The battle carried on till the sun had taken its descent, leaving the moon to take its place in gracing the earth with light. The Noxians had lost the brief upper hand they had against the Demacians when they regrouped for a counterattack, and reinforcements had arrived for the opposing side as well.
In the end, the Noxians had no other choice than to turn head and flee. The Demacians tried to trap as many as they could, but a terrible roar from the Hand of Noxus sounded and the Noxians moved quicker, knowing that they wouldn't be rescued if they had gotten captured by the enemy. When Noxus saw their own people as prisoners-of-war, they simply saw it as another test for their people to prove themselves worthy of calling themselves Noxians.
As they rode out of the city, Katarina heard Garen curse her name. She looked back, looking at him in his brown eyes now full of rage. She smirked and blew him a kiss before continuing to run. The last thing she heard was more curses on her name and the screams of fury and anguish from the Might of Demacia that eventually grew softer as she got farther and farther from the city.
Darius himself was cursing other people's names. First, there was Garen Crownguard, for being able to rally the Demacians to resist the attack. Fiora Laurent, for being such a prickly thorn at Noxus' side. And finally, Montgomery Campbell, for not getting the job done in wiping as many Demacians as he could out. Katarina considered defending the third person for a brief moment but decided against it. The furious man hadn't called her out on her sudden absence from battle, and she didn't need to end her night by getting rebuked after a lousy battle.
The only two cheerful people seemed to be Samira and Draven. The two laughed as they described the grotesque methods they had employed in cutting their enemies' lives short. Katarina could not understand how they could be so cheerful after what was considered a defeat in Noxus' perspective, but she could understand that they matched each other in terms of eccentrics.
Katarina was jerked free of her thoughts when a hand landed on her shoulder and roughly pulled her back. She snarled, hands instinctively reaching for her knives as she shifted her gaze at the person who dared to touch her. But she froze when she realised that it was only Darius. "Where the hell were you?" He growled as he released the redhead, who scoffed and rolled her eyes as she returned her knives to their respective places on her belts. "We needed you to keep them busy, and you decided that leaving the battle at its most crucial point was the greatest thing to do." Katarina sighed in defiance, causing Darius' anger to spike. "Look at me when I'm talking to you!" He shouted, grabbing Katarina's shoulder and jerking her backwards, causing her to stumble and fall. "Whatever's going through your head right now, it's got to stop!"
As Katarina got to her feet, Darius continued his outburst. "She's dead, Katarina! How many more failures do you need to experience for you to accept that?!" Katarina froze as she got to a sitting position, her eyes still trained on the ground. By this time, the other Noxians had stopped walking, their curiosity taking priority over their exhaustion. "I knew she was bad news when I first saw her, but with how much you're distracted from what matters most, it's safe to say that she's a bloody catastrophe!" At that moment, something inside Katarina snapped.
Letting loose a guttural cry, she ran at the bigger man and flung her entire body at him while using her left leg to hook onto his right, causing him to lose his balance and tip over backwards. Darius growled as he pushed the assassin off him and got up. Katarina snarled as she drew a knife out. "Watch the knife!" Samira called out. Before she could take a swing at the general, Katarina suddenly felt an arm wrap around her throat as a hand grabbed the one she was holding the knife with, crushing her wrist, and forcing her to drop her knife. Katarina immediately made a move to draw another knife, but the person behind her tightened the pressure around her throat, crushing her windpipe. She took desperate gasps for air as her hands clawed the assailant's arm.
As she continued her desperate yet futile struggle, Darius got up and walked over. "Let her go." The assailant obeyed, and Katarina dropped to her knees, gasping for air. Darius knelt in front of her. "Look at you." He said, voice full of disdain. "You can try and defend her for all you can, but that doesn't make me wrong." As Katarina tried to get the circles in her vision to go away, he continued, "You've been off your game ever since Ionia. You're not the same woman Noxus respects." He watched Katarina as the latter continued to gasp and wheeze before sighing. "Take some time away from the battle. You need it now more than ever."
With that, the big man signalled to the other captivated soldiers to continue walking. The soldiers turned and walked away, none whispering anything about how Noxus' famed Sinister Blade had 'disgraced' them. They were mostly too tired to properly process the events that had just occurred, but those who did valued their lives. A prideful person such as Katarina Du Couteau did not often take kindly to being mocked after a humiliation like that.
Katarina lay there until she was sure the others had walked far enough before getting up. Her face was stained with tears that she had quietly shed during Darius' rebuke. She tried to walk towards her discarded knives but fell to her knees. Darius was right. She wasn't the same woman since Noxus' war with Ionia. She thought that the woman she had met before the war had changed her life for the better, but she was wrong.
As she had found out, love was a deadly thing. It could boost one's morale and will them to risk almost everything they had just to see the ones they loved. It could also crush one, when one's loved one goes away, and never comes back.
oooooooooo
The Demacian soldiers were all occupied with carrying the wounded to the respective medical facilities or ensuring that the gate could be temporarily repaired to protect the city for at least the night until they could be better equipped to repair it. The battle had been a costly one, both in manpower and environmental situations. Civilians had begun to gather in curiosity to watch the progress, murmuring amongst themselves of the apparent abduction of Luxanna Crownguard, Demacia's prized Lady of Luminosity.
However, upon hearing a shrill whistle, they quickly moved aside, parting a way for a group of soldiers to pass. The soldiers were all mounting horses and were led by a lady of held her chin high, her eyes cold and calculating. Her hair was a striking resemblance of Lux's, or more accurately, Lux's hair was a striking resemblance of the woman's.
People instantly recognised her as Tianna Crownguard, aunt to Garen and Luxanna Crownguard, and high-ranking marshal in the Demacian army. Her eyes darted around the area quickly, searching for one man. "Where is Ser Crownguard?" She demanded. A soldier passing by saluted. "Ser Crownguard has headed outside with a search party." Tianna's eyes narrowed. "Who are they searching for?" Upon hearing the question, the soldier looked like he was trying to swallow a thick lump in his throat. When he finally succeeded, his tone had shifted to a timider one. "L-lady Crownguard, Marshal Crownguard." Tianna's eyes narrowed even more. "What?" She spat, finding it hard to believe in what she was hearing. "They're searching for Lady Crownguard. Ser Crownguard said she got taken." Tianna wanted to scream but forced her temper to cool. Lashing out at this soldier wouldn't help matters, or her public image.
She looked at her soldiers, quickly deciding what to do with them. "You three, help the others here. The rest of you, follow me." The commands were barked out, short and sharp, which the soldiers immediately followed. The three that Tianna had assigned to help with the others around the area quickly dismounted while the others urged their horses to follow Tianna.
Garen, what has happened now? Tianna despairingly wondered.
oooooooooo
Tianna had managed to find Garen after a while.
He and his forces were in the forest with torches ablaze and their moods desperate. Garen barked orders out while his soldiers struggled to follow. One soldier seemed to be exhausted. He had fallen and couldn't get back up. Tianna nodded towards the fallen soldier, and instantly one of her own went to help him. She urged her horse over to Garen, and that was when she truly saw the sorry state he was in.
Garen's usually neat hair was now ruffled, his face was matted with sweat. His armour was filthy, no doubt due to the earlier battle, and his eyes held a desperate glint in them. At least he still had some of his senses to stop what he was doing and salute his aunt as she drew closer. "Garen, is it true?" She asked, her famous cool taking over her tone. Garen frantically nodded. "They took her, they did." He was trying to hide it, but Tianna could detect the slight tremble in his voice. He was trying to hold himself back from crying.
Tianna scanned the area. The soldiers were trying their best, but their movements betrayed their slight sluggishness. Their breathing was laboured. The soldiers needed to rest, otherwise they would be wiped out if the Noxians had laid an ambush for them. "The soldiers can't take the load of this search." She spoke. "We have to retreat and recover for now." Garen's eyes widened in disbelief. "But Luxanna-" Tianna raised a hand. "What good is rescuing one person if it means leading many others to their deaths? Have you gotten so desperate that you have lost your senses, Ser Crownguard?" Garen opened his mouth to protest, but hearing the formal tone meant finality in his aunt's decision. He lowered his head, muttering, "No, Marshal."
Tianna nodded, further wounding Garen's heart when he saw that her face betrayed no signs of internal conflict. However, he should have known that masks were a common thing in Demacia. Although she looked cool on the outside to others, Tianna's heart was suffering as much, if not more than, Garen's. It pained her to make this hard decision, the wellbeing of Demacia and its people always came first before anything else. Even before family.
Not wanting to look at Garen's heartbroken expression for another moment longer, she turned around. "Come now, your sister has been trained to be strong in this type of situation, she won't tremble at the feet of our enemies." She had said that to reassure Garen, but she knew she was trying to reassure herself. She may not have the same maternal instincts a mother would have, but Garen and Luxanna had been entrusted to her after their parents' deaths. What kind of aunt would she be if she allowed harm to come to one of them? She silently cursed the life choices she had taken, but what's done has been done, and the only thing she could do was plan for the future.
"Stay strong, Luxanna." She murmured to herself at a volume near impossible to be heard clearly by the others. "We'll save you soon."
oooooooooo
The first thing Luxanna felt when she woke up was a throbbing headache.
She winced and tried to rub at the part of her head that ached worst, only to find her hands clad in iron manacles. Her breathing quickened as she frantically scanned the area around her. The ground she was sitting on was cold. The room she was in was dark, save for the yellowish-orange glow of light that passed the gaps of the iron bars of the room. Still, it was barely enough to fully light the room. Willing herself through the pain, Luxanna got up and walked towards the entrance of the cell.
Her timing could not have been worse, as two Noxian soldiers, one male and one female, who were walking by, saw her and stopped. The male soldier had a scar that ran long his cheek and wild, black hair while the female soldier had brown hair just as wild as his. "Well, what do you know?" The male one drawled, leaning in close to Lux. Lux backed away. "The little beauty has risen from her slumber." Although she was hopefully protected from the Noxians thanks to the bars, Lux could not help but shift uncomfortably when the female soldier licked her lips. "I wonder what her body looks like." She said as both soldiers stepped closer to the bars. Lux continued to back away until her back hit the wall, and she wished the wall would swallow her up. The cell was generally big, but the distance and the bars between her and the soldiers weren't enough to quell her discomfort.
Suddenly, a loud sound of metal clashing against metal sounded and echoed through the room, startling everyone. "Hey! What are you two doing here?" A gruff voice asked. The two soldiers turned to the new guy with distaste evident in their expressions. "Buzz off Karl, we're just socialising with princess here!" The male soldier complained. "Keep it up, and the only person you'll be 'socialising' with is General Darius for lack of discipline." The two realised that Karl wasn't screwing around and walked off, grumbling to themselves. Karl himself stepped into Lux's view.
He was tall but wasn't as muscular as the other Noxian soldiers Lux had faced in the earlier battles, instead having a leaner appearance. He had short black hair that was neatly combed and a short moustache that looked like it was properly trimmed. Unlike the other soldiers who wore black armour, he wore a uniform with arm guards and carried a baton. He gave Lux a neutral stare before continuing down the hall, tapping his baton on his open palm as he did so.
Lux walked over to the bed in the cell as reality came crashing down on her. She was in a Noxian prison, with no one around to properly help her, and with no knowledge of what was about to happen to her.
She crawled onto the bed and curled into a ball, trying to cope with the hopelessness of her situation. Garen, please save me.