[For one thing, Kratos does gain a new range of words while comprehending their meaning. For all the words Kratos misses, the context is fairly clear given Skulduggery's pantomime. Kratos watches in silence, his mouth growing slowly tighter. The nuance might be lost, but Kratos understands enough. Skulduggery's story ... sounds not unlike his.

[Except that it still doesn't answer his most pertinent question. It's the series of physical events, not an explanation of Skulduggery's mana. Perhaps that is too complicated. Perhaps Skulduggery genuinely doesn't know.

[In any case, hearing the story makes Kratos wonder something else. His flips through the book again until he finds the page quite obviously about families. There's a mother. A father. A son. A daughter. Kratos's voice is gentler than it was as he taps that image and asks:]

Family?