Skulduggery Pleasant: Raising Cain

Chapter 95 - A little date

Skulduggery – Crow

Anton – Bear

Ghastly – Panda

Dexter – Wolf

Saracen – Weasel

Erskine – Snake

Solomon – Raven

Corrival – Pa

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Chapter 95

"Surprise!" Valkyrie grinned. "You've always wanted to ride a motorbike."

"I don't have a licence," Nadia said quickly.

"Well, yeah, I kind of thought I'd drive and you'd hang on," Valkyrie said, gently pulling Nadia over. "I can teach you but not today."

"Valkyrie, how did you get this?" Nadia breathed, her eyes never leaving the gleaming machine.

"It's Tanith's. It's how we got to the ice cream place too since she can't drive anymore, I just drive the bike everywhere for her and I get to use it myself sometimes," Valkyrie explained. "And don't worry, Pa – I mean, Corrival gave me a fake licence."

"Corrival? As in Elder Deuce? You call him Pa?"

"Yes."

She gaped. "Seriously? He actually gave you a fake licence?"

"Yeah I know, it's great! Come on, let me help you into the helmet. You have to do the jacket up first," Valkyrie smiled, and helped her do just that. "Oh my god, you're so adorable!"

"I feel massive," Nadia said from beneath all the layers of padding.

"You're not though. Just your head is three times its normal size. You're so small in my old jacket that it just makes you look smaller and it's so funny," Valkyrie laughed. "You're like a little, cute bunny in a massive helmet!"

"Stop laughing at me!" Nadia complained, but she looked like a tiny, angry bunny when she did that and Valkyrie laughed more, wheezing about how adorable she was. "I hate you."

"You love me," Valkyrie smiled, and kissed Nadia's hand because that was the only skin showing.

They got on the bike and with a little help, Nadia was safely wrapped around Valkyrie for the journey. After promising a thousand times to go slow, they set off into Dublin.

Perhaps she didn't stick by that promise the whole way, but feeling Nadia's arms tense around her whenever she sped up or when they curved around traffic was the best feeling in the universe and she would have to try and convince Tanith to give her the bike when she had a baby to travel with. It was only right she inherited the death machine when Tanith downgraded to the status of 'responsible' after all. She was her sister.

Regardless of bike ownership, she loved riding with Nadia and when they got to the car park and removed their helmets Nadia was a little shaky but had the biggest grin on her face.

"Fun?"

"Yeah," she breathed with a laugh. "I don't think I can do that myself."

Valkyrie shrugged. "I'll get you a car. Come on, it's a ten minute walk to the restaurant."

They walked in amiable silence to the restaurant and they were seated as soon as they got there due to being after the lunchtime rush. She'd taken them to a simple place that did a lot of soups and sandwiches, but all of it was on the high-end spectrum, so the food was always great and the atmosphere was a lot quieter. She asked the waitress to give them a table upstairs, which she did, and they sat by the window with a view into the busy street below.