Darquesse smiled. “I’m not the one who’ll surrender. And it won’t be like it was, either. There’ll be no more of your annoying little voice in my head. But when you’re gone, what you are – behind all the thoughts and the snarky comments – will remain. That’s what I want, Valkyrie. You’re a part of me. We belong together. You feel it, too, right? You feel that a part of you is missing?”

She did. She couldn’t deny it. There was an emptiness to her now, a loneliness she hadn’t felt before. Not even the new magic, whatever it was, could fill that gap.

“Come on,” Darquesse said, holding out her hand. “Why are you fighting? All you ever do is fight. Why? Who says you have to? There are other ways, Valkyrie. Try acceptance. Accept that we belong together, that we’re stronger when we are one. That we’re better. Stop fighting. Stop hurting. I don’t want to hurt anyone any more. Not even Ravel. I’m tired of that. I’m tired of this. Come on. Take my hand. You never have to be lonely again.”

“Well, maybe that’s the difference between us,” Valkyrie said, getting to her feet. “I don’t mind the loneliness. Not really. You know why? Because I know I have friends. And they’re standing right behind you.”

Skulduggery and Melancholia emerged from an archway. Shadows writhed round Melancholia’s body like angry snakes, and more shadows seeped from beneath Skulduggery’s shirt as he walked. They covered his body, forming armour, and when he rose up on a tide of darkness it was not Skulduggery Pleasant who crested that wave, but Lord Vile, in all his terrible glory.

77

Lord Vile and Melancholia attacked.

They were relentless. Two of the most powerful Necromancers of the last thousand years, and they drove Darquesse back between them.

Shadows were knives and whips and hammers and chains. They cut, tore, ripped and bludgeoned. Darquesse was given not one moment to recover, not one second to heal. Valkyrie watched in numb astonishment as her adversary, as the adversary, was sent to the ground again and again.

She watched as Darquesse got up, for maybe the tenth time, took a step and faltered.

Frowning, Darquesse looked down at her left foot. It was badly broken, twisted at an unnatural angle. She glared at it, and finally the foot moved, mending itself. But the frown on her face remained.

Vile and Melancholia closed in.

Twin beams of sizzling energy burst from Darquesse’s eyes, but Vile was already shadow-walking away. Melancholia seized her chance, leaped high into the air and sent down a thousand thorns of darkness. They ripped through Darquesse, tearing through her armored clothes and shredding her flesh, and Valkyrie caught an unmistakable grimace of pain.

Darquesse was hurt.