She snatched back her coat and they ran on, darting into another house as a trio of riders appeared ahead of them. They took the stairs up, ran to the window and jumped through it like they were hurdlers, landing on the roof of the neighbouring house. They jumped from rooftop to rooftop, sprinting to the sheer edge of the city, as all around them, riders clambered up to continue the hunt.

“Do you have a plan?” she called.

“Only rarely,” he answered then scooped her into his arms and jumped. There was nothing beneath them but a two-mile drop to the valley floor, and Valkyrie screamed.

“Why are you screaming?” Skulduggery asked in her ear as they tumbled through the air, and she turned her head to him and continued the scream right into his eye socket. He sighed. “Do try to hang on.”

Their angle changed abruptly and now they were moving sideways, out of range of the knives that were being hurled at them from the city.

They were flying.

12 DOWN THE BARREL

12
DOWN THE BARREL

As China’s lifeblood drained away, Pennant walked over to where she lay and aimed his gun at her again. Then Fletcher Renn stepped out of nothing and swung a baseball bat down on Pennant’s arm. Pennant screamed and dropped his weapon and Fletcher caught him twice more before he disappeared. A moment later he was back and swung a weightlifter’s dumb-bell into Pennant’s jaw. Pennant pirouetted like a ballerina and fell to his knees. Fletcher let the dumb-bell fall and vanished, then reappeared with a taser gun. He jabbed it into Pennant’s back, electricity crackled and Pennant jerked and fell forward. The air closed in around Fletcher and he was gone, taking Pennant with him.

China touched the markings at the hinges of her jaw, and the heat started almost immediately, travelling the length of her body and then back again. It focused around the wound and she gritted her teeth. She felt the bullet move and twist, and tears came to her eyes. It worked itself back through the tunnel it had carved, and she cried out as it rose to the surface, now a misshapen lump of lead.

Fletcher reappeared beside her, but she waved him away with a hand slick with blood. The heat intensified and burned away the bacteria that had followed the bullet in. Slowly, far too slowly for her liking, the meat inside her began repairing itself.

13 NO THANKS

13
NO THANKS