“The Passage isn’t a theory, dear girl. It is an inevitability. We know it’s a lot to accept – we know you don’t understand. That’s why we sent Dragonclaw to keep it a secret for as long as possible. But now that it’s out in the open, now that we can have a conversation about it, yes, actually, we did think you would have been willing to kill billions of people – given enough time, of course. If you had chosen Necromancy over Elemental magic, which was a distinct possibility, this would have been the first schism to form between yourself and your skeletal mentor here. And once we had our hooks in you, really got them in there, you would have been ours. And you would have understood. We would have slowly opened your eyes to the truth and the glory of the Passage.”

“I still wouldn’t have killed those people.”

“Well, that’s rather a moot point at this stage, isn’t it? Because now we have Melancholia. She wouldn’t have been my first choice, I admit, but she is dedicated, and she is passionate. These qualities count for something.”

“She’s unstable,” Skulduggery said. “You can’t even keep her under control, for God’s sake.”

“She’s young,” Tenebrae shrugged. “Impetuous. Yes, she went after Valkyrie the first chance she got, but that was nothing more than childish spite. Nothing to worry about, not really. We were all young once, weren’t we, Skulduggery? Remember the adventures we got into when we were young men?”

Valkyrie frowned. “You knew each other?”

“He didn’t tell you? We used to be friends.”

“Friends is such a strong and misleading word,” Skulduggery said.

Tenebrae smiled. “Acquaintances, then. In the early days of the war, before the Necromancer Order withdrew from the conflict, we fought side by side. Didn’t we, Skulduggery?”

“If by side by side you mean I was always in front, then yes, Auron, we did. Not that it has any bearing on what is going on today.”

“Really? I would have thought that you of all people would know the effect the past has on the present. But then, you’ve lied to yourself about so many things, why should this be any different?”

“Now this,” Skulduggery said, “should be interesting.”