always shedding,” Valkyrie replied.
“Your dog is the only dog that has ever been in this car, you know.”
“She’s honoured.”
“It was meant as a complaint.”
Valkyrie shrugged. “You have me for twenty-four hours. She can’t go twenty-four hours without being fed.”
“We could have left her with your parents.”
“She doesn’t know them.”
A pause.
She could feel him watching her. She kept her eyes on the road ahead.
“When was the last time you were in Haggard?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. She could feel the sharpness coming on.
“You’ve been back in the country for five months. How many times have you seen your sister? Three?”
“Let’s not talk about this right now, OK?” she said. “I’m not in a sharing mood.”
Skulduggery nodded, and Valkyrie felt bad, but she was used to that feeling.
They passed a few signs warning of a flood ahead, then drove by some announcing LOCAL ACCESS ONLY, then about half a dozen PRIVATE PROPERTY signs, before turning on to a long, narrow road that led into the empty distance. An elderly farmer opened a rusted gate and allowed them through, muttering into his lapel as they went. The road seemed to be pockmarked with potholes, some wide enough to swallow a wheel, but the Bentley sped over them without even a rumble. Just another illusion to keep the mortals out.
Advancements in cloaking technology meant that not only were magical elements within the cloaked area rendered undetectable, but what passed for a normal image could also be extrapolated and projected in real time. Skulduggery had explained all this on her first trip back. He’d talked about the marvels of what had been achieved and what was now possible for the future. Valkyrie hadn’t paid attention. Her focus then, as now, was to try to spot the shimmering air of the cloaking field before they passed through it. But now, as then, she failed miserably, and Roarhaven appeared before her in an instant – a vast, walled city exploding into being where a moment ago there had been nothing but dead trees and lifeless scrub.
They slowed as they neared Shudder’s Gate. Named after a friend of theirs who had lost his life to a traitor whose name Valkyrie refused to say aloud, the gate was supposedly the only way in and out of the city – although Valkyrie had her doubts about that. The Supreme Mage was a woman who understood the merits of a good secret entrance, after all. Or, at the very least, a good escape route.
The Bentley prowled forward, reflected in the visored helmets of the grey-suited Cleavers who stood guard, and they joined the traffic that flowed through the city streets like blood through the veins of a giant. Here, on the outskirts, the streets formed a tightly packed grid, and the traffic moved easily. But the closer they got to the centre, the more erratic the design became, and the slower they travelled. They were closing in on what had become known as Oldtown: Roarhaven in its original incarnation, with its narrow streets and narrow houses. The city around it had been constructed in a parallel dimension, then dropped here, on top of and around the original. It was a masterpiece of design by its architect, Creyfon Signate, and a testament to his genius, if not his choice of associates. A lot of bad people were involved in the evolution of Roarhaven. Most of them were dead now.
The city had changed a lot since Valkyrie had been away, rebuilt after the battle with Darquesse. The eastern quarter had been obliterated in the fighting, but fortunately it had been mostly uninhabited at the time. It was still largely uninhabited, though, even with brand-new buildings and roads. Those who had to live there, because of the massive influx of residents over the last five years, reported crippling psychic stresses and traumatic dreams. Those sorcerers whose abilities lay on the Sensitive spectrum couldn’t go any further east than Testament Road, for fear of permanent neurological damage.
Just one more thing for Valkyrie to feel guilty about.
Roarhaven’s population had surged in the last few years. There were magical communities all around the world – some consisting of nothing more than a single street, and some as big as a mid-sized town. There were even three Mystical Cities that only appeared on earth every few decades, places of wonder and absolute freedom. But Roarhaven … Roarhaven was not only the biggest sorcerer city there ever was, it was the first to become part of the landscape. Mages came with their families, and they suddenly didn’t have to hide who they were or what they could do. Those who didn’t find jobs immediately worked at creating them. It may have been a city of mages, but it was still a city, and like any city it ran on its businesses. It had its shops and its stores and its restaurants and cafés, and it had cinemas and theatres and libraries and swimming pools. It had its own financial sector, albeit a small one, and it was all linked to – and dependent on – the mortal world beyond the wall. The highest salaries went to the people who integrated Roarhaven’s activities with the rest of the world without mortal accountants or lawyers or politicians noticing anything amiss. Roarhaven: the Invisible City.
Once they were through Oldtown, the traffic eased up. Travel here was mainly by silent trams that hovered centimetres off the ground, as any cars other than those with Sanctuary tags were forbidden to enter the Circle zone.
In the middle of the Circle stood the High Sanctuary, a palace by any other name, raised thirteen marble steps above street level. Its walls were thick, formidable, and its towers and steeples stretched for the sky as if rejoicing in their own splendour. Twelve years ago, the Sanctuary had been located beneath a waxworks museum in Dublin. When that had been destroyed, it had moved to a flat, unimpressive circular slab of a building that had once stood here.
Now, that slab was hidden deep within this majestic structure, an imperfection to be painted over and forgotten about.
A cathedral reared up on the east side of the Circle. This was new, and it worried Valkyrie. Black and grey, it had wide shoulders, and its towers were almost as tall as the High Sanctuary’s. In exchange for various concessions, including a vow of non-violence, the Church of the Faceless had been granted legitimacy before Valkyrie had left for America. Disciples of the Faceless Ones had been allowed to worship openly from that point on.
For centuries, the Faceless Ones had been regarded as little more than sadistic fairy tales – insane gods banished from this reality aeons ago by the Ancients, the first sorcerers – but Valkyrie herself had witnessed their attempts to regain a foothold in this reality. Their existence confirmed, sorcerers flocked to their teachings, and Church numbers had exploded. Otherwise good people attended this cathedral and the other churches throughout the city – and the world – and prayed to cruel gods whose very appearance would have driven them insane. Valkyrie didn’t understand it, but then she didn’t understand most religions. Faith, she had learned, just wasn’t for her.
The Bentley slowed to allow a tram to pass, then moved on to the entrance to the High Sanctuary’s underground car park. A City Guard, flanked by Cleavers, held up his hand, and they rolled to a stop. He came forward, eyes on the Bentley, an unimpressed curl to his upper lip. The dark blue uniform struggled to contain his gut, and the badge on his chest glinted in the sun. He had two stripes circling his shoulder, indicating his rank, and his thick belt, on which hung his gun and sword, was polished black leather. The City Guards hadn’t existed when Valkyrie had left. There had been a sheriff’s position and the Cleavers, of course, but they had been all that were needed to safeguard the streets. Apparently, those days were gone.
Skulduggery
