Here's to Christmas - Skulduggery Pleasant FanFic

Chapter 5: Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow

Sunday morning came far too quickly. Valkyrie rubbed her face and sat up, looked around her living room. Light streamed through the window and spilled across the carpet like a fallen can of paint. She groaned and looked at her phone. 8:14.

She contemplated going back to sleep, but decided against it and got up to make herself some toast, only to find her bread bin was unmercifully empty. She looked through the fridge - no bacon, no eggs, no sausages. In the cupboard there was only a jar of jam, a can of beans and a bottle of ketchup.

"I have to buy some food," Valkyrie said to herself. She looked down and found she was still wearing her work clothes, so she took off her tie and slipped off her shoes and stuck the beans in the microwave.

Whilst the beans cooked, Valkyrie went to switch the heating on. The temperature outside was dropping everyday, and it was almost certain to snow in the Christmas week. But when she turned the knob on the radiator, there was no hum from the hot water pipe. She frowned, turned it off and on again, and still nothing happened, so she went to check the boiler.

The green light was off and there was no sound coming from the boiler, so she opened the hatch and looked inside. It read, 'HOT WATER: OFF'.

"Well how the hell do I switch it back on?" she shouted at no-one in particular. She shut the hatch again and hit the boiler with her fist. Suddenly it whirred into action and the green light came back on. Underneath the hatch, the sign read 'HOT WATER: ON.' She nodded to herself.

"That's more like it," she said sternly, and went to put the beans on a plate.

Shortly after she finished breakfast, there was a knock on her door. She hurriedly tidied the plate away and opened the door, and her face lit up in unexpected glee.

The corners of China's mouth twitched upwards into a smile.

"Hello Valkyrie," she said smoothly. Valkyrie didn't think twice - she simply catapulted herself at China, who absorbed the impact with admirable ease.

"Hello China," she murmured into her impeccable clothes. She was wearing a white blouse and black trousers and impossibly elegant high heels. Her face and features were, of course, entirely flawless. She pulled away. "What are you doing here?"

"I just came to say hello," China said too simply to be telling the truth. Valkyrie nodded.

"Ok. Well, come inside, I'll make some tea and then you can tell me what you've really come to tell me."

Valkyrie let China in and shut the door behind her. China ran a porcelain hand through her hair.

"Actually, tea won't be necessary," China said, bringing her hands down in front of her and wringing them. Valkyrie had never seen China like this. It was unnerving.

"What's wrong?"

"Oh, I shouldn't say it," she said softly, almost to herself, "I really can't...oh, but I'm going to. I am."

"China, why don't you sit - "

"I'm moving away."

Valkyrie actually recoiled, her hands frozen halfway to hold China by the arms. Her eyes widened, then narrowed, and then she shook her head.

"What?"

"I'm leaving, Valkyrie. I'm so sorry."

"You're lying. Stop it. Don't wind me up."

China herself looked close to tears. Water began to accumulate in Valkyrie's eyes and she angrily blinked it away. This wasn't right. China wasn't leaving. No. No no no.

"Why?" Valkyrie said softly, trying valiantly to stop her voice from breaking and failing horribly. China looked down.

"I just can't stay here. I've lost everything. I have to start afresh."

"You haven't lost everything." Valkyrie insisted. "You haven't lost me. Don't go. What are you talking about? Don't do this."

"Don't you see, Valkyrie? I've lost my books, I lost you and Skulduggery and then, for a short while I had you back but then I lost you again and Skulduggery found out about how I felt once and I can't handle it. My life is in pieces around me and I know that as long as I'm here there's no way I'll be able to rebuild it."

"I'll help you rebuild it," Valkyrie was clutching at straws. "You're overreacting, you just need a little help. You have me now, China."

China's gaze held that determined, resolved look that no amount of tears could wash away. A single tear left a long trail down her cheek. Valkyrie couldn't help but let her own tears come.

"Where are you moving?" she asked quietly. "Can I at least have your address?"

"I don't know where I'm going." China shrugged, avoiding her gaze. "I thought maybe America would be an option? Or maybe Australia. The weather's good and the government's not too bad..."

"Don't leave, China."

Valkyrie wrapped her arms around China's little waist and soaked her blouse with her tears. China, unusually, encircled her with her own arms and buried her face in Valyire's hair.

"I know this is unfair," China hiccuped, "after everything you've been through. But you deserve to know the truth. I wouldn't want you to think I was...murdered in my sleep, or thrown in a ditch or anything."

Valkyrie laughed, but it wasn't enough. "How about your books?"

China pulled away and smiled sadly. "They're staying here where they belong. I was wondering...if maybe you'd look after them for me? Just once in a while. Make sure they're still there."

"Ok." Valkyrie said, and looked at the face of the most beautiful woman in the world for what would appear to be the last time. China sniffed and swallowed.

"Sorry to drop this bombshell on you, but at least one person needed to know the truth. Valkyrie," she was suddenly stern, "you have to promise not to tell the others. I can't have them coming after me."

Valkyrie hesitated. How could she do that? Skulduggery had a way of knowing when she was hiding something.

"Promise me."

"I promise."

"Good girl. I have to go to the airport, so...goodbye, Valkyrie Cain. I doubt our paths will cross again."

Valkyrie said nothing; just watched China walk away down her path without looking back. She still walked into every room like she owned it, she still held her head high with her shoulders down.

"Don't go, China," she whispered as she got behind the wheel of her car and drove away. "Please don't leave me now."

China, of course, paid no heed and Valkyrie watched the car disappear at the end of the road.

Valkyrie shut the door and felt her heart rate escalate. The tears seemed to swallow her as they spilled over her eyelids without her consent. She put her hands on her head and looked around for an escape route, but there was no way to back out of this one, no way to deny what had happened, no way to forget. China's last words ricocheted around her head.

I doubt our paths will cross again. I doubt our paths will cross again. I doubt our paths will cross again.

Valkyrie felt like a part of her heart had become either hard, cold or empty, or all three.

She went up to the loft, still frenzied, and hauled out the box of her old stuff. She rooted through it until she found her protective jacket, which she hugged around her like a shield, pretending it was deflecting all the hurt and pain and the uncontrollable anger now flowing through her veins.

She stayed in the loft until she had no more tears and her heart rate returned to normal. Even though she'd stopped panicking, she continued to think of China, and before long Ghastly and Anton floated into her mind and made her ache.

After a while, she put her jacket away, she went downstairs, and she noticed it was a little colder. Hugging her arms, she walked towards the radiator and placed a hand on it. It was cold again.