[Fan fiction] Shadows and Sunlight Part III

It's Friday, that means another entry in my ongoing fan fiction series, "Shadows and Sunlight". Also, I promise to ignore my other work for the next hour or so to hang out in Fan Creations.

Here's some boilerplate though. Don't recognize the boilerplate? That probably means you missed part one and part two; I recommend checking them out before reading on.

I love the League of Legends world; stories of Runeterra, her cities and her characters, are fascinating. Like most players, I'm not on the narrative team. But, like a few of us, I dabble in short stories and novellas whose main characters are League champions.

Sharing my own stories is my attempt at finding a consistent meeting place and time for players who love lore, narrative and the craft of writing to get together and let our imaginations get all new age-y, running wild.

As a reminder, I am not a member of the narrative team. My words are as canonical as they are upside down and backward. Which is to say, not at all. In fact, I probably go off-canon at points. But I won't waste any more of your time, here's the next section of my fan fiction, "Shadows and Sunlight."

###The story so far…

####When Katarina du Couteau, a fiery-haired young assassin, learns that a noxious Noxian nobleman named Anton Swain is kidnapping girls from the Sinister Blade, the school Katarina only recently graduated, she crashes one of his black masquerades.

####After defeating his guards with the help of fellow student Evanie White, Katarina's challenge against Anton is interrupted by her father, General Marcus du Couteau, the only noble to hold that rank in the military. She's carted off by Darius Navek, the Hand of Noxus, and awaits an audience with her father.

##Shadows and Sunlight ###Part III: Pirates and Prisons

A wide glass dome encloses one roof of Ebonclaw Manor's three spires. Across a short span, the Nest crowning the Rookery stirs a hundred rustling ravens blossoming into a dark cloud casting a shadow over the sky.

General Jericho Swain eschewed a traditional library or study, preferring to strategize under the stars. He struggled across the mirrored floor, prodding his way with his crooked cane towards the young woman sprawled languid along a lounge chaise.

"It is a profound wish of mine, captain," he said as he approached her, "that these daily intrusions of yours would cease. If not on the third attempt, surely by the ninth."

"I have nothing but time, general. And my name is Sarah, not Shirley."

Swain scoffed, descending at a snail's pace to rest in the high-seated 'tovian recliner.

She leaned forward, "Time and a great deal of military surplus and a few truly unique treasures I'm still more than confident you should be interested in seeing."

"You've misplaced your confidence, miss," Jericho chuckled, adjusting his weight to his seat instead of his cane. The chair protested, groaning loud in the echoing chamber. "My answer is no different now than it was two weeks ago."

Ravens rushed in through a hole in the dome, pecking noisily at the feeding troughs. Swain reached inside his robes to produce a few stray bits of fruit among the dusty cotton balls that kept nibblers away. One particularly large bird perched atop his shoulder, picking through the pieces in Swain's hand to nab the largest morsel.

"Sadly, the volume of my wares is. I'm running low on supplies and even lower on goods worth selling. I promised you something you hadn't seen before." She stood up, her heels lifting her even higher above from Swain's slumped form. "I'm breaking at least two of my own rules, general, but I brought a sample with me."

Jericho arched a wispy, fading eyebrow. He gave heaped scorn into a stare directed at shadows behind the pillars lining the dome. "I'm surprised the Nightravens let you pass with contraband on your person."

Sarah's wry grin slipped wider as she jostled the chest she'd been sitting beside with her ankle. She stood one foot on it, "There are a lot of places to hide contraband on a person."

"Clever, but not compelling," Jericho said, swallowing and looking away. "Your time is up."

Sarah sprung back, hoisting the container in front of her, proffering its contents. "Don't you want to see what's inside my treasure chest?"

She opened it, pulling a burnished cup from the felt lining. Swain took hold of the strange, shimmering bronze goblet. As he lifted it, he seemed to stand taller in the grim green light of the blackfire torches.

"An athenic grail," he murmured, examining it, turning it over in his hands. The raven on his shoulder cocked its head, pecking at the metal. "Marcel's Artifacts of an Antique Age mentions one. But it's a reference to another text, not a primary source."

"Hmm, well. I deliver on my promises."

"So it seems, child." He ran his fingers across the etchings in the chalice. "It appears you actually may. What else do you have?"

"What, exactly, has that blighted school done to you, girl?" General Marcus du Couteau, the master of his house, last living male of his line. Walls lined with cartographic depictions of his military victories, bookcases stacked with volumes upon volumes of tactics, strategy, diplomacy and a section on magic kept in the shadows. Katarina knew her bladecraft and parlor tricks did not stand up to the eldritch power in those tomes.

Her father went on. "Anton Swain's tapped to escort your sister and you crash his party, threaten not only to slit his throat, but expose his perversion to the entire court? All of whom, it should be noted, are fully crying aware of it already!" His face was flushed in the orange glow from the fire. He'd practically spit on her.

She composed herself. "Even if Evanie told one of the guards to find you, you still arrived too fast. You were watching me."

Her father didn't speak. His eyes bore into hers.

"No, I understand. You were watching him. You knew about the masquerades. Following up on intelligence, like a proper general. You weren't going to let Cass be trapped with that lazy, bloodvirgin hedonist."

"But you," Marcus rapped his knuckles on the grey ash table," you weren't there for your sister, were you?"

It was Katarina's turn to be silent.

"When you expose a man's secrets, kreshnaya, his hidden weakness, it is far better to exploit it yourself. Leaving him open to your rivals costs a victory as surely as a spoiled supply train. But this one. This one would have debased your sister. My youngest daughter. And far from here. So sure, he would have been, that there'd be no repercussions." Marcus paused to circle the room, silence gathering in the gloom. Letters littered tables, candles flickered as the wind passed through an open window.

"The world is deadly and wide," he whispered.

"Killing any Swain has consequences," she observed. "Even one so inconsequential."

"With Jericho involved, we are already mired in consequences. We just can't see them yet."

"That's comforting, father."

"In any case, that was before he threatened you. Before he attempted to kill you. Anton Swain," he spat. Katarina backed away from the table, looking over a bookcase filled with half-finished efforts Marcus had made of writing memoirs. "Jericho is not emperor. Not even Grand General."

Katarina glanced back at her father. She tilted her head, "True. And none of Anton's guards could dance with me. And Anton showed none of the makings of a decent partner. I could challenge him again, away from the loopholes he used during the party."

"It's far easier than that, daughter." Marcus du Couteau rose from the high-backed goldenwood chair. "A tribunal has been convened. I will prosecute courts martial." He walked around the desk until he stood beside her.

"Courts martial? Who else is on trial?"

Marcus raised his hand to her shoulder.

"Kreshnaya, you penetrated his security, ascended the roof of his manor house, shattered an enormous, and alledgedly enormously expensive, skylight, killed seven of his allegedly enormously expensive guards, and were about to kill him before I broke down the door."

Katarina whistled the tune to the Noxian funeral dirge. "So," she paused to say. "You're saying I'm the other one on trial, huh?"