A/N: I took such a long time writing this chapter because I had, I think, three different ways I wanted it to go, and it was a little difficult to choose which would be best in the long run. Along with that, I also really, realllyyyy wanted to finish a new cover image for the story before I published a new chapter, but I have the worst attention span when it comes to art and it took me forever to finish.
I was also really excited to get back to writing, so have two chapters ^-^
Anyway! My response to reviews are below the chapter this time because there were quite a few and some got a bit lengthy.
Lux was awake a lot earlier than she would have wanted the next morning.
It was a little disorienting inside the Institute since her apartment was in the middle of the building and didn't have windows, and besides checking a clock, there was no way for her to tell what time of day it was. Still, Lux glared at the absurdly small single-digit number on the face of the clock in her kitchen, quite sure that the exhaustion she felt hinted at an early start to the day.
She dressed snugly before leaving her apartment, perhaps in a small attempt to bring some of the comfort of her bed with her, and most of the walk to training room four was spent readjusting her sleeves over her wrists, and brushing her hair out of her face, and readjusting her grip on her baton.
And worrying.
She wasn't sure if that feeling in her belly was more concern or excitement, but whatever it was convinced her it was best to skip breakfast for the moment. Her walk slowed a bit as she steadily approached the training room, and as was becoming routine, she thought over what she and Talon had talked about the day before.
She'd said a lot more than she intended, that was for sure.
She pinned the blame for that on Talon; he didn't ask much, but what little he did required a decent amount of explaining, and everything he wanted to know seemed to cut to the very quick of Lux herself; she'd only spent a few hours in his company, but Lux felt she'd revealed more to him in that short amount of time than she ever had to anyone else.
Not that she'd had much of an opportunity or inclination to before, but that wasn't exactly the point.
She just felt that it was much more difficult to remain as guarded as she was used to being around him, and the prospect made her nervous; coupled with the fact that they were meeting somewhere she was certain to be uncomfortable, almost painfully so, Lux didn't have the best of outlooks for the upcoming day. But still, she walked on, and even though the training room was out of the way, she arrived soon enough.
The training room, like most of the smaller rooms throughout the Institute, had a small window in the door, although the glass was decoratively frosted and difficult to see through; it was still easy to tell that the light was on inside, and Lux hesitated outside of the door, briefly wondering if someone else had beat them to the room.
Not very likely.
Because there were so few champions joined to the League at the moment, it was easy for Lux (or anyone else that cared to) to quickly figure out who liked to be where. Aside from herself, no one had ever been to training room four.
Which meant that Talon beat her there.
An impressive feat considering what time it was and that even Lux considered it to be early, and she slowly opened the door, careful not to move too quickly lest he be holding something sharp and not paying attention.
Lucky for her, it wasn't an issue.
The training room wasn't very big, hardly bigger than the one Talon had in the Du Couteau mansion, and it was laid out much the same; there was a small table set against the left wall, burdened with things Lux couldn't see, and the wall the door was set into was all hooks and shelves and things of that nature that housed blades and the equipment to maintain them, and one long, dark blue cloak that hung from a peg on the wall very near to where Lux was standing, lengthy enough to be hung near her head and still pool on the floor. Talon was standing in front of the table and turned with the sound of the opening door, giving Lux a better view of what was in front of him; she saw the coffee cup in his hand about the same time she smelled it, and her mouth couldn't help but water. It smelled like the good stuff from Noxus, not the weak, sweet coffee that Demacians preferred, and she wished she had thought to make some that morning.
She didn't focus on the coffee for long, because spread around Talon's hands were an array of knives that ranged on the small side, but were still long and sharp and all uniquely different, and all caught the light in the wicked way only weapons could. She hesitated in the doorway, unable to immediately avert her gaze, only doing so when Talon moved. It took a few strides for him to cross the room and proffer the cup to her, and she stared warily at the inoffensive mug, eyes flicking between the white ceramic and Talon's face.
"You don't like coffee?"
Lux did, very much so, but she wondered why Talon would assume she did, and why he would go out of his way to make her some.
But her curiosity wasn't enough to make her picky.
She reached out her free hand, using the sleeve of her sweater as a barrier between her skin and the burning mug, and blew gently over the top, momentarily breaking through the swirls of steam. The situation filled her with a sense of déjà vu; it was very reminiscent of the first day she'd spent with Talon in the Du Couteau mansion, only their positions were reversed, and decidedly less hostile.
Lux liked it a lot better this way.
"I do."
They eyed each other over the coffee for a moment, both trying to subtly observe the other, neither quite succeeding. It was strange, as always, for Lux to see Talon while not wearing his hood; he had thick hair falling into his eyes, not brushed aside at the moment, and Lux was envious of the fact that he didn't look tired at all, even despite the current time. Something looked off about his eyes, something about the way they caught the light, but he was turning away before Lux could pinpoint exactly what it was, walking back to the table of weapons.
"I don't think training is as interesting as you think it's going to be."
Lux watched his slim fingers pick expertly through the knives laid in perfectly straight rows in front of him, selecting one seemingly at random and holding it up to his eye. Lux smiled a bit wryly to herself; after spending hours a day watching both him and Katarina do just that, she knew quite well how boring watching someone target practice was, but that wasn't her intent for doing this.
"I know it isn't."
Talon paused in his inspection to glance at her from the corner of his eye, but she hid her smile behind her cup, taking a small sip of the liquid that had cooled enough for her to enjoy it. It tasted exactly like something she would have made in Noxus, and filled her with the strangest feeling, akin to nostalgia, which was weird considering how poor all her other memories of Noxus were. Talon didn't ask her to explain her rather cryptic response, instead walking to the middle of the room with his knife of choice, then pushing his sleeves up his arms as he eyed his target across the room. For a moment, Lux allowed her eyes to wander over what Talon was wearing, something she never remembered doing because it was usually covered by the cloak; dark shirt, dark pants, both devoid of any marking or decoration. Completely unremarkable and so different from the gaudy way most Noxians dressed (his sisters included), and the way he looked felt very… quiet, to Lux.
Very fitting, considering how subdued he was when not actively trying to kill someone- and he even did that with a cold calmness that was very quiet in nature.
"Are you usually up this early?"
Lux spoke first because she was genuinely curious (his sleeping schedule seemed nearly as erratic as hers, which was certainly something) and because Talon had readied the knife in his hand, moments away from letting it fly, and she wanted to distract herself.
She looked down at her coffee when he actually threw it, and tried not to compare the sound it made burying itself in the dummy to the sound they made embedding themselves in her own skin.
"Typically."
She heard quiet footsteps cross the room, and shifted on her own feet, sipping from her coffee again. She wished she had somewhere to sit.
"And what does 'typically' depend on?"
Lux settled for sitting on the floor, placing herself to the left of where Talon's cloak was hanging and almost directly parallel to where he himself was standing; she crossed her legs, cradling her cup in her lap and placing her baton on the floor next to her leg, and looked up when Talon was back to where he started, knife once again in hand. His lips twitched into his approximation of a smile, and he paused to think, giving her the feeling he was censoring his answer.
"My job is usually a nighttime thing. If I'm… working, there's a good chance I'd be up about now."
He studied Lux's reaction after that very carefully, his gaze no less disconcerting now than it had been the day before, the opposite of what Lux would have expected. She kept her face smooth but for a small frown as one of the questions she had the first time she ever saw Talon resurfaced.
"Why did you start… your job? I've always wondered."
He shrugged, turning back to his target across the room, but his smile was gone. He didn't seem especially sensitive about it, not like Lux when she was asked about her parents, but his mood definitely seemed worse off than before.
"The same reason anyone from the slums does anything- to survive."
Talon had a way of talking about himself that made it seem like he was casually commenting on a stranger, and not speaking about his own thoughts and experiences; it was uncomfortable for Lux because it was always sad to hear someone talk about themselves that way, and because she knew that was probably what she sounded like herself.
"And after that?"
Talon readied his knife again, solely focused on what he was doing, and Lux hoped he was paying attention. She didn't look away this time, forcing herself to watch every movement, no matter how small. Him actually throwing the knife was a quick flash of movement that, even as attentive as she was being, Lux almost missed; it was followed by an answering thump, and when Lux looked across the room, she was unsurprised to find the knife lodged somewhere that would have been very important if the cloth dummy was a living, breathing person.
Well, not breathing after that.
His eyes were on her when she looked back, and she could endure the eye contact for only a moment or two before she looked away, taking another sip from her coffee.
"Because Marcus Du Couteau bested me, and spared my life. I owed him a debt."
Noticing that he hadn't yet moved to collect the knife, Lux looked up again, unsurprised to find herself yet again the focus of Talon's attention. His explanation seemed very… off, considering who it was in reference to; Talon, to her at least, didn't seem like the kind of person who held honor in a very high regard. Why, then, would he continue to honor a debt even after Marcus was gone?
"Marcus has been missing for years. Is your debt not repaid?"
It seemed to frustrate him that she didn't understand; he walked over to the dummy, his steps louder than before, and when he jerked the knife from where it was stuck he hesitated there, turning the gleaming metal over in his hand.
"The only thing of value that I had for many years was my life, and a few very cheap blades. Marcus could have taken it, but he chose not to. I don't know how to fully explain the depth of that gesture to someone who didn't have to kill to live."
Lux was certainly not someone who had been pushed to the extremes the way Talon had, but she knew what it was to fear for your life, and desperately, even if it was not in quite the same way. She nodded slowly as he returned to his spot, commenting quietly.
"You respect him very much."
She wouldn't say as much, but it felt very obvious to her that Talon's feelings towards the missing Du Couteau were not as simple as he made it out to be.
"He is one of very few."
That sounded right.
"Katarina and Cassiopeia…?"
She wondered about how taking in Talon would have affected the Du Couteau sisters; she knew very little of Cassiopeia, so she couldn't quite imagine what she would have felt, but Katarina had always struck her as haughty and more than a little stuck up; accepting someone from the slums into their home, talented or not, would have seemed like the kind of thing that Katarina would disapprove of.
Talon's mouth twisted, and he twirled the dagger between his fingers a little more stiffly than before.
"Katarina, yes."
When he set up to throw the knife again without further explaining, Lux felt obligated to prompt him.
"And Cassiopeia?"
Lux's own knowledge of her before her brief stint in their household was sparse; Cassiopeia was a pretty socialite who liked expensive things and lavish parties, and didn't seem to have any outstanding skills besides spending money and worming her way into every elite crowd Noxus had to offer. Clearly Talon's opinion of her was not very high, and Lux was curious.
"I've never been her favorite. It's impossible to respect someone who doesn't respect you."
Lux thought that depended on the person, but didn't say so out loud; she was much more interested in other things.
"But you respect Katarina."
He nodded, yet again readying his knife, but he seemed a little less sour than before; at least, he was no longer scowling.
"I feel like I have to- she's very stubborn."
Lux snorted -that sounded like Katarina, alright- but she was getting the same feeling from him about Katarina like she was about Marcus; it wasn't simply respect with those two. Talon spoke before Lux could ask, amidst the repetitive sound of a knife finding its mark.
"What about the other Crownguard?"
It was a very broad question, but Lux sat a bit straighter, aware they were very near to uncomfortable territory once more. Talon didn't elaborate as he crossed the room, but instead of returning to his usual spot, he walked over to where Lux was sitting, taking a seat against the wall just like Lux, only slumped a little more comfortably, resting the hand holding the knife on his knee. He was sitting a little too close to Lux for her to be comfortable, and although she tried to make it as not obvious as possible, she couldn't help but track every movement of the metal twisting between Talon's fingers.
"Do you respect him?"
His hair was in his face again and he was sitting about an arm's length away from Lux, so his expression was somewhat hidden, but Lux frowned; it was a strange question to her, whether she respected her sibling or not.
"Of course I do."
Garen was the type of person most people couldn't help but respect, whether they were related to him or not; he was just a very genuine kind of person, and Lux had never met someone with so obviously pure intentions before.
He looked over at her, momentarily shifting his attention from his hand, studying her expression long enough that she dropped her eyes to her forgotten coffee when it grew uncomfortable.
"But you're not close."
His assumption, although very much true, irked her; his tone suggested he was commenting on something very casual, and not actually something that was an extreme sore-spot for Lux.
"No, we aren't."
She saw him shift from the corner of her eye, but she didn't look up, and she pursed her lips.
"I just never really got a chance to, not because he's a bad person."
She felt defensive of him, even though Talon hadn't insulted him or anything, and it occurred to her that it wasn't very fair of her to react angrily to him inquiring about her personal life when she had just done the same, with Talon reacting a lot more reasonably. She sighed, leaning her head against the wall behind her, once again feeling an inkling or two of regret; she really hadn't considered how difficult these meetings with Talon would get, but she was too invested by now to simply call them off; there was still so much about him that she didn't know.
"You don't have to explain."
Talon was doing that thing again; Lux didn't know why, but he became very… accommodating, when it was obvious that she was upset. Neither of them had a lot of experience with comfort, both giving and receiving, and she assumed that it was just as strange for him as it was for her, if not even more so.
"But you did."
She didn't like holding herself to different standards than Talon, and she felt like she had to at least match him. He made a quiet noise, halfway between a snort and a laugh, and Lux looked over.
"We're not the same, Crownguard."
His tone bothered her, like he was suggesting she was less capable of remaining collected when recalling her past than he was, and she frowned at him, resisting the sudden urge to do something childish, like stick out her tongue.
"Fine. I won't tell you then."
He met her gaze with that irritating half-smile, half-smirk of his, clearly pleased at successfully pissing her off yet again.
If there was one thing she could attest to Talon being good at, it was making her mad.
"You're a little bit infuriating."
'A little bit' was definitely selling it short, but she was finding that the longer he sat there smiling at her, the less and less true it felt, and that was almost more unsettling than anything else they'd discussed that morning.
But she couldn't look away, either.
Similar to her never bothering to notice what Talon wore before, she'd never just sat there staring at his face before, either, and she realized now why it was a bad idea to start.
Without the hood to obscure his face and while he was sitting there in such a benign sort of way, Talon was really quite attractive.
Much more attractive than she thought an assassin from the slums of Noxus had a right to be, and it bothered her that she was distracted, however momentarily, by the set of his jaw and his easy smile, half smirk or not.
"And you aren't?"
His voice (which, now that she was paying attention to things like that, she noted was deep and smooth and altogether very pleasant) was a sufficient enough distraction, and she frowned as she turned her gaze back to Talon's hand, still twirling the knife.
"Not in the slightest."
She was sure she was, but only to him; he was the only person aside from Maddick that had ever bared the brunt of her anger and biting sarcasm, and to her, they both deserved it.
"Difficult logic to argue against; I concede."
As with most of his responses, Lux felt the strong desire to roll her eyes, and readily indulged it; it was a mystery to her how they ever discussed anything serious when he seemed more inclined to sarcasm than anything else.
But as it usually did, the humor dissipated, and Lux was left to decide whether she wanted to answer his previous question or ignore it.
Did she want to dig herself in deeper, or lie?
He wasn't sure if sitting next to her was his best idea.
She didn't say anything about it, naturally, but she was sitting stiffly and could never meet his gaze for more than a minute or two before looking away. She was staring at his hand now, which he remembered was still holding the knife from before, and during her inattention Talon had a free moment to observe her.
The way she was sitting reminded him of the day of the League's orientation; slightly curled in on herself, and even though she'd had her head resting against the wall before, she held it forward now so that her hair fell over the side of her face. It was the kind of posture that suggested she was subconsciously trying not to be seen, like she was used to shirking away from attention.
Which, he guessed, was not very surprising considering that she was a spy. Twelve years was a very long time to be told you had to be invisible.
She let out a very deep sigh, like she had decided to do something she knew was going to be unpleasant, and she didn't look up.
"I know everyone likes to think that Noxus and Demacia are polar opposites, but they're not, really- if there's anything I learned being a spy, it's that they are more alike than either of us would like to acknowledge."
He wondered where exactly she was going with this, and waited patiently for her to continue.
"It's a very big honor to fight for your country; it's an honor to be strong, even though we see it differently, I suppose. Naturally Garen felt that way, but he was different because he showed a great deal of promise. When he joined the military, he was deployed at great lengths. I saw him twice over three years, before I joined myself."
He noticed the way her mouth twisted when she referred to herself 'joining' the military, but he understood now where she was going with the explanation; it made sense why she and Garen weren't close.
But she wasn't finished.
Her hair was still blocking most of her expression, but a very dark frown crossed her face, puckering her delicate features with anger and regret.
"And after… after I joined, they barred me from seeing him. I didn't think they would enforce it, not at first, but…"
She leaned her head back again so that it was resting against the wall and her eyes were focused somewhere across the room, and Talon stopped turning the knife in his hand, absorbed now with her expression and her words.
"Eleven years."
A dejected whisper, but her frown didn't change, and Talon tried to wrap his mind around someone being kept away from their family (that they wanted to see, anyway) for eleven years against their will. It was difficult for him, someone who knew what they wanted and had the means to get it, to imagine it. It was even more perplexing to him because he now knew that Lux was also someone with the means to do what she wanted; if she could willingly turn herself invisible and sneak into Noxus, then surely she could have snuck through Demacia on occasion to see her brother.
And, on that same thought, she could have left the military and Demacia altogether, if she really wanted.
Talon was confused enough that he couldn't stop himself from asking.
"Why didn't you leave?"
It was vague, like a lot of his questions tended to be, but she understood; she set her coffee mug onto the floor beside her, running both of her hands through her hair with another sigh.
"I was scared to, at first, when I was younger; I didn't know what kind of repercussions it would have on Garen. And there was a time when I was a bit older that I actually did leave Demacia, but I came back before anyone knew I was gone."
Now that her hands were free, she could run the fingers of her right hand along her baton, seemingly drawing comfort from the object she was apparently inseparable from. He filed away that bit of the story for later (what exactly had made her want to leave Demacia then?) and listened as she finished her explanation.
"I just… after that… I couldn't. I felt like if there was anything I could do to make it so that no one ever had to be put in my position again, I had to do it. I could have left Demacia, but I wouldn't be helping anybody. I didn't think it would even help myself, at that point; I couldn't have a life in Demacia if I deserted, and I was too young to have a life anywhere else, even if I wanted to. I was stuck."
She smiled a bit wryly now, although it was a very self-deprecating expression.
"Noxus was my only other option, and I would rather live a life of servitude in Demacia than to live there."
It felt like, to Talon, if she was a bit more selfish then none of those things would have been a problem; if she didn't care about Garen or Demacia and only cared about herself, then her options would be more plentiful and she would feel no inclination to stay in Demacia.
If she had been more like Talon, her life would not be filled with the same hardships.
But she wasn't.
She was raised Demacian, raised to think and feel like them, and then forced to live and act as a Noxian; trained in espionage and familiar with war, but burdened with a conscience and a need to do good by others.
A very miserable existence, even by Talon's standards.
Normally he probably would have pitied someone similar to Lux, but nothing about the way she spoke sounded to him like she felt sorry for herself, and most certainly didn't want anyone else to; instead, Talon felt like he was not pitying her, but that he regretted the things that happened to her.
Which was a first.
"I'm sorry."
He didn't even think about speaking; he murmured the words without consciously deciding to, and Lux looked over, her blue eyes still stormy, but some of the darkness from before missing from her features.
He felt the overwhelming urge to touch her then, to maybe reach over and cover her hand with his or brush away some of the gold hair still falling across her cheek, an urge he fought down viciously.
She stared at him, like she was trying to decide if he was being genuine or not, but her expression didn't change and it was impossible for Talon to know if she'd come to a decision or not.
"Thank you."
Apparently, she had.
She was on her feet hardly before she was finished speaking, however, her baton in hand and her expression once again smooth, although he thought that today she finished their conversation in a lighter mood, even considering how it had gone.
"Tomorrow."
And that was all she said before leaving the room, closing the door quietly behind her.
Talon moved slowly after she was gone, collecting her abandoned coffee cup off the floor and returning to the table across the room, fitting the knife back into its spot in his lineup and placing the cup on the table top, his fingers curling around the ceramic that was still warm despite the coffee having long since gone cold.
It wasn't getting any easier for him to imagine the blonde in the scenarios she shared with him; forced into the military, barred from seeing her brother, too scared to leave and too righteous to refuse service.
And also clearly harboring quite the secret.
Yesterday, when she mentioned having to use magic without her baton, and today she had said there was something that had made her only once nearly leave Demacia. It could be a coincidence that she refused to elaborate on either and that both times and she had gone stiff and dark, but Talon very much doubted so.
And now that he realized she was hiding something, it wouldn't be long before it became an obsession to him, and becoming obsessed with anything that had to do with Lux would be nothing short of a disaster. There was a reason that neither of them would be seen together, for the same reason Katarina couldn't be seen with Garen, although the circumstances between the pairs were different; regardless of whether it was platonic, like Lux and Talon, or meaningful, like Kat and Garen, the people of Noxus and the people of Demacia did not approve.
A feud was a feud, war or not.
So to continue to see her was surely not going to end well for either of them, and Talon resolved that once he cracked Lux's big secret, he would be done. That was why he pursued her at all- because she was hiding something that he wanted to know.
He nodded to himself, set on his decision, finally releasing the cold cup in his hand.
A/N: As always, a special thanks to everyone who took the time to review! It means a lot to me.
TheMixKage- Thanks! I have a pretty good idea of how to play him, I'm just super weird about playing new champs because I don't like to do badly with them :( it makes learning anyone super difficult for me. Slowmance is so. Painful. Must. Keep writing. For flufffffff. It makes me incredibly excited to see an email for your review, also!
Glaesii- this review was sooo flattering, thank you so much! It makes me incredibly happy to have inspired you in any way, and I'd love to see anything you draw. I'm pretty sure you can PM me links, and if not and you're on NA, you can always add me on League and link to me there. I'm pretty sure Lux/Talon isn't a thing and it's totally off the wall, but I love it haha. Will do!
A fan- Thank you! I kind of feel the same way- Talon's character changes a lot in my mind, and it's hard sometimes to stick with something. Good to know!
Ulcaasi- Why thank you very much :*
Sundavr-Thank you! Well, hopefully the chapter made sense :o
GarenKat Fangirl- I MISSED YOU. I think the thing I'm most trying to portray is frustration- Lux for being scared, Talon's sarcasm, and both of them being a little frustrated at themselves for being really interested in someone they shouldn't be, and that it's very difficult to find out anything about them because of how stubborn and guarded they both are naturally.
Ack, thank you so much ;-; this fic has been so much fun so far and I've had so many wonderful people reviewing, it's really amazing. I can't to hear from you!
Guest- thank you! You are excused, because I think that's a compliment!
Captain Teemo- Well, because the fic isn't about Bandle City :p I'm writing about Lux and Talon, so that's why Demacia and Noxus are developed and Bandle City isn't, because it has nothing to do with them. Each city also has the same number of champions in the League currently and there are (that I counted) 8 Demacians not in the League, and only 5 yordles from Bandle City (and I counted Gnar, who technically isn't). So far, Bandle City wins in representation. 6/18 are mids, and mostly by coincidence, because I thought they would complement the story best. Like I said in chapter 1, I'm deviating very, very far from lore. Hopefully that explains things a bit! Gnar maybe, Teemo never.
James Gnar Pwn- the updated version, but if you imagine it with the old, it's fine. #GnarlyPun
Imstillive- First, I checked chapter 12 and I couldn't find the typo, but I'll keep looking. I read the chapter like 5 times and I need to take a break lol. As a Lux player, I can say with certainty that that lane is usually awful lol, except on occasion like you said. I think it made sense for her to lose since the matchup is so uneven and Talon isn't as hindered in game, and because Lux was scared of him. You're right about her doing it for the greater good; I didn't say it outright yet, but that was the reason (and Garen, too) why she didn't just up and leave Demacia, or never come back after a deployment, because it's deeply ingrained in her (and every Demacian) that it's an honor and a duty to fight for their country.
I just always figured Talon doesn't like doing things he doesn't have to, or he doesn't deem necessary, like killing Lux, among a crap load of other things (since importance is relative). And he is definitely a romantic, loads more than Lux, but he just doesn't know it yet :^)Lux on the other hand has had plenty of time to grow bitter and jaded, so she just doesn't see things the same. I changed his dialogue from in game because it feels… stiff, I guess? A little weird for someone who grew up on the streets and with someone as sarcastic and vulgar as Kat. That's a big reason why he's relatively patient and intuitive, and just all around mature; it takes a very mature person to deal with Kat, and having two sisters definitely helps to build character. I would also think that the General would want him to be on his best behavior and respectful, and since he's very close with Kat, he's sarcastic to a fault when he's allowed to be. He's also perfected the art of knowing how to comfort/calm someone, but also knowing exactly how to push their buttons (as anyone with siblings probably knows.)
Talon is just very, VERY perceptive, and the Demacians aren't stupid, but just not as wary I would say. Talon's been on edge ever since he could remember, and to be an assassin of his and Kat's caliber you have to be perfectly attentive to things around you. It's a skill of the assassins (who are given a singular target, usually) to be able to focus entirely on one thing and really not miss anything. I thought Talon would be kind of a laid-back person when he wasn't on a job, when he's not angry, and when he's not catching thieving maids, which is why his banter is pretty light-hearted and casual. I also just don't like his dialogue in game a lot, like I said. It feels unnatural :c Talon doesn't know his real age since he doesn't have a family and doesn't know where he came from, but estimates around 25. So, 25 :D (and if you're wondering, Garen is 29, Kat is 27, and Cass/Quinn are also 23.)
As always, thank you tons and I enjoyed the review! If you want to pm me instead, feel free, I love to run on and on about headcanons and stuff. :D Ez and Cass all in good time!
Xoxopigtails- I'm super familiar with lurking on stories myself, and I'm so glad you reviewed! Thank you ;-; I think I've mentioned before, but the highest compliment to me personally is when people compliment my characterization- it always makes me feel all warm and fuzzy c: Thank you so much!
Kat- THANK YOU ;-;
Nic- Of course! I've always thought if you guys can take the time to review, then I can take the time to answer, and I really just love responding to reviews. So, thank you to all c:
Guest- Thank you ^-^
Guest- Awww, I would never leave you guys ;-; I actually saw this review just as I was finishing chapter 15, and I just. AW. I would definitely let you guys know if there was something that would permanently keep me from writing, so no worries! It's super touching to know that you guys are looking out for updates though, hearing that kind of thing makes me to want to write all the more.
I said at the top, but I took a break to draw the new cover image, and I was like… really obsessed with making it okay enough that I was happy with it, and I just have problems focusing on singular projects sometimes so it takes me a while. It was also a little weird switching from drawing to writing, so it took me a day or two to get back in the swing of things, but I'm hoping now I'm back in my groove, and updates won't be forever.
But, thank you again ;-; It really does help reading reviews like this.
To everyone- Thank you for reviewing, like/favoriting, and just reading! I appreciate it all.