Gordon smiled sadly. “Mm. Well. Yes. Regrets. I’ve had a few. That’s all very interesting, I have to say. All very interesting indeed. Do you have any other bombshells to drop on me today? You may as well get it over with while I’m still partly in shock.”

There was a single chair in the room, and Valkyrie slouched into it, crossing her legs. “I’ve got one or two. The least of which is that I’ve broken up with Fletcher.”

“Oh, dear. Oh, dear me. Well, we knew this would eventually happen. Um… The important thing is to remember the good times, but not dwell on them… Dwelling leads to miserable thoughts and the playing of bad music. It is to be avoided at all costs. Fletcher… There will be another Fletcher, and another one after him, and another… It’s not the end of the world, Valkyrie. You know what the end of the world looks like – by all accounts you’re the cause of it.”

He chuckled. She didn’t. He stopped chuckling.

“He didn’t dump me,” she said. “I broke up with him.”

“Oh,” said Gordon, much brighter now. “Well, that is completely different! Excellent. Bravo. Well, not excellent. I liked the boy. He seemed nice. But obviously, you had a good reason for ending it.”

“It just felt like the time. I was getting… bored.”

“The death knell for many a mediocre relationship. I can’t tell you how many beautiful women have broken up with me because they were bored. I can’t tell you because it never happened. They all adored me.”

“It was your humility, wasn’t it?”

“I’m sure that had something to do with it. You’re like me, Valkyrie. You’re never going to be content until you find that one person, that one single person, who fills you with delight every time you hear their name.”

“Did you ever find that person?”

He hesitated. “Yes. I did.”

“And what happened?”

“Does it matter? What matters is you. You can’t let this get you down.”

“I wasn’t. I’m upset about it, I suppose, but… There’s other stuff happening too.”

“There always is.”

“Skulduggery kept a secret from me.”

“I see. You think that was wrong of him?”

“No, not wrong, but it’s a pretty big secret, and it’s… it’s bad.”

“Is he still your friend?”

Valkyrie sighed.

“Has he moved against you in any way? Has he hurt you?”

“No.”

“Then is he still your friend?”

“I suppose.”

“This secret, how long has he had it?”

“Hundreds of years.”

“Then it has nothing to do with you. It’s quite simple, isn’t it? He kept something from you, something about his past, and now you know it, and now you deal with it and move on.”