"You want to do what?" There is a brittle kind of incredulity in China's voice as the woman arches an eyebrow and regards a grinning Valkyrie with a look of morbid curiosity.
"It's just a photograph, China. The Sanctuary's paper is running an article on some of the people involved in the world's recent events."
"Valkyrie Cain, there should not be a sorcerer in the world who doesn't know what I look like. A photograph would hardly be necessary."
"All the same, China, it might be nice. A record for future generations and so on." Valkyrie pauses, examines the look on China's face. "Or not."
"I'm glad you've seen sense, dear," China says. "Now, if you will excuse me, I have a library to attend to."
"Explain to me how this turned into such a nightmare, Skulduggery," Valkyrie says darkly as she helps Fletcher with his eyeliner.
"Well, the journalist didn't seem to care at all about how easy the pictures would be to get. Luckily we still have some old snaps of Vaurien, and it was easy enough to get Ghastly, Melancholia, Solomon Wreath and the Nye to send in their photos, but as you know, China's a little touchy about photography and Caelan's, well…"
"Dead."
"Yes. I'm in charge of getting the pictures together, of course, so that leaves you and Fletcher to stand in for China and Caelan."
"That is really creepy, I hope you realize."
"Oh, I do. That might be a bit much by way of lipstick, don't you think?"
"If China's not going to let us take proper photographs, then I don't see why we shouldn't show her why that was a bad idea."
"No, I meant on Fletcher."
"Skulduggery Pleasant, did you ever meet Caelan?"
"Oh. Fair enough. Carry on with it, then."
A/N: Written for a prompt on the Kinkmeme about how Tom Percival draws all the female characters as looking pretty much the same. To be quite honest, if it were possible to have gotten all the books with non-Percival covers instead of only the first three, I would happily have done so.
~Mademise Morte, November 24, 2012.