A/N: I don't own Skulduggery, Ghastly, Tanith, or Valkyrie. Valkyrie is about 30 here.

The bad guy was a rotten one as such men went. A third-rate sorcerer, he'd only managed to capture the great Skeleton Detective and his friends through dumb luck, and now that he had them, he didn't know what to do with them.

So he kept them chained in the old castle dungeon, realizing too late that his plan wasn't very creative. Well, Skulduggery realized it for him, and so far the skeleton hadn't shut up yet, much to his captor's dismay.

"So let me get this right, you captured us just to prove you could? Well you've proven yourself, but I must say that isn't really much of a plan. So let us go then, hmm, and we'll forget all about this? I promise not to mention this to a soul, mainly to spare you any further embarrassment."

"I can't, I'd love to, but I can't, I'm sorry!" The captor dissolved into blubbering tears and Skulduggery gave a snort of disgust. Tanith and Ghastly were content to let him do what he did best, knowing full well he'd get them free. He always did, somehow.

"Why can't you?" Skulduggery asked with a weary sigh.

"I lost the keys to your shackles, and the door to the dungeon as well, it clanged shut behind me, we're all trapped here!"

The man dissolved into tears again, and Skulduggery sighed. "Just my luck to get captured by an idiot. I'd tell you not to worry, that Valkyrie would come to the rescue, but she's gone now-"

He stopped at the distant sound of the dungeon door being blown open. But it couldn't be. She was dead, he'd seen her die. He'd attended her funeral, seen the casket lowered into the ground. But as the oh-so-familiar footsteps came closer, he knew it was her.

"Valkyrie!" He called to her as she stepped into view. The clothes were the same, but she wore a large black hat now, the wide brim obscuring the face he'd longed to see for so long. Her hands were stuffed in her pockets and there was something off about her, as if she'd lost a lot of weight.

"Skulduggery." She said softly, not looking up.

Their captor cheered to see the calvary, running straight towards Valkyrie who snapped her head up, her skeletal jaws opening in clear menace, an angry hiss escaping them. Fireballs came to the skeletal hands she withdrew from her pockets, and the man shrieked, turning to run, fainting even as he did, hitting to floor with a dull thud.

"Now that was just insulting, that's what that was." Valkyrie growled as she looked down at the man, then she turned her gaze to Skulduggery and seemed to smile, though it was hard to tell with her being a skeleton.

"Valkyrie! You came back for us, you're rescuing us, but how, why?" Skulduggery asked as she set to work on his shackles, using the lock-picks he'd bought for her.

"I've been trying to get back from the instant I passed, Skulduggery. You need a keeper, I couldn't leave you to wander around on your own, getting hurt and needing rescued as often as you do." His cuffs sprang loose and he got his own picks out, starting on Ghastly's cuffs while Valkyrie moved to Tanith.

Ghastly and Tanith both watched them in stunned silence, perhaps wondering if Skulduggery's hallucination was catching, she couldn't be there, she was dead. But she was, and Skulduggery clearly felt the need to torment her.

"I'm not that helpless. I had a brilliant plan for escape." He said smugly.

"Which was?" Valkyrie asked.

"I'm not telling. I hope you don't think I'm taking you back as a partner, Valkyrie. I have my reputation to think of, and frankly, you'd scare people." He teased.

Ghastly was free and looked from one skeleton to the other in a daze before finding his voice. "There are two of you now. Two skeleton detectives who will never shut up. Oh God, I hereby resign as an Elder." He put his face in his hands and sighed.

"You hear that, Valkyrie? You're out of a job, I bet. Maybe Uncle Gordon will take pity on you and let you back in the mansion, provided you don't scare him too badly."

Valkyrie glared at Skulduggery, straightening up as Tanith's cuffs popped open. "Big talk coming from an animated pile of bones." She growled.

"Said the skeleton." Skulduggery shot back, walking over to place his gloved hands on her shoulders before drawing her into a tight hug. "I missed you." He said softly.

"I missed you too, even if you are the village idiot." She replied, gazing up at her partner in open adoration. Skulduggery's grin broadened then, and he brought his teeth to hers, kissing his wife as he'd longed to for all those lonely months.

"Hmm, not bad. But maybe I got the wrong wife back." He teased, earning a swat.

"Ow! That was a joke, you're an evil woman, Valkyrie Cain, evil. Hitting your poor partner like that when all he is is bones."

"Cry me a river, Skulduggery."

"I was thinking more of taking you home and seeing if we can make skeleton babies, but if you insist-"

"Skulduggery!" Valkyrie scolded, knowing he of course could see the blush that rose to her skeletal features, because his grin deepened as he escorted her through the castle to freedom, Tanith and Ghastly straggling behind in stunned silence.

Months had passed. They were home at last and Skulduggery turned to his beautiful wife. It had been eleven months since she had returned to them, and like any infertile couple they had used magic to bring a bundle of joy into the world.

Valkyrie was cooing to their son, who was currently holding one of her fingers in his wee skeletal jaws, though he certainly didn't need to feed. Skulduggery smiled at the sight, going to his beloved wife and placing kisses on her face with his teeth, before leaning down and brushing them ever so gently on his son's forehead.

Valkyrie returned his affections, placing their son in his arms. "You make a wonderful father, I hope you know that." She said, kissing him again. Skulduggery smiled, and rocked his son gently before placing him in his crib.

"And you make a wonderful mother, Valkyrie Cain. But now our son needs his rest, and I'm fairly certain I can get you pregnant if we try hard enough." She laughed and took his hand, letting him lead her out of their son's bedroom and into their own.

Told you this stuff would be fluffy, aww.