Skulduggery Pleasant: Raising Cain

Chapter 182 - The Dagger

Chapter 182

High in the air, Wilhelm held his icepack to his bruised knee and sulked while the rest of them used his laptop to call Corrival, Meritorious and the rest of the Dead Men. Nadia was snuggled under Valkyrie's arm wearing her protective coat still and hadn't stopped gripping the back of Valkyrie's shirt since they found each other in Earl's office.

Valkyrie had had words with Tanith and Frightening already. They had thought it was fine as they knew Nadia was competent and able to defend and save herself, especially since Earl had no idea she was there and had the element of surprise. Valkyrie may have taken it too far in saying they were no better than Skulduggery, but she hadn't quite calmed down enough to forgive them or apologise. The bottom line for Valkyrie was that when she hadn't been trained enough, no one would have left her alone to defend herself. Nadia may be older than Valkyrie was at thirteen or fourteen when she wasn't able to deal with someone like Earl, but that didn't make her trained or all that capable of a fighter. She had managed it, and Valkyrie was incredibly impressed with Nadia, it just didn't make her less angry at her sister or friend.

"What do you mean you're in China Sorrows plane?!" Corrival shouted through the computer. "Who the hell gave you the authority to involve her?"

"China was going to find out about our world-hopping escapade anyway," Valkyrie told him calmly... and with some aggression. "We have her promise to help us. She fought with us already against the Spiders, she helped us kill her brother. She's involved and she's on our side. Trust me, she doesn't want these weapons in the wrong hands any more than us."

"No, she wants them in her own hands!" Corrival shouted, his face going quickly red with anger. She'd never seen him this mad before. "What were you thinking?"

"Pa, she's already aware that we intend to destroy them immediately and that they'll never even see Ireland or her." Possibly a lie, she had no idea where they would be destroyed, but as long as literally no one else knew it didn't matter. "She just wants them gone because if they are, there's no way for them to get back to the Spiders later and kill her. Did you know that someone killed three of her bodyguards a few weeks ago? They're trying to target her and get her alone. She doesn't want these people to have any more power than they already have."

"China Sorrows is a capable woman, and manipulative at that. I agree that she has good resources and someone like her is useful as an ally, but she cannot be trusted with this magnitude of information!"

"Well, with all due respect, it has nothing to do with you who I involve in this mission," she told him bluntly. There was a pregnant pause. Her team looked away as she and the Elders stared at each other through the screen. Valkyrie broke and continued. "This is a Dead Man mission. Soon we'll be stealing from the German Grand Mage who we are sure is conspiring to go to war with Ireland, irrespective of the Spiders, and then we'll be doing the same in England. In fact, as far as anyone is ever meant to know, this isn't even a Dead Man mission! We need all the help we can get and if China is offering that then we'd be dumb to not take it. I'm sorry, but that's our place in this."

"Detective," Meritorious started.

"I'm not a detective anymore, Grand Mage," Valkyrie said.

"I hope you're thinking this all through," he said simply, and turned off the call.

Valkyrie sighed heavily and closed the laptop. "That didn't go well."

"But we did what we needed to," Nadia said reassuringly. "You should get some sleep."

"I know," Valkyrie said. She looked at the others. "Don't worry about the Elders. They know they aren't involved; they're just as stressed about this mission as we are. We'll be in Germany soon and should get some sleep. We'll be diving straight into the party when we arrive and we don't know how long it'll take for the Spiders to begin their A-game."