Author's notes:
Her, it's my gift for xNekorux's birthday.
I hope you'll enjoy that short story.
Link to the xNekorux's profile (if someone doesn't know her = she's one of the greatest ff authors I have encountered, and have a pleasure to read):
/users/xNekorux
When Ashe opened her eyes, she felt lost. The white-haired queen woke up in a room filled with darkness. She was sitting on a chair; her hands were cuffed. Her entire frame was tied to the furniture preventing the queen from moving even for a single inch. After a few seconds, she felt immense pain. The source of the pounding sensation was her forehead. With every passing moment, the pain was more and more difficult to ignore. The Freljord's queen tried to focus, tried to figure out how to break or loosen the biding bounds, how to escape. With all the might she could muster, she pulled the cuffs. The try was futile. If it was possible, the ties stack even firmer. She hadn't expected that to work. It would be all too easy. Ashe allowed herself to sigh and wait for a couple of seconds before she tried again. The white-haired woman gritted her teeth during the attempt, focusing all the remaining strengths towards her wrists. Suddenly, the new wave of pain struck her. The scream couldn't have been muffed in time. She screamed at the top of her lungs. The pain was immense as if someone or something was cutting her with knife piece by piece. The queen of the north could feel the blood leaking from the wounds on her wrists. Immediately she felt weaker as if the blood loss lasted not seconds but minutes or even longer. Her breath was shallow, she was exhausted, her heart was pounding like a bell. Within moments, she blacked out.
The sounds of footsteps nearby woke the queen up. The dream she woken up from was horrible. Maybe it was just a nightmare, but it felt so real. Ashe's clothes were sticking to her body. She was entirely covered in sweat. Its smell hit her nostrils a moment later. With every passing moment, the sound of firm footsteps was closer and closer. After a minute or so, the door leading the room was opened. The slim ray of bright light appeared in the darkness. In the doorway stood a woman, but the white-haired couldn't describe her with details. For her, she was just a shadow with the curves of a woman. Soon after the opening of the door, she heard the snap of the finger. Out of nowhere, the room she was held captive was filled with light that was blinding her.
"My, my, my," the stranger started in a low tone. "Look at you, the mighty queen of the north tied down to a chair," she chuckled. "You're waiting like a lamb prepared for slaughter, you know?"
"Who are you? Where am I?" Ashe asked. A fraction of her panic could be heard in her voice.
"Oh … I'm more than sure that you know who I am," came the response followed by another chuckle. "Pardon, it's rude of me not to come close, maybe it will help you identify me."
The woman closed the distance between them in a matter of a few firm steps. She put her hands on the cuffs, lowered herself, stared straight into the eyes of the tied-down queen. The oppressor's hair was bloody-red, her face had noble features, her lips were pink and kissable twisted into the smirk. Her eyes were of the color of the cleanest emerald, they were intoxicating. It took Ashe a moment or two to notice the most important details of the woman's face. There was a scare that was passing through the right eyes of the redhead. At that very moment, there was no more doubt in the queen's mind. In front of her, Katarina Du Couteau was standing. So, in the end, it was not a dream, it was not a nightmare, it was a reality.
"What do you want from me, scum!" The white-haired woman growled.
"My, my, my, you really called me a scum? I freed you from your burden," the redhead smiled mischievously.
"You killed my husband, you killed my guards, you killed my people!" The queen shouted.
"Do you want me to kill you too?" Katarina asked, lowering herself even more. "Did you really love him, or was it all just a political pact that gave you the throne?"
"I swore before my gods that I will bear his children and that I will rule fairly. You destroyed all of it," the white-haired queen spat.
"Do you know that he had lovers in nearly every village in your oh so precious kingdom?" The assassin asked in a whisper-like tone.
"You are lying!"
"Am I? Think about it for a second, at least, would it explain why he was leaving the capital so often?"
"He was a king, his deeds forced him to leave."
"Cutie, it's all lies," the redhead chuckled. "He was seeing many women, some of them are even pregnant now. Have you ever wondered why some part of the royal treasury got lost? I know the answer, and you won't like it. He used it to pay those women, to secure them right living conditions."
"Haven't you hurt me enough yet?" Ashe asked. "Why are you telling me all of this, why are you trying to convince me that he was cheating on me?"
"You're a pretty, little thing, queen," Katarina started. "You know that?"
"What do you mean?"
"Oh … come on," the assassin giggled while leaning in. " You're a very unique woman ... at least, for me."
"You … you destroyed my life. Why did you do that?" The white-haired mumbled.
"There are many reasons …" the assassin whispered. "The first one, the most obvious one, it was a direct order."
"Pfff, I don't believe it," Ashe replied.
"You don't need to. The more important question is whether it changes anything at all?"
"You're going to kill me, right?"
"Only if you really want me to do so," Katarina responded and flashed a shy smile.
"You're sick," the queen spat. "What were the other reasons?"
"Hmm … I see the way he treated you … and I think he didn't truly know what a treasure he had so close to him. Long story short, I killed him because of the way he cheated on you."
"Are you going to just fall down to your knees and tell me how much you value me, how much you love me? You're pathetic, you had no right to take my life away from me."
"Maybe … maybe not. We'll see, but for now, it's clear to me that you don't want to live without your husband, who was just a piece of shit. Do you really want to lose your life because of him?" Katarina whispered directly into the ear of the tied down woman. "Or maybe, you want me to tell you what the situation really looked like?"
"I have nothing but the time, at least for now. Tell me everything," Ashe ordered.
"As you wish, cutie," the assassin chuckled. "Where should I begin?"
"As always, from the very beginning," the queen responded in a cold voice.
"Ahhh, don't use that voice on me," the redhead replied. "It only makes it more difficult for me to focus on the story. It's just turning me on. It's so intoxicating."
"You're joking, right?"
"Nope, I mean what I said."
"And it seems that this situation is getting weirder and weirder, apparently."
"I told you, you're unique to me," the Noxian soldier provided a response.
"Get back to the main topic, can you?"
"Gash, sometimes you're no fun at all," Katarina started. "But, fine. I was deployed at Freljord."
"What for?"
"You know that those pieces of information are top secret?" The redhead chuckled.
"Katarina!"
"Fine, fine. As you can see, you're affecting me too much," the assassin joked. "The main goal of that mission was to create some havoc in your capital. But, in fact, it was more. I was to leave a trail that would put the blame on Ionia."
"You're obviously lying," the white-haired summed up latter's statement.
"How do you know that? Why are you so sure?"
"First of all, you wouldn't be sent alone. Secondly, the very moment you would tell the truth, your commanders would know that, and I'm pretty sure they would be displeased."
"Look at you, Ashe, the queen, the smart-ass," Katarina responded ironically.
"I was right, wasn't I?"
"You have a point," the emerald-eyed beauty admitted. "I'm here just because of you."
"What do you want from me?"
"You should already know what I want," the assassin whispered, leaning in even more.
"You want me solely for yourself?"
"Bingo, I want you, and I always get what I want."
"You have your opportunity, I can't move."
"Let me give you a sample. I won't hurt you, I did what I did just because I needed to."
Katarina didn't waste any time. As soon as her last words were said, she sat on the queen's laps and cupped the white-haired chin. She leaned in, but the moment the distance between their lips was pretty much none-existing, the assassin hesitated. It was a completely new sensation to the redhead. She had never hesitated before. After all, her life was kinda simple. All she had to was to obey orders. But, this time, it felt different. Maybe for the first time in her life, Katarina had a choice, she could do whatever she wanted. To some extent, it terrified her.
"I knew you were a coward," the white-haired woman spat.
"I … I'm not a coward," the assassin replied, but there was none confidence in her voice.
"Yeah, like I would believe you."
It hurt, the simple sentence hurt her. Ashe was right. In fact, Katarina Du Couteau was a coward. All her life, the redhead was shielding herself by the orders. The young woman wasn't thinking who she was about to kill, someone marked that person as a target, so the marked one must die. To be perfectly honest, it was that simple.
"I thought that you and that Demacian brute had a thing, or did I receive the wrong info?" The tied-down woman asked suddenly.
"It was all fake," the latter responded. "I secluded him cause I needed particular information."
"What info?"
"About you, about your land about your people."
"You seem obsessed with me. Should I be flattered, or should I start worrying about my life?"
"As I said, I'm not going to kill you, I don't want to," the emerald-eyed woman sighed. "Look, me and Garen were never a thing. I kissed him, I let him believe that I care about him only because I needed something from him. Or to be more specific, I wanted something that his family possessed."
"You stole the dagger that sealed the demon that was living in my husband, did I guess it?"
"It seems that your people were telling the truth that you more than just a pretty face. Not that I doubt that, but still, I'm impressed," the blood-haired woman admitted.
"You must have been planning that for a long time," Ashe said in a low tone.
"Months, maybe even more. I needed every single part of my plan to be flawless. There was no room for an error."
"You do you," the queen sighed. "You want to kiss me, go ahead, I'm not even able to prevent you from doing so."
Something inside the mind of the assassin clicked. She was still just a mere millimetres away from the delicious looking lips of the queen. Katarina licked her dry lips before finally vanishing that none-existing gap. The redhead started with a small peck. As soon as he planted it, she backed off, seeking the reaction. To her utter surprise, nearly instantly, she spotted that the white-haired bit her lower lip and closed her eyes. The queen looked so innocent, so precious, it was driving the blood-haired woman insane. But, it was also turning her on as well. Without much thinking, she leaned in again. This time, she let the kiss last longer. Katarina was so shocked when the tied-down woman returned the action. The assassin licked the lower lip of the latter, asking for permission. Unexpectedly, it was swiftly granted.
The queen tried to get as close to the Noxian as she possibly could. It didn't make any sense, but she enjoyed the sensation, she truly loved the kiss they were sharing. It was intoxicating, the more it lasted, the more she wanted. Damned be the cuffs, damned be the ropes, all she wanted in that very moment was to hold the woman who destroyed her life in her arms. She wanted to kiss her, maybe even more than that.
"Untie me, untie me, or I'm going to go insane," the moan-like words escaped the throat of the white-haired woman.
"You want that, or you want me to untie you to give you a chance to escape?"
"Kiss me, and then decide," Ashe moaned.
"What changed your mind? Merely a moment ago, you didn't even want to talk to me, or kiss me."
"It seemed that you're indeed intoxicating for me," the queen replied. "Don't get me wrong, I'm still mad at you that you did all of that to capture my attention, but later you can prove that you aren't lying."
"Later?"
"For now, I want another kiss, and then another, and so on and on," the white-haired giggled. "Show me what you got, Miss Du Couteau."
"I'll be my pleasure," Katarina responded, capturing the sweet lips of Ashe. "Will you all me to make you feel good?"
"Haha … of course, but for now, behave and obey my orders. And I order you to kiss your queen the best you can."
"Yes … I would love to."
