What Sanguine didn't realise was that Gabe could hear every word. He wasn't human. He wasn't limited to a human's sensory range. And he certainty wasn't oblivious to words broadcast through a transmission.
"Who says I need your guidance, Billy-Ray?" he said without looking around or even changing his step. In fact, as slow and careful as those steps were, they led unerringly toward the nearest stairwell--a fact Sanguine might notice given Gabe now left his 'all one direction around the corner' system.
What actually worried him more, if it could be said to be worrying, was what Sanguine meant by 'if you know what I mean'. There was glee there, and a maddening sort of smugness, and something ... something. An originality. A pride in a plan that no one else had ever thought of. Which wasn't any help at all to someone who didn't know this world. Skulduggery probably would have figure it out just by that sense alone.
"Your daddy askin' for you, Billy-Ray?" He tsked. "Here I thought you weren't workin' for him."
~~~
Solomon left through the church, steadfastly not looking around and simultaneously acutely aware of everything about him. The pews. The altar. The windows. The crucifix. He felt as if the crucifix were staring into his back.
Yet at the same time there was something ... relieved about the place. Something quieter, and less tense. Maybe it was because he no longer had his cane.
His hand convulsively gripped on air and he had to pause by the door before leaving. He was leaving his cane here. Destroyed, of course, but for the time being it had felt as if what had happened in this church would remain in this church. Now he was going to leave it, and take all that had happened with him.
And a knife. He smiled suddenly, a bitter and wry and somehow amused smile. All he had was a knife. Some would question why he was even bothering to defy fate, given how vulnerable he was, but he had to. He was a survivor. That was all he'd ever been.
Solomon pushed open the door and stepped out onto the Dublin street, a sorcerer without access to any magic at all. A man potentially already dead.
It took ten minutes to find a taxi, and another fifteen to make it to his flat. He approached from the back way, the less-used entrance. When he got there, the door was still closed. The window, he had see from the outside, was open.
Maybe he'd been lucky. Or maybe the Temple had hired an Elemental assassin. Either way, Solomon slid the bread-knife out of his coat and hid it, clutched in his hand, up his sleeve as he unlocked the door and entered without broadcasting that he might be expecting an attack at all.
no subject
"Who says I need your guidance, Billy-Ray?" he said without looking around or even changing his step. In fact, as slow and careful as those steps were, they led unerringly toward the nearest stairwell--a fact Sanguine might notice given Gabe now left his 'all one direction around the corner' system.
What actually worried him more, if it could be said to be worrying, was what Sanguine meant by 'if you know what I mean'. There was glee there, and a maddening sort of smugness, and something ... something. An originality. A pride in a plan that no one else had ever thought of. Which wasn't any help at all to someone who didn't know this world. Skulduggery probably would have figure it out just by that sense alone.
"Your daddy askin' for you, Billy-Ray?" He tsked. "Here I thought you weren't workin' for him."
~~~
Solomon left through the church, steadfastly not looking around and simultaneously acutely aware of everything about him. The pews. The altar. The windows. The crucifix. He felt as if the crucifix were staring into his back.
Yet at the same time there was something ... relieved about the place. Something quieter, and less tense. Maybe it was because he no longer had his cane.
His hand convulsively gripped on air and he had to pause by the door before leaving. He was leaving his cane here. Destroyed, of course, but for the time being it had felt as if what had happened in this church would remain in this church. Now he was going to leave it, and take all that had happened with him.
And a knife. He smiled suddenly, a bitter and wry and somehow amused smile. All he had was a knife. Some would question why he was even bothering to defy fate, given how vulnerable he was, but he had to. He was a survivor. That was all he'd ever been.
Solomon pushed open the door and stepped out onto the Dublin street, a sorcerer without access to any magic at all. A man potentially already dead.
It took ten minutes to find a taxi, and another fifteen to make it to his flat. He approached from the back way, the less-used entrance. When he got there, the door was still closed. The window, he had see from the outside, was open.
Maybe he'd been lucky. Or maybe the Temple had hired an Elemental assassin. Either way, Solomon slid the bread-knife out of his coat and hid it, clutched in his hand, up his sleeve as he unlocked the door and entered without broadcasting that he might be expecting an attack at all.