“A day can last forty-nine hours around the world,” said the man, walking out and leaving Conor sitting there at his kitchen table. “A lot can happen in a day.”

Exclusive Peek at the Dying of the Light

I’m writing this little introduction on March 17th, 2014, and I’m taking a break from The Dying of the Light to do it. This here is the second chapter of the ninth book, and there really isn’t a whole lot for me to say about it except, y’know, if you like this, the rest is just as good!

Or if you don’t like this, the rest is better. I swear.

Um.

he flickering lights of the trashed supermarket threw deep shadows from dark places, and Stephanie stepped through it all with one hand wrapped tightly round the golden Sceptre. Rows of shelves lay toppled against each other in a domino-sprawl of scattered food tins and ketchup bottles. She caught the scent of a small ocean of spilled vinegar and glanced to her right in time to catch a flash of pinstripe. Then she was alone again in this half-collapsed maze, the only sound the gentle hum from the freezers.

She edged into the darkness and out again into the light. Slow steps and quiet ones and once more the darkness swallowed her in its cold hunger. Ahead of her, a man hovered, a metre off the ground, as if he were lying on an invisible bed. His hands were clasped on his belly, and his eyes were closed.

Stephanie raised the Sceptre.

One thought would be all it’d take for a bolt of black lightning to turn him to dust. One simple command that, less than a year ago, she wouldn’t have even hesitated to give. Davos Rhadaman was a threat. He was a danger to her and to others. He had stepped into the Accelerator and the boost to his powers had turned him violent. Unstable. He was now the enemy. The enemy deserved to die.

And yet… she hesitated.

She was not one to second-guess herself. She was not prone to introspection. For the majority of her existence, Stephanie had been all surface. She was the reflection, the stand-in, the copy. While Valkyrie Cain was out playing hero, Stephanie went to school, sat at the dinner table, carried on with normal life. People viewed her as an unfeeling object. She had been an it.

But now that she was a she, things were murkier. Less clean. Now that she was a person, now that she was actually alive, she found that she didn’t want to deprive any other living thing of that same opportunity – not if she could at all help it. Which was, she openly admitted, hugely inconvenient.