Serah Santimano

“Lucy,’ Lockwood said, ‘the last time I saw body language like yours was when we were chatting to Martine Grey about her missing husband, and afterwards found him at the bottom of her freezer.”
― Jonathan Stroud, The Whispering Skull

“Hey, Flo! It’s Lockwood!’

Silence. The figure straightened abruptly; I thought for a moment it was going to turn and run. But then the voice came again, faint, hostile and guarded. ‘You? What the bloody hell do you want?’

‘Oh, that’s fine,’ Lockwood murmured. ‘She’s in a good mood.’ He cleared his throat, called out again. ‘Can you talk?’

The distant person considered; for a few seconds we heard nothing except the sloop and slosh of the river along the shore. ‘No. I’m busy! Go away.’

‘I’ve brought liquorice!’

‘What, you’re trying to bribe me now? Bring money!’ More silence; just the sucking of the water. Away in the haze a head was cocked to one side. ‘What kind of liquorice?”
― Jonathan Stroud, The Whispering Skull

“Kat Godwin, Kipps’s right-hand operative, was a Listener like me, but that was about all we had in common.

She was blonde, slim and pouty, which would have given me three good reasons to dislike her even if she’d been a sweet lass who spent her free time tending poorly hedgehogs. In fact she was flintily ambitious and cool-natured, and had less capacity for humour than a terrapin. Jokes made her irritable, as if she sensed something going on around her that she couldn’t understand. She was good-looking, though her jaw was a bit too sharp. If she’d repeatedly fallen over while crossing soft ground, you could have sewn a crop of beans in the chin-holes she left behind.

The back of her hair was cut short, but the front hung angled across her brow in the manner of a horse’s flick. Her grey Fittes jacket, skirt and leggings were always spotless, which made me doubt she’d ever had to climb up inside a chimney to escape a Spectre, or battle a Poltergeist in the Bridewell sewers (officially the Worst Job Ever), as I had. Annoyingly, I always seemed to meet her after precisely that kind of incident. Like now”
― Jonathan Stroud, The Whispering Skull

“Kipps is the worst, though. He really hates us, doesn’t he?’

‘Not us,’ Lockwood said. ‘Me. He really hates me.’

‘But why? What’s he got against you?’

Lockwood picked up one of the bottles of water and sighed reflectively. ‘Who knows? Maybe it’s my natural style he envies, maybe my boyish charm. Perhaps it’s my set-up here – having my own agency, no one to answer to, with fine companions at my side.’ He caught my eye and smiled.

George looked up from his comic. ‘Or could be the fact you once stabbed him in the bottom with a sword.’

‘Yes, well, there is that.’ Lockwood took a sip of water.

I looked back and forth between them. ‘What?’ I said. ‘When did this happen?”
― Jonathan Stroud, The Whispering Skull