Skulduggery Pleasant: Raising Cain

Chapter 144 - The 'M' word

Chapter 144

Two weeks went by in which Valkyrie officially finished in her job as a Sanctuary Detective and on the day of her seventeenth birthday, she was officially instated as a Dead Man in the eyes of the Sanctuary. Her family said it was all just fanfare because she was already a Dead Man, but Nadia's eyes shined brightly when she wore her fancy suit uniform. The Sanctuary had secretly gotten together all the medals and awards they had been trying to give her and her brothers for a while and threw the metal at them while they were doing the short speech, so there was that as well. It was embarrassing and unnecessary but also sort of thrilling to wear badges of honour, two medals and all sorts of traditional Mage medals for all the things she'd done in such a small time.

Still, she threw them off into the special bag Ghastly had gotten her as soon as she got back and into the very back of the cupboard they went.

Her birthday was relaxed and calm and nothing happened, except all the little milestones for little Laila. The weeks after her birthday went by quickly and soon it was in mid-November, making Laila a month and a half. In that time, they only got three calls for small jobs for the Dead Men so they were ready when the next one came in.

"Hey, Val," Fletcher said from outside her bedroom door.

Valkyrie looked over at him from her position in bed reading, her face the picture of surprise. She forgot he even lived with her sometimes. "Oh, hi, Fletcher. I, er, wasn't expecting you. How are you?"

"I'm alright," he nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets. His hair was even longer than the last time she had seen him. "You?"

"Grand, grand, I'm grand, yeah," she nodded back, putting the book down. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"Oh, yeah, I just wanted to ask about these house plans you had. Anton told me you were doing up the place and I would have to go–"

"Oh, God, yeah!" Valkyrie suddenly remembered. "We're redecorating the place. Well, doing a full remodel actually. I forgot I had to tell you, sorry."

"It's fine," he shrugged again.

"I assume you'll move to Australia," Valkyrie continued. "Since Myra lives there, I mean. I'd offer for you to stay in the guest area while it's made, but obviously they're going to destroy everything so there isn't a guest area, so you'll have to leave. I think we aren't starting for a while yet."

"Anton said it would be in a few weeks," Fletcher told her.

"A few weeks?!" Valkyrie gasped. She hadn't known that. "He didn't tell me. Oh my God, I don't even know where I'm going."

Fletcher laughed and seemed to relax a bit, making Valkyrie guilty that she hadn't spoken to him earlier. It must have been stressful finding out he was being kicked out of his home soon. "Yeah, that's what he said. And yeah, I'll move to Australia I guess, I like the heat."

"And you can still get to work here," she smiled.

"Yep," he said, popping the p and bouncing on his heels nervously. "Myra's looking forward to it. She was saying about getting an apartment together and stuff."

"Sounds like you two are pretty serious," Valkyrie commented.

"Yeah, I really like her, you know?" He said, running a hand over his stupid hair. "I think she was a bit, you know, taken aback by the sudden need to move but she's alright with it. She said that we should do something together, like, dinner or something. I realised we didn't say happy birthday so we figured we'd take you to dinner."

"Oh, that would be lovely," Valkyrie said, smiling now. "It's alright, I had a small birthday this year. The big one's next year."

"Yeah, eighteen next year. Nadia's almost eighteen, right?" Valkyrie nodded. "Wow, you two have been together forever. You really like her too, huh?"