrie had half a mind to throw her to Vile and run on without her.
Valkyrie faltered when she heard a roar up ahead. Grimacing, she sneaked to the end of the tunnel, peeked round.
Melancholia was trying to climb to a higher ledge while three rat-monkeys attacked Lord Vile.
Valkyrie looked closer, trying to come up with a better description than rat-monkey. But no, rat-monkey was exactly what they were. They were humanoid, as tall as she was, covered in patches of dirty brown fur. Their faces were long and their mouths were small but packed with sharp teeth. Vile threw shadows, but they dissipated on impact. The rat-monkeys leaped on him, shrieking, bringing him down.
Above it all, Melancholia was halfway to the ledge.
Vile kicked the first rat-monkey away, slammed an elbow into the second. The third fell on him and they rolled. The rat-monkey was up first, dancing and chattering. Vile got to his feet, lunging, his hands closing around the creature’s throat. The rat-monkey squawked, its hands and feet flailing as Vile’s arms straightened and he lifted. They
may have been immune to magic, but Vile had hundreds of ways to take a life. Even from where she stood, Valkyrie heard the snap of the creature’s neck, and then Vile threw it to one side and turned to face the other two.
They snarled and shrieked their rage. Vile sent a shadow up to the ceiling. It wrapped around a stalactite and snapped it off, then swooped down and drove it through the smaller rat-monkey’s chest.
The remaining creature howled in anguish and went straight for Vile. It leaped for him but he moved, got behind it, wrapped an arm around its neck. He held it struggling against him while he strangled it, then let it fall.
Vile nudged the creature with his foot, while a shadow rose through the air after Melancholia. It lazily wrapped around her ankle and tugged, and she fell to the cavern floor, cursing. Vile lost interest in the rat-monkey, strode over to Melancholia as she did her best to stand.
“Stay away from me!” she roared.
Valkyrie took a breath, and sprinted from cover.
Melancholia tried to sweep Vile away in a wave of shadows, but something went wrong and she cried out, fell to her knees. Darkness pulsed through her skin.
Vile shadow-walked to her side, but just as he reappeared, the darkness pulsed again and he was gone.
Valkyrie skidded to a halt. “Where’d he go?”
“Thought you were dead,” Melancholia murmured.
“Where’s Vile? What did you do?”
Melancholia grimaced, and got up. “I don’t know. I think I redirected his shadow-walk.”
“Where?”
“Not sure. I don’t know how this works.”
“Is he far away? Are we safe?”
Melancholia hesitated, then shook her head. “I can feel him. He’s still down here. Still after us.”
Valkyrie looked up to the ledge. “You were going to climb up there? Let’s go.”
Melancholia scowled, and they started climbing. Valkyrie’s bloody fingers made climbing difficult, but she hissed through the pain, letting it make her angry, letting it reinforce her strength. She got to the top, turned and helped Melancholia up. They straightened just as someone stepped from the darkness beside them, and the White Cleaver swung his scythe at Valkyrie’s neck.
“Stop!” Melancholia yelled.
The blade halted, a hair’s breadth from Valkyrie’s skin.
“We need her to get out of here,” Melancholia said, wincing. “We can throw her to Vile as a decoy, or something. We have to keep going. You understand?”
The Cleaver nodded, slid the scythe into its fixture on his back, and scooped Melancholia into his arms. Then he took off running, and Valkyrie did her best to keep up.
Chapter 57
Beheaded
he echo of their footsteps changed, and they emerged from the tunnel into a cavern with a still lake in the middle. It was vast and black.
Valkyrie heard footsteps and turned as Vaurien Scapegrace charged out of the darkness, yelling a war cry. The White Cleaver suddenly thrust Melancholia into Valkyrie’s arms. His scythe glinted, and Scapegrace’s head popped off. Valkyrie stared as his body kept running and toppled into the water.
The White Cleaver swished his scythe into its fixture, then took Melancholia back from Valkyrie. There was another cry, this time a long, mournful wail, as Thrasher staggered towards them.
“What have you done?” he cried. “What have you done?”
“Don’t kill him,” Valkyrie told the White Cleaver. Melancholia nodded her agreement, and so when Thrasher was close enough, the White Cleaver merely kicked him. Thrasher went hurtling back into the shadows.
Valkyrie hesitated, then picked up Scapegrace’s head. She’d never liked him. The first time she’d met him, he’d tried to throw her off a building. Time and time again, he’d tried to kill her, until his failures actually started to endear him to her. She realised she had begun to view him as a dumb little puppy who would always turn up, sooner or later, to chew on her sock or poo in her shoe. She was going to miss him.
He swivelled his eyes to her and she yelped and dropped his head. He bounced, and landed on his ear.
“I’ll get you,” he wheezed. “All of you. You’re dead!”
Valkyrie didn’t know what to do. She glanced back. Even Melancholia’s eyes widened in surprise.
Valkyrie picked up the head again. “Sorry,” she said.
Scapegrace tried to bite her hand, and she slapped him lightly.
“Behave.”
“When my Master hears about this—”
“Scapegrace, what the hell are you doing down here?”
He sneered. “I’ll never tell!”
“Who’s your Master?”
“I’ll never tell you that, either!”
“How did you even get here?”
“Let me bite you. Just let me bite you.”
She slapped him again. “Scapegrace, listen to me. You’ve got a choice. Either tell me what I want to know, or I throw you into the lake.”
“I’m not afraid!” Scapegrace said defiantly.
“Are you sure about that? On the lake bed, all alone. Who knows how long it’ll take for you to rot away?”
“Go to hell!”
“I wonder what strange mutant monster fish they have down here. I bet they’ll start to nibble at you.”
“You can’t scare me!”
“You’ll go mad first, of course. Mad with despair. Mad with hopelessness. It could take years.”
“Shut up,” Scapegrace said feebly.
“Is your Master a man called Vandameer Craven?” Valkyrie asked.
“Yes!” Scapegrace wheezed proudly.
“He showed you another way into these caves?”
“Yes!”
“You need to tell us where you came in.”
“My Master will kill you all.”
“Craven’s dead,” Melancholia said.
His eyes swivelled to her. “What?”
“He’s dead, killed by Skulduggery Pleasant. But you’ll take orders from any Necromancer, won’t you? My name is Melancholia St Clair. I’m a Necromancer.”
“Mistress,” Scapegrace wheezed adoringly.
Valkyrie turned him back towards her. “You take your orders from us now, all right?”
Scapegrace looked at her for a long moment, then his face crumpled. “I can’t even nod! You took away my body, now I can’t even nod!”
“Were you trying to nod?”
“Yes!”
“Maybe you should tell us if you’re doing something like that.”
“Fine, I’m nodding, OK?”
“Good. Melancholia needs to find another way out of here.”
“Turn me round.” She did so. “See that tunnel up there? See the light? That’s a flashlight. Thrasher dropped it, like an idiot. There were a lot of us when we came in. Now there’s only two of us left.”
“Well,” Valkyrie said, “there’s one and a bit of you left.”
“Turn me round again.” She did so. He tried to bite her.
She held him by the few strands of hair that still clung to his burnt, rotten scalp. “When we get to that tunnel, where do we go?”
“Follow the flashlights the others dropped,” he snarled. “But there are monsters up there. Horrible, chattering monsters, and they’ll eat you. I hope they eat you. Not you, Mistress. But I hope they eat her.”
“I understand,” Melancholia said. “Can we get rid of him now?”
Valkyrie looked at Scapegrace. “I was actually going to miss you, you know that?”
“I hate you and I hope you die.”
“Right,” Valkyrie said, and drop-kicked the head as hard as she could. It shot past Melancholia and the Cleaver and was gaining height when Thrasher suddenly appeared from nowhere and leaped up, his hands closing around it. He landed and ran off, head under his arm, and they watched him go.
“I’ll get you!” they heard Scapegrace wheeze, as the two zombies vanished into the shadows. “I’ll get you, Valkyrie Cain
!”
A couple of moments passed. “Well,” Valkyrie said eventually. “That’s something you don’t see every day.”
“He’s coming,” Melancholia said.
Valkyrie turned. The darkness writhed in the tunnel behind them.
“If we can ambush him—” Valkyrie began, but Melancholia shook her head.
“Are you insane? We can’t ambush him. And even if we could, then what? Are you going to talk to him? Try to get through to him? Your friend is gone, you stupid little girl. We have to run. We have to get out of here.” She turned to the Cleaver. “Delay. You understand? Do whatever it takes to delay him.”
The White Cleaver nodded, and took out his scythe.
Valkyrie wrapped Melancholia’s arm around her neck and they hurried to the base of the tunnel.
“Hold on to me,” Valkyrie muttered, sweeping the air in. It lifted them, but for a moment Valkyrie didn’t think it would be enough, so she reached out desperately for more. The air buffeted them up and over, and Melancholia cried out as they landed heavily.
Valkyrie pulled her to her feet, ignoring the curses, and they hobbled for the tunnel. Before they reached it, Valkyrie looked back and saw Lord Vile emerge. The White Cleaver stood in his way, blocking his path. Two dozen shadows surged from Vile’s armour and speared the Cleaver’s body. The Cleaver managed to remain upright for a few seconds before a spasm rippled through those shadows and tore him apart.
Valkyrie dragged Melancholia onwards.
Chapter 58
The Main Event
t came from above, scuttling from the tunnel ceiling to the curve of the wall, moving so fast it was hard to keep track. Before it slipped into darkness, Valkyrie saw its pale skin glisten wetly.
“I don’t think we should go this way,” she said softly.
“You heard the zombie,” Melancholia responded. “This is the way out. What do you want to do? You want to go back?”