A/N: Doesn't exactly have a real plot, more of a relationship exploration thing. Swain/Talon pairing. If you are allergic to OOC-ness, plot-less-ness or gay parings, it is strongly advised to not continue reading. Otherwise, enjoy.
[To Tame a Hawk]
Tear away all flight feathers and the cage is unlocked.
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He did not bring any other proof but his knives because that was enough.
Night draped thickly over the Empire of Noxus, as it always does to cover the filth that surges through this nation's veins; Talon had learned to befriend it as a child. He knew the shadows as a fish knew the waters, a bird knew the winds.
Soundlessly the dark hid him, and he watched the new Grand General at his post, alone. Whatever Swain does is done in the air of authority, the posture of a ruler, an emperor; as if the power he holds is not stolen, robbed from some other, but given to him along with pulse and breath and heartbeat. In silence he observed like some predator does its prey, except for the crow is a much too cunning animal to be preyed on, especially by a hunting hawk long tamed by the hands of humanity. So he did not swoop to kill, but watched in intent to.
Slivers of crimson slipped from metal into ground, and the earth in its thirst drunk every drop. Come out, ordered the General. He obeyed. The assassin stood in unease as candlelight washed over him and his blood-washed blade; Jericho nodded, held out his hand, which he ignored and left. Not a word was exchanged because that was enough.
·
Never has he enjoyed company of any kind, but Swain happens to be one of those who will not destroy his solitude by being there, if not the only one. On nights when he comes to the Du Couteau Mansion to seek out Marcus, more often than not does Jericho find Talon to be his company while he waits in the parlor. And as it happens, when awkwardness is repeated over and over and over again, it is gradually gotten used to.
Days after the disappearance of Marcus, Talon sneaked into his office at the high command, flipping through notes and documents in desperate hope that some sort of clue to the general's whereabouts may be uncovered. He was halfway through when the Master Tactician happened to appear by the door, silent as a raven gliding through the night, and the trained senses of an assassin discovered him easily.
Both of them were aware of the other, and did nothing.
He finished his search with disappointment, and left, slipping past the raven-accompanied man without a sound. He waited patiently for the assassin to disappear beyond the corridor's end, then stepped into the office of an enemy, locking the door behind.
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There was something in the Grand General that made you bow. He knew when he first saw him, and he knew it now.
So he stands beneath the throne and looks up to the expressionless mask worn by Jericho, albeit does not kneel and hail him, for he was an assassin of the Du Couteaus and he is proud. He will rather have his knee cut out from its joint then bend it.
He surveys the throne, so very grand and impressive, and contemplates for a moment when will it be pulled out from under him. For he has spent enough years between gang fights in the slums of Noxus to know that the emperor often enjoys a short life and a horrible death, especially those who tyrannize without a sharp knife of their own.
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Kalamanda's peace was a short-lived one. After all the trouble that Katarina went through it was in vain, and war broke out as it should have; as Swain wished it to, for the Black Rose craves more nourishment than Noxus could supply. So does Jericho's ambition.
The brighter flares the flames, the darker dims the shades.
So, as it should have been, Swain reaches out and takes the scepter of power in his hand where it rests beautifully. So as always, he watchs from afar, in the darkness.
He does not ever remember the Grand General calling him by name. "Assassin", it was always. Never Talon. To Jericho he is never a human. Assassin meant he is a weapon, a sharp and efficient one, something silent and lethal to spill blood that cannot be reaped on the battlefield; Talon meant he is a person. To Swain he isn't.
He is no fool to serve Jericho Swain. He knows better than to become a lifeless thing, for blades can be easily abandoned and replaced the day they become old, and he prefers to stay alive.
Yet again, to Marcus, he was not either.
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Jericho Swain has the hands of dawn.
He would have thought those fingers of the tacticians are cold, cold as the last frost of autumn, for they had a master with a heart of ice. Yet no—they were warm, warm and overly smooth and soft, without even a single trace of the raven's beak. The hands of a ruler. These are hands that would bring Noxus to its glory.
His own hands, coarse and calloused and cold, could not care less of what his homeland will become.
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"There are many skilled assassins in Noxus, my Grand General." Purred the matron of the Black Rose, "skilled servants and flatterers, even more."
"None of them the Blade's Shadow." Came the reply, every syllable slightly clipped and bitten down on hard.
LeBlanc chortled, her voice shrill yet wondrously charming to the ear, "since when have you grown so horribly obstinate, Jericho?"
This time he answered nothing, but she knew well enough how addictive grooming a fierce predator can be. So she simply laughed her sweet-sounding laughter again, and plucked a flight feather on the outer edge of Beatrice' wings', earning a sharp caw from the crow and a warning glance from the man.
"Beware how much you trim him," she warned with a smile, "or he may never take flight again."
"Good," was his answer, "then he will only tear at the meat I allow."
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He hated being touched by hands that were not his own. But when Jericho's fingers traced the countless marks that covered every inch of him, he stood and endured it in silence.
There was a constellation of scars decorating his body, jagged, uneven lines strewn across his arms, his back, his chest—and they declared in a wordless manner that he is a fighter that has seen many battles, a Noxian, an assassin. Yet the fingertips that danced slowly around them were pale and slender and delicate, beautiful that he would have thought them to be the hands of a woman's, and frail.
It takes nothing more but a raise of his own hand to break those fingers.
A sudden pulse of pain flashed through his veins, and he flinched. His blade was raised halfway when their eyes met; then, with a pause, it slowly lowered back down.
The air was cold. His skin, bare, tingled against it.
He heard a pleased chuckle escape from the General's lips, and shuddered, and said not a word.
·
A thousand times over had he answered the same answer to a same question.
There was a difference between Marcus and Jericho that made him refuse to serve the latter. Du Couteau wielded him as he would a blade; Swain wishes to train him as he would a dog. The blade is a sharp thing, double-edged, and would slice an unskilled master at any given chance; he would not be collared and caged, and he never will.
A thousand times over he was being a fool, and he knew it.
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His own crimson irises stared back at him from the mirror.
The face reflected is still his own, every mark and line as familiar as it ever will be. His neck still bare, clean from chokers of any kind.
A six-eyed raven swooped down through the open window, fluttered, and eventually perched easily on his shoulder, its claws digging deep into his flesh like knife into bone. He drove the bird away, donned his cloak of blades, and turned to leave.
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[END]