Chapter 4
Two hours after they arrived at China’s, Skulduggery felt the need for coffee. He couldn’t drink. Why did he want coffee? He felt tired and he never felt tired. Ever. Exasperated, annoyed, and overworked sometimes, but never tired. Things were becoming too much for him to deal with. Vile was back, and it was only now that Skulduggery realized that no one had ever defeated him before. Vile had just gone into hiding. Could Skulduggery and Valkyrie beat him without starting a full out war that would no one would benefit from? Valkyrie said that he was becoming cynical but he didn’t agree. He was just being his regular self that looked at all the possibilities. The good and the bad. The only thing was that the bad seemed to overwhelm the good by far too much.
An excited shout from across the library, followed by many shushing sounds and annoyed grumbles, made him look up from his book. Skulduggery wasn’t even sure what the book had been about. The words had started to blur together. Jay dashed towards him, her red hair falling all in her face as a brilliant smile lit up her eyes. What was there to be so happy about? Skulduggery was bothered by the effect she produced in him. Her face was way too familiar for his liking, especially that smile. Jay was holding several pieces of paper that were covered with notes.
In a hushed whisper she said, “I think I found a way to save your friend. I was reading The Secrets of Myeloen and I put together some of the pieces that he didn’t.”
Skulduggery’s head snapped up.
“Wait, wait. Myeloen was insane. None of his theories were right and he could never prove them.”
Jay started to shake her head before he’d even started speaking.
“No, he just thought differently. He thought like me, like a pure magician. His theories worked if you could do pure magic and I think I can prove them. That’s not my point. My point is that I think that I can save your friend.”
“How?” he asked.
“Well, he says a few times, when he is talking about medicine, that negative energies could be expelled from the body with pure magic to cure sicknesses. He’s a little wrong about that. Back then they thought that sickness was negative energies and the wrath of the gods etc. Now we know that it is bacteria and viruses but he has the right idea. Negative energies could be expelled from the body by pure magic. I didn’t make the connection at first but Remnants are negative energies. They are evil spirits that exist because of Necromancy. I think that a large amount of pure energy would either kill the Remnant or force it out.”
Skulduggery nodded.
“One problem with your theory. I thought that Necromancy was impossible to counter with pure magic.”
Jay’s face split into an even wider smile. She should become a teacher. She seemed to love to teach people new things.
“It’s not. I mean it’s hard to counter but not impossible. Imagine this. Water puts out fire, right? All the same, a bucket of water would not put out a forest fire. Me going up against Lord Vile would be like a tsunami against a candle but me against a Remnant…” she trailed off thinking.
When she thought, her brow furrowed in a way that Skulduggery had spent the last four hundred years trying to forget. Jay started speaking again.
“Remnants are our opposites. They are kept alive, for want of a better term, by death magic. They are essentially the embodiment of death magic and I’m not sure how powerful that makes them. I think that it may make them altogether allergic to my magic or it could make them immune to it. It’s worth a try if I build up enough power.”
“So this plan will all be improvised and has a small chance of success.”
“Yep.”
“Oh, I love those kinds of plans.”
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