Chapter 139

Valkyrie silently sat, watching her family talk in quiet tones about the information Skulduggery gave her. They were in an office, in the Sanctuary, in Roarhaven - a dark, gloomy office that Valkyrie particularly hated. Her Skulduggery finding team was on the other side of the room on a table silently mulling over the story she'd told, likely angry with her for not trying to bring him in. Meritorious and Corrival had left to talk about their next plan of action. She didn't know if they wanted to pursue Skulduggery and bring him in or if they were going to let him go, but she had a strong suspicion they'd allow him to leave.

Solomon was quiet, holding Laila and not looking at anyone. The knowledge that Skulduggery had cut their relationship in half and left was affecting him, although he'd said at the time that he knew it was coming. Tanith had been angry with him and wanted to track him down, so did Ghastly and all of her Sanctuary team, but Erskine and Anton had been supportive of him going to receive help. Really, she thought the others did too, but they were also upset and angry and that was hard to let go of.

Valkyrie, Saracen and Dexter had been quiet. She didn't know what her brothers wanted, but they had nodded and smiled at her. It didn't seem that they had an opinion more so that they were supporting Valkyrie. She knew whatever she wanted to do, they'd follow. Nadia, quiet on her other side and holding onto her arm tightly, was doing the same. If she didn't feel so shit about everything, she'd be grateful.

Corrival and Meritorious came in and gave their verdict almost an hour after leaving to talk about it privately. They were letting Skulduggery leave for the treatment facility, so long as it was confirmed he went there. They had already sent someone to check and would get in contact with them if he never arrived, in which case they would be tasked to pursue him. But as of that moment, Valkyrie, her family and team were dismissed.

"What a shit day," Amanda, the only female of Valkyrie's Skulduggery hunting team, said.

Valkyrie grunted.

"If it helps, I think you did the right thing."

Valkyrie looked at her as her brothers spoke between themselves. Only Nadia seemed to be listening in. "I thought you wanted him in."

"I did. But the goal was the get him treatment for the torture, right?" Amanda pointed out. "He's getting that."

"If he even goes," Tuppence whined.

"Shut up," Amanda rolled her eyes. "It's not like we did anything to find him."

"You helped a lot," Valkyrie said automatically. "Everyone did. But he was more cautious than I thought he'd be considering how... damaged he is. And I got distracted looking at other cases. It exactly didn't work in our favour."

"Perhaps. But we got what we wanted," Amanda said, finally smiling. "It was good working with you."

"You too. You'll all be going back to regular work by the way. Unless we hear Skulduggery hasn't turned up, this team is disbanded."

Amanda, Tuppence and Grant took their leave with nods and smiles at Valkyrie. They weren't all happy, Valkyrie could see that, but they were polite and didn't give her trouble which Valkyrie appreciated. She also knew that Amanda and Grant had done all the paperwork and taken all the phone calls and read every letter sent to the Sanctuary to do with the case. She decided to herself to do something for the two of them for their help. Could she get them a raise?

Nathanael and Kinsey stuck around a little longer to talk with her brothers, but they too left once Valkyrie promised to call them first if they were going on a world-hopping hunt after Skulduggery. Valkyrie sincerely hoped it wouldn't come to that.

All she had to do now was quit.

.*****.

Ghastly came over that evening and they had a family meal that actually went well – Tanith even enjoyed her first proper meal since she was six months pregnant and got to sit at the table and eat and laugh without feeling ill while Ghastly got to let his dinner go cold as he bottle fed his baby. It was cute to be fair, and Ghastly didn't mind at all by the way he was smiling at Laila.

Together, they watched a television program and after they all had ice cream and tea before going to bed. Ghastly offered, stupidly, to take Laila for the night and, smirking evilly, Tanith batted her eyelids and gave him the baby and told him to get on with it. He, having never looked after his child alone before, looked excited and ready to do it. Valkyrie had to admire how much he loved the girl, but he had not spent enough time with her and was not prepared to do a full night. Even Valkyrie struggled with just a few hours alone and she knew how to change a nappy and what Laila's cries meant. Ghastly didn't.

Still, the family grinned and left him to it. This was both revenge and a wakeup call for poor Ghastly.

Morning proved them right. All of them were well rested and Tanith had woken up early and went on a short walk around the house for exercise – she couldn't do much yet but was improving – before going to Ghastly and taking Laila. Tanith had reported to them that Ghastly had been pale, looked as if he had cried and had stains on his clothes, and had been very quiet when he handed Laila off before passing out on the sofa.

Maybe it was mean, but they laughed. Tanith was gleeful and had also told them that she had gotten a phone call that morning over going to her first baby care class that day. She was going to take Ghastly.

Valkyrie was happy for them, but even more so she was happy for Laila. Yeah, her father had been an idiot, but she knew that was mostly because he was delusional about his responsibilities more so than uncaring or unwilling - if he was the latter he never would have been so good with Valkyrie growing up.

She and the family cleaned the house all over, setting up a large room at the back for later that day for when Nadia's friends arrived, and Ghastly woke up at midday with just enough time to clean himself, change and eat before he drove with Tanith and Laila to the class.

With them gone, Valkyrie and Nadia had spent some time alone, talking about who was coming mostly, before they left for the airport.

"They're landing now," Nadia told her from where they were sat in arrivals.

"Just a few hours left then," Valkyrie stretched.

"Don't whine. We'll get food after this," Nadia demanded. "They're hungry."

Valkyrie smiled and put a hand on Nadia's leg. "Calm down, baby. You're getting stressed."

She huffed. "I'm not stressed."

"I think you are," Valkyrie teased.

"You are not helping," Nadia gritted out.

"Well at least you're admitting it," Valkyrie said cheekily before catching Nadia in a kiss. They both heard the three old ladies gasp and begin muttering angrily, making them giggle. They kissed again and again until the women huffed loudly and strutted away, muttering about children these days. Grinning to each other, they pulled apart.

"Mission accomplished," Valkyrie grinned.

Nadia rolled her eyes. "Annoying old bats isn't meant to be fun."

"I meant that I made you happy."

Nadia laughed. "Shut up, you. Come on then, have you memorised my friend's names yet?"

"I think so. Bedrooms of ten are stupid by the way."

"I know. You've said it, like, twenty times."

"Yeah, well, it's true. You've told me all the ins and outs too. Rebecca was one of the girls, but she's not coming, and you've told everyone why and the others are gushing all over you and saying they love you. Of the other eight there's Charlotte from America, Fleet from Australia and Prema is from Sri Lanka. Those three knew each other growing up because their mothers grew up together. Lian is half Chinese, half French. She's one of those mages that knows all languages, right?"

"That's her magic, yes," Nadia confirmed.

"Yeah. And then there's Tara, Vasuda and Zainab who were all born and raised in India."

"Yes."

"But they didn't know each other before coming to this school. And lastly there's Dhiya–"

"Dheea!" Naida corrected her. "God, you can't shake her hand and say, 'hello Dia!'"

"Sorry, sorry! I meant Dhiya. With an ee sound. I am trying."

"I know. I'm sorry, I just want this to go well."

"It's okay," Valkyrie forgave. "Did I get them all though?"

"Yes. Oh, I got a text," Nadia said and checked her phone. "They're almost through security! I'm so excited Valkyrie!"

Valkyrie tried to calm her down but it was no use and Nadia shot up from her seat when the girls came through the door and they all jumped and squealed together.

"I missed you so much!" They all kept repeating.

Valkyrie stood, not entirely sure what to do other than smile and look pretty and hope they would like her. After getting in the way of at least thirty people, the girls all began moving through the hall as one large mass towards Valkyrie.

"Valkyrie!" Nadia said excitedly, like she had just remembered her existence. Valkyrie refrained from rolling her eyes at her girlfriend. "Guys, this is my girlfriend Valkyrie. Val, this is Charlotte–" a tan, slightly larger girl with light brown hair, soft eyes and a pretty smile "–Prema–" a dark-skinned beauty with a few shallow pockmarks on her cheeks "–Dhiya–" a small lipped, long-nosed, incredibly overexcited girl with a neon orange headscarf "–Fleet–" a blonde, blue-eyed tall girl who looked strangely like a mix of Valkyrie, Dexter and Tanith in all the best ways "–Tara–" the ends of her hair were dyed blue "–Zainab–" who was impossibly pale, accentuated with her dark, perfectly drawn eyebrows, and also wearing a headscarf but in a different fashion to Dhiya "–Lian–" who was the perfect mix of her parents, with Asian, impossibly smooth skin, light green eyes, dark curly hair with what Valkyrie thought could be red highlights, and narrow cheekbones "–and this is Vasuda." Vasuda was the shortest, and very broad shouldered. She had an arm around Nadia and Valkyrie could immediately sense that Vasuda did not like her.

The girls waved and said their hello's one by one, except for Vasuda who, using the hand that wasn't around Nadia's waist, shook Valkyrie's hand. Valkyrie made sure to clench the girl's hand just a little more than she should have and some of the nasty look went away to be replaced with caution. What did this girl think she could do to Valkyrie? Steal Nadia away? Valkyrie didn't like how she was holding Nadia, but she was more than confident in her relationship and since Nadia was blissfully unaware of any of this, Valkyrie looked the girl in the eye and smirked.

Vasuda didn't look so confident anymore. Good.

"How was your trip?" Valkyrie asked pleasantly, drawing her attention away from Vasuda like nothing happened.

"It was excellent!" Dhiya excitedly said. "We went first class!"

"It was a good trip," Fleet agreed in a calmer way.

"The food was awful," Vasuda complained.

"We're going to get food now," Nadia said quickly. "I've made reservations at this Italian restaurant not far from Valkyrie's house. We ordered cars, they'll take your luggage home."

The girls, including Vasuda, looked suitably impressed with this discussion and complimented Nadia on the surely expensive choice but Nadia just directed the compliments to Valkyrie. The girls giggled and some of them pretended to swoon to mock Nadia, but she took it with good graces and Valkyrie could only grin as Vasuda got more upset that Valkyrie was being nice.

They were split between two smaller cars for the trip to the restaurant, which had been done to accommodate the eight suitcases. The trip there was full of happy talking between Nadia and the girls in their car, so Valkyrie was free to be quiet and listen in from the passenger seat next to the driver. At their destination, the drivers opened doors and they continued into the building, the two groups merging into one large, gossiping mass.

"Good afternoon," a smiling waitress greeted Valkyrie. The group travelled slower behind. "Do you have a renovation?"

"Yes, name Cain?"

"Ah, yes, you booked in this morning," the waitress said, looking down her list to mark off their arrival.

"My girlfriend did, yes. I hope they're not too loud," Valkyrie said just as the girls walked into the front entrance laughing loudly over something. The waitress just shook her head in a 'that's alright' way and led them through to their table at the back.

The group was slightly quieter as they took their seats, Vasuda was still next to Nadia as Valkyrie expected, with Dhiya on Nadia's other side and the others just mixing around the table. Valkyrie got a seat opposite Nadia which was better than she had expected.

"Do you young ladies know what you'd like to drink?" The waitress asked when they'd settled.

"Could we please," Valkyrie started before anyone else got a word in, "get some jugs of water with ice and lemon for the table?"

"Of course," she replied, writing that down.

"And then I'd love some cherry lemonade," Valkyrie finished and gestured to Nadia. They went around the table ordering drinks, and the waitress made quick work of getting them all out to the table as conversations began again. Valkyrie ordered some bread for the table, and they all ordered off of the short lunch menu, Valkyrie and Nadia choosing the same goat's cheese, roast vegetable pie.

"So, Valkyrie," Prema said from beside her. Valkyrie looked at her with a smile, trying to make friends. "Tell me what living with the Dead Men is like!"

Valkyrie laughed. "It's great. My brothers are wonderful people, most of the time, and we get on very well. Dexter and Anton are great cooks, Saracen can always help find the stuff we drop behind the sofa. We get on really well."

"I heard a Necromancer live with you," Vasuda cut in. The girls, including Nadia, looked at her as if she'd been rude but then they looked at Valkyrie curiously.

"Yes, Solomon Wreath live with us too. He is, or was, Skulduggery's boyfriend. They've split up and Skulduggery is receiving psychiatric help at the moment. Solomon has done a lot of work with children in the Temple and, since the Temple is gone and I was formerly his apprentice, we decided he could stay with us. We get on really well. He's like a father to me."

Charlotte nodded sympathetically. "I heard that you'd lost a lot of family before. I'm glad you get to have Solomon as your father."

The girls agreed and Valkyrie felt she had taken a step towards friendship with them.

"What's it like living with Dexter Vex?" Fleet grinned.

Valkyrie snorted a laugh along with the rest of the table. "He's funny and very sweet," she said, knowing Fleet didn't care about that one bit. "As I said, he's a good cook and loves food. Him and Saracen are dating right now."

Fleet's grin widened when she mentioned Saracen. She asked what he was like.

"He's great but likes to mess with us. Sometimes he'll talk like he knows things, you know, but he doesn't at all and we go searching around the house for whatever we were looking for and he laughs at us when we confront him about it. He thinks it's hilarious."

Nadia rolled her eyes. "You know that's not what she wants to know."

Valkyrie grinned at Nadia. "Yeah, but this is funnier. Anyway, they're at home, so Fleet has lots of time to drool over them later. I'll make sure to introduce you."

Fleet was more than satisfied with that and didn't care less that the others laughed at her. Valkyrie turned the questions around, asking them about what their lives were like, but it kept being sent back to her as they were only interested in what it was like to work as a detective, and what she had to do to get so strong, and ask if it was true that Ghastly had a daughter. She answered them all as honestly and usually in as few words as possible so it wouldn't seem like she was hogging the conversation. Still, they seemed happy with what she did say and Valkyrie saw Nadia get more comfortable as it continued. The food came out in good time and conversation stopped for that, and there were mostly mutterings of good food for a while. Nadia was drawn into a conversation about what some friends had done over summer as well as ask her what she planned to do with the school year starting in two weeks, but Nadia didn't answer what she was doing, just smiled and continued eating.

Valkyrie paid for their meal when they were all done and ready, and they took the cars to Valkyrie's house. The girls were all complimentary of the mansion, although they all agreed it was foreboding which led to an easy discussion about renovations.

Inside the house, the suitcases had been taken up to the room the girls were staying in and they all went up to there first. The girls were all jet lagged but insisted they'd be fine and talked instead about what Nadia intended to do with the house and if they'd have a proper parlour room, if Nadia would have an office, and what about a library, and some nonsense about a cat room. Valkyrie whispered for Nadia to come down when they were settled for drinks and left them to catch up.

Downstairs, Valkyrie stretched, her back clicking.

"How is it?" Solomon asked, buttering some bread at the kitchen counter.

"Good, I think," Valkyrie told him, sitting at the bar. "They're all interested in how life is living with the Dead Men and they didn't really talk to me about Skulduggery. I told them about you living here and they actually seem happy that you are, because I said you're like a father to me."

Solomon smiled fondly at her and abandoned his sandwich in favour of a hug. "You're a good girl."

"I know," she grinned, giving him a kiss on the cheek. They separated. "Do you know when Tanith and Ghastly are back?"

"Not for another hour I think."

"It's getting late."

"It's a long drive," he told her. "And a three hour and a half course."

"Well, it's almost five," Valkyrie said. "The girls are making plans to change the house. Apparently they think there's going to be a cat room. What does that even mean?"

"It's a room in which there are platforms around the walls, bridges between the walls, sometimes cat flaps into other rooms, and toys, food and beds for pet felines," Solomon told her, going back to his sandwich. "I imagine Nadia will want one."

Valkyrie huffed. "She can't get a cat."

"She can."

"She can't. I want a dog."

"Well, she did help you recover. She even talked to me when I was at Kenspeckle's. So, she probably deserves it," Solomon told her, looking over with a smirk.

Valkyrie glared. "That's not fair."

He laughed and walked out of the kitchen.

Valkyrie just huffed and sulked before finding Erskine and informing him that he'd be working on house plans a lot later and that he would have to make notes. He had smiled knowingly and got out his notebook which he had been writing down ideas and inspiration in over the last month in which they had been thinking about changing things. Valkyrie never saw him without it these days.

"What are you guys doing then?" Valkyrie asked, closing the bedroom door behind her.

"Waiting for your girlfriend and your girlfriends' girlfriends to start looking for us," Dexter grinned. "I mean, it's only a matter of time."

"I'd say you're up yourself, but you're unfortunately right," Valkyrie said, jumping on the bed with the other three. "What ideas have you and Nadia even come up with?"

"The outside is set," he told her. "She said it was along the lines of what you told her, and it's pretty modern. Anton said we can't decide on the kitchen until he's here, and he's working all the time so that hasn't happened. But we're doubling the space. In total, there's going to be less rooms downstairs, but there's going to be more room per room. We've had a think about floor planning upstairs, but we've been arguing about it."

"What? Why?"

"We can't decide if we should make an addition," he whined. "We don't have the room for a library at the moment if we want ballrooms, and we want ballrooms. And if we want a formal dining room for parties and an informal dining room for every day attached to the kitchen, we can't fit expanding the garages. Having an extension with a big library would fix that and it would mean we don't need an office corridor like we were planning before because we can have desks in there, so we technically save space."

"You want a three-story expansion and you think it saves space?"

"Well it does in a way," Saracen chimed in. "If this is going to be the last big, real do-over of the house, we may as well make it right. And for the number of apartments plus guest rooms we need, we'll be using all three of the upper floors. The larger basement we never go in can be food storage and for weapons since it'll have concrete all around. Alongside a larger kitchen, larger laundry room, two dining rooms and the large meeting room at the front of the house which will also be made larger, there is no more room."

Valkyrie pouted. "Why are you making sense? This costs money you know."

Saracen snorted. "We spoke to Gordon about it while you were out. I don't think you'll be in too much trouble if we add a tiny extension, so long as we give him a proper room with a sofa for visits. His rule."

"How tiny is the expansion?"

"Three stories and about the size of the larger ballroom," Dexter said. Valkyrie looked at him like he was insane. "Except it's not that big. It's bigger."

"How many fucking books do you want?!"

Dexter laughed. "It's a mansion, Valkyrie! And anyway, there's so many of us in this house we need the space! I mean, Ghastly will need a shop here to have enough time to be with Laila, we need a kids area for Laila to have more room which may eventually be an apartment of her to live here too, and Tanith has already text Erskine saying she wants to home school Laila!"

"Oh my God, how is this all going to fit?"

"By expanding for the library!" Saracen laughed. "It'll double as office space. Plus we'll be using all three of the upper floors rather than just the one we've been limiting ourselves to for years."

"But we were going to put offices in the apartments."

"We thought that was stupid," Erskine said offhandedly. "No one will use them, except maybe Ghastly, and he'd only use it for sewing. We thought we'd give him a staircase in his rooms so he could have a sewing room under his proper rooms."

"And where's that going to go?"

"In the house, obvious," Erskine said back. Valkyrie glared at him but he just grinned. "Come on, trust us Val! We know what we're doing."

"I'm sure you do, but I'm worried you're going to take on too much and it'll be a mess," Valkyrie said.

"Would you like to see the plans?" Valkyrie nodded and he got up and brought over a giant binder almost the size of her and flipped it over to 'Ground Floor'. She stared at it, trying to make out if she should laugh or cry. The left had the ballrooms as it currently did but behind them at the back of the house was no kitchen, back door, storage or laundry, it was a large area that seemed to be dedicated to being a hallway. When she asked, Erskine explained it would be an orangery, a room filled with plants, sofas and pretty things to make it both a useful space and a corridor. It could lead to the outside entertainment area, the library expansion on the left and the giant new kitchen on the right. It would be practical for them - especially if they put herbs in there - plus it would look good for their parties if they wanted people to be able to get to the outside and library from the ballrooms and the formal dining room without them seeing all the behind the scenes cooking.

Valkyrie loved the idea because it seemed extravagant and she loved the concept of an orangery.

She looked over at the library. It was like her rectangular house had another square attached, overlapping slightly at the corners. Valkyrie wasn't even sure what to say about it as it was just so crazy to add on so much more space to her literal mansion and just looked around further.

The large kitchen was open plan with the informal dining room and at the end of the dining room was a door leading to a large room that could be used as a 'child room'. That meant it was for Tanith to decide if she wanted it to be a playroom or school room or anything else she came up with. That was the back section of the house. The area between the stairs at the front and the kitchen dining area at the back – the middle of the house – included four rooms. The formal dining room which was really big. A large toilet room, the largest downstairs and intended to be used when they had a big party. Gordon's room. And finally, a laundry room that was three times its previous size.

The stairs, as well, were different. Right now it was one very large staircase in the middle of the entry room. They planned on taking that down and making two curved staircases on either side of the entry to make a real balcony and make the split down the house right in the centre rather than with two corridors as it currently was. It was much more space efficient for downstairs and certainly would be grander and more elegant rather than obnoxiously. The balcony took up a bit of space but since they were spreading out the house better now, it wasn't that bad and looked amazing.

The right of the house was more familiar. There would still be garages, this time with an extra two doubles. This reduced the space they had left inside the house but would be much more fun to have those garages. There would no longer be a snug, or the current most used downstairs toilet. Instead, they'd extend the meeting room so that there would be doors leading to it in the parlour, which was otherwise the same shape and space. Valkyrie could already see herself using the parlour and meeting room regularly. The informal living room and old dining room was being turned into a television room and normal family sitting area. The parlour was going to get doors on all sides and be kept as a 'do not touch under threat of death' area. Erskine was threatening them with white sofas.

She left out a breath. "This is a lot of new stuff."

"Yeah, but I think it's better," Erskine said, a little doubt coming into his voice now.

"No, I think it's more practical," she told him. "It cuts off the formal rooms from access so we can't get into them so much, and it'll suit our needs better. But it's a lot of work."

"I know," he nodded, glad to have her approval. "You haven't even seen the apartments yet."

Valkyrie groaned but smiled. To be fair, they weren't bad. They had taken into account all the different family member's needs. Corrival's rooms were nearest the front of the building where he'd be happiest and they were modest as he'd want, plus them being smaller worked nicely since he had his own entire mansion to go to if he wanted some space whilst still giving him a permanent place in their family home.

Tanith's apartment was opposite his room and they were much larger and had some extra rooms for guests such as her brother. Ghastly's sewing area was on the first floor also, although somewhat small. Saracen had a rather small apartment of his own too, but it seems to be mostly unplanned and as he said he didn't plan on using it. The last apartment was much, much larger, taking over almost half of the first floor ground space by itself. That was for her and Nadia.

"This is too big!" She said immediately.

"You and Nadia should have the space," Dexter told her more seriously. "You have personal access to the library and there's a secret door in your apartment with a spiral staircase going down to the living room, exiting behind a fake bookcase – I thought you'd like that. You share a real office that you two will actually use, you get two guest bedrooms and you both have walk-in wardrobes."

"That bathroom is insanely huge."

Dexter shrugged. "Nadia wanted a walk-in shower."

"How far does she want to walk? I could go for a freaking hike in there! It's massive!"

"Valkyrie, you own a mansion. Act like it," Saracen admonished.

Valkyrie's mouth snapped shut. How was she meant to respond to that? She changed the subject. "Where are the guest rooms?"

"Normal guest rooms are off to the side above the ballrooms. It just worked with the space to do that. And on the other two floors," Erskine turned the page to the second and third floor side by side illustrations, "the rest of us fit."

Sure enough, he showed her the apartments for Dexter, Solomon, Skulduggery, Erskine and Ghastly. Ghastly's was slightly smaller than the others to make up for his sewing room below, and Solomon's was also small as per his request. Skulduggery's was fairly large, with a large walk-in wardrobe area. Valkyrie was almost surprised he had an apartment but knew it was because they couldn't bear to imagine life without Skulduggery. Valkyrie tried not to think about it. Other than that, there were some out of the way things such as a cinema room, secret weapon rooms and some other spaces not yet decided.

"It looks good," she told them.

"We thought so too," Erskine grinned. "Anton still wants to look it over for 'practicality', whatever that means. We're also undecided on a few things so they could all change. I really want to fit in a pool and a gym."

"Practicality is probably a good idea," she said.

"Yeah, probably. But I like it as it is too. It's splendiferous."

Valkyrie laughed as her phone buzzed and she checked it. "Come on then. Nadia demands our presence."

Also, as a reminder, the next SP book comes out on the 30th so you know your girls pre-ordered it! If I don't post much straight after my exam, the book with definitely re-invigorate me! I'm super excited! :)