Valkyrie Cain

Valkyrie Cain (born Stephanie Edgley) is the main female protagonist of the Skulduggery Pleasant series. She is a young teenage girl who meets Skulduggery Pleasant after an attempt on her life and insists on coming with him as his new partner. Near the end of the first book, it is discovered that she is descended from the Last of the Ancients. Over the series, her skill with magic gradually evolves and she becomes quite the capable fighter and sorcerer.
==Personality==
Valkyrie is shown to be a stubborn, exceptionally mature, and independent girl, who often ignores orders. When approached by strangers, she usually ignores them. She hates it when she is treated like a child or talked down to, although almost always happens. She is loyal and caring to her friends and also her family. Valkyrie can also be very selfish, as Fletcher states. She admits to it later on. Her uncle Gordon Edgley described her as "strong-willed, intelligent, sharp-tongued, doesn't suffer fools gladly." After she had to kill Caelan, she became hostile to vampires, thinking them to be horrible creatures.
It has been noted on various occasions that Valkyrie is extremely witty and sarcastic, frequently joking and bantering in life-or-death situations, possibly to mask her own fears or anxieties.
As Darquesse, Valkyrie's personality undergoes a drastic, dark transformation. While still retaining her core behavior and principles, as Darquesse is simply a darker version of her and not a separate entity, they are greatly twisted. She retains her witty, sarcastic personality, but it becomes cruel and malicious rather than playful. She relishes in causing and feeling pain and violence, and is constantly seeking opponents who can actually challenge her. However, it has been noted that Darquesse is not inherently evil - simply cold, uncaring and above all curious in regard to her abilities and their limits. She is willing to ally herself with those who would usually be opposed to her, valuing self-preservation above all else.
==Powers and Abilities==
Prior to Darquesse's extraction from her, she was confirmed to have talents for magic. At first, from Skulduggery, she learned Elemental Magic that enabled her to control fire, earth, water, and air respectively. She was later revealed to have an aptitude for Necromancy when she used Solomon Wreath's cane in The Battle at Aranmore Farm against the Faceless Ones. This prompted Wreath to seek out Valkyrie as his pupil believing that she could be the next Death Bringer. Unfortunately, she eventually became consumed by her darker side, Darquesse, and the said dark side was later extracted from her body to bring Valkyrie back thus creating two separate entities, Darquesse and Valkyrie Cain. The process ultimately made her lose those powers as her True Name was the source of her power, now taken by Darquesse who proceeded to destroy the world as prophesied by the Sensitives.
In spite of this, after her Surge kick-started when she was caught in a magical explosion in an alternate dimension, it revealed that the extraction process awakened Valkyrie's latent magical talent that that can be compared to that of an Energy Thrower. These newfound powers enable her to control lightning and create energy blasts and an energy shield along with levitation and aura-sensing (a psychic ability) thus depicting the wide range of her new abilities. In Resurrection, she was discovered to be psychic after she was able to obtain a vision of the future upon being prompted by Skulduggery Pleasant into using Cassandra Pharos' vision chamber. The range of these newfound abilities was due to the fact that losing her True Name meant she had no restrictions and was "closer to warlocks and witches than sorcerers". This meant that her magic was purer than sorcerers and came directly from the "source".
Valkyrie has displayed non-magic talents throughout the series, such as being highly intelligent, a gifted detective, and an expert hand-to-hand fighter. Her official profile released by Derek Landy states that she practices Kenpo Karate, Muay Thai, Krav Maga, and Capoeira. Valkyrie has shown proficiency in punches, kicks, elbows, headbutts, and throws among other techniques.
Category:Book Heroes
Category:Female
Category:Siblings
Category:Amazons
Category:Teenagers
Category:Martial Artists
Category:Elementals
Category:Magic
Category:Sidekicks
Category:Dark Fantasy Heroes
Category:Horror Heroes
Category:Successful
Category:Dissociative
Category:Possessed/Brainwashed
Category:Determinators
Category:Genius
Category:Omnipotents
Category:True Neutral
Category:Protectors of Innocence
Category:Lethal
Category:Loyal
Category:Protectors
Category:Jerks
Category:Anti-Heroes