Hey guys. I'm really sorry that updates aren't quick lately. I've just been really busy recently, and so i'll probably only update on story each week so sorry :(

hope you enjoy chapter 20

Chapter 20

Shikamaru turned around sharply and saw that it was the skeleton detective grabbing his wrist with Butler behind him.

"I have to help Valkyrie! How can you just let her suffer? She's you're friend!" Shikamaru shouted at the skeleton and then his eyes widened.

"Ino…" his voice trailed off and suddenly he realised that the voice in his head had disappeared.

Skulduggery smiled at him (well Shikamaru presumed he was smiling, it was hard to tell as he had no lips).

"The voice ends once you figure out what it's whispering about. It seemed to be focusing on what you're most guilty about. Me and Butler figured what that was pretty quickly however seeing as rest of you should be too young to seriously guilty about anything, we decided to help you along a little bit." Skulduggery explained.

"Why did you stop me from breaking the mirror?" Shikamaru asked his head still shaken from the extra voice inside his head.

"Breaking the mirror doesn't help, it makes it worse. The mirrors reflect the worst part of you or the part you think is the worst. The more mirrors there are the stronger the voice."

"And if you crack the mirror then more mirrors are formed from the shards." Shikamaru finished finally realising.

Skulduggery nodded his head in agreement.

"The only person who can help Valkyrie is herself"

"Do not make a sound or move a muscle if you do expect to feel a great pain in your stomach." The masked person, with their hand on Artemis', mouth hissed and as Artemis didn't really want to be stabbed in the stomach today, he complied.

"Were going to walk over there to the stairs nice and slowly and if you try to run I'll kill you. Nod if you understand." They snapped however Artemis could feel their hands trembling with fear. The person didn't want to do this.

'Where's Butler when you need him?' Artemis thought but he nodded his head and they started to walk towards a staircase behind one of the mirrors.

'Well that's where the mystery attacker came from.' He figured. When the reached the foot of the stairs the masked attacker demanded that he walk up the stairs but keeping within 5 steps of the attacker.

"Do not run or I'll…"

"Kill me, correct. However you can't do that as the person who is ordering you around wants me alive, don't they? I'll still do what you order but just because I want to see who the 'spider of the web' is, and what it is they want. So where are you bringing me to? After all, the maids are required to answer any questions we have while we stay here." Artemis responded.

The kidnapper gasped.

"H-how did you know I was one of the maids in the house-hold?"

"You were one of the maids that served us dinner, I recognised your voice. Now I think we should move on.

"Stephanie, Stephanie." The voice echoed.

"Why don't you stay with us, you never see us. Stephanie please stay, or is Stephanie even your name any more? You abandoned us Stephanie, when all we did was love and care for you."

"Please stop, please." Valkyrie sobbed.

"Don't you love us, weren't we enough?"

"No, I do, but…"

"YOU HATE US THAT'S WHY YOU LEFT!" The voice bellowed.

"NO! That's not true!"

"Why did you leave us then." The voice sneered.

"I'm sorry I'm really sorry. Mom, Dad I didn't mean…"

Valkyries eyes flew wide open.

"The voice it stopped!" She exclaimed.

Then she noticed Shikamaru. He was lying down by the wall looking at her with a quizzical look on his face, not unlike Skulduggery.

"You feel guilty about leaving your mom and dad?" he asked.

Valkyrie stared in shock at Shikamaru.

"You were talking in your… sleep. Would you call that sleep? And as it turns out, those voices target what you feel the most guilty about."

"Oh, well I guess deep inside. I don't really think about it as usually I'm busy hitting bad guys or learning magic or running from bad guys. There is an awful lot of running. I still love my parents but I also don't want to be just another average person." Valkyrie explained. "What about you. Do you feel guilty about becoming a ninja?" she asked.

Shikamaru yawed and replied lazily "My parents know I'm a ninja, it runs in the family. Infact, my dad is the head of our clan which is one of the strongest ninja families in the hidden leaf."

"Oh."

"If you're wondering what my voices said they were shunning for when me and Ino were kids."

"What happened?"

Shikamaru sighed "When Ino was six she had a best friend named Sakura. They were really close but then they both fell hard for this guy named Sasuke, all the girls did. And suddenly Sakura ends their friendship, choosing Sasuke over Ino. This really hurt Ino more than she let on, she'd act so strong but I'd she her crying when she thought no one was around. I've known Ino literary from the day after I was born."

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow.

"Our dads and moms are best friends and they were in the same room of the hospital when we were being born. So when I was born one day ahead of Ino, my parents decided to wait until Ino was born as well."

"Oh, well continue on with the story."

"But though I knew so well no matter what I did I couldn't cheer her up and neither could Choji. I guess I've always been guilty because I didn't do enough to stop her from suffering."

"You know Shikamaru, for a guy who is supposed the smartest person in the whole of the fire country. You are really are an idiot."