Black Tattoo, The Read online

  "Is that right?" asked Charlie.

  "It's like you said, Charlie," Esme told him. "I've been waiting for this moment my whole life. Ever since the thing that you let inside you took my mother from me. You?" she added, and shrugged. "You're here by mistake."

  And she lunged.

  She leaped straight off the steps, hurling herself through the air toward Charlie.

  Charlie too leaped toward her, a fraction of a second later.

  Jack saw a blur of limbs.

  There was a resounding and sickening crack.

  Then the two of them landed again, on the opposite sides to where they'd been standing before.

  Charlie looked shocked: his eyes were wide and staring, and his left arm cradled his right, which was sticking out a an alarming angle.

  Esme's mouth was twisted in a sneer of rage: her killing hands twitched at her sides. She leaped again.

  Charlie flung up his arms to ward her off.

  And then the fight really began.

  It was almost too fast for Jack to watch. He could see Charlie doing his best to block her, but Esme was too quick: for every blurring blow of foot or fist that landed relatively harmlessly on Charlie's shins or forearms, there seemed to be twice as many that cracked into a rib, hammered at his face, or smashed the air out of his belly, leaving him gasping. Esme spun on the spot and drove her trainered foot squarely into Charlie's midriff, doubling him over, taking him off his feet and hurling him through the air, straight back into the stairs he'd started off on. As the rest of his body hit the steps, his head snapped back, cracking against an edge. Charlie's hands fell to his sides, his eyes rolled up in his head, and he lay there unconscious.

  Snarling, Esme leaped again, straight up this time, ready to stamp Charlie, when she landed, right through the floor.

  Charlie was out for the count, defenseless.

  Jack held his breath. But suddenly—

  —at the moment of impact—

  —Esme stopped.

  Jack stared.

  Esme began to struggle, but she was stuck fast. Hands like steel pincers gripped her waist: Charlie's hands.

  Instead of dodging or rolling, Charlie had simply caught her.

  His face just inches from hers, Charlie's eyes flicked open, filling with blood. The black tattoo shivered, then rippled through his whole body.

  And the thing inside him smiled.

  Still grasping Esme, Charlie swung upright. Now he was hovering off the ground. Esme stared back in horror as Charlie continued to grin at her. The Charlie began, slowly at first, to spin.

  He spun once. Esme's hands began to pluck uselessly at his.

  He spun twice. Esme's legs were already beginning to trail out behind her as the terrible momentum took hold.

  He spun a third time, still grinning at her.

  And then he let go.

  Like a stone from a sling, Esme was flung across the room. She crashed to the floor in a pile of tables and chairs.

  Charlie's awful smile remained frozen in place. Slowly, easily, he looked around the room—

  —and the furniture, the bottles, the glasses, everything in the pub that wasn't screwed to the ground rattled in its place for a moment, then lifted into the air. The cloud of objects began to move, picking up speed, converging on Esme.

  She sat up, blinked — and sprang to her feet as the blizzard of objects came whistling toward her. Instantly Esme became a blur of flailing limbs — ducking, twisting, and blocking as she used every ounce, every minute of her years of training and preparation to defend herself. When the first bar stool hit her she was ready, warding it off with a combination of a backward roll and a scything kick that sent it winging away into a corner: it smashed into the wall leaving a large hole in the plaster. The second and third met similar fates. Then the first table caught her in the small of the back.

  Jack heard her gasp.

  She missed a step.

  And now, suddenly, she was down. The stools and tables and bottles and chairs kept coming, smashing into her, sending her sliding across the polished wooden floor under a burgeoning mound of twisting, twitching furniture. At the wall, not five yards along from where Jack was lying, she stopped.

  The furniture stopped moving. She was trapped.

  Charlie's smile widened further, in a ghastly grin that showed all his teeth. Then—

  "LEAVE HER ALONE!"

  In a blinding white burst, all the lights of the pub went on at once.

  There, at the top of the steps above Esme, stood Raymond.

  KHENTIMENTU THE SCOURGE!" he roared. 'TO ROOTS THAT BIND AND TO THORNS THAT CATCH I CONSIGN YOU!"

  Charlie froze.

  "By the light of the world," said Raymond, quieter now. "By the strength of my will and the curse that first stilled you, I command that you return to your prison. Get you hence, and trouble us no more! "

  Charlie — or the thing that was wearing him — smiled again.

  "Do you know," said Charlie's mouth, though the voice that came out of it was nothing like Charlie's now, "what it's like to be imprisoned for nine thousand years?"

  Charlie's eyes, as the Scourge glanced around the room, were completely black, like marbles: Jack looked at them and shuddered.

  "Just try and imagine it," said the demon. "Nine thousand years, a day at a time. You can't do it," it said. "Can you?"

  "Kh-Khentimentu the Scourge," began Raymond again, less confidently this time.

  "Quiet," said the Scourge, and there was quiet. "I've been planning my revenge for longer than you could possibly comprehend. You—" it paused, and the eyes in Charlie's face seemed to bore into Raymond's, "are my finishing touch. When you're gone, your little "Brotherhood" will have ceased to exist."

  "Yeah," blustered Raymond. "What about Esme?"

  The demon smirked.

  "It's already too late for her." Charlie looked down at Esme, who was still trapped under the pile of furniture.

  "It's always been too late for her," said his mouth. "Just ask Felix."

  "What are you talking about?" began Raymond, then stopped. He turned pale.

  "That's right," said the Scourge, grinning delightedly. "Haven't you ever had your doubts about where her powers come from? Her strength? Her speed? Her spirit? Well now, at last, you can begin to understand. Now, when it's too late."

  "No," said Raymond quietly. "Ah, no. Surely not." He looked at Esme.

  "You're going to die now, Raymond," said the demon. "You are harmless and weak, and you pose me no threat, but vengeance is vengeance and I will not be denied. If you have anything left to say, say it now."

  Raymond looked at Esme.

  "Listen to me carefully, petal," he said quickly. "Remember what I told you about your mother, all right? Remember your mother."

  "Dad," said Esme. "I—"

  Raymond shook his head. "Look in my room," he said. "There's something for you. I was going to give it to you for your birthday, but that doesn't matter now: when you're ready, when you know what to do, you use it. All right?"

  "Dad, I don't—"

  "There's more to life than this, petal," said Raymond urgently. "Don't ever forget that. And don't ever forget... well, that I love you."

  "Oh, no," said Esme. "Oh, God, Dad! "

  "All right," said the big man, straightening up and pushing his chest out. "All right, you bastard: do your worst."

  The demon spread Charlie's arms. Its smile faded. The air in the room heated up suddenly, crackling and popping in Jack's ears with an awful electricity. A blast of pressure blew out all the lights of the pub, leaving it in darkness once more except for the dull red glow of the Fracture.

  Then there was silence.

  Raymond was gone. There wasn't even a body. It was as if he'd never existed.

  Charlie's hands fell to his sides. The light from the Fracture was brightening now: it was widening, opening, the red glow changing quickly to orange, then yellow, then a freezing, icy white. Charlie looked down at his
hands. His face was blank.

  "You're dead," said Esme, sitting up. "I'm coming after you, and when I find you... you're dead! " He voice cracked as she said it.

  Charlie turned. The tattoo had subsided. The demon inside him had let go for the moment, and it was Charlie the boy who was looking at Esme now. A pang crossed his face and his jaw began to tremble.

  "I... didn't..." he said.

  Esme just looked at him.

  "I... what...?" said Charlie. He looked back down at his hands.

  "Oh no," he said. "Oh, God."

  He turned to look at the blinding white gap in the air that had appeared, silently, behind him. It was now wide enough to step through.

  And suddenly, watching him, Jack knew what he had to do.

  There's nothing for us here. That was what Charlie had said. It wasn't true — of course it wasn't. But Charlie had let himself forget: the thing that had used him had made him forget. Jack got to his feet.

  Charlie looked at him: a begging, pleading look that twisted in Jack's heart like a knife.

  And instantly, the black shapes were swarming up Charlie's neck again. Charlie's face went slack as the demon took control once more, ensuring that its victory wouldn't slip away at this, its most triumphant moment. Charlie turned away woodenly, facing the Fracture. He stepped forward—

  —and vanished.

  Not pausing to think too much, Jack ran. The Fracture was already closing. He could hear a screaming sound as the freezing white space loomed up in front of him, a screaming he suddenly (with an odd sort of clarity) was able to identify as coming from Esme, begging him not to do what he was about to do.

  But it was too late. He had done it already.

  The light had him now. The shouts behind him were getting fainter, and soon there was nothing but light.

  Right, thought Jack, waiting for the next bit. Here we go, then.

  He was on his way.

  On his way to Hell.

  END OF

  BOOK ONE

  BOOK TWO

  THE PIGEON SWORD

  WELCOME TO HELL

  Some time later, Charlie opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was the demon.

  It was the same black figure he'd chased over the rooftops. The same one that had pretended to die when he'd struck it with magical fireballs — a slim, narrow, but man-shaped thing made out of absolute darkness, its face a shiny black blank. It was looking at him.

  "Good," said the Scourge. "You're awake."

  "Er... yeah," said Charlie.

  "Did you sleep well?" the voice came directly into Charlie's head, with a sensation like icy fingertips behind his eyes. Before answering, Charlie sat up. The tattoo was still there in the skin of his arms, but it wasn't moving now; it was still. The room he was in didn't appear to have any walls or ceiling or even a floor that he could see. There was himself, the bed, and the demon: everything else was just featureless white.

  "I don't know," he said. "How long was I out for?"

  "There's... something I want to show you," said the Scourge gently, ignoring the question. "It's a sight that I promise you'll never forget as long as you live." With a smooth, liquid movement, it stood up and offered an ink-black hand. "What do you say?"

  Charlie looked at the Scourge's hand.

  "All right," he said, and took it.

  The demon's touch was cool but firm. Charlie felt a rush of hot air, a sensation like huge black wings closing around him, then—

  "There," said the Scourge. "Open your eyes." Because as soon as Charlie had glimpsed what was there, he'd closed them tight before he could stop himself. The demon lifted one of its arms in a wide, sweeping gesture.

  "Welcome to Hell," it said.

  Charlie looked down at his feet. He was standing, unsupported, on a lip of black stone barely as wide as his trainers. Above him and around him there was nothing but starless sky, warm and thick and strangely still. And in front of him...

  In front of him, and below him, stretching as far as he could see in any direction, was Hell.

  "Buh — buh—" Charlie gibbered.

  "Take your time," the Scourge advised. "Take it in slowly."

  Charlie did his best, but it was difficult.

  It's one of the strangest things about the human mind that, when it sees something really impressive — the Grand Canyon, for instance — the first reaction, often, is simply to dismiss it. "Naaah," says your brain, "it's a backdrop. Painted scenery. Special effects. It's to really there." You have to stand and look for quite a long time sometimes, just to let the realization sink in that what you are looking at is actually there. That what you are looking at really is many millions of times bigger than you. And it doesn't care whether you believe in it or not.

  "This place is known as the Needle," said the Scourge conversationally. "It's the highest point of the palace and, therefore, the whole of the realm."

  Charlie didn't reply. He was too busy staring. It was like standing on the summit of a mountain, he decided. Only instead of being made out of rock, the crags and peaks below him were actually buildings. Keeps, turrets, and towers of all shapes and sizes, from slender spires to things like giant cathedrals, all seemed to be jutting nonchalantly from the palace's gargantuan tapering sides. From the foot of it, miles below him, five vast and arrow-straight white-lit lines struck out into the landscape as far as his eyes could see. These lines were linked by smaller curved paths that split the land into a series of roughly concentric rings, broken up into sections by the five great roads. Charlie's attention was immediately caught by a country-size chunk that was the only bit of Hell so far that was anything like what he'd been expecting: the whole section appeared to be made out of flames. The flames were a beautiful rushing red and orange and yellow, and they slid up the wall of the pit that contained them and slipped back down again, heaving and subsiding like coastal sea on a stormy day. At every seventh great convulsion the waves of fire leaped even higher, sending a great gout of flame bursting up into the night sky before it crashed back into itself, leaving blossoming purple flashes on Charlie's retinas as he stood watching, spellbound.

  "It could all be yours," said the Scourge quietly.

  "What could?"

  "All this," said the Scourge, gesturing again. "All Hell."

  Charlie stopped looking at the sea of fire and turned to look at the demon.

  "What are you talking about?" he asked.

  "Here," said the Scourge. "I'll show you." Without further warning, it grabbed Charlie's hand — and they stepped off the edge.

  Charlie's heart rose in his chest and his breath caught in his lungs as, for a full ten seconds, they plummeted straight down. Past his feet, the sheer black stone blocks of the tower they'd been standing on blurred past with sickening speed. His eyes were streaming, but when he looked ahead he could see the spiked roof of the next-tallest turret rushing up to meet him and — apparently — impale him. A scream pushed its way out of his throat. But it wasn't fear.

  It was joy.

  HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" screamed Charlie, or something like it, as, with a pressure that made his insides feel like they were being squeezed flat, he and the demon suddenly leveled out and swooped round the turret. For a wonderful fraction of a second, Charlie actually felt his foot brush the edge of the roof — then they were diving, swimming through the air. The Scourge swung him out to their left, taking him in a wide circle, as the spectacularly fanged and spiked and crenellated and twisted towers of the palace rose to meet them, and pass beneath their feet.

  "These are the High Reaches," said the demon, and Charlie heard its voice perfectly clearly even over the din of the rushing air. "From here all Hell's affairs are managed and directed."

  They were now level with the highest windows of the palace. What Charlie saw didn't make a lot of sense to him. Up where he was, the turrets all seemed very small — individual structures separated from each other by the yawning spaces below — and they were all different from each ot
her. He glimpsed windows of all shapes and sizes, and all were brightly lit, but he and the Scourge were flying too fast for him to be able to make out any more than a blur.

  "This actually isn't the best way to see the palace," said the demon. "To appreciate it fully, one really needs to get away from it a little."

  And with that, the roofs dropped away beneath them, and he and the Scourge swung out over the clear skies of Hell.

  The night sky was a deep and tender purple-blue, warm and clear apart from occasional tiny wisps of strange cotton wool-like clouds that tickled past them as they continued their strange descent. Charlie gave himself up, letting the demon take him where it would, until the rushing air on his face slowed to a breeze — then, suddenly, they stopped.

  Perfectly still, floating in the air, they turned round to face back the way they'd come.

  "There," said the Scourge. "Impressive, don't you think?"

  And Charlie had to admit, the Scourge was right.

  The palace was unquestionably the biggest thing in the whole landscape. It was so big that if he hadn't been told what it was, Charlie wouldn't have been sure it really qualified as a single building. From where he was, hanging suspended high in the air, still holding the demon's hand, Charlie saw his earlier impression confirmed: the palace was more like a mountain than a building, with hundreds, maybe thousands of individual structures seeming growing out of it in an astonishing profusion, a bewildering and chaotic array. The harder Charlie looked, the more detail there was to find.

  So he stopped himself.

  A small, thin stream of cloud drifted past: Charlie felt the moisture of it on his face and stuck out his tongue to taste it on his lips. It was salty, like tears.

  "So this is Hell," he said, as casually as he could.

  The Scourge didn't answer.

  "Listen," said Charlie, his voice sounding high and strange in his ears. "Before we go any further, you're going to have to clear a few things up for me."

  He took a deep breath.

  "First of all, and I'm sorry if this comes out sounding a bit stupid, but — are we dead?"

  "No," said the Scourge. "Not dead. On the contrary: for the first time, I think, you are truly alive."