Chapter 12 – Separated Lanes
Katarina couldn`t sleep that day. Even her sister were snoring lightly on her side of bed, while Talon stood on the edge of the window, keeping an eye outside sliding the covers slowly aside so he can see what`s going on in the slum`s main road.
"Talon?" The red haired rolls in bed facing Talon`s back. She would ask more things, but he could be mad at her or plotting something behind her back. She tried hard to ignore her doubts when he returned in the mansion, but now she feels like asking for answers. "Talon. What do you hide from us?" Her soft voice was enough to wake Cassiopeia, but not enough for her snake sister to bother turning around.
"You want to know?" He sounds cold as always watching the street.
"Y-Yes." Katarina was afraid of his attitude at this point. A thin thought run through her mind that she might be guilty too, but she fights against her wrath and gets up from bed, keeping her knees in her palms. Her eyes were dull and apparently sad. "What did my father tell to you before he disappeared?"
"Mhm." His attention was in the street. He saw some kids trying to rob an old man and he remembers about his childhood in the slums. He didn`t want to sound like hurt for any reason, so he thought about the military general and his brother Draven. "Come closer." He longs his arm for Katarina to come at him and takes a look on window. "See those kids? Darius used to be like them too. He used to rob and fight his own way on the noxian rotten streets. Now you respect him as the military general. He and his brother dealt this misery, but today they are ones of the best noxian soldiers." He paused as Katarina was already hugged by his arm. She was silent looking outside the window. "...while you had everything being the daughter of the ex military general of Noxus." He turns his face at her looking from close up. That scar wasn`t a big deal in his opinion. He had worst scars on all over his back, a few on arms and the rest of his body. It wasn`t the actual training with her father, but the real struggle working for Swain all this time. When the strategist thought it`s enough, he asked for Talon`s head without mercy.
"Strong noxian soldiers grew up from slums on the hard way." She keeps staring at the kids out there. She might not know the struggle, but she could understand it.
"Also I am glad you forget about the demacian Garen. Being young and foolish is something normal for a young woman." Talon shrugs keep staring at her scar.
"Ugh..." She didn`t mind him looking at her from a close distance, yet she didn`t find it intimidating or flirtuos. Her usual anger on him mocking with her will burst out but she couldn`t say an word.
"Demacia is a lighter place than Noxus." He started again to make differences, but her expression look lost, so he added something about Garen instead. In Talon`s eyes, Katarina looked like day dreaming even if she stares at him, he felt inferior than the demacian. "Crownguard is his family name and he is one of the strongest soldiers of Demacia."
Cassiopeia lifts from bed curling her snake tail and ignoring the two in the room. "Can I go in Shurima?"
The red haired recovers from her absorbed disillusion being so close of Talon. At this moment she realized she didn`t listen much to his words, she was just staying near him. "Cass!" She gasps.
"If Black Rose people wore demacian armours, then Noxus will start fight against Demacia. I don`t want to be part of the war! Please, Kat, I want to leave in any second!" Her voice was whining knowing she is not trained like her sister and Talon.
A few days later, in Riven`s bar, Black Rose members started to talk about Le Blanc`s death. Riven could swear it`s a trick, but it wasn`t her problem so she ignored them. Yasuo stood on the edge of the bar stand holding his jaw like understanding Riven without commenting a thing.
Talon and Katarina helps Cassiopeia to climb into a merchant car that travels in dessert. Just as the red head and the snake woman kisses and hugs for a long lost goodbye, some noxian soldiers tracked Talon down and the women broke the embrace brutally. The car started to roll as fast as the soldiers arrived.
Talon didn`t complain and goes with the soldiers, pushing Katarina away from their way. "I don`t know this woman." He shrugs at them being helped by her disguise raged clothes. Deep inside, he wanted Katarina to understand him at least this time.
She didn`t know what happened exactly, but her eyes search for someone as Talon left her in slums street all alone.
At Riven`s bar, the white haired exiled heard the news and welcomes Katarina in. She offered a spare room where Yasuo used to stay in the first place and gave her clothes and food. She planned to join their war and break their fun. Thought no one talked about Talon betraying Noxus, so she would hang the broken sword one more time for a friend. Despite that Yasuo wasn`t implied in her state business, so he didn`t have to know what she planed.
"Yasuo, I might be going for a few days or maybe more..." She gave him a warm carefree smile, keeping her sword in one of her packages. "I will keep the ring you gave to me in case I lose my way." She allows Katarina to look at them when they have a departure goodbye. In the red head`s face could be sensed pain and fear.
"Just... promise you`ll return, Riven." Yasuo said reading her mind.
"Don`t worry!" She waved carefree as she departures together with Du Couteau`s daughter.
Noxus was ready for battle. All those cruel faced men holding their axes started to move to the specific location of the ambush. A pale dirty figure moved in their back as the autumn wind blows her rags as warning. It was Riven. She starts from the back of the crowd, ripping legs and arms like a mad hurricane. "You better stay out of me, general!" She roars at Darius who was chilling with his brother in the front lines.
"And what these people done to you, Riven?" He clenches his fists in his axe. He didn`t mind drinking at her place. War was the important part of his life.
"Are you... the bunny from bar?" Draven lifts an eyebrow curiously aiming his axes in her way. She dodges them, not answering, just fighting. "Hey! I`m talking to you!" The general`s brother growls getting into a close up fight with the white haired woman, while Darius stood in front line analyzing the real situation.
"They... They took Talon!" She kicks Draven at a certain distance shouting at him and preparing her huge sword.
He didn`t know what she was talking about, so he thought only about himself. "Eh? Are you planning to cut my head off?" He smirks at her rubbing his mustache.
"Only your mustache." She gives him a cold stare and from the other side, Darius waved his axe to gain her attention.
"And Katarina is now talking to Swain." The noxian general`s raw attitude made Riven stop for a moment. He was smart, he knew that the both noxian women parted their ways when they arrived in the capital. He assumed it right that Katarina went to investigate, while ambitious Riven will come on the battlefield to revenge the noxian assasin Talon. "Step aside, Draven. Riven is an exiled from Noxus. I am the one taking care of her." He comes closer ready to kill.
"Alright then, Darius." Riven shrugs with an expected desire to fight a worth opponent.
But to Darius illusion, Katarina didn`t run into Swain, she went through the guards inside the underground jail. It was a cold and watery metallic corridor till she reached his cell. She could feel Talon`s misery in silence as he was facing the dirty floor. He might hear someone breathing in front of his cell, but he didn`t bother to lift head.
"Talon?" Katarina looks up excited to see him in that way. Her mind plays with her, but she knew it wasn`t the right moment to start a fight. "What happened?"
"Hm. So you come after me?" He smirks in his pain as she assumed they beat him up before caging him.
"I couldn`t be a bad sister for you, could I?" She tries to hide a sole laugh, but her eyes were more exited to see him in this situation. She would shout that he deserves everything because he was a liar to her and her sister. "Now tell me, Talon! What have you done?"
"Stuffs..." He laughs too in his own pain, as he lifts his head showing blood and bruises.
"Too bad your marks won`t be permanent as my scar." She shrugs crossing her arms.
"Why are you here, Kat?"
"...to save you?" She tilts head, but she wasn`t sure about that, she only agreed to help Riven. Riven was the one who wanted to rescue him, not her. So he knew that Katarina wasn`t sure about her family feelings for him, so he let her be. He didn`t mind being locked inside the noxian prison. He knew very well that an assasin and also a spy for Du Couteau family can`t be forgiven or spared. Not even Du Couteau remaining siblings can`t afford to know his secret and all he did for them.
"...too bad then. You wasted your time coming here." He laughs in her face with deep hate that he couldn`t express in her face. "You better leave, Kat. Here is no place for you." As he finished his last sentence, a group of soldiers came right in and lifts her up.
Katarina didn`t see much things, but one soldier remained near Talon`s cell. She could swear that soldier was a female. The red haired instantly thought wrong and goes jealous.