The Maleficent Seven (From the World of Skulduggery Pleasant) Read Free Page B

stood up. “Your training starts today.”
     
    They called her Highborn, the other children. They used it as a weapon to wound her. One of them, a girl with dull brown hair, but a sharp cruel tongue, was too vindictive to cross, so the others flocked to her side. The cruel girl was the first one of them to take a name, and she chose Avaunt.
    Quoneel took the girl for a private lesson one day. “Do you know why they call you Highborn?” he asked.
    “Because they don’t like me,” the girl said. The practice sword was heavy in her hands.
    “And why don’t they like you?”
    “Because Avaunt doesn’t like me.”
    “And why doesn’t Avaunt like you?”
    The girl shrugged, and attacked, and Quoneel stepped out of the way and struck her across the back of the knees.
    “Avaunt doesn’t like you because of the way you speak and the way you look and the way you walk.”
    The girl scowled and rubbed her legs. “That seems to be a lot of things.”
    “It does, doesn’t it. You are well-spoken, and that points to breeding and education and privilege. You are pretty, and that means men and women will notice you. You walk with confidence, and that means people will know to take you seriously. All of these are admirable qualities in a lady. But we do not train you to be a lady here. Attack.”
    The girl came forward again, careful not to fall into the same trap as last time. Instead, she fell into an altogether different trap, but one which was just as painful.
    “We are the hidden blades, the knives in the shadows,” said Quoneel. “We pass unnoticed amongst mortals and sorcerers alike. The privileged, the educated and the beautiful cannot do what we do. You must lose your bearing. You must lose your confidence. You must lose your poise.”
    His sword came at her head and she blocked, twisted, swung at him, but of course he was not standing where he had been a moment ago. He kicked her in the backside and she stumbled to the centre of the room.
    “They call you Highborn because that is what will get you noticed,” Quoneel told her. “You must learn to mumble your words, to shuffle your feet, to stoop your shoulders. Your eyes should be cast down in shame at all times. You are to be instantly forgettable. You are nothing to the mortals and the sorcerers. You are beneath them, unworthy of their attention.”
    “Yes, Master Quoneel.”
    “What are you waiting for? Attack.”
    And so she did.

he key to any successful heist was the team assembled to do the job. That was the first law of thievery. The second law, of course, was that thieves, by their very nature, were an untrustworthy lot – and if team members couldn’t trust each other, then what was the point of being a team?
    Tanith felt she had the answer. Sanguine wasn’t so sure.
    “This has been tried,” he said. He was sitting at the small table in the small kitchen. “Me and my daddy tried it, got together a group of like-minded individuals and did our level best to kill everyone, yourself included. Correct me if I’m wrong, but you seem to be alive and kicking despite our best efforts.”
    Tanith stood by the window, mug of coffee in her hand. The safe house was drab and barely furnished, but at least they weren’t going to be surprised by an army of Cleavers any time soon. “Your little Revengers’ Club had a very basic flaw, though,” she told him. “You all wanted the same thing.”
    “How was that a flaw? It brought everyone together, united for a common goal.”
    “And how long did they
stay
together? By the end of it, everyone was betraying everyone else, because you all wanted to be the one to kill Valkyrie or Skulduggery or Thurid Guild... Your little club unravelled, Billy-Ray. Having a common goal is not always a good thing.”
    “And you have the answer, I take it?”
    She turned to him, smiling. He had his sunglasses off, and she looked into the dark holes where his eyes should have been. “Of course I do. The trick is to have