Traffic [Valduggery, Skulduggery Pleasant Fanfiction]

VHS: Part Two

Part two of two. Continuation from chapter twenty-two.

Torture. Yay.

The bar sank into the darkness, cigarette smoke turning the corners endless. Everything felt yellow, and Tanith smiled politely at the bartender as she took a seat. He eyed Tanith, glass in his hand, and the bar's murmuring died away.

"Have anything that doesn't come in a glass?" Tanith asked.

The bartender shook his head. "We're not serving you."

Tanith lost the smile. "Well, that's a terrible way to run a business."

"Where's the skeleton?" the bartender hissed, leaning closer. Already, a few patrons were hurrying out, head low, eyes darting. "I know he's around here."

"Just be happy you got me." Tanith kept her voice calm, even though she could feel the seconds drags by. How long until infection, until shock. Skulduggery knew, but she wasn't going to broach it. She couldn't. "Do you have any information?"

"That was a onetime deal, before you fell back in line, Low." The bartender grip on the glass turned his knuckles white. "Get out. I don't know anything. She's getting what she deserves, you don't just get to break the law, murder people. It was only a matter of time before she went missing."

Val, laughing, arms wrapped around Tanith's middle as they flew down the highway. Val, rubbing her arm after one of the hearings, looking at Tanith—they can't take my magic away. But Tanith hadn't seen anything, none of the things the scholarly essays claimed Valkyrie, Darquesse did.

Tanith hadn't even realized she had pulled her sword out.

...

They drove in silence, Skulduggery texting with one hand. It was so, so quiet in the car. She watched Skulduggery move out of the corner of her eye, how the car stayed on the road even when Skulduggery shifted with his remaining hand.

Tanith could feel her head dipping, and she kept jerking back awake. There was no time, but Tanith could already feel her judgement slipping, the thoughts sliding out from underneath her. And all the while, Skulduggery, dark and dangerous and quiet.

He knew, too.

"Skulduggery," Tanith began.

"Don't." Skulduggery placed the phone in his pocket.

Tanith looked at him. "You need to hear this! How long has it been, do you think, Skulduggery? How long has she been tied to that chair? How much do you think he's peeled off of her? We have to—"

The car sped up. "Have to what? Tell me Tanith, how do we have to give up on Valkyrie?"

"We have to accept the possibility that Valkyrie—" Tanith's voice cracked. "We're not giving up on her."

"It sounds an awful lot like you're giving up on her. You think that she can't take it, just because you're weak. You don't know her like I do. She'll keep fighting until he drags a knife across her throat, and even then. Don't you dare," the car swerved around traffic, jostled Tanith, Skulduggery stared ahead, "Don't you dare underestimate her."

"Skulduggery..." Tanith's words died in her throat when he looked at her. She opened her mouth, shut it, looked out the window. "Are the Cleavers on their way?"

"Yes."

They weren't there when the Bentley pulled up. Skulduggery shut the car off and was already half way to the house by the time Tanith had unbuckled her seatbelt and gotten out. They were supposed to wait for backup, for the ambulance, but Skulduggery was at the door.

Tanith reached out a hand for the door as Skulduggery kicked it open. Tanith drew her sword and the smell of blood hit her nose. She opened her mouth, tasted it, and she was pushing past Skulduggery into the kitchen.

"Val," Tanith cried out, dropping to her knees beside the chair. "Val, Valkyrie, Val, open your eyes."

Skulduggery was beside her, fingers pressed against Valkyrie' throat. Tanith wanted to cry out, scream to hurry up and let her know what had happened, please, please, not someone else, Tanith couldn't bare it, not Val too.

Skulduggery took out his gun and moved away, and Tanith heard a rasp of breath. Tanith allowed herself a second to rub Valkyrie's upper arm, hoping that maybe Valkyrie felt it, knew she was safe now.

Upstairs, the sound of crashing furniture. Tanith stood, turning a part of her cold as her eyes swept the room. A Remnant. That's what they were going on. She felt sick as she picked her way through the house, sick at this senseless torture. This might have been her. Who had she tied to a chair and—

Tanith stepped over VHS tapes covering the floor. There was a TV in front of Val, the static on silence, and Tanith stared at it. What the hell had Dexter been doing? No, the Remnant had been doing.

She caught sight of the video camera, heavy and out-of-date. The cable.

Tanith looked back at the floor. How many hours per tape?

...

Two hours.

"I want them burned."

Tanith froze outside the door. Her eyes flicked from the crack in the door to her hand, hovering, unsure whether or not to push the door open. She hadn't known Valkyrie was awake—not that she had really expected Skulduggery to call her, but Val, maybe...

Skulduggery's murmur.

"I don't care," Valkyrie said, her voice getting louder, "I want them all burned and I know he took some. I want to make sure they're gone."

Another quick, soft reply from Skulduggery.

"I don't know. I don't know. Which ones did he send you? God, I wasn't screaming, was I? Was I crying?"

A reply.

"He just kept talking. He told me things from Dexter's... It sounded so much like him, Skulduggery. I just..." Valkyrie's voice dipped lower.

Tanith took a few steps back and walked through the door, offering the chocolates ahead of her. "Look who's finally up, awake, out of the mud bath! And you know what always makes torture?" Tanith almost got the word out without choking. "It's chocolate!"

Val looked pale in the big, white bed. She gave Tanith a smile and held out her hands for the chocolate, which Tanith handed over. There was a few seconds of awkward silence. Tanith stood with her hands on her hips, looking from Skulduggery to Valkyrie.

Skulduggery let out a quick laugh. "Well, I suppose I should let you two get reacquainted. No, no, I'm fine. I did just spend the past week searching high and low, near and far for my misplaced partner, but by all means..."

Val scoffed. "Get out of here." She ripped open the chocolate. "Oh, you know what I would love? I mean like, really love? A doughnut and coffee."

"And now I'm an errand boy," Skulduggery mused as he left the room.

Valkyrie seemed to wilt when Skulduggery left the room, like he had taken some part of her. Tanith's eyes fell on Valkyrie's arm, the pale skin, a neat patch from the wrist to the elbow. Val opened the chocolate and popped one in her mouth.

Val looked so tired, drained. Tanith kept picturing her screaming, straining against the chains, or shaking with electricity, arm dripping with blood. Tanith looked away, wondering if the teeth had been replaced yet.

"So..." Valkyrie said around a mouth full of chocolate.

"So, Skulduggery missed you." Tanith tried a smile.