“No, I didn’t. I put her in a situation where she might die, yeah, but I didn’t try to kill her. Did you get what you needed, young one?”

Valkyrie met his eyes. “He just said a castle.”

“There you go then. He was brought to a castle. That’s a clue, isn’t it? I mean, how many castles are there around here? Not that many, I’d wager.”

“When we take down Dusk,” Skulduggery said, “we’re going to take down everyone who stands with him.”

The amusement left Moloch’s face. “We don’t stand with him, skeleton. He made us an offer and if certain things go certain ways, we’ll be considering it. If you happen to take him down before that, so be it.”

“Then what was he doing here?”

“Requesting some of the Infected to bring home, to replace the lads lost in the Sanctuary raid. Apparently, he can’t afford to be waiting the two nights it takes to turn vampires on his own.”

“And did you give him your Infected?”

“Of course not. He wasn’t exactly happy about it, but there you go.”

Skulduggery held out his hand to the vampire with his gun. Moloch nodded assent and the gun was returned. Skulduggery slid it into his holster.

“We’re going to be watching you,” he said.

“Of course you are,” Moloch replied, bitterness in his voice. At an unseen signal, the eight vampires left them, walking silently from the square. “Take Caelan with you when you leave,” Moloch continued. “He’s used up any good grace I have left. Tell him never to come back here.”

Skulduggery nodded and they watched him go.

They’d left Caelan at the storage facility, and he had limped from the car without looking back. Valkyrie felt bad – he’d been hurt because of them after all. But they couldn’t bring him with them to see Kenspeckle Grouse, not with the Professor’s vampire phobia at an all-time high lately.

They parked at the back of the old Hibernian Cinema and walked in. Now that the adrenaline had worn off, the pain from the hand Valkyrie had broken while punching was shooting through her. She cradled her arm as she followed Skulduggery up on to the stage and through the door projected on to the screen.

They took the first corridor to their right, almost bumping into Clarabelle. She held two long test tubes, one in each hand, both filled with a clear liquid.

“Hi, Clarabelle,” Valkyrie said. “Is the Professor in?”

Clarabelle’s eyes were moving between the test tubes. “Safe, unsafe. Safe, unsafe. Left one safe, right one unsafe. Left safe, right unsafe.” She looked up and smiled brightly. “Hello, Valkyrie! Hello, Skulduggery! I haven’t seen you in ages!”

“Well,” Skulduggery said, “I’ve been—”