Chapter Text
7
“Violet!”
Startled in her mad dash through the foliage, Vi tripped on a root and hit her head against a rocky patch of soil. The world spun and blurred as she groaned in pain.
“Found you,” the governor’s daughter giggled. She dropped to her stomach next to her, but her smile fell at the sight of Vi’s miserable pout. “Your face!”
Vi hissed when she touched the bump on her forehead. “Ow!”
“Sorry,” the girl said, and then gave her a toothy grin. “Goose egg.”
“Whatdiya call me?” Vi grumped, sitting up with crossed arms. She could hear the other children screaming all around them, their game of hide-and-seek reaching soaring heights in the governor’s sprawling yard.
“Does it hurt?”
“No!” Vi felt a gentle finger prod at the bump again.
“It’s not going back in.”
Vi sniffled as her eyes filled with tears.
“It does hurt!” the governor's daughter gasped.
“Does not,” Vi mumbled, feeling the sting spread.
“I know a trick. May I try it?”
Vi looked at the girl she had only met this morning. It was her birthday and Vi had been invited, along with many important people’s children. Vi wasn’t important, she knew, but Vander had started working for the governor and they’d received an invitation regardless.
“Try what you want.” Vi wiped her nose with the back of her scraped hand. Her heart suddenly squeezed in her chest as the girl met her eyes and cupped her cheeks.
Caitlyn Kiramman was the prettiest girl she had ever seen. She was missing her two front teeth but it didn’t matter, her smile was like the sun in the summer days. Her long hair was blue like the sea in the moonlight and her eyes were brighter than the lagoon.
Her hands were soft and—
Oh, she kissed the bump. Vi felt her cheeks go red. Her heartbeat thumped in her ears.
“Did it work?” Caitlyn asked with a furrowed brow. “You look like a beet.”
Vi fell back, grinning at the sky. She wasn't sure how much time had passed before Caitlyn lay down beside her, hand brushing against hers.
“Can I stay with you, Violet? Everyone is so loud.”
The palm trees and ferns swayed gently around them. Vi smelled sugar and salt in the air, the best of all worlds. Caitlyn Kiramman had kissed her on the most beautiful day of the year. She covered her hand with hers.
“It’s Vi. You can stay with me until the sea empties.”
9
While the Kirammans taught their daughter how to shoot, Vander taught Vi how to swordfight. Her sister Powder was five and watched them from the wooden bench of the smithy, her raggedy monkey in her arms.
“You know how to use it, but do you know how to craft it?” Vander later asked. There was sweat on his brow and Vi wondered if she’d finally managed to tire him out, swinging from the beams and the iron chains.
He showed her the deadly embers of the forge, how to strike iron and steel, how to shape the rapiers and cutlasses. Powder stayed on the bench, listening without listening, too young to care, but too attached to her sister to leave.
“This is honest work,” Vander said as he picked up a hammer. “You’ll be sought out by governors; by merchants; maybe even kings and queens if you hone your skill. It’ll get you anywhere.”
Vi knew why he insisted, but she missed the smell of sea salt and wood. The pirate blood thrummed in her veins. She wondered if Powder felt it too. If she remembered their parents’ ship.
11
“Vi, I can't sleep.”
Vi shifted to her side and cracked an eye open. Her sister looked small and scared, with her arms tight around her monkey. Vi patted the space beside her.
Powder climbed up on the bed and beneath the sheet. She wrapped an arm around Vi’s waist, her face pressed against her shoulder.
“Pow?”
Vi’s stomach dropped when Powder started to cry. Whimpers at first and then sobs.
“What’s wrong? No monster’s gonna get ya. I’m right here.”
“It’s not a monster. It’s a pirate.”
“Oh? What’s he look like then? I bet his breath stinks.”
Powder giggled against her shoulder. “He’s big and ugly.”
“Yeah, he is. Does he have a stupid hat?”
“With feathers. And he has a big hole in his stomach, from where the cannonball went through.”
“Oh so he’s a ghost pirate? He’s even more funny-looking than I thought.”
Powder laughed now, the fear snuffed out of her eyes.
Vi cupped her tear-stained cheeks. “I’m gonna tell you a secret, Pow. Promise you won’t tell Vander?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You don’t remember mom and dad, but they had a ship and a crew.”
“A crew? A pirate crew?”
“Yeah. They used to go around the world looking for treasures. They knew the sea like the back of their hand. Nothing scared them. They tried to make it work when they had me, but it was tough. That’s why they came here. Tried to settle.”
“Tried?”
“It’s hard when the blood’s in you. Don’t you feel it? Because I do. I remember the sea at night the most. How quiet and dark it was, with the stars in the sky guiding us.”
“That sounds pretty.”
“That's just a little piece of it. A lot is grime and sweat. I remember nights where my teeth would chatter from the cold, even if they covered me in wool. I remember how the big ropes felt in my hands, slimy and heavy. There were storms where we had to spend hours soaked to the bone, bailing the water with buckets. I'd wake with a fever and be sick for days.”
Powder seemed worried for her, even knowing she was now safe and in bed by her side. Vi chuckled. “Thing is... I miss it like I'd miss my heart if someone took it. There's nothing like the sea when the sun breaks at the surface. There's nothing like the sea when she's calm; when she's angry. That power... It puts you on your knees. Doesn't matter who you are: governor, merchant, pirate, child. She rules us all.”
“What if we stay on land?"
“You can do that. It's not a bad life we have. It's safe and the governor's not rotten; not like the ones mom told me about." Vi shifted to lie on her back, hands beneath her head. She stared at the wooden beams of their ceiling. "But I don't want safe. One day, I’m gonna steal one of those ships in the bay and get off this island. I’m gonna sail the sea ‘till I know every corner. Find treasure, eat at all the taverns in the world, and hunt down anyone who tries to stop me.”
“I wanna go with you!”
“I don’t know," Vi shrugged, pretending to be concerned. “It’s really scary out there.”
“No! No! I can help!”
“What about your ghost?”
“I’m not scared anymore.”
“Ah, all right. I’ll think about it then.”
Powder kicked her feet beneath the covers, her body thrumming with excitement. “I can’t wait.”
12
“Did you know some people make deals with the sea?” Caitlyn asked.
“What for?”
Vi was half-asleep in the shade of their palm tree, her head resting on Caitlyn’s lap. Caitlyn was reading a small, leather-bound collection of voyages from a seafarer.
“Good fortune, I suppose. Hardy wood for your ship. A healthy crew.”
Vi shrugged. “And what does the sea get?”
“Do you know Sevika?”
“Mean Eyes Sevi? Sure, I know her. Vander made her dagger.”
“Well, I overheard the cook say that the sea took her arm in exchange for the gems she found.”
“Horseshit,” Vi scoffed. “The sea doesn’t need to make deals to take. She does it everyday just fine.”
Caitlyn turned the page, brow furrowing as she read something else. “I think it’s a trick. A slippery slope. One day an arm, the next your heart, and then you’re willing to trade your soul. Maybe that’s the most precious treasure of them all.”
Vi gave her a bizarre look. “You read too much. There’s nothing more precious than gold.”
Caitlyn set the book aside, looking embarrassed. “You’re right. What more could anyone want?”
Vi closed her eyes again. “Don’t make deals you can’t afford to lose on, that’s what Vander says.”
13
With Caitlyn’s formal education filling her time, Vi and Powder spent most of their days with Mylo and Claggor. Sons of merchants and shipwrights, they were just as eager to explore.
Between their escapades around the craggy pools of Piltover and the lushest parts of the wilds, pretending to find treasure in the mangrove, Mylo taught them cartography and navigation, while Claggor taught them about shipwood, sails and ropes. Vi wrote the lessons in her journal near the oil lamp at night, knowing one day she would rely on them. When Vander was away from the smithy, Vi taught them how to fight with a cutlass and their fists.
“I’m the fucking Sea Wolf!” Mylo howled. “Ruler of the Noxus!”
Vi laughed, “You’d scream like a little boy at the first sail.”
“Not fucking true. I’d be a damn good navigator.”
“You’d be a powder monkey and get your head blown.”
They chased each other like children did, climbing the beams, shoving each other in the hay, and taking turns striking scorching iron on the anvil, laughing at the shapes they made.
Powder grew close to the clockmaker’s apprentice, Ekko, and together they made their own toys with gears, springs and wind-ups.
~
“Do you wish you had a sister?” Powder asked Caitlyn one evening.
“Why would she wish that?” Vi retorted as she stripped the bark off an old piece of wood. “It’s nice to have your own room.”
“Shut up,” Powder said, sticking out her tongue.
Caitlyn laughed as they shoved each other around. The sun was setting and the cove from the hill looked beautiful that day. There was a sweetness in the air from the frangipani trees in bloom.
“I think I like the way things are,” she replied just as Powder smacked Vi with a frond.
“Last chance to surrender!” Vi exclaimed.
Powder threw the frond at her before bolting down the hill. “See ya!”
Vi huffed, looking at Caitlyn. “Will you have my back if I throw her in the cove?”
Caitlyn tried to suppress her grin. “I’ll always have your back, Vi, but I don’t believe you’d ever do that.”
“Hmph.”
14
Caitlyn ran her hand through Vi’s hair, which was shorn on one side and longer on the other. She was tentative and gentle, enjoying the feel of the spiky little hairs. Vi cut it herself this morning, using Vander’s razor and a cracked mirror, which explained the… varying lengths. Regardless, Caitlyn couldn’t stop touching it. It was so… Vi.
“Did the razor hurt?”
“No.” Vi felt like she was floating, her scalp appreciating the press of Caitlyn’s fingers. They were a short walk from the governor’s villa, on the grassy shore of a waterfall, where clear ripples lapped at their feet. It was a sweltering day, with barely a cloud in the sky. “It’s just a bit rougher than the scissors.”
“You look very pretty.”
“I don’t want to look pretty,” Vi mumbled. “I want to look mean like Mean Eyes Sevi. I want people to piss themselves when they see me.”
“Even me?”
Vi looked up, meeting her eyes. Caitlyn’s smile was faint but soft. “No, I don't ever want to scare you. I want you to come with us, so we can see the world together.”
“On your ship? And what would I do? I’m the governor’s daughter. Not much of a pirate.”
Vi sat up, reaching for her hand. “Quartermaster. Boatswain. Whatever you want. You’re the best shooter I’ve ever seen. People will think you’re just a pretty face and then you’ll shoot ‘em dead.”
Caitlyn startled. “I don’t want to kill anyone.”
“It’s not anyone. Only the people who chase us or steal from us.”
“I don’t know, Vi. Maybe I’ll just wait for you here.”
Vi felt something inside her sink like a rock in the water. She got up, feeling shame creep in. “Well it’s not for everyone.”
Caitlyn stood, looking cautious, like Vi had turned into a wild animal. “I just think life at sea sounds difficult. What do you admire so much about it?”
“I’ve been on this island since my parents washed up here. Vander breaks his back every day to make other people’s blades, and then they go off on their ships, but I’m stuck watching their sails from the shore. There’s a whole world out there and I’m supposed to be fine dying on this scrap of land?”
“But Piltover is getting better every day,” Caitlyn argued, sounding so much like her father. “The harbor is expanding; the markets are full. Livestock and crops are thriving across the island. More wells are being built and-”
“I don’t need you to tell me things are good,” Vi scowled, letting the hurt feed her anger. “You live in a villa on the hills, in your big, green paradise. Of course they’re good! I live downland right next to the smithy. It’s always boiling hot, I taste iron on my tongue every day, my clothes are greasy and the air is dust. You don’t know anything about that, do you?”
“Vi, I’m-”
“No, you don’t. You wake up in your linen and your silks and you get ready for the day with your fancy damn tutors, while me and Powder spit out soot.”
Caitlyn tried to reach for her hand. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-”
“Forget it!” Vi snapped. “You people never mean to do anything but you do it anyway.”
“Where are you going?” Caitlyn called out, struggling to keep up.
“Home. I know where my place is.”
~
“Vi, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Go to sleep.”
“Is it Cait? Did you tell her about the plan?”
Vi turned around in bed, her back to Powder. “I’m tired.”
Powder climbed in anyway. She cuddled against Vi’s back, holding her shoulder. “What did she say?”
Vi frowned, feeling her insides ache again. On your ship? And what would I do? She’d never thought about that. Caitlyn was always just there in her mind. There on the quarterdeck. There in the captain’s cabin. She’d never thought… about the reality of it. What Caitlyn wanted. What her education was leading her toward.
“Her father’s the law and her mother’s the master gunner,” Vi replied flatly. “It was stupid to ever think she’d wanna come.”
“But she’s your closest friend.”
“No, she’s not. She’s just a girl.”
“You’re with her all the time when she’s done with her lessons.”
“They have good food at the villa. A bunch of fruit in the yard.”
“She makes you laugh.”
“Useless skill on a ship.”
“No, it's not.”
“Shut up. Go to sleep.”
Powder yawned. “All right.”
Vi waited a moment. “You’re still here.”
She felt Powder’s head against her back and sighed at the resounding silence. “G’night, Pow.”
~
Vander keeled over in the smithy on a scorching afternoon. He was bedridden for days, told by the sawbones Huck that his heart was sounding exhausted. Huck was a mild-mannered man whose smile was more of a grimace. He was honest with his assessment, but so nervous-looking that Vander doubted him anyway.
“It’s nothing,” he later told Vi as he got out of bed. “Must’ve stood in the sun for too long. You know how I prefer a cloudy day.”
He was back in the forge that evening, catching up on lost time. Vi made Powder a fish stew with the afternoon’s cod, but the dinner table remained quiet when they ate. It felt like the good days were slipping away, and Vi didn’t know how to stop it.
~
Caitlyn visited with her mother a month after their fight at the waterfall. While Cassandra spoke with Vander about the humidity in the air, Vi noticed Caitlyn approaching her as she shoveled coal.
With her clean blouse and breeches, Caitlyn looked out of place in the dark and dusty forge. She had been here before, but their differences struck Vi deeply that day. She felt grubby in her own breeches, stained with soot and grease. Her hands were oily and she knew there were black charcoal streaks on her forehead and shoulders.
“Hello, Vi.”
“Hm.”
Caitlyn was holding her hands in front of her, anxious. “I… wanted to let you know that my mother and I are traveling to Demacia tomorrow.”
Vi met her eyes, taken aback. Demacia was the big chunk of land at the bottom of their maps. Two weeks by ship, at least. “What the hell for?”
“I’ll be starting my diplomatic training.”
Vi resisted the urge to march up to Cassandra and ask to be smuggled on their ship. Instead she dug her heels in, gripping her shovel tighter. “Good for you.”
Caitlyn looked down, shoulders falling. “Well, I… This is goodbye for a while then.”
Vi frowned. “What do you mean? You’re not going long, are you?”
“I’ll be gone for a year at least.”
The breath was knocked out of her. Vi felt a wave of dread; the heat of the forge suffocated her. “A year?”
Suddenly dizzy, she pulled open the creaky back door and gasped for air outside. The shovel fell with a clank.
“Vi? Are you all right?” Caitlyn asked behind her.
“I’m fine.” Vi exhaled and looked at Caitlyn, feeling her anger, her panic, slip away. Why had she been so stubborn? Why had she not gone to Caitlyn sooner? It all seemed so stupid now.
“Vi, I… I’m sorry for what I said. I’m sorry you’re so unhappy. I wish I could take your place. I wish life could just be a house, a few trees and your company. Well, that must sound terribly boring to you-” Caitlyn stammered.
“No. I’m sorry I was… That I yelled at you,” Vi murmured. “You’ve never treated me differently.”
Caitlyn leaned forward and kissed her cheek. Vi closed her eyes, feeling the warmth and softness of her lips. She saw soot on the tip of Caitlyn’s nose and wiped it off with her thumb.
“Are we still friends?” Caitlyn asked.
“Only if you promise to write.”
“I’ve already packed my paper and quills. Will you write back?”
“My handwriting isn’t as neat as yours.”
“I don’t mind. I just want to know what your life is like.”
Caitlyn took off her necklace. It was a single blue gem set in a circlet of gold, which she had worn for as long as Vi could remember. “I want you to have it.”
“What? No, I couldn’t. It’s yours. You never take it off.”
“I just did.” Caitlyn tied it around Vi’s neck. “The gem is an aquamarine, like Janna’s Rings. She’ll protect you.”
Vi scoffed, blushing. “What about you, then?”
“I’m going to Demacia,” Caitlyn rolled her eyes. “The fortress of the world. It has fortified walls, cannons everywhere, and soldiers in every street. Nothing is going to hurt me there.”
“It’s a long journey.”
“I’ll be with a fleet of five. All will be well.”
“Caitlyn?” Cassandra called from the forge.
“I’ll be right there!” Caitlyn replied, chewing on her lip. “Vi, I… I’ll…”
“Me too,” Vi breathed out.
“Will you tell Powder I’ll miss her?”
“I will.”
Caitlyn held her gaze a moment before turning away, only to falter on the doorstep.
“Cait.”
Caitlyn threw herself in her arms, burying her face in the crook of her neck. Vi wrapped her arms around her waist, and when they realized Caitlyn’s pretty blouse was smeared with grease and soot now, it made Caitlyn laugh so loud that Vi felt her own smile hurt her cheeks.
15
“Do you miss the sea?”
Mean Eyes Sevi wasn’t so mean once you spoke to her. Vi didn’t know where the nickname had come from, only that she’d dragged her ass to Piltover with a reputation already. If she’d truly found treasure somewhere, she’d already spent it. No one rich wasted their days in a tavern with a leaky roof and rotting beams, with the smell of sweat and fungus all around them.
“How can you miss something that’s on your doorstep?” Sevika answered, hand-rolling her cigar in the back of the room.
Vi felt younger than she wanted here, surrounded by weathered merchants, drunken dockworkers and gamblers spoiling for a fight. Women made eyes at her from all corners, awakening a strange feeling in her gut.
“Don’t act a fool,” Sevika warned, lighting her cigar with the melting candle on their table. “Fools lose their coin.”
“I don’t have any.”
Sevika savored a drag, inhaling the smoke deep. “What do you want?”
“Teach me how you fight. Vander’s too tired and his joints hurt. I saw how you beat that oaf at the underdock last night.”
“No place for a kid.”
“I’m not a kid,” Vi frowned.
“Look like one to me. What do I get out of this? You just said your pockets are empty.”
“A place on my crew, when I set out to sea.”
Sevika exhaled smoke through her nose, scoffing. “Is that right? Your crew? And where are you getting a ship?”
“In the bay. I’ve been planning it for years. You’ll see.”
“You’re a landlubber,” Sevika mocked. “Talk to me when you sound less stupid.”
“I was a deckhand on my parents’ ship. I know my way.”
“You don’t have a damn clue.”
“You’re rotting in this shithole because no one wants a quartermaster with one arm. Bad for morale, they say. But I don’t give a fuck. I heard the stories about you. You were a damn fine sailor. Almost got yourself on the Noxus.”
“Fuck the Noxus,” Sevika spat.
“Well, one day my ship’ll be even better. I want you on the crew. I want sailors like you.”
Sevika took another long drag, her patience wearing thin. “I’ll give it to you, you’ve got guts. But I’m not in the trade anymore.”
Vi got up from the bench. “I know you miss it. It’s in your eyes.”
“You know what’s in your eyes? Stars and gold. Childlike wonder. That’s what it’s all about to you. Come back to me when there’s fire. No one survives the sea without rage.”
~
Vi tore open the letter left on her bed by Vander. It had been seven weeks since the last, but it was storm season and ships were slow.
Caitlyn was doing well in Demacia, though the climate was colder and the wind whistled between every stone wall and every crack. The only palm trees were up on the hills, beyond the ramparts. She missed running around the tangled forest with Powder and her, and digging through the shallow waters for hermit crabs. She missed the smells of the frangipani. But what she repeated the most—
I miss you, Vi.
Vi kept the letter in her pocket until the sand, sweat and salt threatened to make it illegible. Then she slipped the letter beneath her pillow with the others, wondering why missing someone felt so plain miserable.
~
“Does it hurt?” Powder asked, staring at Vi’s irritated skin.
“A little bit.”
Powder’s finger hovered over the lines of the new ink curling down her sister’s arm, the rope and cutlass twisting around the waves of a stormy sea.
“What are you getting next?”
“The stars on my other arm. So I don’t need Mylo telling me where Leona’s Cluster is.”
Powder stifled a laugh. “Then we won’t need to take him at all.”
“We’ll have him scrubbin’ the deck.”
Vander entered the room with a net of sweet potatoes.
“If you’re both done with the giggles, maybe you could help an old man with— ah,” he groaned, his hand shooting to his heart.
“Vander?” Vi rushed to him, hand on his back as he leaned forward, disoriented.
He turned away with his jaw clenched. “It’s nothing. Got up too fast, that’s all. Now how about… peeling these, eh?” He forced a chuckle and left to get water.
~
“Does he like it?” Vi asked Vander as he came back from the governor’s villa. She’d been with the donkey all day, walking back-and-forth from the forge to the docks, hauling the loads of coal shipped in.
Powder was spending more time with Ekko and his mentor, Benzo, tinkering with clocks and collecting discarded trinkets that washed up on shore, from soft sea glass to compasses; shark teeth to porcelain.
“Finest ceremonial rapier we’ve ever made—of course he likes it,” Vander replied. “But he was distracted.”
Vi brushed the donkey’s back as he munched on hay. “How come?”
“The little miss came back at dawn. Well, she’s not so little anymore.”
Vi's heart jumped in her throat. “Caitlyn’s back? But she never mentioned—it hasn’t even been a year.”
“Seems like it’s only a halt on their way to Ionia.”
Vi was out the door before he’d even finished. He chuckled to himself, patting the donkey’s head.
~
Vi ran through the thickets of the hills of Piltover. She ran up the path to the villa, sweat beading on her brow, dripping down her nose, the wind blowing in her hair.
She felt ferns and leaves slap against her legs; roots try to stop her. She stumbled but pushed ahead, her heart beating wildly in her chest when finally she saw the villa. She cut through the yard to the back of the house, to the window of Caitlyn’s favorite room, with the thousands of books.
She gasped and wheezed as she peeked inside. There was a cup of tea on the table and a plate of biscuits, but Caitlyn’s favorite chair was empty.
“Vi?”
Vi spun around, hardly believing her eyes. Caitlyn looked out of breath too, like she had rushed from the study without her shoes.
She was tall. Her hair had gotten longer and her face had lost some of its roundness.
“I… I…” Vi exhaled deeply, hands on her knees. Every muscle in her body felt like it was on fire.
“I was going to see you at the smithy,” Caitlyn said. “I just needed-”
“You’re tall,” Vi blurted out.
“I’m… sorry?”
“No, nothing to be sorry about.” Vi rubbed her arm, realizing she hadn’t thought out any of this. She smelled like sweat and donkey. Fuck. “Uh, I was writing you a letter.”
“Oh?” Caitlyn smiled, looking unsure of how to act. “What does it say?”
“It says, um, that I can’t wait to see your ship on the horizon,” Vi stammered. “How the island just isn’t the same without you. How I…”
“How you miss me?” Caitlyn finished, hopeful.
“Hmph.”
“Pardon?”
“Yes! That.”
Caitlyn approached her. “And I would reply that not a day goes by when I don’t think about you. That I fall asleep hoping to dream of you.”
Vi swallowed, eyes wide. “You’ve always been better with words.”
“I disagree.”
They held each other’s gaze and then broke into grins. Vi took her in her arms, feeling her body settle. Caitlyn clung to her shoulders like eleven months had never passed between them. “Nothing has ever felt like this,” she whispered.
Vi swallowed, feeling warm all over. Her stupid mouth spoke before she could think: “I smell like donkey.”
Caitlyn’s laugh was muffled in her shirt, the best sound Vi did ever hear. “You could smell like ambergris and your arms would still be my favorite place in the world.”
~
They sat by their tree, Vi feeling at home when Caitlyn motioned for her to rest her head on her lap. “I’m glad you haven’t grown it out,” Caitlyn said, caressing the soft fuzz of Vi’s hair.
It felt so good that Vi could’ve purred. “Powder does it for me now.”
“How is she?” Caitlyn asked. “I wish I could see her.”
“She’s doing well. She spends a lot of time at Benzo’s shop. When do you leave?”
“At sunrise. My parents and I will be attending the ceremonial swearing in of the new Ionian guard. There will be a ball in a fortnight, with ambassadors from all regions and islands. My mother thought it would be the perfect bookend to my diplomatic training.”
“Oh,” Vi said, trying to conceal her disappointment. She wouldn’t pretend to understand the importance of such events. “How was the sea?”
“Calm, but the wind was strong. We were very fortunate. The Uprising is a marvelous ship. You would like her.”
“And Demacia? Do you still… You used the word ‘beautiful’ in your letters. Would you want to live there?”
Caitlyn bit her lip. “Demacia is an island of many wonders, but it doesn’t have… the people I hold closest to my heart.”
Vi felt her cheeks go red. Caitlyn looked down at her with a pleased smile. “You look like a beet.”
Feeling overwhelmed with affection, Vi pushed up and claimed her lips in a firm, earnest kiss. Caitlyn let out a stifled gasp in surprise, then cupped her jaw, falling into it. Vi pulled back, her eyes sparkling with mischief.
“Now who looks like a beet?” she asked.
“I… um,” Caitlyn let out a breathy laugh, her thumb brushing over Vi’s cheek. “Where did you… I mean, did you learn that somewhere?”
Vi shrugged. “I didn’t learn it from trying it, if that’s what you want to know.”
“No, no…”
“I just listen to people talking. Maybe I saw some people kissing in the tavern and wondered about it, that’s all.”
“A-and what else did you learn?” Caitlyn asked.
Vi shifted to sit on her knees. She cupped her cheek and kissed her again, this one slower. She angled her head to the side and caressed her tongue with hers, feeling the gentlest wave overtake her body, like floating closer to the sun.
She pulled back with a dazed look. “Was that… all right?” she murmured.
“Yes,” Caitlyn let out a shaky breath, smiling in the space between them. “Oh, Vi, yes.”
“I wish we could stay here forever, like when we were seven.” When minutes felt like days and days like years.
“I’ll be back in two months. It’ll be nothing at all.”
Vi rested her head on Caitlyn’s shoulder, eyes closing when she felt her arms wrap around her.
“I’ll wait on the docks ‘till I see your ship.”
Caitlyn nuzzled her neck, and if she ever minded her smell, she certainly did not show it. “We’ll go to the waterfall.”
“We’ll dive for shells in the cave.”
“We’ll eat honey cakes and mango. Then we’ll go to the cove and count the ships. We’ll guess which one sails away first.”
“And the winner gets a kiss,” Vi finished with a smile.
Caitlyn slid her fingers in her hair and all was well and perfect again. “Janna will protect you,” she whispered the prayer.
Vi kissed her forehead. “And you.”
~
She watched the Uprising pull away from the cove at sunrise. It was a mountain of a ship, with billowing sails and soldiers scattered on its decks looking like ants. Two smaller ships trailed behind it, no less fearsome with their monstrous cannons and dark sails. Vi did not look away until it was a dot on the horizon.
“I bet she’s looking too,” Powder said behind her.
Vi stood and stole her sister’s hat, a tricorn with barnacles still stuck to the folds.
“Give it back!”
“Bets are for scallywags,” Vi said. “You bet, you lose. Thanks for the hat.”
“Not fair!”
“All is fair in sisterhood. Where did you get this anyway? It smells like crab.”
“Ekko and I found it near shore.”
“Hm. Tell you what, I’ll bet I can get home faster than ya. First one there keeps the hat.”
Powder took off without another word, leaving Vi in a cloud of sand. She chuckled before running down the hill, jumping over rocks and logs.
They barreled through the streets of Piltover, heading toward the smithy. Vi saw her sister’s braids whip around in the air; heard her laughter and taunts. She slowed, her eyes prickling with tears as she realized her sister had grown, no longer afraid of pirates and ghosts.
“I win!” Powder exploded with joy, climbing atop one of the wooden crates.
“Damnit, Pow, when did your little legs get so fast?”
Powder bent down to grab the hat, sticking out her tongue when she put it on her head. “It’s Captain Powder now.”
Vi smiled up at her. “You want a ride, captain?”
Powder jumped on her back, arms around her neck, and perhaps there was still a little bit of childhood in them after all.
~
It was a hot day, but there was a breeze in the air. Vi had fallen asleep in the back of the donkey’s cart, her body exhausted after a morning spent shaping two cutlasses. Her arms felt like dangling ropes and her legs were jellyfish.
“Vi. Vi, please.”
She cracked an eye open and sat up, brushing a hand over her face. Vander stood in the smithy holding Powder’s hand.
She was supposed to be with Ekko, but there were tears down her face and she struggled to meet Vi’s eyes.
“What happened?” Vi asked, jumping off the cart. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s the governor. The Uprising.”
The following silence felt like a knife to the throat. A promise of suffering. Vi swallowed, approaching them.
“What- what about it?”
“The governor was found on shore. There… There was an attack. He says the Noxus came during a storm.” Vander looked down, mournful. “Lady Cassandra was murdered before his eyes.”
It was a hollow feeling in her heart. Like the earth was robbed from her feet. Her blood turned cold.
“C-caitlyn?” Vi asked, voice barely above a murmur.
Vander knelt before her, putting his hands on her shoulders. “No one was spared.”
Vi shook her head as the shock swept through her. “She’s… a strong swimmer… Cait is smart. Smartest girl I- I know, she could’ve-”
“Tobias watched it happen, there was no doubt,” Vander said, his eyes downcast and somber. “I’m so sorry, Vi.”
“The governor made it to shore?” Vi repeated, feeling sick, like her insides were turning over. “They left four days ago, how can that… be… how can-”
“He doesn’t understand how. That’s all I could gather. He’s in a great amount of sorrow.”
Vi tried to control her breathing, but sweeping despair made her knees buckle. A sob ripped through her body like a bullet.
Powder threw her arms around her shoulders, and then there was Vander holding them both, but nothing comforted her. She howled in pain, fingers digging into the dirt.
All joy, all love, all future tasted like ash in her mouth.
~
Vi pushed through the rabble of the underdock. They were circling around a fight, egging on the two bodies pummeling each other in the center.
One hard shove and Vi had broken into the circle. She punched the tattooed brute square in the mouth, so hard and sudden that this man twice her size stumbled back.
But she was not here for him. She hurled herself at Sevika, landing a hit to her nose before she was thrown on her back.
Sevika held her down by the neck, meeting her eyes.
“Don’t you fucking touch me you shipless coward!” Vi growled, digging her nails into Sevika’s wrist.
She felt her blood boil so hot that her skin burned. Her jaw felt like it would snap. She wanted to fight. She wanted to hurt. To destroy; eviscerate. “Fuck you! Let me go, you cunt! I’LL KILL YOU!” she snarled, voice cracking open.
Sevika pressed down on her throat tighter until Vi shattered completely, hot tears spilling down her cheeks. “I’ll kill her, I’ll kill her,” she cried, eyes squeezed shut.
The grip on her neck loosened. Sevika watched her break apart, impassive, then stood. “Good. I can work with this.”