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His heart was all bass and drum beat, teeth and splinters. It was darkness, brightness, cruelty, and maybe kindness. He was all strange curves and sharp angles, like the discarded remains of an orchestra pit. Over four hundred years and he was still finding new shapes in his anatomy. Unfamiliar dips in his Iliac crest, notches along his spinal chord, the river like parietal paths across the back of his skull. He supposed it would be the same if he aged across a normal human lifespan. There would be new wrinkles, new scars, graying hair and loosening skin.
But Skulduggery Pleasant wasn’t a normal human, nor was he fully convinced he was still human at all. He felt like a cherry pit, like the universe chewed up all the goodness in him, the choicest parts, and spat out the rest. His flesh was consumed by agony and fire, and all that was left were the things too hard to eat. Namely, his skeleton, his hatred, and his pride.
His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. He missed Valkyrie. Terribly. He hadn’t been this depressingly self-deprecating in at least two centuries. Skulduggery was well versed in self-loathing, but to be this pathetic about it was a new and unwelcome development. He was uncomfortably close to treading into broody vampire territory. And that was quite unfair of him, really, to get on this long and then succumb to this sort of adolescent idiocy now. It was all Valkyrie’s fault. There was no other explanation. Her absence had him degenerating into a juvenile wreck.
He wouldn’t say it out loud, not ever, but the past five years felt more like a hundred. There wasn’t a day that passed that he didn’t think of his partner. Her name was a tattoo on the inside of his skull. Not a literal one of course, but he wouldn’t put it past Finbar to try to convince him it was a good idea. But it was more or less the same as the real thing: permanent, bold, and possibly in poor taste.
Skulduggery knew why Valkyrie had left and could understand the sentiment. He told her as much. Guilt is a powerful feeling, fueled by love and fueled by hate. Guilt was his most constant and loyal companion over the long centuries. Hers was young and not as well cultivated, but it was vicious and growing like strangling vine. He knew it curled around her throat as she tried to sleep at night. It twined itself around Valkyrie's hands when she had rocked her baby sister. He could see it when her carefree smile faltered. Skulduggery was a flesh-less skeleton, but that didn’t mean he was blind.
But all of this didn’t stop him from missing her and wishing she would just come back to Ireland already. It also didn’t stop him from blaming her for his increased boredom. Life was becoming oppressively dull in Ireland. China was still in charge of the Sanctuary, dealing in orders, rewards and punishments. Her primary concern was the re-consolidation of power and the stability of Roarhaven. Everything else was secondary. For the sake of appearances she still sent the Skeleton Detective out on various cases, but those were few and far between. For one, there weren’t many mages left in Ireland. And for two, those left were not intellectually stunted to enough to challenge the might of China Sorrows.
China, in all her infinite wisdom and infinite disinterest suggested that perhaps he needed to find a someone to talk to. ‘Find someone who cares’ she clarified. The problem with China’s suggestion was that there really wasn’t anyone left who did care. Even the people loathed him were dead. Those left who had lived had no strong feelings on Skulduggery one way or the other. It was just indifference, really, and perhaps that was the most unacceptable thing.
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Skulduggery Pleasant slid his Bentley into neutral, careful to align his tires perfectly perpendicular to the road. Parking brake engaged. He let his fingers linger on the steering wheel for a moment before leaving the confines of his beloved car.
He was at the docks again. It was always the docks. At least once a week like some twisted vigil. Valkyrie was still alive of course, but that didn’t stop him from wallowing in the memories of her. Each visit was reading a different obituary. The death of her innocence, her youth, her optimism. And of course in every snippet was only a tiny paragraph about him, the murderer. Because everything has to be about her, doesn’t it? Even thousands of miles away his partner was greedy one.
All things considered it was a decently pretty night outside. If you ignored the cold, the fog, and the emptiness, one could even consider it gorgeous. Sure, there wasn’t a moon or even the faintest trace of stars in the blank slate-grey sky, but who was he to judge? Ireland was Ireland through and through, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.
The phone in his front pocket felt like a dead weight. Tonight he was going to call her. Yes, he was going to do it.
Any minute now.
Any minute.
All he would have to do is just press speed dial and then… what?
What the hell was he going to say? What exactly? That she should just come back to Ireland this instant? That he was a positive wreck without her?
Might as well tick pride off the list of things he had left.
God, he had no clue what to say. He could beg, he supposed. That would be a first.
Time slid by like maple syrup. The rhythmic wake of waves slapping against the boats was the only sound to be heard.
-
A sudden buzz in his pocket. The obscenely loud and tinny stylings of Frank Sinatra. If Skulduggery had any skin to jump out of, he would have left it right then and there.
And there, a blazing fire on a black screen. As is someone reached into his rib cage and yanked hard. Valkyrie. Frank was almost through his serenade before Skulduggery had the presence of mind to even pick up.
“Hello?” she said from halfway across the planet.
“Hello? You there?” She said like they had only spoken yesterday.
“Skulduggery? Can you hear me? Hello?” she said because the Skeleton Detective, the once feared Lord Vile, had forgotten how to speak into a phone.
“Hola! "Cómo le pueda ayudar, Señorita?” Solid recovery. Ten-out-of-ten.
“Not funny, Skulduggery,” she said without even skipping a beat. ‘I know it's you. Your accent sucks by the way.”
“I’m wounded Valkyrie. Half a decade in America and you still have no sense of humor.”
Instead of a huff of laughter, awkward silence lingered on the phone. Reminding him of just how much distance was really between them. God, he missed the banter.
“What time is it over there anyway?” he asked. He knew of course. He had already done the calculation, but this conversation already needed a life-raft. The tension on Valkyrie's end of the line was palpable.
“Noon.”
So much for the life-raft.
“You were right,” she said after a while. After the silence stretched eons. But Skulduggery hung on her words like a starving animal and so he was still listening. Attentively. Pathetically.
“Aren’t I always? But about what specifically? Being right about everything means I have a lot of things to keep track of.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line. He hoped she was smiling and not imagining her fingers around his non-existent throat. Skulduggery felt like he should comment on how her conversational skills have degenerated during her self imposed exile. But, considering she chose exile in the United States, he was relatively impressed she kept all her nouns and verbs intact.
“About redemption. I can’t earn it by being here.”
“I see,” he intoned carefully neutral.
“Yeah, I think I want come home,” she continued. “Skulduggery?”
“Yes?”
“Could you come get me?”
And just like that the world turned on its axis.
“I mean,” she continued. “You don’t have to. It’s just...Ugh. I don’t want to chicken out of this. I’m ready to come back. I’m ready to face the things I’ve done- I think. I just don’t think I can come back alone. God, that sounds weak doesn’t it? I just need a friendly face because lord knows I won’t be seeing very many once I do go back. “
“I don’t have a face,” and you aren't weak.
“Well then, put on the friendliest one you’ve got.”
“What qualifies as friendly?”
“Of course you’d make this difficult.”
“You’re asking me to come all the way to America with a very specific face and you’re calling me difficult.”
“Fine. I’ll call up Fletcher instead.” Ouch.
“Too late. I already have a face picked out,” and he was already making up travel arrangements in his head. What air carriers he liked. Where his fake passport was. Where his real passport was.
She sighed on the other end of the line, but he could imagine her smile.
“You know, I never really thought exile would solve everything,” she said.
“I do remember telling you that.”
“Yeah, but I thought it would at least make me feel better, even if it was a little bit. The reality is you have waaay to much time to think of all of the shit you’ve done wrong. I still see Alice’s face every single time I try to fall asleep. That and everyone else’s in quick succession. Everyone who is dead I mean. And now I know a lot of dead people. And I miss a lot of dead people.”
The words lingered in his his chest: It’s not your fault. No. It doesn’t have to be. Because of course the fault was his. He did this to her. She volunteered as barely a teenager. But he accepted all the same. Skulduggery just didn’t have the physical or metaphorical balls to take the blame in this discussion. Other discussions yes- just not ones where Valkyrie is deciding whether to come back home or not and with whom.
“Will it get better?” she asked.
“No.” he replied. “But you’ve asked me this before.”
“I guess I was hoping for a different answer this time.”
“So that’s why you want to come back? Second shot of redemption? I can’t say I’m not flattered. They say that mimicry is the highest form of compliment.”
Skulduggery knew she missed Alice. Her family. Ireland. He missed his family too. The same way he missed her. He said it in a multitude of ways- but never plainly. She was his partner, his family. It was her smile, her cleverness, the banter, the way she walked straight into death. He loved her.
“That and honestly, I’ve missed you.” her breath so rushed he heard static. “I can’t tell you how much.”
But most of all he loved her because no matter what- she had all the right things to say.
“Alright, I’ll see you in Twelve Hours. Text me your address.” I missed you too.