If his car hadn't died on him, he would have tried to find Bernadette Maguire's cottage and asked her what exactly Lynch had told her. There was the faint possibility that her life was in danger now that Lynch was dead, but he doubted it. Such things only happened in movies, unfortunately.

Which meant that Kenny now had only one lead left to him a and that was the tattooist he'd heard about.

It was a glorious Tuesday afternoon in Temple Bar. Kenny walked up cobbled streets until he found the brightly coloured building. Music played above. He climbed the wooden stairs, pa.s.sing the photographs of tattoos and piercings and other works of body art. He had never been tempted to get a tattoo himself. It all seemed like a little too much pain.

There was a skinny man in a Thin Lizzy T-shirt, his arms inked, a ring in his lips and his head shaved. He turned down the music when he saw Kenny. Damien Dempsey was playing a 'Negative Vibes'.

"Are you Finbar?" Kenny asked.

"I am indeed," said the skinny man. "Are you looking for a tattoo?"

Kenny hesitated, then smiled. "Actually, no."

"A piercing, then? No need to be embarra.s.sed. Just tell me what you want pierced and we'll pierce it. I'll pierce anything, me."

"Actually, I was hoping we could just talk."

"Oh," Finbar said. "Oh, right. Well, I'm flattered, I am, but before you go getting your hopes up, I have to tell you a I'm married."

"Uh, that's not what I meant."

"My wife's in the other room, if you want to meet her. I'd call her in, but she's not really speaking to me right now. Don't know why. She was in a cult, you see, and she had to shave all her hair off. She left eventually, like, and came back to me, and we're a family again, but her head's having a little bit of trouble re-growing all that hair. She says I'm unsympathetic. I say she looks like a tufty bowling ball. Maybe if you see her, you can decide who's right."

"I wouldn't really be comfortable doing that."

"Ah, fair enough, I suppose."

"I heard you're a psychic."

Finbar's laugh was delayed by a split second. "Not me, mate. But there's a Mystic Meg up the street there, she does a bit of tarot, that sort of thing. She's good, you know, if you believe in it."

"I don't want my palm read. You see the future."

"Who's been filling your head with this nonsense?"

"It's the word on the street."

"And what street would that be? No, not me. Sorry."

"What do you know of the Pa.s.sage?"

Finbar didn't move away. He stood there, his tongue pressed against his lip ring. "Who did you say you were?"

"My name's Kenny Dunne. I'm a journalist."

"And why would a journalist be asking about stupid things like the Pa.s.sage?"

"So you do know about it."

"Don't know anything that could help you, sorry. You'd probably better go."

"I can pay."

"Then you have more money than sense, mate. Keep it, spend it on something worthwhile. Like a taxi."

"They say you're a psychic who saw something so horrible that you haven't been able to see any visions since."

"In that case I wouldn't be any help to you, would I? But you don't know what you're talking about, and I haven't a clue where you're coming up with this stuff. I'm a busy man. I need you to leave."

Kenny indicated the empty room. "This is busy?"

"Tuesday takes a while to get going."

"Finbar, you know what's going on, don't you? I've been hearing about the end of the world, ancient G.o.ds, super powers, strange people who can do amazing things... I'm pretty sure I've even met some of them. A tall man in a suit. A dark-haired girl. You know these people?"

"They don't ring any bells."

"I'm going to find out, sooner or later. You can help make sure I get the facts right."

"I don't know any facts."

"Come on. I know you're not a stupid man."

"I'm quite stupid. Ask anyone."

"Finbar, are there superheroes living among us?"

Finbar snorted with laughter, and Kenny started to feel a little thick. "Superheroes? In tights and capes, flying around? If there were superheroes, Mr Journalist, don't you think they'd be in New York or somewhere like that? There's really not that many tall buildings for Spider-Man to swing from in Dublin, you know? He'd have maybe two swings and then he'd just hang there looking disappointed."

"These people don't wear tights and capes, Finbar."

"So they're naked superheroes? That's grand for now, but when the good weather is over they're going to regret it."

"They look like us. They dress like us. But they're not like us. They're different."

"You," Finbar said, "are sounding very racist right now."

"I'm going to find the truth, with or without you. Either way, you'll be seeing a lot of me in the next few weeks and months. I'm going to follow you wherever you go."

"I don't go anywhere."

"I'm going to trail your friends."

"I don't have any."

"I'm going to photograph every single person to enter and leave this tattoo parlour."

Finbar rolled his eyes. "And they'll hate that, because people who get dragons drawn on their backs are normally so shy about other people noticing them."

"It doesn't have to be this way, Finbar."

That tongue, pressing against the lip ring. "I can't help you," he said at last. "But I know someone who might be able to. His name's Geoffrey."

"What does Geoffrey do?"

"You can ask him yourself, if he meets with you. Three o'clock today, outside Bruxelles on Harry Street."

"How do I know he'll be there?"

"I'll give him a call. If he wants to meet you, he'll be there."

"If he doesn't show up, I'm coming back."

"Well, if you come back, I might not open the door."

"The door's always open."

"Then I'll get the lock fixed," Finbar retorted. Kenny waited to see if Finbar had anything to add, but he obviously didn't, so he left him alone.

Kenny had lunch in Milano's, then walked up to Grafton Street. He wasn't going to be late a not this time. He got there at half two and sat outside in the sunshine. At a little before three, a small man in khakis wandered up. He had a gentle face, beads in his beard, and hair the colour and approximate texture of wheat. He had many bracelets on his wrists and rings on his fingers.

He joined Kenny at his table.

"You're Geoffrey?" Kenny asked.

"Indeed I am," said the man. "And you must be Mr Journalist."

"Kenny Dunne, hi, pleased to meet you."

"The pleasure is all mine."

"I really want to thank you for meeting with me. I've been having a hard time getting anyone to talk about this stuff."

"I can't really blame them," Geoffrey said with a chuckle. "This kind of talk gets people killed."

Kenny frowned. "You're talking about Paul Lynch?"

"I'm sorry, I don't know who that is."

"He was a homeless man. He said he had visions of the apocalypse."

"Which one?"

"Sorry?"

"Which apocalypse? There are a few."

"Uh... there was one where these old G.o.ds came back..."

"The Faceless Ones, yes. What about the Remnants? Did he foresee that? Last Christmas?"

"The Insanity Virus thing? With all those slices of darkness? They're called Remnants?"

"Don't worry about them, they're all locked away, safe and sound. Did he foresee the Death Bringer?"

"Who's the Death Bringer?"

"The Death Bringer's the one who is going to initiate the Pa.s.sage."

Kenny took out his notebook, started scribbling. "Death Bringer. One word or two?"

"Either. I've always preferred two. What about Darquesse?"

"I'm sorry, I don't know what that is."

"He didn't foresee Darquesse? Oh that's interesting." Geoffrey sat back, finger tapping the beads in his beard.

"After every apocalypse pa.s.sed without actually happening," Kenny said, "he'd get a new set of visions."

"Ah, well, that explains it. He foresaw them one at a time. As each one was averted he'd see the next one. It's a pity he didn't see Darquesse, we've been trying to find out more about her."

"So it's all real?" Kenny asked. "All of it? The visions, the G.o.ds, the superheroes?"

Geoffrey chuckled. "Superheroes? They're not superheroes, Mr Journalist. They're sorcerers."

"Sorcerers, like... with magic?"

"Like with magic, yes."

"So, the tall man and the teenage girl... they're sorcerers too?"

"Oh," Geoffrey said, smiling. "You mean Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain. Those two, they're the good guys. We're all alive today because of them."

"They saved the world?"

"They've saved the world a few times, indeed they have."

"This is amazing."

"Yes, it is. You don't believe any of it, though."

Kenny smiled, and shrugged. "Well, I'm, I suppose I'm sceptical, but if you believe it, there must be something to it, right?"

"But I'm a crackpot," Geoffrey said, smiling broadly. "Finbar's a crackpot. Everyone you've spoken to about this is a crackpot. You can see that, can't you?"

Kenny frowned. "You're all nuts?"

"Sadly, yes. You're going to go home today and you're going to look at all your notes and research and you're going to realise that it's all just nonsense."