Kingdom of the Wicked

“Good news or bad news?”

She looked back at Alan. “Sorry?”

“The text message. Good news or bad news?”

She shrugged. “Just news.”

He leaned closer. “Really? You’re not going to say it’s from your boyfriend or something? Maybe use it as an excuse to get me to go away?”

“I don’t have a boyfriend, Alan.”

“Now that is a crime.”

The big man passed behind Alan and Valkyrie tensed, but he walked on and sat at a table without making any suspicious moves. His boots were slightly scuffed, his jeans worn. The coat had seen better days but had character because of it. He wore a thick watch. No jewellery.

Now that the conversation had stalled, Alan hid his awkwardness by taking a drink and looking at something interesting on the wall. Valkyrie glanced at him. Out of shape but not obese. Soft hands, though. A watch that looked expensive but wasn’t. Off-the-rack suit, badly ironed shirt, bad tie. She leaned back, her eyes flickering to his shoes. No laces, no grips.

“Don’t you just love awkward silences?” he asked, and she smiled as he chuckled, and looked over his shoulder at Margaret. Her coffee lay untouched on the table before her. Her bag lay open, within easy reach. Anything could be in that bag. She was casually watching the people queuing up, like she was keeping her eyes away from Valkyrie’s side of the room on purpose.

And those were only the three people who had paid attention to her. There were over a dozen more in here who hadn’t even glanced her way. There were the men in suits and the harried-looking women and the dude in the jeans and the idiot in the—

Margaret glanced at her and looked away immediately. Valkyrie settled her gaze. Another few seconds passed and their eyes met again. Margaret gave a cheerful smile, and when Valkyrie didn’t return it, that smile faded into a straight line.

They stared at each other across the coffee shop.

Alan was saying something and the people to her left were laughing, and a new song came on the radio and Valkyrie looked at Margaret and Margaret looked at her. She watched her right hand slip into the bag. Valkyrie’s own left hand raised her coffee cup to her lips. Her right hand flexed.

Alan was still talking. About what, Valkyrie didn’t have the slightest idea.

“Alan,” she said softly, without taking her eyes off Margaret, “would I be unforgivably rude if I asked you to go back to your table?”

He didn’t answer right away. “No,” he said. “Not at all. You’d be honest. And I appreciate that.”

“Thanks for understanding.”

He gathered up his pastry and his coffee. “It was very nice to meet you, Stephanie.”

“Same here,” she murmured.

She didn’t watch him as he walked away. Margaret gave her a nod of acknowledgement. Valkyrie nodded back.

Moving very slowly, Valkyrie stood up. So did Margaret, who took her hand from her bag. She wasn’t holding anything. Three chatting teenagers passed between them.

Valkyrie stepped towards the door and Margaret stood in her way.

“Leaving?”

Valkyrie nodded.

“But you haven’t finished your coffee.”

“My friend’s waiting for me outside.”

Margaret smiled. “I don’t think so.”

Margaret took a step towards her. She was wearing a ring she hadn’t been wearing before. She grabbed Valkyrie’s arm. Valkyrie tried to pull away but Margaret wouldn’t let go. Margaret was smiling. And then she frowned, looked down, looked at Valkyrie’s jacket.

In the movies, spies killed other spies by jabbing them with poisoned spikes concealed in rings. Valkyrie grabbed Margaret’s wrist, pulled her hand away, saw the spike that had failed to puncture her sleeve. Margaret twisted, locking Valkyrie’s elbow, tried to grasp her bare hand. While people chatted and laughed around them, Valkyrie manoeuvred to the side, teeth gritted, trying to turn the ring away from her. They were being noticed now, conversations dying down. The spike drew closer to her bare skin.

Valkyrie bit Margaret’s face and Margaret turned and dragged Valkyrie across her hip and flipped her. Valkyrie slammed down on to a table, people jumping back and shouting, but all Valkyrie cared about was keeping that spike away from her face. Margaret pressed down. She was stronger than she looked.

The big man stepped in, tried to separate them, and Margaret jabbed him in the eye with her free hand. He fell back, cursing, and Valkyrie tried to get a knee between them. Margaret raised her up then slammed her down again, the table almost toppling, the spike almost nicking her chin, but now Valkyrie had one leg wrapped round Margaret’s head. She dragged the hand with the ring to one side, then hooked her other leg over her foot, caught Margaret in a triangle choke. People stood and stared. The only sounds were the music, the table rocking on its struts and the older woman’s strangled grunts.

Margaret heaved herself to one side and they both fell to the floor. But Valkyrie kept the choke on. Margaret’s face was bright red. She was sweating. Spittle flew from her lips. She was close to passing out. She brought her legs in, got her feet under her. Any second now. Any second now she was going to pass out. Margaret lifted Valkyrie off the ground. Any second. And then this frumpy, dowdy, middle-aged woman straightened her back, lifted Valkyrie high in the air, turned around, and dropped face down. Valkyrie hit the ground and her legs flew apart and Margaret rolled out, sucking in lungfuls of air.

Valkyrie focused on a shocked face staring at her. Poor Alan, frozen where he stood, probably vowing not to chat up another girl in a coffee shop ever again.

Still trying to get her breath back, Margaret grabbed Valkyrie’s leg, going for the ankle. Trying to find bare skin. There was a commotion, and then two men in luminous yellow jackets were there, pulling Valkyrie and Margaret to their feet. Guards.

Even as the Guard holding Valkyrie was telling everyone to just calm down, Margaret swung an elbow into her cop’s throat and ran, barging through the onlookers.

“I’m really sorry,” Valkyrie said as she turned and drove her knee between the legs of the cop holding her. He doubled over and she let him fall. The crowd parted for her as she hurried to the girl behind the counter. “Where are the security logs? I don’t have time to argue, just tell me where they are.”

“Backroom,” said the girl, her eyes wide. “To your left.”

Valkyrie rushed in, found the monitor hooked up to the CCTV. She clicked her fingers and fried the hard drive. Then she ran out into the street, scanning the faces of the people passing by until she saw Margaret’s scarf by an open door. Obviously a trap.

She crossed the street, passed through the door into what had once been a shop. Now it was just empty, with a ladder and a few tins of paint. There was a sound behind her and she turned. Margaret stepped in, a gun aimed directly at Valkyrie’s head.

“Do not raise your hands,” she said. “Keep them by your sides, away from your face. Those clothes of yours are bulletproof, I take it? Pretty fancy, but I suppose I should have expected that. Only the best for Skulduggery Pleasant’s favourite little pet.”

“Who are you?” Valkyrie asked, backing away slowly.

“You won’t care what my name is when you’re dead. I just want to say that I had planned to do this low-key. You wouldn’t have felt even the tiniest of pinpricks. And the poison? It wouldn’t have hurt. You’d have gone to sleep tonight and just not woken up in the morning. Painless. Subtle. But what happens instead? A fight in a coffee shop in front of dozens of witnesses. And cops! There were even cops!”

Wherever Valkyrie moved, that gun tracked her. “And you’re blaming me for this?”

“Yes, actually, I am. I’m a professional. I fly under the radar. A fight in a coffee shop is not under the radar. I have a reputation to maintain, for God’s sake. If I can’t take care of one teenage girl, what use am I?”

“Funny,” said a voice behind her, “that’s exactly what I was thinking.”

Margaret turned and a blade flashed. She dropped the gun, took a step and crumpled face down. Her last breath escaped her body and then she was completely still.

The woman standing over her wore boots, brown leather trousers and a brown leather waistcoat. She was blonde and pretty and her arms were strong, her shoulders wide. Tanith Low wiped the blood from her sword and smiled. “Hey, Val. Missed you.”

The fallen gun sped towards Valkyrie’s outstretched hand but a man in a suit and sunglasses shot out of the wall, snatching it before it reached her.

Shadows wrapped round Valkyrie’s fist but Billy-Ray Sanguine backed off.