Birds of a Feather
Chapter 1
"This is wrong," Talon says as the woods begin to grow dark around them. "The Demacian scouts surely caught wind of us."
His companion, Katarina Du Couteau, is knelt in the loose pine of the knoll. She regards the patched horizon impassively, but does not stand. "Do you think so little of our abilities, Talon?" She picks out several snapped branches with the tip of her free dagger.
How the Demacian horde ever got any ground in this war, she hadn't fathomed.
"We're behind their scout line," Katarina concludes, rising with the aid of an adjacent birch. "We need to lead them east."
"We need to double back for more time," Talon urges again. "This is wrong, Kat. You are not dull enough a blade to think that they'd be so careless with their flanks."
Talon is clumsy with his words. He'd not been bread a fanciful title to practice and hone his politics. Thankfully, Noxus politics had far less to do with what spilled out of your mouth in comparison to what spilled out of your skull.
Katarina laughs far too loudly for the empty woods.
"The Demacian forces are green and naïve in their thirst for honor. This track is no larger than my own boot. These aren't sharpened steel men, these are boys, Talon." Her green eyes cut him from belly to nose with distaste. "I'd think you of all people would tell the difference."
Talon doesn't take the bait. He'd serviced the Du Couteau family too long to not recognize that the sharp point of Katarina's tongue was no less a toy than the heavy wooden swords her father, Great General Du Couteau, had fashioned for his children.
She still wore the marred scar across her left eye. A jagged old bundle of flesh that ruined her face for court, and instead, helped cave her brow to the resting scowl she observes Talon with now. They'd been children, trading blows about the Du Couteau courtyard when Talon's uppercut splintered his toy under Katarina's force, tearing a sharp, bloody, point across her face.
Talon thought he'd be hanged. Katarina's sister, Cassiopeia, had sobbed harder than anyone. She just kept screaming through the stone halls, "You killed her! You murdered her! You monster!"
The General pardoned Talon and Katarina with fewer words:
"Maybe the mirrors will remind you to not be so careless."
Katarina looks at Talon over her left side, the long scar agitated by the cold. She bundles the thick sable of her cloak around her shoulders, sheathing her dagger at a moleskin belt. Few could compete for the best dressed assassin.
Less even wanted the title.
"We are wasting time," She says over a cold wind that rattles the trees.
"I agree."
It's a careful trek back down the slopping knoll, Talon's boiled leather boots having a hard time finding a sure footing in the black woods. An early winter shower had frozen the thick snakelike roots slick, more than a few times threatening injury or tumble. The trees are suffocating in their proximity, large and strong darkwoods that forced the pair to abandon their mounts miles back, and snuffed out the moonlight with curling finger-like branches with monstrous claws.
But, slender as a knife, Katarina cut through the overgrowth with graceful and confident steps. Her long auburn hair streaking like a fox through the darkness.
They'd spent the better part of two moon faces skirting the Demacian party; he hadn't liked it. The forces were compact, no more than twenty swords, and two shoddy shots, but one of the men – boys – had a fancy new Piltover rifle slung on his shoulder. He sat passenger to a long caravan of six large crates.
Piltover wasn't known for selling its clockwork weapons to surrounding powers. Especially in times of peace. But Talon couldn't confirm the cargo, and Swain's ravens came often with the red Noxus seal and fresh parchment with wet ink: Hold position, they'd scrawl.
That morning there were two ravens.
It was petty work. The Crimson Elite were not trained bloodhounds nor lapdogs, but Master Jericho Swain had them both tied out in the rain and mud for his bidding. They'd stalked the woods for scraps, leaving breadcrumbs of evidence for the Demacian scouts.
Not bloodhounds, but sheep dogs, herding the party East. Talon wasn't point on this mission, and Katarina had never been much for conversation, even as children, but some breadcrumbs didn't need careful manufacturing. The pair had wandered into an abandoned fire pit two nights back, the ground stamped with the Noxas military boot.
It didn't sit right with him. He'd never had the patience for board games or puppets.
By the time the pair find a clearing, the moon had moved several hours. Talon's bones are soaked with mud from the hike, his cloak soiled and heavy from travel. He's picking his feet from the earth with loud sucking sounds when he almost runs into the back of Katarina.
"Talon," she says quietly as she hunches her shoulder and eases back into the shadow of the forest, "look."
She doesn't point, but he spots the blemish instantly. Amidst the black face of the Ironspike Mountains the tell-tale flicker of a cooking fire, rimmed with a long plume of smoke. He could smell the cooked rabbit.
"Fools," Katarina hisses, spitting in disgust. She's knelt back on her haunches, observing the clearing with a trained eye. "Why don't they just send invitations next time?"
Talon lowers to the mud, taking care to hide his fair complexion behind the thick black wool of his cloak. "This doesn't make sense, Kat," he begins again. "They didn't take the Iron Tunnel, why would they do this?"
There is one paved road through the Ironspike Mountains, another Piltover wonder realized by an enormous hole carved through granite. The engineer, a mad Zaun scientist by the name of Viktor, had fashioned intense light that cut like a knife to carve the passage. Rumor had it he refused handsome pay for the tunnel in exchange for a pardon from the city.
He still lived in Zaun, and Piltover still taxed the tunnel.
But the Demacian force had chosen to hide their cargo from the prying eyes of the main road, and took their chance with the treacherous path over the mountains. Talon scans the tree line, taking great care to separate the tall wood shadows of the bark from anything more sinister.
The clearing was a ruined field of stumps, chopped by the surrounding city-states for resources and sectioned off in a large, rectangular, slab. It was hundreds of paces across, on mostly a flat plateau. If this was an ambush, the Demacians would have a decent sprint to reach them, and no archer's bow would be long enough to utilize the far cover of the forest for a shot.
The only explanation would be stupidity.
"This reeks of treachery," says Talon.
"Come off it. How many times did you risk a fire against the cold?" She scoffs at him, but doesn't take her eyes off the adjacent tree line. "This is nothing more than the careless comforts of ignorant boys."
"Garen is in their ranks, Kat."
"Oh please," she rolls her eyes. "What would he do? Challenge me to a match? He can't tell his sword from his dick for that time he's spent using either. League lap dog." Katarina spits the words. "Does a Champion unnerve you, Talon?"
"No more than your sister."
Katarina laughs for the second time that night. "You have not seen her before court. Ghastly thing before the priming, you'd think she belonged in the sewers with the rats."
"One of Cassi's nicer descriptions I've heard."
They begin a trek along the perimeter of the clearing, hunkered low to the shadows, but passing their words carelessly. For a moment, he forgets the cold and pine and mud, and instead can feel the roaring heat of the Du Couteau grand room. They are children again, sharing a long bench and hot cut of fowl.
"Best be careful, Talon. She might start to fancy you. And I know her advisors whisper for a suitor."
He shakes his head. "I doubt I hold the position to catch your sister's eye. Now, Master Swain on the other hand – like a fine wine to Cassi."
"Ugh, don't make me vomit. A snake and a vulture."
Katarina slices a natural ruby stained pout for that tilted smirk Talon had come to recognize. It's contagious, and though he knows he should be the cautious balance to her ambition, he's already grinning back at her as they make their way towards the flicker of their good fortune.
And that's when the shot fires.
The sound is very unlike the thup of a bow. It cracks and splinters the air in a deafening boom and flash of smoke. From across those hundreds of paces, no arrow could make the shot, but the cold, smoothed, ball of Valorian steel has few problems.
The bullet strikes Talon in the shoulder, immediately blowing most of his arm away and leaving a mangled knot of muscle and skin. The force knocks the wind from him, and he becomes acutely aware of the moon's thin highlight on the steel helmet of the Demacian foot solider across the clearing.
How obvious, Talon thinks as the breath leaves his lungs and he begins to crumple in on himself. His ears are ringing, but above the sound he can make out her voice.
"You killed him! You murdered him! You monster!"
The ground is wet and sticky with mud and it seems ages before his lungs fill back up with air, the scent of dirt and pine and wood choking him. He thinks of the rabbit they're cooking up the hill at the Demacian camp; he and Katarina had been chewing on bark to stave the hunger, he'd had more a taste for it than her.
Katarina had known hunger in her life, but it was not the hunger of an empty belly, or the sinful hunger of the flesh. And she was so, very hungry.
She had abandoned her thick sable cloak for speed, and is already halfway across the clearing by the time the Demacian soldier has another shot readied. He fires carelessly, missing her completely and giving away his position. She can make out three huddled men, the prone form of the sniper and two standing guards with the long tell of lances.
To his credit, the closest soldier rushes to meet her charge, buying time for his comrades to right themselves from the dirt. His armor is fresh, soiled only by the weather, and too complete a plate set to offer him much movement. He is slow on his draw, placing his foot back to find momentum for a strong forward thrust.
It is an obvious maneuver that Katarina punishes without hesitation. Sidestepping the fine crafted point of the lance, she brings her blade under the supple flesh of his throat, taking the steel back to the spine, then through. His head lops off in a soft thud and spray of blood.
The second lancer, like the first, is a slender build but much sharper on his feet. He opens his attack with a long sweep at her frame, his spear the dark stain of oakswood with a polished steel point. Katarina rolls to the mud to narrowly avoid the swipe. On the ground, her attacker rallies forward, striking at her like an iron serpent.
He makes to skewer her, striking once – twice – three times at her chest. Katarina is deft in her maneuvers, slinking like a viper around his point. Her blades are greasy, knocked effortlessly from her grip when she attempts to parry his advances; it is mere moments before she is completely disarmed and at mercy to her speed.
But the lancer grows impatient with her endurance, overcompensating with strength and furiously burrows his blade into the base of a rotted tree stump trying for a stab at her skull. There is a soundless intake of breath as the Demacian soldier realizes what he's done – a flash of terror pulls the corner of his eyes wide - before the punishment of Katarina's blade takes his arm off at the elbow.
The sound is not unlike the crack of the bullet – air splitting and short. The boy doesn't cry for agony more than a second before the shock sets in and he slumps to the ground in a cationic state. He convulses and grips the bloody mass of his stumped appendage.
His right hand still wrapped around the spear.
Katarina makes a show to wipe the dirt from her features, the once bright flame of her hair doused in mud. She flicks several large clumps across his unmarred breast plate before approaching.
"That was uncalled for," she says, approaching with the drawn blade.
"Yeah, but me blowing your head off won't be. Don't take another step," responds the timid voice behind her. There's the distinct click of the Piltover Rifles clockwork.
Of course, Katarina thinks. She sighs loudly, drops her blade, and begins to turn. The gunman is standing now with the butt of the rifle holstered on his shoulder, aimed down the impressive barrel between her eyes. He's no more than six paces away, close enough that Katarina can tell his eyes are hazel.
"I said don't move!"
She observes him behind her scar and gives two open palms. "Get it over with then."
His hazel eyes shift rapidly in his skull, flicking between her and his fallen comrade. "Brandon, on your feet!"
The fallen lancer makes no response.
The Rifleman makes to sidestep towards his companion, keeping the barrel pointed at Katarina as he pivots. But he is careless with his spacing, skirting too close, and in the final shift of his weight and eyes to his partner, Kat strikes for the end of the barrel.
The steel is ice through her gloves and its weight substantial. In a vicious motion, she clears the blast zone, tugs the rifle forward off the boy's shoulder before immediately thrusting it back, striking the boy square in the nose in a crunch of blood. He reels in agony.
He is seated in the mud, crying, and sniffling like a child when she shoots him directly in the face.
"Didn't expect the kickback, did ya?" says a slick voice from the shadows.
She doesn't turn to the observer, but rubs her shoulder where the weapon had bruised. In all honesty, she hadn't, not that she'd ever admit that to Draven. "Enjoying the show? You've been there long enough."
The man that reveals himself from the treeline is thickly built on a long frame. His attire is mostly gold and fine violets with a lavish breast plate, and two crowned axes hung on his belt. A unique facial hair experiment threads two long strands across his lip, decorated with oils and charms.
There's a bright chime in his step that demands as much attention as the gloved hand that twists the tip of his mustache.
The executioner of Noxus, Draven, played sidekick to his brother before making a spectacle (mockery) of the Noxian firing squad. He crowned it his stage and gave lavish performances to sold out stadiums. But without war, Draven became more of a bureaucrat on the court due to popularity, and soon left the yard of the judicial system for the leash of the League.
The crowd knows no difference.
"I knew you could handle it, kitty cat." Draven observes the closest body with the toe of a freshly oiled boot.
"I wasn't aware the League allowed dogs off their property."
Draven laughs loudly. "Now now, kitten. If you want an answer to a question, put away the claws and ask nicely."
Katarina shoulders the clockwork rifle, but doesn't sheath her curved blade. "Why are you here, Draven? I've already executed them."
"And with such flair," he bends to the body to loot a small satchel of coins from the belt, "But you know me, little of everything these days. Today I come as a messenger though."
He presents a roll of parchment from his breast plate, the ornate wax seal of the raven stamped across the lip. Katarina takes great care not to touch him in the exchange. She reads the directive once – then again.
Kill him.
Draven is looting the furthest body by the time she's folding the parchment away into her boot. He doesn't look at her, but addresses with a casual tone: "best be on your way. I hear the Demacian dogs. They'll be displeased by your handiwork here."
"You'll take care of the body?"
Draven smiles at her this time. "What would you have me do with them, kitten?"
She grinds her teeth. "Talon's body."
He feigns realization, exaggerating the "ohh" of his mouth. "Why yes, of course," he caps with a smirk. "Already done."
The distant howl of the Demacian bloodhounds echoes in the standing wood. The thunderous clap of mounts can be heard approaching- above it – the shouts of Garen. She has little time as the Calvary collapses down the face of the mountain.
"Bye bye." Draven wriggles his fingers at her, slipping away into the tall shadows of the forest.
For a brief moment, Katarina touches the marred line over her eye. She can't find the seam through the leather of her glove, but she knows the landscape well enough. She thinks of the stern cut of her father's face on her fourteenth birthday, the shadow of his shave giving him a dark and looming presence.
He presented her a blade – her first real one – a curved, flat blade, with an ornate handle of white gold. She'd taken it tentatively, struck by the clarity of the metal, and gazing into her reflection along the point. Like a mirror, that sword looked back at her.
Maybe she'll not be so careless in the future.
It's only moments before the Demacian Calvary is nearly upon her, thundering across the clearing on their tall, rugged, mounts, that she remembers her place and shoulders the clockwork rifle with a cutting smile. She beckons the company with a long finger before cutting East through the treeline.
She fires the Rifle every few moments as she leads them down the rabbit hole.
"I said order!" cries the judge. He is a fat man, with thick fingers, and a disgusting greasy patch of facial hair that Katarina knew Cassiopeia would have fancied. Her sister, Cassi, sits front row off the side – her best velvet dress pressed straight in mourning. A drawn hand hides her expression. "Order! Order!"
The adjacent run of seats dulls to a hum of whispers. Snuffing their speculation behind drawn hands. It's a smaller courtroom reserved for more private affairs than the public display of execution. The room is tall with vaulted ceilings and long windows of ghastly stained glass panes. Ornate iron fixtures frame the room's details.
"Shut up you scavengers," the judge hisses again, tapping his hammer. "What say you to the accusations, Du Couteau?"
Centered the dark marble expansive stands Katarina. Her bright hair is tied back in an elegant braid Cassiopeia had fashioned, likewise, she wears the black fit of a finely pressed Noxus military uniform, the breast adorned in medals.
Katarina straightens her chin and gazes up at the judge. "I do."
The wood paneled room erupts in hushed tones and hissed insults. Katarina suppresses the urge to sigh and instead straightens her shoulders and stares down Jericho Swain at the head of the court
He observes her in silence a moment, letting the volume of the crowd fill the room.
"Order! Order!" The judge taps his hammer again, flushed through the neck in an attempt to regain control. He punctuates his words in spit. "General Commander Swain to speak – shut up!"
There is instant silence as the Commander rises from his position adjacent the judge. He is an older, ugly, man with mangled features and broad shoulders. Little of his face is exposed from a high cowl and layered robes; scaled haircut with sunken eyes and a sharp nose – anything else the war left him is hidden.
Jericho Swain is the new Grand General of Noxus. A ranking official and tactician left over from the actual battle, he found little purpose in the evolution of war to politics and had spent the most recent of his days crippled on a walking stick behind a desk and title. He kept little company outside the monstrous bird perched on his shoulder.
It wasn't fair, but war was no game.
The minute flick of his hand silences the room at once. It's another drawn moment as he takes the effort to stand; no one dares offer assistance. With the help of a black cane of darkwood, he rises, dragging his boots to the raised podium that looks down on the accused.
Swain wets his lips twice and straightens his spine to peer down over the silk of his collar. "Fancy meeting the daughter of the Great Du Couteau in trial."
The courtroom echoes with laughter.
He continues: "You realize, Child, that you're pleading negligence in the case of the former High Commander, Boram Darkwill's death? Yes?"
Katarina smirks. "Oh, I'm well aware my failure has done you quite a favor, Master Swain." She flourishes a satirical bow.
Swain scoffs. "Such jest for someone on death row." More laughter. "But I needed to make sure your oversight in the field wasn't due to stupidity that could be measured in court. It appears you understand your charge and so you will be sentenced:"
The hum of gossip begins to roar, the anticipation of bloodshed raving the crowd as the mob shifts in their seats, pressing forward for a better view. Cassiopeia slinks back from her seat towards the far exit.
"Katarina Du Couteau, you have been found guilty in the case of Boram Darkwill's assassination by Demacian scout due to your negligence and failure to carry out your directive. You cost not only the lives of his company, but the lives of your own tactical division – you are hereby stripped of your status as a Crimson Elite and unseated for the ranking honor of a Noxus Military official."
The crowd hisses in approval. Chants of "hang her!" leak into the marble hall as Cassiopeia's escort cracks the tall doorway.
"But," Swain draws the word around a lifted hand for silence. "Your abilities should not be overlooked, and your teachings should not go to waste lest we disgrace your late, great, father. I sentence you not to the firing squad but to the serve in the League of Legends for Noxus bidding."
The crowd wanes in their volume suddenly.
Swain's cheeks pull upwards in a hidden smile: "Make no mistake, Katarina, you are not a Champion for Noxus, you will serve as a tool. Have you any parting words?"
Katarina bites her tongue and manages to smooth her features stoic. "No. In a moment of reflection such as this, I merely look back on my Noxus teachings for the answer: loyalty before honor."
She spits the moto to the floor as flanking guardsmen take custody of her arms and begin to drag her towards the door.
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