That definitely wasn't like Skulduggery. Skulduggery was a man who'd lost his flesh; this was a skeleton inhabited by something else. For a moment Solomon stared into the light of the apparition's eyes, and then felt his heart pounding loud in his ears and the pressure in his chest, and the shadows at his feet start to rise up over his shoulders, and looked away.

Just looking was making his magic react. Not a good idea to meet the apparition's gaze, then. What sort of apparition could make necromancy react just because the necromancer looked into his eyes? An identity lurked in the back of Solomon's head, but he didn't particularly want to look at it.

"I'm a sorcerer," he said. "Wizards in my world are generally frauds." The shadows settled back down, some of them reforming back into the shape of his, and some of the kedan nearest sidled away from them both.