“Because I don’t think you do.”
“I do,” Jenan insisted. “I get it. Secrecy is—”
“Everything, Jenan. Secrecy is everything. I’d have thought that you of all people would know this. I’d have thought, out of everyone, that you would be the one person we didn’t have to explain this to. Your father understands the need for secrecy, right?”
“My … my father?”
“He’s Grand Mage of the Bulgarian Sanctuary, isn’t he? Grand Mages have to keep secrets. It’s what they do.”
“Yes,” said Jenan. “Of course.”
“So this little spy,” Nero said, walking over to the bed and turning, “he obviously didn’t go splat when he was supposed to. Have you found out yet who he is?”
Jenan hesitated. “Not yet.”
The feet shifted slightly, and the bed creaked as Nero sat, pinning Omen in place. “I don’t believe this. I’m going to have to go back and tell Lethe that you’re in over your head. Who should take your place, do you think?”
Jenan’s voice squeaked. If that had happened in class to anyone else, Jenan would have mocked them mercilessly. “N-no, I can still … I can do it. I can.”
“It doesn’t look like you can. I have to say, Lethe is going to be so disappointed. He wouldn’t shut up about you – can you believe that? Jenan Ispolin is exactly who we need. Jenan Ispolin will change everything.” Nero’s voice was tinged with bitterness. “He’s going to be gutted.”
Jenan did his best to inject some decisiveness into his voice. “We’ll find him,” he said. “The spy. We’ll find him.”
“How?”
“We’ll question them,” Jenan said. “We’ll question them all, every Third Year boy of that height with that hair colour. And I know who we’ll start with.”
“You have a suspect?”
“I do,” Jenan said immediately. “Omen Darkly.”
Nero leaped to his feet, furious. “You let the Chosen One into the goddamn meeting?”
Omen watched Jenan’s feet stumble back. “No, no! That’s Auger! That’s his brother! Omen Darkly’s nobody, I swear to you! Even if he told anyone, they probably wouldn’t believe him!”
“What about the Chosen One?” Nero asked. “Would the Chosen One believe him?”
Jenan swallowed. “Maybe.”
“Jesus …” Nero said. “Of all the people to let in, of all the goddamn people, you let in Auger Darkly’s brother.”
“It mightn’t be him,” Jenan said quickly. “It might be someone else. We’ll find out, though. I’ll interrogate him personally.”
“You’d better, Jenan. A lot of people are depending on you.”
“You have my word. By my family’s crest.”
“And if it turns out that it was this Omen Darkly … and if he has told the Chosen One … you know what you have to do, don’t you?”
There was a hesitation. “Yes. Yes, of course.”
“You kill him,” Nero said. “You kill them both.”
Jenan nodded. “Yes. I swear.”
“We’ll be back in touch, Jenan,” said Nero. “Don’t fail us, you hear me? You really don’t want to fail us.”
Omen didn’t know why he did it. He wasn’t planning on it, that was for certain. It wasn’t something he’d thought about, lying there under that bed. But the moment he realised Nero was about to leave, he reached out a hand, and his fingertip touched the heel of Nero’s stylish shoe, so that when Nero teleported, he took Omen with him.
“Where are we?” Valkyrie asked, peering out of the car window. The street was narrow. There was graffiti on the walls, none of it any good. She was surprised at this. She hadn’t thought Roarhaven would be tolerant of something so mundane as declarations of lust and crudely drawn genitalia. She’d expected their graffiti standards to be higher.
“We are where we need to be,” Skulduggery said, coming to a stop and turning off the engine. “Ironfoot Road is close by.”
They got out and he locked the Bentley. Valkyrie zipped up her jacket against the cold and they started walking. She kept her head down and he kept his façade up, but everyone they passed was too busy with their own problems to notice them.
They walked for three minutes before coming to a blue door. Valkyrie stood watch while Skulduggery picked the lock. When he was done, he tapped her and they slipped inside. He drew his gun and they crept upstairs to a quiet corridor. They found Melior’s apartment and Skulduggery picked that lock next. When the door was open, he splayed his hand, reading the air, and led the way into the kitchen, where Richard Melior stood with his back to them, watching the window.
Skulduggery walked right up to him without making a sound and pressed his gun into the back of Melior’s head.
“Not an inch,” Skulduggery said.
Without turning, without looking over his shoulder, Melior said, “I’m … I’m very glad you came.”
“You should be glad I haven’t pulled the trigger.”
“I’m glad about that, too.”
“Turn.”
Melior turned, saw Valkyrie and tried to smile. “Hello.”
“If you even think about blasting us again,” she said, “we’ll hit you until you’re nothing but a puddle of mess on the floor.”
“I understand. And I’m really sorry about that. If you’re in any pain, I can help you.”
“I’m fine,” she replied irritably. “We have doctors who specialise in healing people.”
“Take a seat, Doctor,” Skulduggery said. “I want you where we can keep an eye on you.”
Melior nodded, and sat in the chair Skulduggery pulled out for him. He didn’t object when the shackles were produced. Valkyrie turned on her aura-vision for this next part – she wanted to see what happened when they were put on – but she noticed something as Skulduggery moved in. Like most auras she’d seen, Melior’s was orange, but it was a slightly different shade. She didn’t know what that meant, didn’t know if it meant anything, and then the shackles snapped on and Melior’s power dampened, and the aura shrivelled away until Valkyrie could barely see it.
She switched off the aura-vision. She was really going to have to find a better name for it. “What were you looking at?” she asked.
“Sorry?”
“You were looking down at the street. At what?”
“Oh,” he said, “no, I wasn’t looking at anything. I was waiting for you. You came through the window the first time we met and for some reason I thought you’d come through the window again. I never expected you to come through the door.”
“Doors are for people with no imagination,” she conceded, “but we like to mix it up a bit around here.”
Skulduggery sat opposite Melior and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “You’ve got a lot to tell us,” he said.
“I do. Anything you want to know.”
“Let’s