PLEASE READ THIS: So, it's finally come around. This is the very final chapter of 'Lending a Helping Hand', my very first story ever published on , and my first Skulduggery Pleasant fanfiction. I just want to thank you all for all your support and reviews and really for everything that you've done. Even just by reading this you've made it all worthwhile, and I'm so grateful to each and every single one of you. This chapter just got me so emotional I actually wanted to cry while writing it, and even more when re-reading it. I've just loved this experience so much and I really don't want it to end, but it has to. And that's the way it has to be. I'm tearing up just writing this bit and you guys haven't even gotten on to the chapter yet!
Now, there will be a sequel. It'll probably be put up in the next two weeks, as next week is half-term, so if I get all my homework done by then, I can focus on the story all that week. It will be a Skulduggery Pleasant Fanfiction ONLY, and I'll post the link on here when it's up so you can find it. There might also be a short compliation of one-shots from between this and the sequel as there will be a bit of a time-jump, but I'll let you know more about that later.
And now, what this whole story has come to: The End. (p.s. please don't kill me!)
Valkyrie couldn't breathe. Couldn't sigh. Couldn't yawn. She was tired, and not just from the lack of sleep worrying over the plan that seemed more and more stupid, and yet more and more necessary as each minute passed. She was tired of everything. She was tired of running, she was tired of lying and she was tired of talking to the stupid homicidal psychopath that lived in her brain, constantly telling her that her idea was stupid, and would never work. But of course, that was what made it more necessary. Even if she never slept again, became an emotional shell like the Hollow Men, it would be worth it. The people she loved would be safe, and that was worth everything.
It was dark outside, early morning. Valkyrie looked to her bedside cabinet where she had framed and placed the photograph she had taken of herself with Fred and George in Hogsmeade just after Christmas. Under her bed, exactly the same scene, but with her and Skulduggery instead. Naturally he had his façade on (this one had browny-blonde hair with brown eyes) so if her parents ever found it they wouldn't freak out about her taking photographs with a living skeleton in a suit. Of course, they probably still freak out about her taking a photograph of herself standing next to a man considerably older than herself.
Her parents and Alice were asleep in their beds. Echo-Gordon knocked on her door and opened it (or rather, he walked through it). She looked to him sadly, trying not to let her heart pang at the pained yet accepting expression on his face.
"You can still change your mind, you know." He said quietly. Valkyrie shook her head.
"No I can't. This has to happen. Something like this was always going to happen." She bit her lip to stop it from trembling. Her suitcase remained packed at the foot of her bed.
"I'm proud of you, you know that." He said, and his own voice was shaking slightly "I'm proud of you whatever you decide."
"Thanks." She managed to speak weakly, her own voice shaking. She could feel the heat rising in her body, the tears threatening to swim to her , with a sinking heart, she heard the tyres of a car pull up outside of the estate.
"I have to go now." She murmured. He nodded slowly and opened his arms for a hug and Valkyrie accepted. Even though she couldn't properly hug him, it felt nice to know she was close to him, like he was still alive. The echo-Gordon behaved in exactly the same way as her real Uncle would have done – and that made her want to cry even more.
"Go on," Echo-Gordon whispered "before they wake up." She nodded and pulled away, taking a deep breath. He looked at her, resting his hands on her shoulders "Be strong." She nodded wordlessly, and he stepped aside. She passed him, walking down the hallway, down the stairs. There was the door, the door that would take her to the gates of the estate, to the Bentley. It was the door that would lead her to the biggest decision she would ever make in her life. She suddenly hated that door. The door that Skulduggery had kicked in to save her on that day, the day she had met him for the first time. The day she thought her life would turn around. Hadn't it just.
She opened the door and stepped out, closing it behind her. The air of the night was cold, not shivering cold, striking cold, like a slap across the cheek. She folded her arms, cupped her hands to her sides to try to warm them, and walked forwards. The sound of her boots against the gravel was pulling at her heart strings, one by one as it thudded in her chest.
Skulduggery stood, arms folded, at the gates, and her breath hitched in her throat. She walked up to him, a metre away now. He tilted his head.
"What is it?" He asked. She choked on her breath, couldn't speak. "Valkyrie?"
"I'm sorry," she managed in a breath. He unfolded his arms.
"What's wrong?"
"I-I can't do this, anymore."
"What on Earth are you talking about?" He asked, and there was an edge of worry to his voice. That velvety voice that had swept her up the moment she took his hat hostage.
"This." and her voice was coming back to her now "The Sanctuary, magic. I-I can't do this. My family, they need me. I-I nearly got them killed. I can't risk that. Ever again. I just, I can't." Skulduggery was silent.
"I have to go," she said, and the tears finally took hold of her, and left her eyes to drip down her cheeks "and I can never come back."
"Valkyrie, just, think about what you're doing."
"I have thought. And I know the answer. I have to stop this. For good. Otherwise… otherwise…" she couldn't finish her sentence and broke down into sobs. Darquesse was silent in her head as Valkyrie's heart sunk like a stone, sobs racking her body. She put a hand up to her face and wiped away the tears from her eyes in an attempt to see, but what was there to see? Only the face of her partner, her best friend, who had deactivated his façade, the skull only slightly different from the one that had made her faint, the silly, innocent girl she had been, all those years ago.
"The Sanctuary needs you," he said, and there was a subtle plea in his voice.
"The Sanctuary can cope without me," her voice cracked with each word "you've got Ghastly, and Tanith."
"They're not you." Valkyrie – no, Stephanie now – was silent save for her sharp intakes of breath and her sobs.
"I-I can't. I'm sorry." Her bedroom light flicked on and off in quick succession. Stephanie looked towards the house. "That's Gordon," she said quietly "my parents must be awake." She paused, and took a last look at Skulduggery. "I'm sorry. I have to go now." She took a step away. "I'll miss you." He said nothing, and despite every instinct telling her to run up and hug him, to tell him it was all a shitty joke, she turned, and left.
THE END
