Valkyrie sighed as she felt the wind in her hair. She was sat on a bench on the outskirts of the courtyard. It was the middle of 5th lesson, and she had no class to help teach. Skulduggery would be arriving in a few minutes to do a training session with her, and she was looking forward to it with a calm eagerness. She was too tired to be hyper. Yet more sleep had eluded her, and she felt that if sleep was a physical entity, she would punch it for being so annoying, and then tie it to a chair so it could never leave again.
She heard footsteps coming towards her; not Skulduggery's. They lacked too much grace and silence to be his. They were loud, and as the two voices sounded, she smiled slightly, tilting her head so they were in her view.
The Weasley twins grinned at her simultaneously, and she smiled back, patting the bench either side of her.
"Afternoon boys," she smiled "what's up?"
"Nothing, you just looked rather lonely." George said. She had learned how to tell them apart, sort of. George was usually the one with a little spring on his left foot, so when he walked he always made a slightly louder noise. Fred didn't have that. But she could only tell if they were in corridors like this, where it was quiet, and the sound echoed slightly. After spending so much time around Skulduggery, being so used to his footsteps, she had gotten quite good at identifying things like that.
"Nope, Skulduggery's coming in a minute. We're having a training session."
"What do you even do in training sessions? You always say 'training',"
"But you don't actually say what you're training for." Fred finished George's sentence and Valkyrie rolled her eyes, smiling slightly.
"That's 'cos I don't usually know what we're training for. But I think today it's fighting."
"You're going to fight the skeleton?"
"That's Mr. Skeleton to you Mr Weasley." Skulduggery's voice came thick and smooth from behind them, and the twins jumped. Valkyrie grinned, already having heard him approaching. She sometimes forgot how quiet he could be to everyone else.
"Sorry." Fred muttered. Skulduggery tilted his head and there was slight amusement in his voice as he spoke to Valkyrie.
"Are you coming?"
"Yep." Valkyrie popped the 'p' and stood, brushing imaginary dust from her clothes.
"Come along then." He said, striding off. Valkyrie grinned at the twins and then followed, waving slightly to them until she caught up with Skulduggery. His pace was always much faster than hers. They walked down towards the lake in comfortable silence, nodding to the occasional passer-by that had a free lesson. They even passed two students who were skipping a lesson, and Skulduggery barked at them to get to it. At the scared look on their faces as they scurried back up to the castle, Valkyrie broke into fits of giggles, and Skulduggery chuckled softly.
"So, fighting." Valkyrie smiled as they stopped a little way down from the lake.
"If you like." Skulduggery nodded, and Valkyrie smiled, walking away slightly. They faced each other in combat position before Valkyrie grinned, and they lunged at each other. The punches and kicks were thrown thick and fast, dodges as blurs, which was a shame, Valkyrie thought, as there were some pretty good ones. Then fire was brought into play, and they were lobbing it at each other, Skulduggery dousing hers with water, she avoiding his. He shot a torrent of water at her, which struck her in the chest and knocked her to the ground. She was quickly up again with an air attack, which caught Skulduggery's ribs. He grunted slightly as she smiled, almost pleased with herself. Then she realised, Skulduggery had been holding back. He became faster, more agile, dodging more, throwing more. Valkyrie attempted to tackle him to the ground, but failed. The result was that he had her over his shoulder, and had stopped attacking.
"Hey!" She squealed as he laughed. She was panting slightly as she began to batter his back. He laughed and slowly began to swing her towards the lake.
"Don't you dare!" She screamed as she laughed.
"1…" Skulduggery began to count, making the swings wider "2…"
"No!" Valkyrie laughed.
"3!" He let go of her, but she didn't let go of him, and ended up clinging to his jacket, hanging off of him. He laughed as she got up and smacked him across the chest, still laughing. She cursed him, and he laughed again before they caught their breath (or Valkyrie caught hers) and began again.
Fred and George watched from the hilltop as Valkyrie and Skulduggery walked away from each other, and then turned to face each other. George felt as if he were almost spying on the pair, but he was so curious as to what kind of training 'training' actually meant. Like 'fighting', what was that? Well, obviously it was fighting, but what kind? Would they see their magic? He had been dying to see that again. He knew his brother felt the same.
Fred stayed close to the ground, laying down next to his twin, and grinned slightly, as they watched. Nothing happened for a moment, and Fred almost thought they wouldn't do anything at all, just stand there, until they moved. It was sharp and fast, blurs almost as they lunged at each other. It was like a frenzied attack, the details too distant to see clearly. But both twins could see the black suits Valkyrie wore moving viciously, the hat the skeleton wore almost a blur of darkness. Then bright orange was brought into play – fire. It burned around them as they continued their attacks, then water, and air. Valkyrie was flung back before she leapt to her feet, the skeleton then hit in the side, before Valkyrie jumped, and then the fight was over. The fire extinguished, and laughing drifted up to the brothers from below. They watched in almost shock as Skulduggery attempted to throw Valkyrie into the lake, the both of them laughing profusely.
"George couldn't believe his eyes – how could the funny new friend Valkyrie be so aggressive so quickly. It seemed beyond him. All her knew was, he didn't want to get on her bad side. Ever. His brother felt the same.
