She put down the carving knife and picked up a candle, placed it carefully inside the jack-o’-lantern. She lit it and stepped back. It was a good likeness. No, it was a great likeness. Valkyrie was such a pretty girl, and Tanith had to resist the urge to take a picture and send it to her. But she knew that Valkyrie would only tell Skulduggery, and Skulduggery would trace the picture back here to this small town in Ohio, and suddenly there’d be Cleavers, Cleavers everywhere. It was all so unfair. All Tanith wanted to do was protect Darquesse from the people who were planning on harming her, after all. She was on Valkyrie’s side, in a way. Why couldn’t Val see that?

Headlights looped in around the room, and Tanith went to the window, looked out. A battered old car lurched to a stop outside the house next door, and a shabby, middle-aged man climbed out. As she watched him hitch his trousers higher round his waist, Tanith made sure to keep her mind calm and free of violent thoughts. There were Sensitives who could pick up feelings of hostility and, while she didn’t know if Jerry Ordain was one of them, she couldn’t take the chance. There was too much riding on tonight to risk a stray thought at the wrong time. The fact that he came home at all meant that he hadn’t foreseen tonight’s events, and that was a promising start.

Of course, it was entirely possible that Jerry knew full well she was there, and he had a trap waiting for her the moment she made a move. That was the trouble with Sensitives – it was very hard to sneak up on them.

She took her sword from the table and left through the back door. She sprang lightly over the fence, landed without a sound in Jerry’s yard as lights flicked on in the house. She crept to the window. No sign of an ambush. She saw Jerry ambling into the kitchenette. If he sensed her watching him, he gave no sign.

Taking a breath, Tanith moved to the door and rested her hand against the lock. It clicked open and she moved in silently. Jerry was a bachelor and lived like it. The house smelled of dust and old socks. She slid her sword from its scabbard and walked up the wall. Those floorboards were old and she didn’t trust them not to creak. She crept upside down along the ceiling, careful not to disturb the bulb as she passed it or cast her shadow on to her target. Jerry had his back to her, and was making himself a massive sandwich. She reached the far wall and walked down until she was standing normally again. He still didn’t turn round. She took out her phone, sent a text. A few moments later, Billy-Ray Sanguine rose up from the floor beside her.