Rise From the Darkness

Music Suggestion: Finale- Madeon

Chapter 7: The Devil in I

A/N: Cover art is by LengYou on deviantart, check him out.

*Warning* This chapter gets a little dark.

i.

Wake me up from this dream that never ends,

Haunting me, haunting me till my bitter end.

i.

For a moment, he was there, right beside her. Then in the next, he was gone.

She brought her sword up and scrambled around the large redwood that had previously been serving as cover. She hadn't a chance yet to discern exactly how many enemies there were or which side of the carriage their target was in, but if he could do it, so could she.

So she charged forward, merely a couple steps behind The Blade's Shadow.

Shouting from a few men on foot, commotion to her left. Her sixth sense perceived it, and just in the knick of time. She came to a screeching stop and cleaved her sword in an arc above her head, not even taking the time to analyze if there was a target in front of her or not.

The sword met some resistance. The all too familiar sound of blade slashing flesh cracked through the air.

In an instant, a man fell to the ground before her; his right shoulder and torso not on his body any longer.

She didn't care.

She pressed forward, turning her attention back to The Blade's Shadow.

In the time she had taken out one, he had taken out four. He showed no signs of stopping there.

In mid stride, she watched him. She could see every movement, every action, as if it were in slow motion.

It was mesmerizing.

Three men sprung for him at once from all directions.

His right hand, which held no weapon, formed a fist that brutally knocked itself into one man's stomach. In an instant, his arm blade found its mark through another man's throat.

The third man seemed to be within striking distance, but The Shadow leapt backwards, and whilst in midair unsheathed two shurikens. They soon after found their way into the third man's skull.

She was broken from her trance when a gleam of silver caught her eye. She instinctively ducked, and narrowly dodged a sword that was originally aimed at her neck. She brought her own up and drove it through the poor person's chest, creating a gaping chasm of blood and guts.

Another soldier came, then another, then another.

Each one she cleaved down.

And then no more came.

The woman turned her head to check on her partner. He seemed to have already dispatched of the other men and immobilized the transport.

She trotted up to him.

"He's inside?" She asked.

"Guess we'll find out." Was all he offered in response.

Talon ripped open the door to the carriage. It was such a violent motion that the unfortunate door came clean off its hinges and landed roughly against the muddy ground. The Blade's Shadow leapt into the buggy with an interesting gleam in his eyes, akin to a wolf closing in on its prey. Riven stood watch outside the door for a few moments until a man came barreling out of it; thrown by Talon with much force. The man hit the ground quite hard, and with a resounding thud he fell limp.

Riven waited a few moments, staring unsurprised at the body, then at all the bodies around them. The horses had long since left, leaving only the two assassins and the dead. She didn't feel guilty for killing them, no, but she did feel a twinge of sadness. They had wives and mothers and sons that would never see them again. But she always reminded herself that this is war. And when one joins a war, they fully know they could be signing a death wish.

"Looks like we're done here." She said, breaking from her thoughts and entering reality once more. "Let's get out of here before someone realizes the noble hasn't checked in."

Riven turned heel to leave, but after a few steps, she noticed The Blade's Shadow had not followed. Doing a 180, she saw him still looming over the noble. His eyes revealed nothing, no joy nor anger in his kill. It seemed like he only… analyzed.

"What are you-" She stopped when he held up a hand.

Talon cleared his throat. "Feigning death will get you nowhere with me." His voice was deep and low, almost a whisper. But Riven could still hear him, and was perplexed as much as she was confused.

Talon silently unsheathed one of his many shurikens. If she hadn't been watching him, she would not have known he did it. Then, in an instant, he flung it downwards towards the face down corpse of the noble. It penetrated his right calf deeply, and for a moment there was silence, until the man rolled over and let out a bellow of pain.

Riven was confused.

He was dead, right?

Had he been faking?

If so, how could Talon have known?

The noble had tears dripping down his face; begging for mercy. Talon merely crouched next to him and looked him in the eyes for a moment.

"Pl- Pleas- Please. D-D-D-Don't k-kill me!" He blubbered pathetically; urinating on himself to add insult to injury.

Riven had no idea who this man really was aside from being a Demacian noble, but from what she had observed, he was disgusting to say the least. His obese form showed many rolls of fat gathering under his neck and around his waist. His hair was long and greasy and black, and unkempt. His clothing consisted of one long robe that was decorated in many golden and eloquent patterns. It was repulsive to her.

He pulled a handsome sack of gold coins and tossed it at Talon's feet. "Keep it! Just let me go!"

Talon didn't break his gaze. "Oh, I'll let you live."

The man's eyes lit up momentarily.

"Under one condition." Talon said.

"Name it! Anything you want!"

"I get to take one of your organs of my choosing." The Blade's Shadow said without a hint of feeling.

The pompous noble narrowed his eyes. "What? That's preposterous! You'll just take my heart or my lungs and I'll die anyway!" His voice quivered in a mix of fear and rage.

Talon remained stone-faced. "You misunderstand, Demacian. I will only take an organ that you can live without. With all the medicine in Demacia, you'll probably be fixed right up when you get back."

The noble weighed his options, but decided anything was better than death. "Fine! Fine! You have a deal. Just make it fast!"

Talon reached into his waistband and pulled out a long, serrated knife. It had to be at least five or six inches in length at least. A small, almost inconceivable grin spread across his face.

Talon's voice came once more, but this time it was sinister and conniving. "Hey, noble, what's your name?"

The noble looked up frightfully at the blade in his hands. "Ed-Edward."

"Well Edward, you wanna know a fun fact?"

"Su-sure."

"Did you know that your skin is considered an organ?"

Edward's eyes widened a bit, and Talon only chuckled in response.

Riven finally spoke up. "Talon, I hope you're joking. Just kill him quickly so we can get out of he-"

"Shut up." He interrupted her abruptly with venom spewing through his words. "You wanna leave? That's fine with me. Go." He gestured with his hand to the direction they had left their horses. "As for me, I'm gonna take my time with this guy. He is, after all, a person I very much despise."

Talon gripped the man's chest and began dragging him towards a tree. "Come on you. We've got some work to do."

His blubbering cries were his only means of response.


She should have left. Every part of her mind screamed at her to flee, to leave this sick, twisted man behind.

But, she stayed. However, she didn't choose to stay in front of the two and watch the whole man-skinning spectacle. That would be too much. She instead chose to sit down against the back of a tree about 50 yards away and keep watch.

It was becoming quite hard due to Edward's blood curdling screams.

She leaned back against the tree and exhaled a long held breath. Just when he seemed like he was going to open up to her, just when he seemed to let her in, he fell back into his old habits.

I expected as much. That man is seriously fucked up in the head.

For some odd reason, she couldn't bring herself to be angry with him. She had every right to, though. After all, he had killed her friends, tarnished her reputation, and now was skinning a freaking man alive!

But somewhere in her conscious, she felt a pang of regret and guilt. She was the reason he was here. She was the reason he was like this.

Her thoughts were interrupted by another pain induced scream from the noble.


The ride back to Noxus was quiet for the most part, just like the ride to Piltover. Talon didn't show any joy or anger when he returned, only a blank stare. When she asked whether the noble was dead or not, he merely said, "He's not getting back up."

Towards the end of their journey, she finally gathered the courage to ask something that had been bothering her for the whole ride.

"Why didn't you just kill him quickly?"

Talon didn't turn his head to look at her, but still gave a response. "We were only told to kill him. They didn't include specifics on how to kill him. I got… Creative."

"He never wronged you specifically, why make his death so painful? Is it not painful enough to just die in the first place?"

Talon scoffed. "Sure, he never wronged me personally. But a man like that? Can you honestly believe a man with that much power and authority never wronged others? His streets are extended gutters, and the gutters are full of blood. That's how all power figures are. Their accumulated blood and murder will well up around their waist, and they'll look up and shout, 'save us!'. And I'll whisper... No."

A/N: sry for kinda short chapter. had a paper to turn in for english that took me awhile. anyway, hope you liked a slightly darker take on Talon this chapter. reviewerino plzerino. you know I love every single one of them.

And for Skij: Don't worry, Talon's not getting sappy any time soon. Hopefully this chapter was evidence of that.