The chasm widened. She could no longer see the walls on either side. She fell through mist and darkness.

She looked down. Saw something. She blurred past it.

“Skulduggery!” she screamed, twisting again to look upwards.

The thing was a dot now, rapidly retreating into the distance.

No. It was getting closer. It was falling. No. Flying.

Skulduggery streaked after her.

She reached up, but he didn’t take her hand. He stopped flying and started falling alongside her. He had his arms out, his hands moving.

The air began to buffet them both.

Their fall slowed. When he wasn’t going to snap her in two just by laying a finger on her, Skulduggery pulled her close to him and they came to a gradual stop.

They hovered there, and she clung to him. Buried her head in his chest.

“Are you OK?” he asked softly.

She nodded. Suddenly realised how cold it was down here. Cold and dark.

“Darquesse?” he asked.

“Free,” Valkyrie said, her voice trembling. “In Stephanie’s body. We brought her down with us.”

He nodded. “She was Gordon. I figured as much, when his directions led me to a dead end.”

“He’s gone,” she said. “The Echo Stone is empty.”

“Oh, Valkyrie. I’m so sorry.”

She nodded. “Is there a reason we’re floating?”

“Just have to get my strength back,” he said. “Shouldn’t be too long. Another few moments.”

She looked down. All she could see was darkness below, so it wasn’t vertigo that struck her. It was the open, yearning emptiness. It was the quiet. The awful, empty quiet. If he hadn’t caught her, she’d still be falling even now. She doubted she’d have ever stopped.

Valkyrie frowned. “Huh.”

“What is it?” Skulduggery asked.

“My eyes are playing tricks on me,” she said. “It looks like … light down there.”

They shifted slightly so that he could look down, too. Below them, in the deep and distant dark, a red light burned weakly.

“I see it,” said Skulduggery.

“Wasn’t there a second ago. Hey. Is it … is it getting brighter?”

Skulduggery tilted his head. “It’s definitely getting bigger.”

Her eyes widened. “It’s getting closer.”

“I have my strength back now,” he said, and they started to rise.

“You might want to go a tiny bit faster,” Valkyrie said, and suddenly there was a huge shape below them, unimaginably vast, filling the chasm with its darkness. She saw eyes, glittering and yellow, and that red light was flame that burned in a throat and reflected off teeth, and there was the sound of great wings beating. A rush of air boosted their ascent and Skulduggery rode that wave and they shot upwards as a screech, a terrible screech of inhuman power, blasted Valkyrie’s eardrums and made her bones rattle.