#I’m too tired to pull something more concise and/or coherent out of my brain rn

[beigetiger]

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned this before but I think part of the reason why I found Cadaver and Malice so interesting is because of how they sort of reflected each other.

Or more specifically, they were both dependent on Valkyrie, and then had her stripped away. They were both left grasping for something, anything that could keep them grounded. Perhaps in an alternate universe they could have teamed up against Creed. But what really happened is that they went swinging in opposite directions. Malice was picked up and raised by Creed while Cadaver could only watch, and Cadaver became involved with a bunch of dead gods because they managed to fill the giant gap in his soul that Valkyrie left when she became a harpy.

And by the looks of it, they BOTH tried to save her. We know for a fact Cadaver did, and he was probably injured many times over trying to save her. And based on the way that Malice talks about Valkyrie, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if she also put in at least some effort to see if the process could be reversed. To no avail.

They both lost Valkyrie, and they BOTH became awful people because of it, just awful people on opposite sides of the fight. They BOTH lose sight of what they were initially fighting for and are overtaken by their rage and jealousy to such a degree that when Valkyrie times travels to meet them, she is horrified by BOTH of them. And they both fight each other for her trust and help, only for her ACTUAL trust and affection to be given towards the harpy version of herself.

And the reason I’m talking about this is because it’s probably going to be relevant in phase 3. It’s clear that Skulduggery needs her for emotional regulation and loves her more than anything, and it’s clear that Winter being constantly overshadowed by Valkyrie has caused her to become borderline obsessed with her sister and how she compares to her. So much of both of their lives revolve around Valkyrie, and as a result they are also in each other’s peripheral vision. Not relevant to each other’s lives, but there in the background.

It’s pretty clear that Winter will try to kill Valkyrie at some point. It’s pretty clear that Skulduggery will never let that happen. And I think that Cadaver and Malice will be absolutely ROLLING to see these two develop a hatred for each other that mirrors their own, most notably in the way that it revolves around Valkyrie. Because SO MUCH revolves around Valkyrie, and that is something that Skulduggery loves and Winter hates about her.

And there is no way that this story could ever possibly go wrong for any of them.