in hindsight, we should have seen it coming

"Tonight is the full moon."

Talon looked up from the papers he was reading to find Cassiopeia standing across the room. She'd been having a bad day, and was still supporting herself with crutches, but there was a smile on her lips.

"You'll try it?", he asked, and she sat down beside him on the couch. There was a good meter besides them, and he barely felt the cushions move as she leaned back, but for a second, Talon thought that it must mean something. Maybe she was nervous.

"Of course. Not like I got a lot of choice, right? My chances won't get better by waiting."

And they were shit already. Neither of them said so—her voice was deliberately light, but it hung over them like a guillotine. With every day, her body gave in more. She wasn't in any condition to do a ritual, but she might not get another chance. Cassiopeia was betting her life on tonight.

LeBlanc had told her that in not unclear terms that she'd better start writing her will, and as much as Talon had wanted to make her shut up, the fact remained that the black mage had more expertise with curses than either of them. Cassiopeia had just thanked her for her honestly.

"Can I do anything?", he asked. Cassiopeia looked up at him, and he took in the image like a vision. Her irises that had become slits. Her fallen-in face, her thinning hair. The purple spots on her arms, as if somebody had hit her. Her body, that had stopped looking slim and started to look malnourished. Her entire being screamed death.

Her eyes were the only thing about her that looked alive. Hopeful, scared, surprised—when had he last seen so much emotion in them?

"Not really, I -", she started, and then fell silent again. Staring at him. Then, shifting her face to the window, staring outside. Her mouth opened, and closed again, as if she couldn't decide what to say. Finally, she spoke, her voice brittle and pained. "Actually, there is something. It might be a little weird, though."

"I told you. Anything."

She swallowed, stared at her hands for a second, and Talon couldn't help but stare at them as well – her fingers were thin, almost skeletal.

"I haven't been outside in a year.", she finally said with a carefully controlled voice. "Since Katarina's– Since trade picked back up, they must have rebuilt some parts. I want to see it."

A million thoughts ran through Talon's mind as he stared at her. It was dangerous to go outside. He wasn't able to protect her—he hadn't been able to protect her in here. What was he supposed to do in the streets?

And it was ugly. Noxus, outside of a few rich mansions, was uglier than ever. There was still hunger. Half the city still laid in ruins, the military was still helping the police to get the slums back under control. But he had said anything, and he'd meant it.

"You'll be disappointed."

"Maybe. Maybe not. I will have to see, right?"

Cassiopeia pushed herself up with her crutches and walked over to the small table. She hid her face behind the veil again and then turned to him. He looked at her, a defeated expression on his face.

If the ritual this evening went badly, she wouldn't get a chance to see Noxus rebuilt. Today would be all she'd have, dirty streets where one needed to search hard to find their potential to be glorious again. It broke his heart.

Silently, he offered her his arm, and she took it after dropping one of her crutches.

They left the mansion slowly—Cassiopeia struggled with the stairs, and her steps were small, but they made it all the way out of the mansion, out of the park. They walked through the streets until they stopped being pretty. They crossed beautiful houses until they turned into ruins.

Cassiopeia had walked with him silently. Her breath was a little faster, but the one time he had offered to turn back, she had pursed her lips and looked at the street in front of them. They were close to the slums when Cassiopeia started to cough.

He held her, and it was the only thing that stopped her from topping over when she gasped for air. The coughs were deep, rasped and ragged, and they sounded so much like sickness. It took minutes until she finally calmed down, face white as a sheet, body shaking horribly.

She tried to make a single step forward and collapsed backwards into his arms.

"Cassiopeia, you can't -", he started, and she interrupted him.

"I hate this.", she hissed. Her voice was dripping with anger, hot and consuming, and he nearly flinched back. "I hate this body; I hate being weak -"

"Cass -"

"Nothing works. Walking. Standing. Breathing. I just—I just can't anymore."

She was somewhere between anger and sobbing, and he just held her tighter. If the woman who had cursed her was still alive, Talon would kill her all over. But Cassiopeia had done that herself back then.

It hadn't taken the curse off her.

"You need to get back. Rest before the ritual."

"It feels like waiting to die."

It didn't matter that she had saved Sona behind their backs. It didn't matter that she had given away family secrets. It didn't matter that she had lied to them all, that she danced with everyone but him on balls, that she called LeBlanc by her first name after everything. Nothing of it mattered, if it just meant that she could survive.

They could always make amends, talk it out, set it right, but death was irreversible. And Talon refused to let it happen. Because if he let it happen, it would be his fault, and only his. He had failed to protect her back then. The woman had never supposed to meet Cassiopeia, she had never supposed to even get close enough to fire off the curse.

But she had, and it was Talon's fault, and Talon's fault alone.

"You won't die. The ritual will work. I promise you; it will work."

She stilled in his arms. "Don't make promises you can't keep.", she whispered.

"But I can. You're the strongest person I know."

"I can't even walk."

Talon swooped her up without asking, and for a second, he thought she would protest. She stared at him, mouth open, and there was pain in her expression. Then, infinitely slowly, she rested her head against his chest, curled herself closer to him.

"This is a onetime-thing, okay?" she whispered.

He would carry her for the rest of their lives if that was what it took to save her, Talon thought, but he kept it to himself. There was a border between them, carefully drawn, and they were tiptoeing it right now. She was vulnerable, and he wouldn't put that toe over the line ever again, so he just nodded.

The way back took roughly about ten minutes, while the sun set behind them over the slums and the ruins.

"This is beautiful.", Cassiopeia whispered, staring at Noxus, drenched in warm red.

She was smiling. At some point, she had pushed back the veil to get a better view, and her eyes reflected the sun. Her black hair was warm and seemed to glow, and for a second, he could forget that she was ill, and he was carrying her because she couldn't walk anymore. He just stared at her as if she was an angel.

"Yeah. It really is."

If she knew he wasn't looking at the sunset, she didn't comment.

Cassiopeia was sitting on the ground in the ritual chamber. If she looked up, the full moon was raising to the window above her, bathing her in silver light.

Talon had left—he hadn't wanted to, but she was about to perform black magic, and he wasn't trained in this. If he was in the room, he wouldn't only endanger himself, he would also disturb him. It was a recipe for disaster, and she was glad he hadn't discussed on it. He would likely stand guard in front of the room all night, hating himself, worrying—Cassiopeia pushed the thought from her mind. She needed to concentrate.

She could barely stand up, but everything she needed was within her reach. Her legs didn't cooperate anymore, but they didn't have to either. The magic around her was thrumming, and she could control it—she could control it—because unlike her body, her magic was strong. Powerful. Doing what it was supposed to be.

Cassiopeia uncorked the blood she had gathered from herself during the last days, in emerald vials. She drew a circle around herself and started writing the runes—on the ground, then on her arms and her throat.

Then she lit the cayenne, and as the burning smoke filled the room, she slowly lost sight. It wasn't important. She had done everything that she needed her eyes for.

Tears of pain were running down her cheeks as she whispered the first words of the incantation, and the room around her sprung alive. The ghosts, again. They whispered, and screamed, and cried, and she could feel them touching her, could feel the darkness run over her like fingers. She was surrounded by them, as if she was sitting in the eye of a tornado.

Her curse hissed like a viper. She knew it was there, with all the other ghosts, and she wanted to get up, attack it, kill it—but she knew that attacking ghosts during a ritual was useless. She needed to burn it using magic.

Cassiopeia muttered again, and the runes burned. Her magic surged away, the curse shrieked, and then she was engulfed in flames. She felt the ghosts scream as they lit up, the curse with them, and every flame drained away her magic.

But it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough heat; she couldn't summon enough fire.

Cassiopeia's control was slipping rapidly, and the snake-like curse wrapped around her and the fire, and she couldn't breathe anymore, she couldn't scream, or even stop it. It suffocated her, and the flames with her, and she could barely wonder what was used up first, her magic or the oxygen for the fire.

Her body convulsed, and she smeared over the runes, destroyed the circle.

When Cassiopeia finally collapsed on the ground, she had long lost consciousness.

This night, Lux dreamt of standing in a park. It was autumn, and the leaves whirled around her. The chilly wind made her shiver. She was wearing a thin, white dress, and her naked arms were covered in goose bumps.

"What's a little girl like you doing out here, all alone?"

Lux turned around in shock. There was a boy standing behind her, maybe twelve years old, and he was looking down at her with a mean streak. He twirled a knife in his hand.

Why was she this small? Why did she feel this helpless? She made a step backwards and felt her back hit a tree.

"Have you lost your voice?", he asked again with a shrill voice, and Lux couldn't tear her eyes away from the weapon in his hand. She had been so sure the park was safe. She had been so sure her brother was nearby.

He was getting closer, and she wanted to scream, but she was to stunned to do so. Nothing but a whimper left her mouth. She sagged down on the ground—maybe, if she was smaller, he would leave her alone, maybe if she covered –

When he moved, she thought he'd attack her, but he only grabbed her hair and pulled her up again. He seemed angry now—maybe because she wasn't answering.

"Well, this is not a place for brats like you here.", he snared, and Lux let out another whimper. "I'll -"

"- do nothing.", a voice said.

For a second, Lux had no idea what happened. The boy let go of her suddenly, and she dropped to the ground again. He staggered back with a pained look on his face, and Lux realized that somebody had punched him in the stomach, a girl with blood red hair who was standing with her back to Lux now, as if she was protecting her. She had taken away his knife and held it to his throat.

"Another hand on my guest, Draven –", she said, voice sharp as a weapon, "–and I'll feed it to the dogs."

"You're not the Countess yet.", he snapped back, and she move faster than he could react, kicking away his feet and sending him in the dirt.

"Be glad I'm not or you'd have been hanging yesterday. Now get lost before I really get the dogs."

The boy—Draven, she'd called him - cursed under his breath, but scrambled up and left, as quickly as he could without running. The girl watched him until he had disappeared into the woods, until she turned around.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

Her face was empty. Not void of expression, but literally empty. There was no nose, no eyes, no mouth, just a black void. Lux screamed.

When Lux woke up, she was sitting up in her bed already, heart pounding out of her chest. For a second, she was disoriented. The faceless girl burned into her eyes as if she had looked into the sun for too long.

"What the actual –" she whispered to herself.

These nightmares were getting out of hand. They made less and less sense – first drowning, and now some random park. The darkness she'd drowned it was the same thing that had replaced the girl's face.

And the Noxian executioner, Draven, looking like he was a kid. She had never met him as a child. She had never seen a picture of him as a child, either. This was utterly ridiculous. Maybe last summer had left some lasting damage on her brain after all—maybe she should pay the family doctor another visit to get herself checked out.

And the red-haired girl—she only knew a single person with hair like this, and it was Katarina. But she hadn't met her before the war, either.

This was a mess.

The sun slowly appeared on the horizon, and Lux shook her head as if she was trying to shake the dream out of it. She had to be at the festival in two hours. There was no time to brood over the way her brain was just giving her random nightmares lately.

She got out of the bed determined to just ignore those dreams, instead walking through every single duty she had today. Watching the right wing of the auditorium for anybody acting weird—Harriet would watch the left wing. Escort the crown prince to the podium and back down. Guarding the room backstage, where he would wait for his turn to speak.

Lux kept her mind off her dream the entire morning. She drank two cups of coffee, waved Sona goodbye, checked her staff for any malfunctions, packed herself lunch and something to drink. She met neither Garen nor Katarina, but her father shot her a dirty look when she walked past him in combat boots and uniform and her mother kept her eyes trained to her breakfast.

She ignored them and left the mansion.

Lux loved the way the air was cool and humid on summer mornings, and she took deep breaths while she walked towards the festival place. She was early, and when she looked around, there was barely anybody there besides the food merchants setting up their stands.

Benji, Evan and Harriet had yet to arrive, so Lux looked around for something to sit on while waiting. There was a bank close to the entrance that was occupied by an old lady.

Something about the woman made Lux' hair stand on edge, but she couldn't quite place what. She was wearing a coat and a hat made from lilac felt. Her hair was white and ran down her back in curls. Her hands looked ancient; the paper-thin skin littered with liver spots.

As Lux looked, a raven landed beside her, croaking. The woman pulled a small bag from her pocket and took something out—a grape, Lux realized—and let the raven pick it out of her hand.

Then, as if the woman knew that Lux was watching her with a growing feeling of dread, she raised her head and stared right at Lux. The smile on her face was undoubtedly kind, but it made her stomach churn.

"Beautiful weather, isn't it?", the woman said, and Lux forced herself to nod. But if her rudeness offended the woman, she didn't let it show, instead gently stroking the raven that was sitting beside her in an unnatural still matter.

"They're incredible intelligent animals, ravens.", she said, and Lux just kept staring at her. What was wrong with her? This was just an old woman feeding birds. Given, ravens were a little creepy, grapes were weird food for birds and the lilac hat was straight up ugly, but Lux had seen war, for god's sake!

Just as the woman fed the raven another grape, Lux spotted Harriet coming through the gates, and after waving awkwardly, she used the opportunity to flee. Just before the raven exited her vision range, she could have sworn that his eyes flared up red, but at this point, Lux couldn't have cared even if the damn bird transformed into a pony.

"Morning.", Harriet said, voice still thick with sleep. "Ya look like you saw a ghost."

Lux shrugged. "Just a weird old lady."

Harriet raised one of her eyebrows, then looked around. "The one with the ravens?"

Ravens? Lux had only seen one, but when she turned around, she noticed Harriet was right—two more ravens had appeared, one of them sitting on her hat. At least none of them had red eyes. It must have been a weird reflection of the light.

"Creepy.", she noted as an icy shiver ran down her spine. Harriet laughed at her face.

"Don't tell me you're afraid of them."

It wasn't that, it wasn't the ravens, Lux thought. If she knew what was wrong, she'd probably be relieved, but she could put a finger on it – just that there was something off about the whole scene that gave her the impulse to run.

"Don't we have a prince to guard?", Lux growled, and turned to leave. Harriet, still laughing, hurried after her.

The hours pulled longer and longer. Guarding duty, Lux thought as she watched the masses, was one of the most boring jobs one could do when it was peaceful. Of course, she didn't wish for somebody to attack, but there weren't even drunks or rowdies or thieves—it was peaceful, like it hadn't been in ages.

She had long stopped listening to the crown prince drone on about something—the last time she had payed attention; he had talked about technological progress in Piltover, and even with the respect she held for her employer, she couldn't bring herself to care—and was scanning the crown with increasing tiredness.

The weird lady from earlier had been sitting in the front row the entire morning, her face trained to the various speakers with a concentration Lux found somewhere between admirable and creepy, and it had had Lux on edge, but she had disappeared during the midday break. Maybe it had finally gotten too boring for her, or she'd grown too hot in the stupid cylinder.

It didn't matter, Lux thought. She was gone and had taken the damn ravens with her, and that was all that mattered.

She glanced to the side, and Harriet seemed equally strained to stay alert. The afternoon sun was burning down on them both, and Lux took another drink from her water bottle. She had to refill it soon; she thought.

She looked at the people again, but nobody acted out. Nobody was even close to the barrier they had erected around the prince. In fact, nobody had gotten up for minutes now.

"Harriet?"

Lux' head snapped around at the whispering sound, but it was just Benji who had approached them from the side.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Harriet asked, voice sharp, and Lux silently agreed. What was he doing off his post?

"We need your help for a second. One of the barriers on the back is nearly crashing down. Evan is holding it up right now, but I can't fasten it myself.", he hissed, and there was a sense of urgency in his words. "I know you shouldn't leave your post but -"

"Got it.", Harriet said and turned her head to Lux.

"Watch both wings for a minute, will ya? Let nobody near and use any mean necessary for it."

"Understood."

Lux watched after them for a second and then grabbed her staff closer and moved in front of the podium, ready to spring up a shield any second.

For a second, it ran though her head that this very well might be a trap, a scheme to get Harriet away from her duty. If anybody would attack the prince, this was the moment to do so, the experienced bodyguard conveniently needed behind the podium, out of range to intervene. If somebody foolishly thought that Lux was a weak defense by herself, she would make them regret it bitterly.

But besides a woman in the front row whispering and pointing at her, nothing happened. A few minutes later, Harriet returned, her face blank in a way that told Lux that she was angry, but unharmed.

"Nothing out of the ordinary.", Lux whispered, and something flickered in Harriet's eyes that might have been—amusement? —before the other woman turned away from her.

"Good." Harriet said and stared at the auditorium again.

"Did you get the barrier back up?"

"Of course."

They spent the rest of their shift in silence, but for some weird reason, Lux didn't slip back into boredom. Something was tugging at the corners of her mind, a thought that wouldn't quite form. It was enough to keep her alert.

Harriet and Lux escorted the prince back to his quarters, and they stood in front of the room in silence.

"This was uneventful.", Lux tried to make conversation again, but Harriet just shrugged and stared at the only entrance.

What was wrong with her? Was she still pissed because of the crashing barrier? It wasn't as if she could fault Benji for this, couldn't she? And even if she did, Harriet hadn't stricken Lux as somebody to keep an angry silence.

Maybe she had stood in the sun for too long?

"Are you okay?" Lux asked again.

"Sure. Why are you asking?"

"You seem… off. I have some water left; you want it?"

"Keep it for yourself. I am simply tired."

"Yeah, me too. The heat really makes this more exhausting than it should be, right?"

Harriet shrugged again, and in that moment the door opened, and the prince stepped out.

"Thank you, ladies.", he said, smiling at both, and Lux couldn't stop a feeling of dread rise in her at the title. "The king's guard will take it from here. Have a delightful afternoon, will you?"

He nodded in Harriet's direction, who ducked and left without telling Lux goodbye. Lux wanted to rush after her but couldn't—Jarvan the fourth was still looking at her.

"Thank you for joining on short notice."

"Thank you for having me. It's an honor."

"Having you protect me, surely I am the honored one."

His smile was dazzling, and Lux thought absentmindedly that he must be very popular with women. She dipped her head.

"I will see you for the departure to Freljordt then.", she said.

Something was wrong with Harriet.

"I look forward to it."

Harriet had disappeared into thin air, it seemed. She was nowhere to find, and after a few minutes of scanning the place, Lux had to accept that the other woman either didn't want to be found or had already left to go home.

Benji and Evan were waiting for her at the gate, and she sighed.

"Have you guys seen Harriet?"

"No, thought she was with you?", Evan retorted, and Lux shook her head.

"The crown prince held me up and when I got out, she was gone."

Benji looked up from his wallet. "Gone? We wanted to go for beers after this."

The feeling of uneasiness rose again in Lux, and for a second, she found herself look around for old ladies or ravens, but she found neither.

"Yeah. Said something about being tired. Honestly, she was pissed ever since the damn barrier nearly come down."

Lux was about to turn to walk through the gate when she caught both Evan and Benji staring at her in confusion.

"What are you talking about?" he asked.

"On your end, I mean. Benji, since you came and got her for help, she almost acted like she wasn't herself. Didn't talk to me, didn't -"

She stopped when she realized Benji was staring at her with wide eyes.

"Please tell me this is a poor joke.", he said, and Lux shook her head, feeling the panic rise in her at his words, his expression—somehow she knew what he was about to say, but she still staggered backwards—

"Lux, I haven't left my post for the entire day."

Lux felt as if somebody had dipped her entire head in iced water. It was Evan who spoke out loud what Lux was thinking.

"Fuck."

They ran back to the podium, knowing well that it had been hours. Somebody had impersonated Benji, had come and gotten Harriet—and after that, Harriet had acted oddly. Like she wasn't herself, Lux had said it herself. Like the woman who had stood beside her for hours after that had been an imposter.

Harriet had mentioned the black rose in fleeting to Lux the day before. Harriet had ties to a black magic clan, had told about fearing them—and she had been worried about black mages for the festival.

She hadn't been worried about the prince, Lux thought with the horrible clarity of somebody who watched the puzzle fall into place too late.

Harriet had worried about her own safety.

And she had disappeared hours ago.

They barged back into the rooms behind the podium, and the king's guard was still there, standing around the prince chatting. Over one of them pulled their weapons at the sight of the arrivals, but Lux didn't allow them any time to question.

"Red alarm!", she shouted from afar. The rest of them pulled their weapons. Good, Lux thought. "There's an intruder, possibly more, using illusion magic. Harriet Lee, our guard's leader, was impersonated, likely disappeared hours ago. Get the prince out of here and then help us search."

Nobody questioned her. Maybe it was instinct, maybe the king's guard knew that she had led a team in the war, and they hadn't, that she was still better equipped to handle situations like these, because they did exactly what she said.

She allowed herself to watch them for a second, forced herself to calm down. Panic wouldn't get her anywhere, and she couldn't fucking think with fear floating her brain like this. She took a deep breath.

Harriet couldn't have been brought off from the festival place. The staff knew her and would have stopped her. That meant she needed to be somewhere here. Where would one hide an unconscious—or dead, her mind supplemented darkly, but she pushed the thought away—body? The imposter had done whatever they had meant to accomplish; they hadn't cared about keeping up the ruse afterwards.

That meant Harriet was likely in a room that wouldn't be accessed until the end of the festival.

"The storage rooms.", Lux said. "We need to check the storage rooms."

"We can't split up.", Benji said, and she nodded. Wherever the imposter was, they couldn't confirm that they had left the place, so they couldn't leave any of them alone.

"Then we check every room in order.", Lux pressed out, and took out her staff, summoning shield around each of them and then herself. She didn't have to order any of them to draw their weapons, either. Benji was holding two daggers, and Evan had his sword out.

They found her in one of the smaller storage rooms, where the stands for food were stored. She was handing from the ceiling, her hands tied above her head, unmoving. The smell of blood filled the room.

Lux knew what she would see as she summoned the light, but she did so anyway. Harriet was dead, cuts and bruises all over her body. A small puddle of blood had formed under her. It already dried at the edges. Her hands were a bloody mess, and with an icy shiver Lux realized that somebody had pulled out every single one of her fingernails.

The worst was her face, or what was left of it. There was a huge, black rune drawn across her mouth, that Lux could translate even without particular knowledge in runes herself—it meant silence.

Harriet's eyes were wide open.

"She was tortured to death here. While we stood on our posts.", Lux whispered, feeling sick. She should have known, when the imposter had come back, she had that feeling that something was weird, she should have rung the alarm, likely Harriet had still been alive by then, she could have saved her -

Her train of thoughts was interrupted when Benji threw up violently. Evan, face white as a sheet, was rubbing his back.

"We ought to get her down.", Evan said, voice shaking, and Lux nodded.