Billy-Ray Sanguine


A Texan assassin with the ability to melt into the ground and travel under it, Sanguine dresses like a stereotypical cowboy, giving him similarities to the Stephen King character, Randall Flagg. He has no eyes but is capable of sight and he can see very well in the dark. He covers his empty eye-sockets with a pair of sun-glasses. He is described as being rather attractive, through this was mentioned before it was revealed that he has no eyes. Skulduggery and Tanith Low speculate that he may be a clinical psychopath however he appears to be somewhat cowardly in contrast to the reckless fearlessness of most clinically diagnosed psychopaths (However, as demonstrated near the end of the climax, this could be simply an act). Nevertheless, Sanguine himself admits to being psychopathic and also exhibits misogynistic tendencies. He has an obsession with his razor (an enchanted blade, scars from which never heal) which he uses to commit his murders and becomes enraged when it is taken from him by Valkyrie Cain twice. Sanguine, like Springheeled Jack, has an obsession with killing people and, like Scapegrace, despises Valkyrie though for different reasons. Sanguine was the one who freed Baron Vengeous from prison with the help of a vampire called Dusk although he is actually working for Batu, the leader of the Diablerie. In The Faceless Ones Sanguine says "I been workin' for you for over a year now. Ain't it time we met, face to face?" Sanguine only appears in the second and third books, and near the end of the third book, he says to Valkyrie "Everybody bein' so eager to die...almost takes the fun outta killin' them!". Valkyrie then cuts his stomach and he shouts "What the hell have you done!" before disppearing into the ground. It does not mention if he is killed or not. Strangely enough, despite his reputation as a worldwide feared mercenary and murderer, Sanguine appears remarkably inept at his profession, he has never actually killed someone in the course of the books, and appears to only offer a physical threat to the surprised, the helpless and those without combat training, and is mainly used as a mode of transportation rather than a fighter by his employers. In the fourth book, his father is revealed to be Dreylan Scarab. With Scarab, he forms the Revenge Club, the main antagonists of Skulduggery Pleasant: Dark Days. The wound given him by Valkyrie Cain at the end of the third book is shown to seriously damage his magical powers in the fourth book