let me be the one you call / if you jump I'll break your fall

[impudentsongbird]

Book Four: Dark Days
1 | into the breach
2 | finding skulduggery
3 | retreat to the tunnels
4 | into the cacophony
5 | sanctuary in the cathedral
6 | reuniting old friends
7 | kenspeckle's new patient
8 | holy water and disinfectant
9 | objecting to china sorrows
10 | the roadtrip
11 | baffling guild
12 | shenanigans at the safehouse
13 | reassuring fletcher
14 | valkyrie's intervention
15 | solomon's revelation
16 | visiting the edgleys
17 | recalled to the sanctuary
18 | guild's confusion
19 | gabe is busted
20 | the psychic tattoist
21 | envisioning the cacophony
22 | angel's first migraine
23 | the morning after
24 | china and solomon
25 | detectives' council of war
26 | china's foolishness
27 | the collector dethroned
28 | finding crux
29 | skulduggery's vileness revealed
30 | sorrows in aftermath
31 | finding equilibrium
32 | the devil's number
33 | at the carnival
34 | meeting authorities
35 | solomon's confession
36 | the stray soul
37 | sanguine unsettled
38 | solomon's choice
39 | a cowboy underground
40 | in scarab's basement
41 | striking midnight
42 | craven contested
43 | emergency services
44 | on your feet
45 | and don't stop moving
46 | easy recognition
47 | a deuce of an evening
48 | engines roaring
49 | compromising judgements
50 | solomon's conflict
51 | axis turning
52 | thinking circular
53 | blasting the past
54 | reviling vile

Book Five: Mortal Coil
55 | sanctuary unsanctified
56 | shudder unravelling
57 | catching an angel
58 | layering dimensions
59 | dead men meeting
60 | when it rains
61 | power plays
62 | sing on gold
63 | the valley of death
64 | grand aspersions
65 | no evil feared
66 | new days rising
67 | angelic neuroses
68 | step-brothers working
69 | the many sorrows of china
70 | peacefully wreathed
71 | tarnished gold
72 | the secret in darkness
73 | magical intent
74 | scars worth keeping
75 | benefits of a beau
76 | grand magery
77 | lighting the darkness
78 | old dogs and new tricks
79 | flouting traditions
80 | drawing lines
81 | brothers and sisters in arms
82 | channelling angels
83 | return of the carnies
84 | the death bringers
85 | meriting agelessness
86 | knick knack, paddy
87 | give a dog a bone
88 | americans propheteering
89 | the right side of honour
90 | tailored shocks
91 | hosting angels
92 | elders anonymous
93 | rediscovered strays
94 | changings and changelings
95 | a state of reflection
96 | adding hope
97 | the devil's truth
98 | dead mens' hospitality
99 | lives half lived
100 | next to godliness
101 | devilish plans
102 | beached angels
103 | lights of revelation
104 | heroes worshipped
105 | new devilries
106 | angels under the yoke
107 | brains frozen
108 | father, mother, daughter
109 | parental guidance recommended
110 | driven round the bend
111 | ongoing training
112 | privileged information
113 | reasonable men
114 | passing the buck
115 | gifting magicks
116 | strengths and weaknesses
117 | immaturity's perks
118 | priests and prophets
119 | scaling evil
120 | blowing covers
121 | marring an afternoon
122 | lie detection
123 | five-dimensional pain
124 | reliving nightmares
125 | taking stock
126 | sampling spices
127 | sleeping prophets lying
128 | rueful returns
129 | dead men reunion
130 | medically-approved hugs

The life of an angel was a contradiction in changes and stability. On one hand, they understood very well the way the cosmos was shaped by events within it. On the other, they stood at one step apart from it—or at least had, for a very long time, up until their Master's recent wager with Lucifer. Changes in the recent past had, even for angels, been fast and turbulent, but there were none that concerned Raphael more than Gabriel's abrupt reserve.

In the aftermath of the wager Gabriel had been almost the only one to know where their Lord was at any given time, a fact which had put the Archangel very firmly under Lucifer's radar. Raphael had joked that Gabriel ought to arm himself with more jokes or worse clothes to drive the fallen angel away; Michael had offered the peace of the Garden Coast. (Rafe thought his idea was better.)

Either way, even though their Master was fair hidden, every angel knew that they had only to ask Gabriel and the Archangel would pass on a message.

Then Gabriel had simply blipped off the radar himself. Poof! Gone! No one had noticed at first, because, well, they weren't exactly in constant connection. It was just when Raphael had taken a whim to seek out his younger brother that he'd noticed it, and let it be, because there was absolutely a reason for it. Gabe did not just off and vanish, except that once with his self-exile, and that didn’t count.

But when Gabriel had come back, he had been strangely agitated and yet close-mouthed. The younger Archangel had vanished off to wherever their Master was hidden for a long chat Raphael was dying to have listened into, and yet couldn't (but only partly because it would have been rude). Now he was here, floating among the stars and examining a black hole with unnerving intensity.

For a time Raphael watched without letting on that he was there, but eventually Gabriel spoke. “I’d rather you came to join me instead of lurking, brother.”

Absolutely refusing to feel chagrined, Raphael let himself manifest with an arm around Gabriel’s shoulders and ruffled the younger angel’s hair. Gabriel threw a fond, longsuffering glance up at him, but there was something in his eyes, something distracted and sharp, which indicated that Gabriel still wasn’t truly present. Raphael only wished he knew where the other Archangel was.

“Just wondering what you’re doin’ all the way out here,” he said teasingly. “There’s a party going on down there on Earth, Gabe.” There was always a party going on down on Earth. “You oughta be down there bobbin’ for apples and switching up party-hats!”

“I can’t,” Gabriel said quietly, with a sort of seriousness Raphael had, for all Gabriel’s literalness, rarely heard from him. So Raphael fell into the same seriousness, lost his playful accent, and spoke directly.

“Why not, brother? You’ve been reserved of late. I conf—I’m worried for you.”

For a very long time Gabriel said nothing and stared into the slow-turning swirl of the black hole. Raphael waited patiently, his arm still companionably across the other Archangel’s shoulders. Eventually Gabriel spoke. “Did you know, Raphael,” he said, “that the universe you see around you here isn’t the only one our Master has created?”

Raphael was so startled that he couldn’t answer. That wasn’t what he was imagining. He hadn’t been sure what he’d been imagining, but that wasn’t it. “I’m not sure what you mean, Gabriel,” he said after a moment. “Our Lord told me the story of Creation not all that long ago, and he never mentioned anything of the kind.”

Gabriel nodded. “He told me that story as well. And then He asked if I really wanted to know details.” He hesitated. “I … admit, I declined. It’s something He said—about faith. I decided I didn’t need to know details. But it’s true, nevertheless. Just beyond this …” The Archangel reached out his hand and touched that gossamer and unbreakable fabric that supported reality. “There are other universes, even with different versions of us.”

“Different versions of us?” Raphael repeated, appalled and uncertain and entirely confused. How could that be possible? What could their Master want with more than one of any of them? What was going on? Where had Gabriel gone in that time he’d vanished? Then something occurred to him and he smiled with relief. “This is a joke, right?”

Gabriel looked up at him and smiled back with such a gentle understanding that for a moment Raphael felt very small indeed. “No, Rafe. I’m not joking. It was a shock to me too. That isn’t the point, though.”

“Isn’t it?” Raphael asked, feeling as dazed as an angel possibly could, especially when he wasn’t even inhabiting an actual physical body.

“No.” Gabriel returned to watching the black hole intently. “I met some people from other realities. One of them is in a kind of Hell, and he very much does not deserve it. I promised him that, if I could, I would save him from it.”

Which did not in the least explain why Gabe was staring at a black hole, let alone a million other questions Raphael would have liked to ask and for which he couldn’t find the words. Finally he found one. “How?”

“First,” Gabriel said with a sort of tranquillity Raphael had heard in his brother’s voice a million times but never after delivering so turbulent a piece of news, “I’m going to jimmy open a crack in the door through this hole.”

Raphael stared at Gabe, and then at the black hole, and then back at Gabe. He opened his mouth to ask whether their Master knew he was planning this and then closed it, because that was a stupid question. He opened it again to query if Gabriel had asked whether he could go around lifting the sheets and then realised that was also a stupid question, because whether he had or not, their Master probably would have told him to do what he felt was best.

It was equally clear that Gabriel very much planned to go through with this, no matter what Raphael said, and really, did Raphael have the right to object? Surely if this carried a risk, their Master would have already forbidden Gabriel from making the attempt?

“I’ll come with,” Raphael said at last, and this time when Gabriel glanced back the younger Archangel’s expression was startled. A moment later that expression shifted into grateful apology.

“I’m sorry, Rafe, but I’m not entirely certain I’ll make it through, and we can hardly leave Michael here alone.” He grinned. “Did you see what he was wearing last festival day on the Garden Coast? He hasn’t moved out of the eighteenth century yet. How would he possibly handle the rest of the world?”

Raphael laughed out loud, warm but startled, and the sound of it rang through space. Gabriel chuckled quietly beside him, and for a few minutes there was just companionable humour that faded into an equally comfortable silence.

Still, Raphael had a lot of questions. How did Gabriel plan to find his friend, let alone the universe he was in? How was he going to get back? What would he do if he met another version of himself? Or, worse, Lucifer? Finally the Archangel just asked, “Have you figured out how to crack open the door?”

“I think so,” Gabriel said, considering the black hole. “Once I figured out what to look for. I wouldn’t have gotten even that far if it weren’t for some things our Master said.”

Which meant that, in some fashion, this expedition was sanctioned by their Master, Raphael translated, and something tense in him relaxed. “Something do to with this drain here, I’ll bet,” he said, falling into his casual accent once more. “Gonna rip out the kitchen sink, li’l brother?”

“Just to see what’s hiding underneath,” Gabriel said with a grin.

“I’ll try’n keep it open for ya,” Raphael promised, and Gabriel sent him a smile which lit up the very space around them with its brilliance.

“Thank you, Rafe,” he said, and straightened. Raphael took his arm away as Gabriel lifted his hands, not exactly stepping back so much as giving Gabriel space. The youngest Archangel didn’t often reveal his power, but it was always a sight to see, a song to hear, when he did.

As it was now. Gabriel’s voice started deep, lifted high, split and wove and became more melodies than one would think a single being could possibly sing at once. The sound of it made Raphael’s heart soar, made him want to fly and laugh. It was so deep, so light, so resonating that it was physical; it touched the slow turn of the black hole and made it, for just the briefest of moments, still. In that moment Gabriel sent a carefully-aimed bolt of energy into the heart of it.

It was the kind of sight Raphael hadn’t seen in thousands of years, a play of physics and metaphysics which he hadn’t thought possible, let alone imagined. There was an eruption in the centre of the black hole, where gravity was condensed; the cascade of energy plumed upward and was dragged back down as quick, a tear in the fabric of the reality not allowed the time to widen or become a danger.

Raphael didn’t even know Gabe had moved until the younger Archangel was gone, he was so busy staring in awe. With a start the Archangel stretched out his senses and just barely managed to catch a glimpse of his brother shooting toward the hole at speeds few angels could have achieved through such a gravity well. Raphael certainly couldn’t have.

How, he suddenly wondered, was he meant to keep that open if he didn’t even have the speed of thought to track Gabriel’s movements through it?

Desperately the Archangel cast about for something to jam in the door, as it were. There was some dark matter nearby and with a thought he fashioned it into a spear and pitched it toward the centre of the black hole. It struck just as Gabriel flitted through the crack nearly wholly collapsed in on itself; the star’s gravity caught it, pulled it in, and plugged the opening like a metaphysical sink.

Slowly Raphael made every part of himself relax. For good or ill, Gabe was gone on this quest of his, and now Raphael should probably go and round up some of their younger siblings to guard the area. Just in case.


Book Four: Dark Days
into the breach | finding skulduggery | retreat to the tunnels | into the cacophony | sanctuary in the cathedral | reuniting old friends | kenspeckle's new patient | holy water and disinfectant | objecting to china sorrows | the roadtrip | baffling guild | shenanigans at the safehouse | reassuring fletcher | valkyrie's intervention | solomon's revelation | visiting the edgleys | recalled to the sanctuary | guild's confusion | gabe is busted | the psychic tattoist | envisioning the cacophony | angel's first migraine | the morning after | china and solomon | detectives' council of war | china's foolishness | the collector dethroned | finding crux | skulduggery's vileness revealed | sorrows in aftermath | finding equilibrium | the devil's number | at the carnival | meeting authorities | solomon's confession | the stray soul | sanguine unsettled | solomon's choice | a cowboy underground | in scarab's basement | striking midnight | craven contested | emergency services | on your feet | and don't stop moving | easy recognition | a deuce of an evening | engines roaring | compromising judgements | solomon's conflict | axis turning | thinking circular | blasting the past | reviling vile

Book Five: Mortal Coil
sanctuary unsanctified | shudder unravelling | catching an angel | layering dimensions | dead men meeting | when it rains | power plays | sing on gold | the valley of death | grand aspersions | no evil feared | new days rising | angelic neuroses | step-brothers working | the many sorrows of china | peacefully wreathed | tarnished gold | the secret in darkness | magical intent | scars worth keeping | benefits of a beau | grand magery | lighting the darkness | old dogs and new tricks | flouting traditions | drawing lines | brothers and sisters in arms | channelling angels | return of the carnies | the death bringers | meriting agelessness | knick knack, paddy | give a dog a bone | americans propheteering | the right side of honour | tailored shocks | hosting angels | elders anonymous | rediscovered strays | changings and changelings | a state of reflection | adding hope | the devil's truth | dead mens' hospitality | lives half lived | next to godliness | devilish plans | beached angels | lights of revelation | heroes worshipped | new devilries | angels under the yoke | brains frozen | father, mother, daughter | parental guidance recommended | driven round the bend | ongoing training | privileged information | reasonable men | passing the buck | gifting magicks | strengths and weaknesses | immaturity's perks | priests and prophets | scaling evil | blowing covers | marring an afternoon | lie detection | five-dimensional pain | reliving nightmares | taking stock | sampling spices | sleeping prophets lying | rueful returns | dead men reunion | medically-approved hugs

Comments

[impudentsongbird]

Holy water. Yes. That ... would probably be useful. "I didn't think of that," Gabe murmured, too weary to even be abashed, and looked carefully around for the first time. "Anglican churches don't always carry holy water the way Catholic ones do. I ought to have chosen another cathedral."

It was just that this was one of his favourites, and so one of the first places to come to mind where he might be safe. In his world, it was guarded by angels, the priest a holy man; here it was quiet, empty, akin to somewhere recently dead. If Gabriel had been human again, he would have had chills down his spine. As it was, the amusement faded from his eyes as he looked around and saw a place physically the same as the one he knew and yet so different in the ways that mattered.

He was glad for Skul's distraction, intended or not, and turned his attention to his friend.

"Fugitives from whom?" he asked playfully. "I'm not sure Landel counts anymore." There was only one being who had authority from which Gabe could run, not that he ever would. The idea of being a fugitive, for him, went past a 'problem' and into 'laughable'. "That man who spotted us just before we left the office? Was it his?"

Skulduggery's thanks only gained a soft, warm smile, devoid of any regret or hesitation even despite the Archangel's current condition. He would not think of the Fallen. Could not, until he could figure out how to broach the subject, and this wasn't the time. "You're welcome, Skul."

[skeletonenigma]

"You had a split second," Skulduggery pointed out. He'd simply been relieved that they didn't end up in the middle of the sun, especially if Gabe's concentration was as shaky as his balance. "There should be some on the way." Unless Ghastly actually stopped to think about how strange of a request the holy water was, and decided that Skulduggery must have been driven insane. Which, now that the detective thought about it, was a very distinct possibility. Maybe Skulduggery should have tried to explain, but the whole Archangel revelation just hadn't seemed like a good topic to broach over the phone.

Skulduggery was mildly surprised that even in his condition, Gabe had been able to recognize that the room was an office, or that someone had seen them just before they... teleported? Space-walked? What was it called when an angel did it?

"I should probably mention," Skulduggery replied with an affirming nod, "that he's not too fond of me. Never really has been, either. I imagine it made his day when I disappeared." And because Guild had seen them, for however brief a moment, it was also possible that he would now be targeting all of Skulduggery's known associates; another reason Skulduggery wanted Ghastly to meet them at the church. The tailor's shop was one of the first places Guild would look, and if Crux's actions were any indication, Guild wouldn't be too worried about the rights of the accused.

"We'll be fine here for the moment. Guild would never think to look in a church. He's much too narrow-minded." Skulduggery neglected to mention that he himself hadn't been in a church for years, and hadn't seriously thought about what being in a church meant for even longer than that; but it wasn't as if Gabriel didn't already know that. After a moment of thought, Skulduggery straightened slightly in the pew. "He doesn't reply, does He? Not even to you?"

[impudentsongbird]

One tended to recognise one's surroundings when one had to fly from them very quickly. Especially when one ended up flying through the man in the way. By accident, of course. "That's good," Gabriel said softly, and closed his eyes again. Still, there was a faint smile on his lips. "If I didn't know any better I'd think a lot of people aren't fond of you, Skul."

But that question made the Archangel open his eyes again, this time to tilt his head to Skulduggery in confusion. "He doesn't always answer in a way that can be readily understood, no, but He's never turned me away for a chat, if that's what you mean. I went to Him as soon as I got back from Landel's. Actually, I wouldn't have made it out of my universe if it weren't for some of the things He said not long before I left."

Gabe smiled fondly, his eyes drifting to the crucifix behind the altar. "It's something He's started doing lately, where my brothers and sisters and I are concerned. Giving us all the facts we need to make a choice and then letting us choose ourselves. It's not easy, is it?"

[skeletonenigma]

Skulduggery couldn't help chuckling at the comment on his popularity; it reminded him of when he first met Valkyrie, and the hard time she had in believing that perfectly sensible people didn't like the Sanctuary's Prime Detective too much. "Only the ones without good taste," he answered with the impassive equivalent of a grin. It was, of course, very easy to make enemies when a community of secretive people who relied on accurate first impressions were forced to deal with someone who didn't have a face, preceded by a reputation of being dangerous and unpredictable.

Gabe's answer started off in the same generic way most people answered questions about God, which made the shock of his subsequent words all the more thorough. Priests, in Skulduggery's experience, usually had an ulterior motive in continuing their answers, despite not knowing the truth. Gabe was - as he treated almost everything that Skulduggery found fantastic - practically nonchalant. Simply stating facts. Skulduggery had a hard time wrapping his head around the concept of 'chats with God,' mainly because Gabe wouldn't have made it up and there wasn't room for a detective's usual healthy skepticism.

Skulduggery tried to imagine Gabriel and God chatting over coffee about Landel's, or how to find alternate realities. For once, his imagination failed him.

This was new territory. This was probably the first time Skulduggery had asked about Gabe's day-to-day life. But enough had happened within the last few hours to make him a little more willing to listen to the answers.

"Not if you've never had to make them before," Skulduggery agreed, still vaguely bewildered. "I'm sorry, you... chat? What do you chat about?"

[impudentsongbird]

Gabriel blinked in turn, because somehow it had never occurred to him that this might be a difficult thing to understand. Then again, he didn't usually talk about it except with people who had already come Home, and that generally meant they had already adjusted. "It depends on what we've been doing, or how long it's been since we've spoken. Sometimes we talk about what my siblings have been up to, or the fishing, or if we've just been to a theme-park, we'll talk about that. This time we talked about Landel's, and caught up on some other things since we'd last seen each other."

Coffee sometimes happened, though this time it had been cocktails at a beach-side bar. As the Creator had said, Gabe had looked like he'd needed it. (Not that the Archangel had noticed any difference, really, but he hadn't had any objection.) "We don't always talk, though," the Archangel added, as if this was going to make it easier for Skulduggery to adjust. "Well, we always talk, but often we just play a hand of cards or feed the birds, or watch the sunsets, instead of going anywhere in particular."

[skeletonenigma]

This was not the God Skulduggery had read about, or been brought up to believe in centuries ago.

He was fairly certain this wasn't the God any religion pictured praying to.

He was staring outright at Gabe now, trying to sort through the conflicting questions and thoughts and opinions in his head. A more lucid part of Skulduggery briefly wondered if this was how Valkyrie - how anyone non-magical - felt when they first met him; dancing around the idea of magic or God or Archangels existing, and then one day discovering very forcefully and with no room for doubt that the world was so much larger and stranger than any of them had imagined.

God as a gambler made a certain kind of sense, disturbing though the thought was. Likewise, His fishing or feeding the birds were all properly enigmatic activities that at least felt possible. It was when Skulduggery tried to picture Him on a roller coaster with Gabe that his thoughts came to a screeching halt, and refused to work anymore.

Rather than try to reason any of it out, Skulduggery just picked the first question swimming at the top of his mind - the closest to taking something on faith that Skulduggery was capable of getting, especially where religion was concerned. "What does He look like?"

[impudentsongbird]

"Anything He wants, really," Gabe answered, his attention clearly more on surveying Skul with concern than in actually answering the question. "If He's taking a human shape, He often goes with the 'Old Man of the Sea' or the grizzled cowboy kind of look. Not always, though."

He hesitated for a moment and then asked gently, "Are you okay?"

It hadn't occurred to him before, but suddenly the Archangel could well imagine what kind of revelation this must be. A great shock, a massive change of world-view. He hadn't known what that felt like a year ago, but now he did.

[skeletonenigma]

God enjoyed riding roller coasters, and taking on the form of a grizzled cowboy.

Had Skulduggery believed his thoughts were stopped? Suddenly, he very much wished they had. He was almost afraid to ask another question, and that was just as mind-numbingly unfamiliar as anything else in this suddenly bizarre conversation. Skulduggery had never been afraid to ask questions before. Asking questions was part of what made him such a good detective.

"Fine," Skulduggery answered Gabe, perhaps a little too quickly. He hesitated as well, for a little longer, before his gaze and skull drifted back to the crucifix behind the altar. "God has an affinity for cowboys, and enjoys going to theme parks. I'm perfectly fine."

The figure of Jesus nailed to the cross suddenly seemed to loom over them, and the story of his birth faded slowly back into Skulduggery's mind. "Exactly how much of the Bible is accurate?" he asked, as much for a change of subject as a genuine interest in the answer.

[impudentsongbird]

The answer didn't sound very convincing at all, and so Gabe's expression only deepened. Nor did his gaze shift at first, and the Archangel took a moment to answer. When he did, he followed the detective's line of sight toward the cross and smiled a little, half rueful and half sad.

"Enough of it. Not all, but enough. The Bible was written by men--good men, but only men. There was a lot happening behind the scenes that they couldn't see." Like the reason behind his Master's wrath, and the wager in which Judas was the fulcrum. One of only two times in history that Lucifer had won.

[skeletonenigma]

Only men. Skulduggery had always considered sorcerers a step above the rest of humanity, afforded a perspective on the state of the world normal people just didn't have, mostly due to the sorcerers' longer lifespans and their control of a force understood by few. Today, Skulduggery had witnessed power on such an astonishing level that he felt eons behind. Add to that how Archangels must have existed since the beginning of time, and Skulduggery really shouldn't have felt as offended by those two simple words as he did. It was extremely hypocritical of him.

He nodded slowly, as if any sudden movement might dislodge the new ideas now spreading like wildfire through his mind. He might have asked what was happening behind the scenes, but Skulduggery had a feeling that the answer would take far too long in the short space of time they had left, and he was much more interested in the preventable future. "Fair enough. What about the Book of Revelation? The Rapture? Is that something you two ever chat about?"

It came off more hotly than Skulduggery had intended, a surprise even to him after so long of remaining calm. He wasn't angry at Gabriel, exactly - it was more a reaction to a lifetime of grudges never forgiven where religion was concerned.

[impudentsongbird]

"Not usually, actually," Gabriel said slowly, giving Skulduggery a strange, worried look. "All things end, of course, because all things must, but if my Lord does have an specific end planned for humanity, He hasn't told me what it is and it hasn't been my place to ask."

Though now he thinks about it, the Creator would likely answer if he did. "But," the Archangel added a bit hesitantly, just because he wasn't used to professing his own conclusions about his Master's thoughts, "to be very honest, I wouldn't be surprised if He doesn't have anything planned." Gabriel smiled. "He loves you all too much, you see. Not just having you in His Home, but being able to watch and act with you in His Creation. I've--there's only once when I wondered if He was in any rush to end it all, and I was proven wrong. Given the circumstances of that time, I imagine He's content to have Creation continue on for as long as it would."

For everyone to enjoy, not just Him. Gabriel bit his lip, surveying Skulduggery again. The heat in the detective's voice hadn't been lost on him. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean to upset you. If you'd rather, we can stop talking about it."

[skeletonenigma]

The idea of having an all-knowing boss - or Father, as the case may be - whom you didn't even think to question about the end of Creation was not an idea that Skulduggery had ever had cause to seriously consider before. Now that he had, even taking into account the Archangels' nature to obey, it still struck him as so completely ridiculous that the rest of Gabe's answer caught him just as off-guard as most of Gabe's answers in the past few minutes seemed to be developing the habit of doing.

It was amazing, Skulduggery thought, how religion could turn the basic equivalent of a Big Brother into not only a palatable idea, but a preferable one. And Gabriel, of course, made it sound like Earth itself was a paradise.

"You didn't," Skulduggery assured him. "Don't worry. This is all just... difficult to swallow." What was even more difficult to swallow was that in all their time at Landel's, Skulduggery hadn't once asked about God beyond His mere existence - or at least, hadn't taken the answers anywhere near as seriously without direct proof of Gabe's divinity. Honestly, he'd really brought this upon himself.

A noise at the back of the church made Skulduggery turn, but no one was there. "Which reminds me," he spoke up, voice completely back to its normal even tone. "Those friends of mine. They'll be a tad curious about how I came back, and one of them can be annoyingly persistent. How much do you want them to know?" Gabe had been mostly reluctant to reveal much while at Landel's, at least at first; and while keeping the general public in the dark made practical sense, especially given many sorcerers' inclination towards excitement, it would be a lot easier to explain the holy water if Skulduggery could tell them the truth. That, and why a man with no visible injuries could barely walk.

[impudentsongbird]

Skul's sudden turn around made Gabriel automatically follow his gaze, but the Archangel regretted it almost instantly. He closed his eyes and sank back into the pew, struggling to master the sudden upsurge of pain he had, until then, been managing to use the conversation to ignore. He wasn't sure if that had been the detective's intent, but it had worked, nonetheless, and he was grateful for it.

It wasn't until then that the Archangel realised how little he had been paying attention to his surroundings. Or had been able to. Thank Lord Skulduggery was there.

"I would rather keep the number of people who know my identity down," he said a tad faintly. "Especially if mind-reading is a common thing here; it would be safer for them." Then he opened his eyes to look, carefully, at Skul. "But if you trust them, my friend, then so will I. My being here does make explanations difficult, and I wouldn't have you lie to your loved ones on my behalf."

[skeletonenigma]

Just like Gabriel, Skulduggery had been able to ignore the obvious pain the Archangel was in until he clearly felt another surge of it. As the inadvertent cause of the short surge and the not-so-inadvertent cause of the pain in general, Skulduggery turned briefly back to the church doors with a hint of guilt while Gabe answered. Any minute now, Ghastly, Valkyrie, and Tanith should be here with the holy water. Skulduggery wouldn't admit it, but he was counting the seconds.

"Reading minds isn't quite so common," Skulduggery contradicted him. "I've only met one woman who could do it, and it took her centuries of practice." He gave a short nod, skull tilted slightly to the side. "I've lied to each of them about far worse, Gabe. Compared to that, who you really are would be a walk in the park."

Of course, Skulduggery couldn't deny the entertainment value of watching his friends' reactions upon hearing the truth. Besides, with the full might of the Sanctuary about to bear down on them from every direction - a little more worrisome than Skulduggery had led Gabe to believe - they were going to need all the help they could get. "I do trust them. They'll be able to help." He hesitated, and then added, "They might have more difficulty with your existence than I did, but they will help."

[impudentsongbird]

"You did see more of me than they will," Gabe said with a faint smile that turned rueful. "So to speak." They were still going to see more of him than even he intended; these kinds of injuries were far from normal among angels.

Obfuscating the truth wasn't new to the Archangel, but it would have been a lie for him to say that he was comfortable with Skulduggery outright lying to his friends about something about which they did have some right to know. Especially for his sake. "If you feel it would be better, for whatever reason, then tell them, Skul. They do have a right to demand answers, and if psychic power is that uncommon here then the risk is minimal."

He paused, tilting his head just a little in a way that nonetheless made his headache pound. "Who are we expecting?"

[skeletonenigma]

"I told you," Skulduggery replied. "Friends of mine." His natural caution with their identities was partly force of habit, and partly a lingering practicality from Landel and his Institute. After a few seconds of thought, Skulduggery realized how ridiculous it was in this particular instance.

"Ghastly Bespoke," he continued without missing a beat, "an old friend and ally. Tanith Low, a fairly recent friend, but every bit as trustworthy. And my partner, Valkyrie Cain." Here, he paused, remembering for the first time since speaking with Ghastly that as far as Valkyrie and the others knew, Skulduggery had been gone for a year. It had felt like much longer to him, but a year was a sizable amount of time regardless, especially when you didn't know for sure what was happening.

"I may have mentioned her," he went on in an effort to bury the ray of anger this thought caused. "Fourteen years old, and one of the bravest people I know." Another pause. "Fifteen, now. Don't tell her I said that. The ego boost would be frightening. And as I am such an excellent mentor, you should expect a host of the same questions I've been asking. Perhaps with slightly less tact, but well-meant anyway."

Only then did it occur to Skulduggery that if Valkyrie had been searching for a way to reopen the portal - and there was very little doubt in his mind that she'd have been willing to try something so incredibly dangerous - then she would need a Teleporter, and Fletcher was the only one left. While Skulduggery had a hard time imagining Valkyrie putting up with someone so annoying, she did have an equally annoying tendency to surprise him. And Ghastly had been sufficiently vague over the phone; Fletcher was a definite possibility.

"They might have a teenager with them," Skulduggery belatedly and almost reluctantly added. "And if not, you'll probably meet him at some point. Fletcher Renn. Try not to be offended by anything he says. He's new to our world, and he has this habit of pointing out the obvious very loudly. Just try to ignore him, and everything should go swimmingly."

While Skulduggery's faith in Fletcher wasn't anywhere near as solid, he did have faith in Fletcher's fear of him. Besides, the boy had come through in the end back at Aranmore Farm, and disastrous conclusion aside, what he'd done for them was certainly impressive.

~~

Skulduggery had told Valkyrie before that trying to put her feelings into words was useless at best, and self-defeating at worst. The human experience was so vast and complicated that a measly language of a few million words would never be able to adequately describe it. All she'd manage to do, he said, was force herself into narrowly predefined categories, and thus depress herself further.

At the time, Valkyrie had taken his advice to heart. But now...

Her head felt like a jackhammer was pounding away inside her skull, trying to drill holes through it. She'd long since accepted that Skulduggery was gone, and that the only way to get him back was by using the Murder Skull Guild had taken from them. She'd made that fact the single, unalienable basis of her existence for the last year. To have it so roughly pulled out from under her just with a few words from Ghastly...

Valkyrie spend the van ride trying to sort out all of the many feelings threatening to overwhelm her, if only to get some degree of control back. She wasn't going to see Skulduggery for the first time in months and break down. She wasn't. What she was going to do was have her feelings worked out to the point where she could set them aside, be happy to see him again, and ask all of the relevant questions that needed to be asked, like how on earth he'd managed to rescue himself.

By the time they pulled up outside the church with the holy water, Valkyrie had finally decided that her plan was impossible.

She was clutching the bottle of holy water so tightly as they walked up the steps that her knuckles were white, as if the unexplainable request was somehow a lifeline. She was annoyed at herself for that. She was even more annoyed that she couldn't seem to stop doing it. To top it all off, the idea of Skulduggery in a church was so laughably ridiculous that the holy water somehow started to make sense, but Valkyrie had to take this seriously. Quite apart from anything else, someone was apparently hurt.

Tanith went first, but stopped just outside the door, looking lost - or at least as lost as it was possible for an eighty-something-year-old woman dressed in leather to look. "Should I knock?"

"Why?" Ghastly asked, surprised.

Tanith gave a little shrug. "I don't know. This just... doesn't this feel weird to anyone else?"

"That's what I kept trying to say," Fletcher insisted. As was generally the case nowadays, everyone ignored him.

"It was definitely him on the phone," Ghastly repeated for what felt like the twentieth time. Valkyrie was starting to wonder if it was them Ghastly was trying to convince, or himself. "But he has been stuck with the Faceless Ones for almost a year." The tailor hesitated, and then added in a gentler tone, "He might need a very different kind of help."

"And if he does?" Tanith asked slowly. "How are we supposed to handle that? I'm pretty sure he could take most of us in a fight."

It was a mark of how desperate each of them had become, and how long that same thought had been simmering in each of their minds, that Tanith was willing to admit she might be outmatched. But Valkyrie ignored that. She ignored all three of them, passed Tanith on the steps, and pushed the large door open without a hint of hesitation.

[impudentsongbird]

Names were interesting. It was one of the first things Gabe had to said Skul, when they first met. That hadn't changed now. Gabriel had heard the name Valkyrie before; Skul had mentioned her. But he'd never told Gabe her full name. Valkyrie Cain. That someone should willingly take the name of a traitor and a murderer was somehow ... unnerving.

"I'll be sure to try and avoid swelling her head," Gabriel murmured with a faintly distracted smile. Then he centered himself and looked properly at Skulduggery, his smile widening. Skulduggery trusted this girl, loved this girl, that much was clear; name or not, Gabriel pushed his unease aside. "If she's more tactless than you, my friend, than I shudder to think what the two of you are like together."

The news about this fourth, Fletcher, was curious and intriguing. "I'm new to your world as well, Skul," he pointed out with a hint of a grin. "We'll just have to be new and questioning together."

That was about when the door opened suddenly and with a ponderous scrape. Gabriel's first instinct was to move, his second to not, and what resulted was the slightest fission running through him, just enough to have taken his breath away--if he had breath. As it was, he caught himself, braced himself, and turned, very carefully, in his seat to see who had entered and whether they might have a problem with hiding Skul's ... skulls.

[skeletonenigma]

Gabe probably wouldn't be quite so understanding once he actually met Fletcher and spent more than a few minutes with him. Then again, Skulduggery could easily picture Gabe defending the last Teleporter through thick and thin. The Archangel's endless mounds of patience had always been a source of confusion and fascination for Skulduggery. There was patient - which Skulduggery certainly was - and then there was the angelic patience of a saint.

... Which, now that Skulduggery thought about it, really explained everything.

"You'll question; he won't let go," Skulduggery pointed out, ignoring Gabe's earlier comment. "You haven't so much as mentioned the skeleton part yet. Fletcher wouldn't stop mentioning it for hours. I think he believed the more he claimed it couldn't exist, the greater the chance it wouldn't."

Skulduggery might have been more careful about standing to see who was coming in, but he was fairly sure he'd recognized the way the door was violently shoved open. It may have been a bit of a far-fetched thought, but it turned out to be correct, because Valkyrie was walking purposefully into the church when Skulduggery turned. She froze when she saw him.

To say he had missed her would have been an understatement. Skulduggery just hadn't allowed those feelings any time in his consciousness while the question of ever seeing her again was still up in the air. Fruitless feelings of frustration would have done absolutely nothing at Landel's to help him escape, and they certainly wouldn't have helped with the Faceless Ones. Now that they'd leaked through the cracks before he could do anything, Skulduggery wasn't too surprised to find that they had mellowed into a strange mixture of guilt and sadness. And for the first time in a while, they came without even a slight hint of anger.

Neither of them said anything, the silence between them slowly lengthening into minutes. Skulduggery still didn't have any idea what to say when Ghastly, Tanith, and Fletcher then filed slowly in after her. Nothing continued to be said by anyone.

Skulduggery took note of the water Valkyrie was carrying, and the hesitant - perhaps even wary - way in which they all looked at him. He nodded slowly, wondering if even revealing his original skull would be a little too much at this point. Part of him knew they needed to get through this reunion quickly, because Gabe still needed their help, but another part of him inexplicably wanted to just stay in this moment forever.

"I'm back," he said simply, spreading his arms slightly to the sides. He didn't deserve to be, but he was. "And not crazy, I promise." Maybe slightly delirious, but that was only to be expected. "I take it things have gone downhill without me?"

[impudentsongbird]

It was, in some way, fortunate that they were focussing in Skulduggery. Not that this was a surprise; he was their friend, and he had sacrificed himself, and Gabriel had no intention of interrupting their reunion. In fact, he was anticipating it. The reunions in Heaven had always been his favourite part of guiding souls Home--bringing them to their party, the one just for them, and seeing their joy at the friends they had lost.

It wasn't a case for every soul that there would be someone they knew waiting, but usually that just meant the party started out with a bang as everyone else compensated.

The thing that Gabriel had truly not been expecting was to feel the thrum of Valkyrie's blood--it must surely be Valkyrie; she was a teenager, strong and hopeful and wrought with tribulation. Gabriel had been expecting to feel nothing from the blood of the sorcerers here, because the magic here was different to his.

Except it wasn't.

Except that he could feel the resonance of Valkyrie's line just as easily as he had been able to feel it in all those of the blood in Taubolt. It wasn't as loud as Joby's, because Joby's grandfather had, after all, been the last Ancient; but it was loud enough, and with the pound in his head and the contrast to her friends, it seemed even louder. Without meaning to the Archangel gaped, closed his eyes, pulled himself together, and almost managed to recover himself before he heard the sussurration beneath the hum of Valkyrie's blood.

This wasn't like the whisper of the Faceless Ones. It was something else. Something he knew, something that had pained him, something he came as close to hating as an Archangel could.

His eyes snapped open and his gaze fell to the ring on Valkyrie's hand. How, he thought a little dazedly, ironic that a ring like that would be so close to a bottle of holy water. They rebounded off each other, like opposites--otherwise he might not have heard it through his aching head. Gabriel looked up at Valkyrie's face again, and this time he was pale, his expression torn between recognition and dread and that kind of grief belonging someone who knows a loved one is on a path to destruction--the kind that left tears in one's eyes.

Valkyrie Cain. Surely Skulduggery wouldn't have taught her that. When Gabriel had first discovered Skul had been a necromancer he'd been shocked, horrified, and then glad beyond words that the detective had had the strength to give it up. Not many did. No, Skulduggery wouldn't have taught Valkyrie that.

But someone had. Someone who either didn't understand her name or didn't care, because if there was any kind of magic someone with that name should avoid at almost any cost, it was necromancy.

Wordlessly Gabriel watched her, knowing it was rude to exclude the others who had entered with her and hardly able to do anything else.

[skeletonenigma]

Valkyrie hadn't truly believed Skulduggery might be crazy until she finally laid eyes on him in the church. For a moment, she thought that she was going ever so slightly insane, because a skeleton wearing black priest robes in front of the altar of an empty church was just so out there that for a long moment, all Valkyrie could do was stare. But no, that figure was definitely there, and now her worry for Skulduggery grew tenfold.

What happened to his suit? The hat and the scarf and how he was never lost for words? The Skulduggery Valkyrie knew would never have consented to walking around in black robes for any reason, and certainly not the black robes of a non-magical priest. The Skulduggery Valkyrie knew would never have called his best friend after being gone for a year and ask for a bottle of holy water without so much as an explanation.

But then Skulduggery spoke, and none of that mattered anymore, because it was definitely and without question him - sanity and all. There would be an explanation for the rest. There always was. Valkyrie didn't need to force the smile that came at his question, though she did need to fight back a slight tremor in her voice and even, stunningly enough, a tear. "We can manage without you, you know," she teased back, and it suddenly felt like Skulduggery had never left. "Guild hasn't completely ruined everything yet." And there was the tremor, but Valkyrie didn't even try to explain it away. "You're dressed like a priest."

Skulduggery's skull tilted down a fraction, as if he had just noticed. "I thought it would make for a nice change of pace. What do you think, Ghastly? Would I be able to custom-order one within the week?"

"Tell me," Ghastly spoke up, his face completely blank, "that you're joking."

It was impossible to tell when Skulduggery was smiling, but Valkyrie knew he was - knew that everything was absolutely fine, if he was already joking with them. "My previous suit," he explained, "isn't in very good shape. I needed a quick disguise. I've been assured that I won't be - "

But Valkyrie didn't let him finish. She didn't stay frozen to the spot, didn't break down, didn't cry, didn't react in a hundred different ways she'd been dreading she might; she allowed the relief that instantly swept through her to fill her up and propel her forward, and Valkyrie cut off Skulduggery's explanation by throwing her arms around him.

She felt him stiffen slightly, probably from surprise, but then he was hugging her back.

A year's worth of work was now paid off, and nothing could spoil this moment. Not even Fletcher, who for once seemed content to just stand and stare.

"How did you get back?" she asked, her voice low enough so only Skulduggery would hear.

"Haven't you been paying attention? I'm brilliant."

Valkyrie grinned into his robe. It didn't really matter, anyway. "I've got a surprise for you," she said instead, already imagining how much easier a Sanctuary heist would be with Skulduggery planning their every move.

"Would that happen to be my head?" Skulduggery asked, amused. "I hate to spoil a good surprise, Valkyrie, but I already have it."

She pulled away and frowned at him, trying to work out how Skulduggery even knew what her surprise was. "What? How? It's in the Sanctuary!"

"How do you think I got back?" he asked warmly. But then Skulduggery lowered his voice again, tone suddenly much more serious. "Tell you what. Surprise me with the story of that new ring of yours instead, and I promise I'll tell you everything."

Valkyrie was glad that Ghastly had walked up by that point. It gave her the cover she needed to step back and avoid an answer. She subconsciously started playing with the black ring again, pushing it up and down on her finger, before she realized what she was doing and stuffed both of her hands into her pockets.

Skulduggery and Ghastly were hugging now. If either of them had said anything beforehand, Valkyrie had completely missed it. She hoped her face wasn't red. How did Skulduggery know so quickly? She didn't think he paid much attention to her fashion sense, or any accessories she might have started wearing recently. How would he react, when she told him about Wreath? Would he make her stop practicing Necromancy? Probably. Would he be disappointed? Angry? Not want to have anything to do with her anymore?

And just like that, the happiest moment of Valkyrie's life had been soured.

She forced herself to calm down. It was possible that Skulduggery didn't even know it was a Necromancer ring. It was a long shot, she knew, but the hope was enough to at least let her concentrate on the surrounding conversations. Tanith had said her congratulations as well, clearly unsure what to make of the situation; Fletcher had moved closer to the group without saying much of anything, and Skulduggery seemed perfectly content acting as if nothing had changed.

She wasn't aware of the man in the pew or of him watching her, and she wouldn't have cared if she was. Skulduggery was back, and Valkyrie didn't have to risk everything for another chance to see him. Whatever he might or might not know could wait for when they were alone.

[impudentsongbird]

It was the embrace that broke Gabriel out of his stare with a sudden, radiant smile. He had fears, but any doubts were erased at the sheer joy on Valkyrie's face as she flung her arms around Skulduggery. There were still almost tears in his eyes, but this time they were for the opposite reason than they had been.

The Archangel didn't interrupt. He remained where he was, and watched, and bathed in the elation around him. It was almost a balm to his wounds; almost made him forget he was even hurting. What it did do was make every moment of his pain, now and for however long he'd have to endure it in the future, worthwhile.

When, finally, Skulduggery had greeted all his friends--and Gabriel could tell who each of them were, tell by their names and the way they were greeted--the Archangel picked up the detective's skull, hat and scarf, and rose.

He did so very carefully, slowly, still unable to keep the pain from lining his face; yet it was lost under the sparkle of pleasure in his eyes, the beam in his expression. To Skulduggery's friends, he looked like a man only a few years older than Fletcher, in an untucked shirt and knee-length shorts, and barefoot. Gabriel held out Skul's possessions. "I was going to say they might not recognise you without these," he said teasingly, "but apparently I was wrong."

His voice was little more than a whisper, hoarse and fading, only partly there. He no longer cared.

[skeletonenigma]

Skulduggery turned to face Gabe, the Archangel's rough and harsh whisper cutting through the detective's new-found joy far more effectively than even the dark power thrumming around Valkyrie's new ring had. He took the hat and scarf back, pulled each one on with tender care. "There aren't many living skeletons around," he said, irrationally amused at the sight of Gabe holding a human skull. "I'm hard to forget."

"I'll probably find it easier to remember you when you have your real head back on," Ghastly teased.

"It's the hat that does it for me," Tanith added with a smile of her own.

Not to be left out, Fletcher flopped down into a pew just behind Gabe. "You're going to scare the hell out of some priest when they come back," he pointed out with a smirk.

Ghastly had moved his attention to Gabe now, the warm smile still on his face, and Skulduggery knew his friend was realizing that Gabriel hadn't so much as given the ugly scars covering his head a second glance. Somehow, Skulduggery had never really pictured an Archangel as being overly judgmental - Gabe even less so - and so he hadn't felt the need for a warning. It was good to see that one wasn't needed, and even better to see how much Ghastly appreciated it, even if the tailor wouldn't admit it. "I don't believe we've had the pleasure," he remarked evenly. "What happened?"

"Ah, yes." Skulduggery finally took back his skull, though he left it on the pew again less than a second later. "Introductions, of course, but first... Valkyrie?"

She started, as if Skulduggery had interrupted something important. "What?"

"There was a reason I asked for the holy water," he reminded her.

She blinked, and then realized she was still holding it. "Oh. Right. What was that reason, again?"

Skulduggery took the bottle from her without answering, and offered it to Gabe. He knew how strange this must look, but the memory of how well the water helped last time was forefront in Skulduggery's mind. Besides, convincing his friends that Gabe was an Archangel would be difficult enough under the best of circumstances.

"Before I explain anything," Skulduggery told them, "you all need to understand that a lot more happened to me over this past year than any of you think you're aware of. There is more than one universe. I've been stuck in more than one. Fictional characters exist in other realities, and I've had the privilege of meeting some." Even rooming with one, he silently added, but this probably wasn't the best place to mention that.

Nobody reacted. It was possible they thought he was joking. Skulduggery would have thought he was joking if he hadn't personally lived through it. And this time, there was a set definition for the word 'lived,' what with Landel forcing him into a human body.

"Having said that," Skulduggery continued on, slower and more carefully, "I'd like you all to meet Gabriel."

He paused, wondering if that would be enough. Valkyrie was glancing at Ghastly and Tanith, but neither of them showed any hint of recognition, either. After a moment, Skulduggery looked at Fletcher too, but the teenager looked more lost than any of them.

Skulduggery made the sound of clearing his throat, which would never be a normal sound coming from a skeleton, awkward silence or not. "The Gabriel."

Most of them still didn't get it, but Skulduggery could see something finally clicking in Ghastly's mind as he looked over at the holy water. Ghastly and Skulduggery had discussed the possibility, a long time ago, of religious stories having some basis in fact; that a sorcerer had turned water into wine, or that the Necromancers' Passage had been the inspiration for the Rapture.

Neither of them had ever imagined this, but Skulduggery had some background knowledge to help him accept it. Ghastly wouldn't even have that. The quick and suspicious glance he cast towards Skulduggery had completely left his face by the time he looked back at Gabe, but it was impossible to tell what he was really thinking.

Skulduggery was mildly disappointed that Valkyrie hadn't put the pieces together yet. He turned his eyeless gaze on her, next words pointed and direct. "The Archangel. Gabriel. He's the reason I'm standing here right now."

The look of understanding that slowly dawned over her face was quickly followed by disbelief, then shock, then a suspicion very similar to Ghastly's; then it fell back to shock and stayed there, her mouth falling open as she tried to think of something to say or ask. Tanith's face also seemed permanently stuck on shock, but Fletcher didn't even appear to have gotten to that point yet.

"What do you mean, the Archangel?" he broke the tense silence. "Angels don't exist. He just looks like a hobo."

If Skulduggery could have given Gabe a look, it would have been one of told you. As it was, the amusement he couldn't help feeling was vaguely evident in his voice when he next spoke. "He doesn't particularly live anywhere, Fletcher, if that's what you're asking. Maybe he'll explain it better than I can."

[impudentsongbird]

"Thank you," Gabriel murmured, accepting the bottle without trying to hide the relief on his face. He eased himself down to sit on the arm of the pew and unscrewed the bottle, pausing for a moment. It probably, he reasoned, wasn't a very good idea for him to drink the lot of it. As careful as he was being, his wings were still in agony, and the fact was that they felt ... dirty.

It was the Faceless One's touch. Or maybe a spell. He couldn't say for sure, except that beneath the pain there was a certain kind of sharpness too. When mortals got injured, the wound had to be disinfected, right?

Gabe would rather not risk what a Dark God's touch could do to him if left untended.

So he took a couple of small mouthfuls, watching Skulduggery break the news to his friends. He met Ghastly's stare calmly and with a sort of gentle amusement. Fletcher's words made him break into a grin, and he turned his head enough to catch the Teleporter's eye, his voice still hoarse but well enough to raise above a whisper. "I've been a hobo. Pretty frequently, in fact. It's the best thing to be when you want to sit on a bench, feed the birds and watch the world go by."

[skeletonenigma]

"See?" Fletcher announced triumphantly. "He's even admitting the whole hobo thing! Come on, Skulduggery, there's no such thing as angels. I mean, you're sorcerers, you're hundreds of years old, you know that. Just look at the Faceless Ones."

His confidence faltered slightly when no one seemed to be agreeing with him. "Wouldn't you guys know?" he tried again, a slight modicum of fear creeping into his voice. Skulduggery could imagine hundreds of different reasons Fletcher might have for wanting this all to be a joke. "Wouldn't somebody have noticed something by now? Wouldn't someone have told me by now?"

"Fletcher," Valkyrie snapped suddenly, "no one tells you anything even when you ask. Shut up."

Tanith had taken a couple of hesitant steps forward, but she seemed to be trying to look everywhere except at Gabriel, which Skulduggery found interesting. Eventually, her gaze fell on Skulduggery himself. "Are you..." she began, stopped, swallowed, and tried again. "Is he... are you sure?"

Skulduggery nodded cheerfully. "Oh, yes. Wings, halo, the whole nine yards. How else do you explain my being here?"

"But..." Tanith's voice weakly trailed off. She was still talking directly to Skulduggery, and probably wasn't even aware that she was doing it. "Does that mean that..."

She didn't seem able to finish the question, but Skulduggery knew the general direction she was going in. It had been his first query too, even if he hadn't voiced it for a while. It was the natural progression of thought, one step up above an Archangel. "Yes and no," he answered her. "In Gabe's universe, they apparently visit theme parks. But I doubt that's the case here."

Ghastly's face had been carefully blank up until this point, but now he glanced back at Skulduggery with a sort of confused shock. "Theme parks?" He shook his head. "Gabe?"

Skulduggery's reply was delayed by a split second. "He introduced himself that way."

"Exactly how long have you two known each other?"

How was Skulduggery supposed to answer that? He'd met Gabe after only two or three days trapped in Landel's reality, and a good deal of time had passed since then, even before they all managed to escape. At some point, they'd become friends; at some point after that, Gabe had confirmed Skulduggery's suspicions that he wasn't as normal as he tried to make himself seem. Time passed differently in other realities. There was no real answer. "A while," Skulduggery finally decided, opting for simple. "The circumstances where we met were very different."

Ghastly gave a slow nod. The differences in time, Skulduggery knew, wouldn't be what was giving him trouble. "Then... this is Gabriel."

"Yes."

"The Archangel," Ghastly clarified. "Messenger of God. That Gabriel." He didn't seem to want an affirmation this time, instead looking Gabe up and down with a reserved expression. "I pictured him very differently."

"So did I," Skulduggery agreed. "You should see him when he isn't hurt."

A smile finally broke out over his friend's face, and Skulduggery had no clue what it was about. Ghastly's entire worldview had just been shaken to its very core, and he was smiling. Smiling. That was probably a sign of either a badly damaged psyche or - the more likely case in this instance - amusement at his own private joke. Skulduggery would have to ask him about it later.

Ghastly was the first of the four to approach Gabriel, and he politely held his hand out. "I don't know what the protocol here generally is..."

"You don't need to avert your eyes, apparently," Skulduggery informed him.

Ghastly ignored the detective, continuing on as if nothing had happened. "... but I want to thank you for what you did. Especially if it's left you as drained as you look."

[impudentsongbird]

"The sorcerers in my world don't know either," Gabriel told Fletcher gently, as if that would reassure him, and without his meaning to his gaze slid sideways to Valkyrie. "They have their own legends, of course, but only a handful recently discovered how true they were."

Then the Archangel's attention turned back to where Skulduggery was, quite obviously, teasing his friends, and his brow furrowed a little. He opened his mouth to correct the detective regarding his Master's presence, then closed it again, because this wasn't the time and it was doubtful Skul would be convinced this time either. (That didn't mean Gabriel was going to stop trying. Just that, on this occasion, he chose to pass over the assumption that there was more than one God and He wasn't, in any way, present.)

Instead he smiled at Ghastly as the man looked him up and down, friendly and welcoming and trying to be as unthreatening as possible (as if he had to try at all). That smile broke into a happy grin as the tailor offered him his hand, and Gabriel took it firmly.

"It was my pleasure," he said, and meant it in spite of everything, the sincerity clear in his voice. Then he laughed, the sound this time full and light in comparison to what it had been before. "And we don't really stand on ceremony all that much, to be honest." He winked at Fletcher. "It would get in the way of the fun."