Our Hidden Blades

Asleep

Katarina wandered back to the camp just after the sun had set. She'd fallen asleep in the tree after some inner fight with herself about what's right, what's wrong, and asking herself about love. What is love? Who is love? Is it a person, or a thing? Does it describe something, or is it a feeling? Her knowledge of the word love was only very vague - especially seeing love as a sign of weakness and a cry for someone to take care of them. Katarina couldn't put her mind to that - she was too strong, too independent. But with Garen, she felt like... maybe she would let him. He was capable. He was strong. On top of that, he knew not to underestimate her power. He was her rival, her enemy, yet at the same time... very much so her ally. She could see the two of them working well together... doing whatever it may be that she imagined. It was a thought that made her face red and her chest tight, but also made her angry and confused. Just where Garen stood with her, she wasn't quite sure...

She walked into the camp, hands playing with her hair. She was suddenly concerned with how she looked - was her hair a mess, tangled and matted? It felt just as confused as she was. Katarina sighed as her eyes fell upon the shirtless warrior of Demacia - sleeping away, as if the duration of the day had been composed of war after war, battle scar after battle scar.

She watched as his chest rose and fell, her blue eyes filling with her hidden appreciation of him. Slowly, Katarina sat next to the warrior, pursing her lips as she took in his face again. Her hand extended shakily to his forehead and her fingers began to play with the soft hair along his hairline. She sat there for what felt like hours, her heart beating hard against her chest and her breathing becoming constricted with nervousness. She was afraid he might wake up - push her away with those large hands, leave her in the forest, alone.

Garen awoke to a pressure against his chest - it was normal for him. Sometimes he fell asleep in his armor, especially on drunken nights when he'd literally pass out.

Under the impression that he was still wearing his armor, the exiled warrior of Demacia began to lift the armor off him, feeling for the smooth angled metal that adorned his chest. His fingers traced the soft surface as he kept his foggy eyes closed. He felt along the surface and reached his fingertips for the corner of the armor, yet it just ended like that - soft... almost like skin...

It wasn't often that he awoke with a human upon him. Maybe once a month, after another one of those drunken nights, he would find a woman in his bed - snoring, groaning, mumbling to herself in a disgusting, unappealing, and obviously hungover manner.

Garen never liked his drunken taste in women - they were never to his real taste, it was never refined. It was as if he didn't experience the night at all.

Garen sighed, still confused and groggy, as his eyes opened. A morning sky met him, shafts of light beckoning to him through the openings between the leaves of large trees. Birds chirped and he listened as animals stirred. His hand remained on the bit of skin he'd been analyzing in his mind, lingering.

Confusion only grew for the warrior. Wasn't he exiled? Locked away within the confines of Demacia for days, then sent straight to the forest, given an "assignment" he knew was only an excuse to get rid of him, yet still have him on hand when needed. It was a sad, very poor excuse - he didn't believe it for a minute. Jarvan didn't even look like he himself believed what he was ordering. Garen could still see it in his eyes, the look his best friend of so many years had given him. He was disappointed in his choices, but he had known all along. Everyone who was there - at that first fight where Katarina and Garen fought - everyone knew that Garen had fallen in love with her. The red haired assassin of Noxus, his sworn enemy of Demacia, had captured his heart the second she put a sneaky blade against his throat and whispered a taunt into his ear. It was his dream to live a world without the factions - one with her, though she had killed many friend, colleague, and leader. It was his dream to feel his lips on her skin and the way her nails would feel, digging into him as she sighed within the touch of passion...

Garen stared into the sky above him, remembering his assignment to the forest. He happily recalled just the day before... when she'd turned up, out of the blue, looking upset but still trying to act tough. How cute it was when her eyes had searched for a weapon, as if he was a threat. He certainly was, but how could he hurt her, when she had nothing to protect herself with? At times he felt like she was a toy for him, and at other times he felt like she thought him a toy for herself. It was almost fulfilling to be able to switch roles as they had, playing captured and captor.

A sound brought him back to the world of reality. A hushed sigh broke the rhythm of the forest and the pressure among Garen's chest shifted.

Shock filled the warrior. The feeling of skin, yet he was in the forest, exiled? The sigh of a woman, yet he was in a forest, exiled? The pressure and shift of sleeping body, yet he was in a forest - Garen slowly brought his eyes down to his chest, lifting himself slightly to see the image. Using his chest as a pillow, a mess of long red hair lay against him, tangled around the face of an enemy and lover.

Katarina's eyes were closed, her mouth slightly ajar. Garen gaped at the image as if she was a million year old painting which had been lost at sea, then recovered after six-hundred years.

The feud between the two - their rivalry - had lasted what felt nearly as long. Every time they put a sword against one-another's throat, nearly won in the effort for death and life, each would falter. Daggers would "slip" - as if such a famous assassin was capable of such a clumsy mistake. Garen's sword would "miss" it's target - as if such a well-trained warrior could miss a swing so close-by. Sometimes they gave it to one another - getting caught purposely, making rookie mistakes. They played with one another whenever on the battlefield, and the knowledge of this made Garen thirst for the same interactions, over and over again... and more.

Garen could feel his chest becoming tight at the thoughts, the images, the heat Katarina created within his mind and body. He wondered how many times he would be so lucky to wake up to this beautiful assassin before Demacia would catch news of Katarina's remaining in the forest. He felt that maybe it was better that she leave - find a new home, maybe nearby, yet not so close. Maybe this way she could return and leave again, without anyone having to find out about their secret interactions with one another. Could he be so lucky to live like that? Would Katarina even want to return? Well, she had returned overnight, hadn't she? Fallen asleep right next to him, so close and so vulnerable that if he wanted to he could let himself set a hand on her delicate, but deadly, blood-red hair.

Katarina's eyes drifted awake as Garen watched her. It was about time she wake up anyway - the sun was rising quickly and made its way one-forth of the way through the sky.

He knew she wouldn't react well to having fallen asleep on him, now using him as a drooling-rag and pillow. Sighing, the warrior attempted to slowly remove the assassin from on top of him.

Katarina's eyes opened quickly, shocked by the pressure being applied which lifted her slightly off the ground and back down again. Katarina was soon sitting on her knees, panic in her eyes.

Garen sighed, only resentful of her having awoken. He enjoyed her sleeping figure. He tried to carve it into his mind.

Who knew when he'd get to see such beauty once more?