LITMIR.BIZ

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way of doing this. I’m going to reach into my coat now. If I were you, I wouldn’t kill me just yet.”

      Moving slowly, Scarab took a phone from his coat.

      “You might have to shield the screen from the light,” he said as he pressed some buttons – “it’s kind of hard to see the picture.”

      He held it out. Guild swallowed, hurriedly put the spider back in his pocket and took the phone from Scarab. He angled it out of the glare of the dull sun and saw what he knew he would see – his wife and daughter, bound and gagged.

      “They’re OK,” Scarab said, looking back at the football game. “Unharmed. And they’re going to stay that way too, if you do what I tell you.”

      “Let them go,” Guild said, all breath gone from his body.

      “Billy-Ray’s with them right now and they’re all watching TV. As soon as you drop the Engine, he’ll release them. We got no reason to kill them, Grand Mage. Your family never did anything bad to us.”

      “I’m not going to kill these people.”

      “Yes, you are.”

      “You’re insane.”

      “You’ve said that. Guild, you don’t like these people, these mortals. From what I’ve heard, you never did. It’s time to break the rules, Grand Mage.”

      “I won’t do it.”

      “You are not only going to do it, but you’re going to do it in the next three minutes or Billy-Ray will kill your wife and daughter.”

      “This isn’t revenge. These people never did anything to you. You don’t have to do this. You don’t even want to do this. You want to make me pay, fine, make me pay. Not them. Not my family.”

      “It’s all part of the same plan. With 80,000 deaths, every Sanctuary around the world will be shown just how vulnerable they are. The Sanctuaries should’ve been disbanded after the war with Mevolent ended. We didn’t need you Elders setting up your fancy Councils, electing yourselves to positions of authority over the rest of us. I don’t like people telling me what to do. I got a problem with it, point of fact. A system like that, well, it’s open to all kinds of abuse. Miscarriages of justice as it were. Your system failed me and I got put in prison for killing someone I never killed, and because of that, you’re going to go to prison for the murder of 80,000 helpless mortals. Let’s see how you like spending the rest of your life alone in a cell. Grand Mage, you have about two minutes to walk to the middle of the field there. I think it’s about time you started walking.”

      Guild had no breath to form words and Scarab was already looking back at the game. Guild stood, the Desolation Engine heavy in his hand. He thought he could feel it pulsing with a low and terrible life, but he dismissed the idea. The bomb wasn’t alive. It had no consciousness, no sentience. It was not an object of evil – it was simply an object. The man who set it off, however, now he would be evil.

      There was a gap between where he stood and the tunnel where the officials entered and exited. He could slip through and walk on to the pitch before anyone could even try to stop him. He looked back at Scarab. The old man wasn’t even smiling any more. He was calm in the face of impending death. Of course he was. This was what he’d been waiting 200 years for.

      Guild stepped down from the seats, his eyes fixed on the ground ahead. He didn’t want to look up and see the tens of thousands of faces around him. He wished he could block out the noise – the cheering, the chanting, the thunder of living people – and yet if he’d had the option, he didn’t know if he would. He was a man who was about to commit one of the single most monstrous acts the world had ever seen. Shouldn’t he suffer for it? Shouldn’t he invite that pain in at the earliest opportunity?

      He realised his feet were still moving, that he was getting closer to the officials’ tunnel, closer to the cameras and the football field, and still no ideas were coming to him. If he didn’t think of something now, immediately, in a few seconds he would find himself either committing mass murder or sentencing his own family to death.

      “Grand Mage,” said a smooth voice in his ear, “could I have a word with you?”

      Skulduggery Pleasant took his arm, the bones of his fingers digging into Guild’s elbow like a vice, and suddenly Guild was in the officials’ tunnel, walking through to where it intersected with the main utility tunnel that ran beneath the terraces. He pulled his arm free and turned, sudden panic setting in. Pleasant stood there, his scarf concealing his jaw, his hat pulled low and his gun levelled straight at Guild’s gut.

      “Sanguine has my family,” Guild said. “You have to let me do this.”

      “Give me the Engine.”

      “It’ll detonate when I let go. Where’s Fletcher Renn? He can save you and the others. If you act fast, you can save a dozen people, maybe more.”

      Pleasant wasn’t moving. “The lives of your wife and child in exchange for the lives of 80,000 strangers? That seems a tad unfair, doesn’t it?”

      “You, of all people, must know that I would do anything to protect my family. At least my walk to the middle of the field buys you some time.”

      “Time to save a handful of people and leave the rest to die?”

      “If you try to stop me, I’ll detonate it right here.”

      Pleasant nodded and put his gun away, but Guild knew what was coming. When Pleasant swept his hand wide, Guild was already pressing at the air. The space between them rippled and a breeze stirred. Within moments Guild’s jacket was flapping in a hurricane force wind, localised to the tunnel and the tunnel alone. This wasn’t going to work. He didn’t stand a chance against someone like the skeleton.

      As if to prove the point, Pleasant suddenly shifted position and instead of pushing against the air, he pulled. Guild stumbled forward and Pleasant got behind him, wrapped an arm around his neck and tried for a choke. Guild struggled against it and Pleasant broke off the choke and shot a side kick into the back of Guild’s thigh. Guild stumbled, but Pleasant was right behind him, making sure the Engine didn’t drop from his grip. Guild let him come closer then pressed the copper spider against the side of Pleasant’s head. The spider’s legs unfurled instantly and sank into the bone, and there was a crack, like lightning hitting a tree, and Pleasant jerked sideways and collapsed.

      Guild didn’t know how the skeleton detective registered pain – his very existence was a mystery still unsolved – but he doubted that even the great Skulduggery Pleasant could take a hit like that and get up again in time to stop him.

      He turned to run for the football field and saw Valkyrie Cain coming towards him. He went to sweep her aside but she was faster, and a trail of shadows whipped into his face and he stumbled. His time had run out and he couldn’t risk the girl getting in another lucky shot.

      “I’m sorry,” he said and tried to let go of the Desolation Engine, but his fingers wouldn’t loosen.

      He snarled, feeling the air closing in around his hand, painfully tight. Pleasant was doing it, propped up with his gloved hand outstretched. Guild ran to him, aiming a kick at his head, but Cain hit him from behind and took him to his knees. She wrapped an arm around his throat and wouldn’t let go.

      With his free hand, Guild tried loosening the choke. With the other, he smashed the bomb hard against her elbow, her shoulder, but her clothes were made by Bespoke. She probably didn’t even feel it. Out of the corner of his eye, Guild saw Pleasant getting to his feet, his hand still outstretched.

      Guild tilted, shunting Cain forward, then swung the bomb and felt it crack against her head. She cried out and the choke was gone. Guild pushed at the air and caught Pleasant full in the chest. Pleasant went flying back, the pressure around Guild’s hand disappearing.

      Guild stood, panting with exertion, his heart beating wildly. He opened his hand.

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