Valkyrie walked into the great hall and immediately spotted the two red heads. Walking over, she grinned.

"Hey." She smiled.

"Hi Valkyrie." They said in unison, making her grin.

"Ok you guys have got to stop doing that." She smiled jokingly.

"Why would we do that?" They said in time, again. She punched the one closest on the arm lightly. He pretended to be hurt, but his grin gave it away. Valkyrie picked up an apple and began to eat slowly before Harry, Ron and Hermione walked in and sat across from them. Valkyrie smiled at Harry, and he returned it slightly. It was the first time she'd seen him smile. But she noticed something was wrong. Ron and Hermione glanced between each other, and Harry kept one hand under the table.

"Everything alright?" Valkyrie asked, raising an eyebrow. Harry nodded quickly. Too quick. Something was wrong. Valkyrie narrowed her eyes slightly.

"Harry, let me see your hand." Harry held up the hand that he had been eating with.

"The other one." She said. He shook his head.

"Show her Harry." Hermione interrupted. Fred and George were now watching with interest as Ron agreed with Hermione. Harry slowly raised his hand form under the table and held it out. Valkyrie took it gently and turned it over. I must not tell lies. Scratched into the back of his hand. It was bruised and had been bleeding. Valkyrie clenched her own fist, feeling Sanguine's razor mark etched into her skin. She fought to keep calm.

"Who did this to you?" She asked calmly. Harry withdrew his hand and put it back under the table.

"Professor Umbridge doesn't believe me, about Cedric." He said quietly. Valkyrie narrowed her eyes into a death glare aimed at no one. Ron shuffled backwards a little bit, as if she was scaring him. Valkyrie clicked her neck and growled slightly under her breath before she took a deep breath out.

"Excuse me, something's just come up." She said politely, brushing her hair back and standing. She walked away, her fist still clenched. She stormed to their classroom, swinging open and almost slamming the door.

"What's wrong?" Skulduggery said immediately. Valkyrie took a deep breath in, and a deep breath out, trying to calm herself.

"Professor Umbridge has carved the words 'I must not tell lies' into the back of Harry's hand." She said, almost growling.

"Are you sure?"

"Positive. I saw the wound with my own eyes. Skulduggery, that'll scar Harry for life. All because she doesn't believe him about what happened. And the fact that a teacher is practically torturing a student, it's just" She held up her hands frustratedly "Insane!" She finished. Skulduggery was silent for a moment.

"We could arrest her for assault on a student." He murmured eventually.

"Yeah and where would we send her? She's one of those ministry nitwits, and we can't send her to the Sanctuary."

"What about the British Sanctuary?"

"They don't like us."

"Lot's of people don't like us."

"We could threaten her."

"That'd get us in trouble."

"I could punch her."

"That'd get you in trouble."

"We can't just let it carry on." Valkyrie said. She felt anger bubbling through her veins as she brushed her hair back and put on her hat.

"Maybe we could alert Dumbledore. Or Professor McGonagall. They both have higher authority in here than her." Skulduggery muttered, scratching his chin.

"That's a good idea." Valkyrie smiled slightly. She still wanted to see the pink blobs nose crack into lots of tiny pieces, but she pushed it aside. If Darquesse ever rose again, then Valkyrie would make it a personal promise for her to kill Umbridge first.

"We have a class first. We could go and find him while the students have their break."

"Yeah, ok." Valkyrie sighed, pushing thoughts of Darquesse and Umbridge out of her mind.

"Try not to worry about it, Val. We'll get it sorted. Seems like this school needed us more than we thought."

"Yeah, but I get the impression that the pink blob hasn't been here before either. None of the professors seem to like her. And it's only the second day."

"I know. I know." Skulduggery had moved the desks from the room, and Valkyrie found that a good place to start a conversation.

"Where have the desks gone?" She asked.

"I asked the caretaker where to put them, and he found a storage room for me."

"You lifted them all down by yourself? I could have helped."

"Val, I levitated them down. There was no effort at all involved."

"Oh. Show off."

"Yes, most unfortunately there was no one around the see it." He said, moving the black board to the side. It still had 'blocking' on it in big letters. Valkyrie sighed. Then Valkyrie had an idea. She smiled slightly to herself.

"Skulduggery?"

"Yes?"

"If I did something indirectly to Umbridge, would you be annoyed with me?"

"Probably not. Why?" He looked to her and titled his head as Valkyrie grinned.

"I think some certain new friends of mine might be more than happy to help me publicly embarrass her. What do you think?"

"I think that sounds rather risky."

"I know."

"So go ahead."

The corridors were quiet after McGonagall stormed up to Umbridge and practically yelled at her for hurting Harry. Valkyrie and Skulduggery had watched form the side lines as Umbridge had confronted McGonagall and announced she would be in charge of her own punishments because the school was 'worse than she feared'. Valkyrie frowned as Umbridge walked past them with a smirking smile on her face. Valkyrie growled under her breath, and felt her fingers flex. She looked to McGonagall, who looked almost defeated, before she saw the Weasley twins. She whistled to them, and they looked to her, walking through the crowd to get to her. Valkyrie looked them both in the eye and muttered

"Classroom, 5pm. It's time the tables were turned." Before she nodded to them politely and walked away, Skulduggery following behind her before they walked into an empty corridor and strode side by side.

"You realise that as sanctuary officials here on official duty, we shouldn't be doing this."

"Of course"

"Good, I'd hate to think you missed out on that knowledge when you're doing this." He said. Valkyrie smiled slightly.

"Hey Skulduggery?"

"Yes Val?"

"Will you teach me to fly?" She asked

"Why would you want to fly?"

"You can do it."

"And as inspirational as I am, it's very difficult."

"So? We have Saturdays and Sundays off, and only one murder case and one possible assault case. That's loads of time."

"If it goes wrong you could fall to your death."

"It's a good thing I'm bad at dying then." Valkyrie grinned as Skulduggery chuckled.

"Fine, if we have time in amongst the rest of your training. I'd like to teach you to manipulate water better this year. You're absolutely dreadful at it."

"Shut up."