They headed over to the Sanctuary's hall of records and spent the rest of the afternoon burying themselves in dusty old files. Valkyrie focused on digging through death certificates and postmortems, in hopes of identifying any previous victims. Meanwhile, Skulduggery's efforts were concentrated on trying to find a way to bring down the monster. Both their searches proved fruitless.
Hours passed, Valkyrie's good mood had long since dissipated. Her eyes were tired from staring at reports. Her neck was stiff; too much time spent hunched over reports she reckoned. Her mind was going numb from boredom. And worst of all, Darquesse would still not shut up.
You do realize you've been staring at the same paragraph for the past ten minutes. Northing's changed. It's still not going to help you.
Valkyrie exhaled slowly, put down the file and reached for another.
No, not that one. You already read that one. It's the one with the rabid badger. Remember?
She huffed in annoyance and grabbed a death certificate she hadn't yet looked at and began to read. While Darquesse's commentary may have been unusually helpful to her earlier, it was unwelcome now.
Wow. Death by chocolate... literally. I guess there are worse ways to go.
She snapped the file shut and threw it. It didn't go very far but the sound made Skulduggery glance up from the book he was reading.
"Is everything alright?"
She sighed, "We've been at this for hours, and we still haven't found anything useful. I'm starting to think that this is the first time a creature like the one we saw has attacked anyone."
"That's entirely plausible."
"Then why am I wasting my time with this?"
"Because we have to be sure. It's our duty to be thorough in our investigations."
She knew he was right. This was just another part of doing her job, and she wanted to do her job well. She wanted to be a good detective. She just wished it wasn't so frustrating.
"Please, tell me you've thought of something useful at least. Some way we can stop this thing."
"Not yet, but I'll will. I always do."
She sat back in her chair, closed her eyes and rubbed her temples.
"Why don't we just...I don't know, get a bunch of explosives and blow it up. That would probably kill it."
"It probably would. But even if we built a device that could be triggered by the monster without us anywhere near the blast radius; we can't run the risk the tunnels collapsing and causing structural damage to the city above. No, we need something more subtle than that. A trap, of some sort, so it can't outrun us."
Or I could kill it for you.
She continued to ignore Darquesse. Focusing on the problem at hand.
"How do you trap something that big? It's not like you can just throw a net over it. "
"I'm still weighing up our options. But it seems the most feasible plan would be to create a trap by carving sigils onto the tunnel walls. Then we lure the beast there, activate the symbols and kill it while it can't run away.
It would be easier if you let me out. Just for a minute. That's all I 'd need.
"That sounds like a good plan." she said. It certainly sounded a lot better than their usual plans. "What's the catch?"
"Well..." he began, then hesitated. "For a start we'd have to hope we weren't attacked before the trap was ready."
"As long as we're quiet, that shouldn't be a problem."
"Yes, well, then we have to worry about luring the beast there. It might be feeling a bit shy after our last encounter."
"Seems like it would be worth a shot though, right?"
Skulduggery crossed his arms. "It's risky. We need to consider other options first."
Like me.
"Why? It looks like- oh." she said, as realization hit her. "You don't want to ask China for help."
"I didn't say that."
"That's why you want to think of another plan. You don't want to use symbol magic because you know we'd need her help."
"Again, I didn't say that."
"I could ask her."
"No. We're not asking China for help."
Valkyrie sighed. It was becoming a bit of a habit now. Trust Skulduggery to make extra work for them because he was to stubborn to talk to China. His anger was understandable, but it did make many of their cases more difficult then they had to be. And she was getting tired of doing things the hard way.
"I know if you had a better plan, you would have said something by now. Come on, Skulduggery. We're going to have to ask for her help eventually anyway. If not on this case, then on some other one where we need to use symbols."
"China's not the only sorcerer who's proficient in symbol magic."
"So let's ask them for help."
Or you could let me handle it. Save yourselves the trouble.
Irritation flickered across Valkyrie's mind. She was getting sick of this constant commentary. It was getting harder and harder to ignore now. It was like the boredom and the tiredness and the illness had left her mental defenses weaker, and Darquesse was taking advantage of that.
"I'm not sure who to ask. The sigils we'll need not only have to be powerful; they'll need to be activated from a distance. Or at least triggered by the beast without us anywhere near it. And more importantly the barrier will have to hold the monster but still allow bullets or magic to cross. I don't know who could come up with something that complex besides China."
Again, I'd like to point out that none of this would be a problem if you let me out.
"Oh my god. Would you shut up!" she snapped.
Skulduggery uncrossed his arms and gave her a look of surprise. "I didn't realize this conversation was so irksome for you." he said dryly.
She closed her eye and rubbed her temples. "I... sorry. I didn't mean you. I was talking to her."
"Ah. I take it Darquesse is in a chatty mood again?" His voice was gentle now, but he didn't sound happy.
"She hasn't stopped. I think she's trying to annoy me into letting her out."
"You have to ignore her, Valkyrie."
"I know. I'm trying. It's just...it's hard. Okay? But I'm dealing with it. I don't need to talk about it."
She knew Skulduggery would understand what she was going through. He was the only one who possibly could understand. But talking about it, would only mean thinking about it, and she was sick and tired of thinking about Darquesse. It left her feeling physically and emotionally exhausted. Even thinking about thinking left a lump growing in her throat. No, talking about it wouldn't help. She was better off suppressing all those terrible thoughts and violent urges, and getting on with her job.
"This is the second time in two days Darquesse has been giving you trouble."
"Can we change the subject please?"
Skulduggery put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm worried about you, Valkyrie. You've not been yourself lately."
The lump in her throat grew more painful. His concern was touching. Her eyes were going to start watering if he didn't cut it out. She forced her lips to turn upwards, into a smirk. Her heart wasn't in it, but she figured it was either that or start balling her eyes out.
"Don't get all soppy on me now, Skul."
He gave her a long look. Squeezed her shoulder, then let his hand drop back down to his side. "It's been a rough day. Take the weekend off. Go home and spend some time with your family. It's been over a week since you last saw them."
She jerked her head towards the sheets of paper strewn about the room. "What about all this?"
"I'll finish off here. Someone else can drop you off at home. Hopefully, I'll be able to come up with a better plan while you're gone, and we can head back down to the sewers together on Monday."
"Are you sure? There's still a lot of files to go over."
"Quite sure. I'll keep you updated on how the research goes, and you can call me if you need anything."
Valkyrie shrugged, "I'm not going to argue with any plan of yours that gets me out of more paperwork."
Skulduggery arranged for a Sanctuary staff member to drop her off. The mage wasn't particularly talkative so the car journey passed in an uneventful haze. In what felt like no time at all she was back, walking the streets of Haggard.
It was the early side of evening by the time she got home. Her reflection was back from college so she entered her bedroom through the window. It looked up from the book it was reading when she pulled herself over the windowsill.
"You don't look well." it commented, as she closed the window behind her.
"It's been a long week. Did I miss anything important while I was away?"
The reflection shrugged. "There was an exam on Tuesday, it went well. The next one's in six days. Fergus stopped by yesterday to borrow the garden strimmer, their's is broken."
"Sounds thrilling. How are mum and dad? How's Alice?"
"They're good. Your dad called earlier to say he landed the Belfry Road contract. He's picking-up Chinese on his way home from work to celebrate."
"That's grand. I hope you asked him to get the pork for me."
"I did," it confirmed." Are you ready to resume your life?"
Valkyrie nodded and the reflection went back into the mirror. She tapped the glass and a flood of memories washed over her. Nice, safe, boring memories that only added to the confusion of what had happened that day. Juggling two sets of concurrent memories was bad enough, but three?
She picked up the book the reflection had been reading, one of her Uncle Gordon's, and flicked through it absentmindedly until her mum called her down for dinner.
"You're looking a bit peaky, Steph. Are you coming down with something?" Melissa asked, as she passed Valkyrie an empty plate.
"I'm fine, Mum."
"Well, just make sure you don't start coughing all over the food. I can't risk getting ill with a new contract underway." her dad said.
"Congratulations on that by the way." Valkyrie told him as she helped herself to food. "What is it they want you to build again?"
"A bat sanctuary." he declared proudly.
"Seriously?"
"Oh, Des." her mum sighed. "Do you even know anything about bats?"
Desmond waved his hand dismissively. "I've seen Batman enough times to have a rough idea of what they want me to build."
Valkyrie laughed while her mum shook her head in dismay at her husband's antics. The three of them settled down to a pleasant dinner. As much as she loved her life of adventure, there were times when she missed this. She'd been so busy with cases recently she hadn't had much time for family, which she was starting to regret. With a future filled with so much uncertainty she knew she ought to be more appreciative of them while she could.
A future created by you.
A cry from upstairs interrupted their meal just as Valkyrie finished her last bite.
"Oh that'll be the little miss looking for her teething ring." Melissa said, putting down her plate of half-eaten food.
"I'll go. I'm already done eating." Valkyrie said.
"Oh you're so good, Steph. Her ring's in the kitchen sink. Give it a rinse off before you give it to her, will you?"
Valkyrie smiled then got up, took her plate into the kitchen and washed the plastic hoop off, before heading upstairs into Alice's room. Her sister was sitting in her cot with teary eyes and snot dribbling from her nose. She took the teether from Valkyrie immediately began gnawing on it.
"That's better, isn't it?" she soothed. "There. No more tears."
Alice gurgled something unintelligible in response. Valkyrie picked her up and gave her a cuddle.
"You know, when I'm hurt I usually chew on some magic leaves. But I'm sure your plastic ring works just as well."
She carried her sister over to the rocking chair in the corner of the room. They rocked together for a while, Valkyrie humming some half-forgotten lullaby. It made them both sleepy. She was feeling ill again. The effects of whatever Dr. Synecdoch had give her earlier had obviously worn off now. Everything felt... fuzzy.
Once Alice was fast asleep, Valkyrie tucked her back into bed and stepped out into the hall. The lights were off and it was black out. She could hardly believe how quickly it had gotten dark. There were snores coming from her parents' must have fancied an early night, she thought. Funny, she hadn't heard them go up to bed. Still, sleep sounded like a pretty good idea to her. So she headed back to her room, shutting the door softly behind her, and got ready for bed.
The pain in her neck awoke her sometime in the middle of the night. The spot where the needle had pierced stung like crazy. She gritted her teeth and looked around for something to distract her. The room she was lying in was dark for the most part, but a shaft of light coming from the hall, through the open doorway, lit up a patch of of dull gray floor. Nothing interesting there. Nor on the plain white walls or the blank white ceiling. The room was as empty as her head felt.
The throbbing intensified. She wished she hadn't woken up. It would have been easier to sleep though the pain. But she was wide awake now and there was nothing she could do about it.