No, no. How could I face Skulduggery after the dream last night? My face flushed just thinking about the dream, guilt came with the blush. I groaned and ran around my bed to get my work clothes. Crap. I'd have to change the bandage on my hands, I was more worried about explaining to Skulduggery how I had even got them. With my clothes on I ran to the mirror to finish getting ready, I brushed my teeth and pulled my hair back into a ponytail. So how's this going to go Valkyrie? You going to tell him or are you going to play it off? Nope. I can't think about this, what about my more important problems? Like the fact I have to kill Tanith? I skidded to a stop as I jumped to the ground floor. What if you take this case, and she tries to kill Skulduggery? How will you live with both of them gone? No. I can't think of that. If Tanith killed Skulduggery, I would kill her. Was it even possible to kill Skulduggery? Yes. Crap. Another problem for me to think about.
A horn sounded outside, and I panicked. If this connection is still there with us, he'll know something's wrong. Well not WRONG, but not exactly good thoughts...
I ran out the door and locked it, and it was pouring down with rain. I sprinted to the bentley and got in.
"Fashionably late as usual Valkyrie" Came the voice. I almost turned to jelly there and then. "Shut up and drive" I said glaring at him.

"And what happened to your hands?" He asked me a while into the drive. I looked down at the bandages and sighed "Fell and cut myself". "All over your hands?" I hated it when he used logic against me. "Fine, broke a mirror...By punching it." He sighed looking down at me and then looking back out the window. Could this all just shift back to normal so quickly? Did he forget his mood with me the other day, and should I mention it? I thought rapidly. If he had been so upset the other day it probably wasn't the best to bring it back up again...But I was his partner so he should tell me everything. Or maybe it was awkward for both of us and more so for him because he hasn't had to comfort me so closely before. That seemed like a more fitting proposition to the situation. He was uncomfortable with being so close to someone and didn't know how to deal with it. Everything would be fine now. I looked to Skulduggery's face and body position, he looked completely relaxed and almost too happy. My eyes drifted to his hands that were clenched around the wheel.
No, nothing had changed.

The rest of the ride to the sanctuary was silent. My eyes were unfocused on the road ahead of us and Skulduggery lacked in conversation. Why was he being so nice to me if something was wrong? If it had been my fault then surely I should be awkward as well. Yet sat her in the car with him, I felt almost complete. I say almost because of my bestfriend's neglect to actually talk.

Oh, was that it? Was it because of my nightmare that he was being overly nice? Did he think I was too frail to talk to normally because of the nightmare? I assured myself that I wasn't weak by twisting my hands to make them bleed more. Skulduggery looked over at this. "Are you okay? Is it hurting, do you want me to take you to the doctors?" His tone was light and laced with worry. It would have been the perfect cover if it had been to someone else. But I know him too well. I could see right through his mask, because that was all it was. I looked him straight in the eye- eye sockets- and said "No, I'm fine, thank you." My voice wasn't vicious, but it wasn't anything but dead serious. Skulduggery nodded getting my hint of me being able to handle it and his body went back to normal. Normal being rigid and not talking.

How fantastic Was my thought as we entered the sanctuary. Again mages walked past us with some fear in their eyes as Skulduggery stormed ahead of me. Except this time I didn't try to keep up with him, I let him walk off and I started to unwrap and rewrap my bandages. By the time we reached Erksine's office Skulduggery had stopped and glared at me six times just for walking normally.

If I was honest with myself I had avoided thinking about our case. It clearly hadn't helped with Skulduggery that night but I couldn't avoid it now. I had to kill Tanith. There I said it and didn't completely freak out over it. In fact if I looked at it, it wasn't really her. Thats all I had to do, distance myself so then I wasn't killing my other best friend. It was all the remnants doing, we were lucky if Tanith was still alive inside. I slumped a little as I realised after all I had no problem with killing my best friends body, even if she was still inside it. I was sure if the remnant was killing so many people then we could kill her. I know we had said that we wanted to capture her first... But I knew Tanith, hell I even know Tanith with a remnant, and she wouldn't go down without a fight. I was just preparing in case things go wrong.

We entered Ravels office again, this time Ghastly was here along with Madame Mist. I frowned at Ravels lack of sensitivity towards Ghastly. "He knows, not all the details. But he knows what Ravel has ordered." Skulduggery whispered in my ear. I shivered not only was the effect from Skulduggery's voice but from the fact that Ghastly had to hear from his best friend that his other friends had been ordered to kill his only love. It sounded confusing but it made sense to me. It was like...like Ghastly and maybe Ravel telling me they had to kill Skulduggery. The room dropped two or three degrees as the thought went through my head. The next thought was worse, if that was to ever occur - then I would be without Skulduggery.

Darquesse whipped against my head, reassuring me that if it did happen and she took over... Everyone inside this room would burn along with the rest of this world. But what made me pale more so was that I liked the idea of it if I did loose him. I liked the idea of the world burning.