Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The air inside the warehouse is thick—thicker than smoke, thicker than blood. It clings to Vi’s skin, coats her tongue, stings her eyes like acid. It smells like burning shimmer, like grease and old rust and fear. The whole place is screaming, but she can’t hear anything except the pound of her own heart, the rush of heat behind her eyes, and the sound—sharp and grotesque—of her own breath dragging in and out of her mouth like a dying machine.

The roof is groaning above them, wooden beams catching like tinder, steel pipes blistering with heat. Flames crawl like living things, snapping at shadows. The whole building is a lung inhaling destruction, and Vi is its exhale. She doesn't hesitate. She can't afford to.

Powder’s sobbing in the corner—thin and cracked, like glass underfoot. Her goggles are crooked on her head, smudged with ash. Her knees are scraped open, little ribbons of red down trembling legs, her body curled in a terrified knot. Claggor is grunting, shoulder braced against a rusted pipe, trying to twist it loose from where it’s fused to the wall. Mylo’s throwing himself at a weak spot in the brick, his hands bruised and bleeding, mouth moving—shouting something Vi can’t hear.

But none of it matters. Because between her and her family is him.

The shimmer-enhanced enforcer is massive. Barely human anymore. Veins glowing with sickly purple, froth clinging to his lips. His teeth look too long. His eyes are wrong—bulging, bloodshot, focused only on her like a predator that doesn’t need to eat, just needs to destroy. His breath comes in growls. His fists are wrapped in torn bandages already soaked through with someone else’s blood.

Vi meets his eyes.

And steps forward.

She doesn’t wait for him to move. She knows how these fights go. It’s not about defense. Not tonight. Not here.

He swings wide. She ducks—barely. The wind of his punch knocks over a metal drum behind her. She can feel the air tear past her cheek like a blade.

She counters—three hits. One to his side, one to his knee, one to his ribs. But it’s like hitting a slab of meat soaked in armor. He grunts but doesn’t stagger.

He backhands her across the face, and the world tilts.

Vi crashes into a crate, wood splintering beneath her spine. Her jaw cracks sideways. Her ribs scream. For a heartbeat, everything is heat and static and the sour tang of blood in her mouth.

Then she’s moving again.

She has to move again.

She spits red, and there’s a tooth in it. Doesn’t matter. Her fists still work.

He charges her this time. No finesse. No strategy. Just brute, inhuman power.

She lets him catch her.

The blow lands like a freight train. Her body slams into the ground hard enough to bounce. She thinks she hears something crack in her shoulder. Can’t tell if it’s hers or the floor. Her vision goes white. She doesn’t scream. She just gasps.

And then—rage.

Pure. Blinding. White-hot.

She uses the moment—uses his closeness—drives her elbow into his jaw once, twice, three times, until his head jerks back. Then she shoves her fingers into his throat and punches upward—breaking cartilage, maybe snapping something else entirely.

He gags. Stumbles. Just enough.

Vi scrambles up. No footing. No breath. Just fury.

And then she unleashes.

Her fists are hammers. Precision and violence and desperation rolled into one. She doesn’t think. She breaks. Knuckle to cheek. Palm to chin. Elbow to solar plexus. She moves around him like a storm, like a girl who’s already died and come back swinging. Every strike echoes in her bones. Every scream from the fire behind her fuels her forward.

He falls.

He stays down.

And Vi is trembling. Standing. Bleeding. But standing.

Claggor roars something—she hears it now, dimly—he’s made an opening. A hole in the wall. Mylo’s at Powder’s side, dragging her up, wrapping his arm around her shoulders even as she sobs, even as she clings to his shirt like it’s the only real thing left.

Vi turns—starts limping toward them. Her side throbs. Blood is dripping from her fists, leaving crimson fingerprints on everything she brushes.

Then she sees him.

Silco.

Standing in the smoke like some specter of rot and ambition. Dressed in high-collar decay. His eyes gleam, bright and dangerous. His lips curl into a smile—thin, smug, wrong.

He looks at her like he’s already won.

Vi’s vision narrows to a tunnel.

The sound of Claggor shouting. Mylo screaming for her. Powder sobbing.

They all fade.

Because then—Vander.

He crashes out of the smoke like a beast unchained. His bellow is a war drum, his body like a moving wall of fury and love and protection. He slams into Silco with a roar that shakes the rafters, and both of them vanish into the firelight.

Mylo yanks Powder and Claggor through the hole. The air is too hot. The building groans again, another beam snapping and crashing down behind her.

But Vi doesn’t move.

She walks.

Toward the fight. Toward the fire. Toward the monster.

There is no clever line. No bravado.

She finds them locked in a twisted melee, blood on both their faces.

And she reaches in. Grabs Silco by the collar. Yanks him off.

He stumbles, blood in his mouth, wild eyes flashing.

He opens it to speak—something about control, about vision, about destiny.

She punches him.

His nose breaks with a wet crunch. Blood spurts like an accusation.

He gasps. Tries to speak again.

She punches him again.

And again.

And again.

His words turn into wet gasps. His bones into jelly beneath her fists. She doesn’t stop. She can’t stop. Not until her hands are shaking, until her arms ache like they're broken, until her breath comes in sobs and the only sound is the crack-crack-crack of his future being crushed under her fury.

Then—

A hand on her shoulder.

Vander’s voice, soft but iron-bound.

“It’s done.”

But Vi knows.

It isn’t.

Not even close.

The news hits Zaun like a flare dropped into oil.

Silco is dead.

There’s no announcement, no formal decree, no procession. The city breathes it in through the blood in the gutters, the smoke rising from the warehouse ruins, the tremble in the boots of every enforcer who dares wander too close to the Lanes. No need for fanfare. Zaun knows. Instinctively. Like the shift in air before a storm. Like a ripple of violence that left behind the silence of aftermath.

Whispers skitter down metal stairwells and echo through rust-stained pipes. They ride the shimmer lines, pulse through the black market tunnels, spread across gambling dens and broken taverns. He’s gone. The eye’s gone blind. Some cheer. Some freeze. Others try to grab the throne he left behind—already imagining themselves as successors, already tasting the gold in their mouths.

But they don’t see her coming.

Vi doesn’t rise like a leader. She erupts.

Bloodied. Bare-knuckled. Black bruises blooming beneath her ribs like midnight flowers. She walks the scorched edge of The Lanes like it belongs to her—and it does. She limps through smoke with purpose, jaw clenched, mouth split at the corner, hands still raw from breaking bones. She’s not dressed for politics. Her shirt is torn. Her boots are scuffed. There’s soot smeared across her collarbone and an old burn across her left shoulder that’s just started to blister. But she walks with the kind of rage that doesn’t ask for permission.

The square outside The Last Drop is choked with people. Hushed voices. Curiosity, suspicion, hunger. The scent of burnt shimmer still lingers. No one steps forward. No one speaks.

So Vi does.

She strides into the center of the crowd, ignoring the stares. Her shadow stretches long and jagged behind her as the flames from earlier still simmer in the distance. A few of Silco’s remnants hover at the edge of the crowd—twitchy and afraid, already calculating if they could take her, if they should. They see her posture, her hands—those ruined knuckles—and they stop thinking entirely.

When no one answers her silence, Vi pulls something from her pocket. A cache. Cylindrical. Familiar. Sickly purple light glowing from inside like a warning.

Shimmer.

She holds it up. Eyes scanning the crowd. Daring anyone to move.

“This,” she says, her voice cutting the air clean in half, “is your god now. This is what you killed for. What you bled for. What turned your friends into corpses and your families into addicts.”

No one blinks.

No one breathes.

Vi drops it at her feet.

And stomps.

The glass shatters, the vial crumples, and that violet smoke begins to leak—but not for long. Because she grinds it under her heel. The hiss of it vanishing is almost a whimper. A death rattle.

“No more,” she snarls. “No more of this poison. You want someone to follow?”

She spreads her arms wide.

“Look at me.”

And they do.

One by one, heads lift. Eyes meet hers.

What they see isn’t just a fighter. Not anymore.

They see a girl who didn’t wait to be chosen. Who didn’t climb. She broke through. A girl who bled for the people behind her. Who crawled through fire with nothing but her fists and her fury. They see her bruises. Her cracked lip. Her torn clothes. They see what Silco never showed them—cost. They see a girl who bled so others wouldn’t.

And it terrifies them.

Because it’s real.

Sevika is the first to move.

She steps forward slowly, her jaw tight, one arm still in a sling from a skirmish the week before. Her face is unreadable—scarred and shadowed and cold. But her eyes lock with Vi’s. And something ancient flickers there. Not deference. Not obedience.

Respect.

She nods.

Once.

Like an oath.

And it is done.

More follow. Scattered loyals. Barkeepers. Traders. Chemtech runners. Workers. Orphans. They don’t cheer. They don’t chant. They just watch her. They stand. And that’s enough.

Vander arrives not long after. His coat is torn. His knuckles are bruised too, but he’s breathing steady. He walks beside Vi—not ahead, not shielding her like he once might have. No. Now, they stand shoulder to shoulder. He knows the tides have turned. He sees the way they look at her. Not like a child. Not like a soldier.

Like something more.

He speaks to the ones she won’t. Calms the chem-barons with words heavy and slow. Draws lines in the sand. “This is what keeps the peace,” he says. “You stay behind your stalls, and we stay off your throat.” But even the barons don’t push too hard anymore. Not with her standing there like a drawn blade. Not with that wildfire in her eyes.

Vi doesn’t talk much. Doesn’t debate.

She acts.

One dealer tries to push shimmer again. She kicks his teeth out.

A gang tries to loot the orphanage during the confusion. She shows up with blood on her shirt and leaves three of them limping, one missing two fingers.

Rumors spread of a new enforcer ring forming. She breaks their bones in the alley, one by one, without ever raising her voice.

The city starts to whisper again—but it’s her name this time.

Smoke without fire. Teeth without bark. Vi without mercy.

She becomes the shadow under every gutter light, the bootstep you pray isn’t hers when you’ve done something wrong. But for those who suffer? For the tired, the broken, the trying?

She’s safety. Even if she looks like a storm.

That night, back home, the adrenaline fades.

The body begins to hurt in ways it didn’t during the heat of the fight. Vi is quiet. Her knuckles throb beneath the hastily wrapped bandages. Her ribs protest every breath. Her shirt sticks to her skin with sweat and dried blood.

Powder is curled on the cot. Still pale. Still too quiet. Her knees are bruised, her voice gone ragged from too much screaming and not enough sleep. She hasn’t said a word since they got back.

Vi sits beside her, lowering herself slowly, like every inch of her aches—and it does.

She pulls her sister in close. Wraps both arms around her, not caring about the blood beneath her nails or the soot still staining her face. She presses her chin into Powder’s hair. Rocks gently.

“You’re okay,” she whispers. “You’re home. You’re safe.”

Powder doesn’t answer.

Vi tightens her hold.

“They’re never taking you again,” she says, fierce and raw. “I’ll rip the world apart before I let them.”

Powder’s breath hitches. And finally, finally, she nods.

Not because the fear is gone.

But because Vi is holding her.

And Vi feels like thunder.

Like the sky breaking open to protect her.

Like the kind of storm that saves.

Time doesn’t stop.

It hisses. It grinds. It mutates.

Zaun doesn’t heal, not exactly. It adapts. Like bruised skin thickening into scar tissue. Like lungs learning to breathe smoke. The chaos never ends—but it changes shape, finds rhythm, takes form.

And at the center of it all, Vi does too.

She stops being a name whispered in alley corners or a flash of red braids in the dark. She becomes a system. Muscle and grit wrapped around structure. An answer to questions no one else dared ask.

What if someone gave a damn?

What if someone bled, not for profit or control—but to protect?

She lays down rules not with ink or politics, but with bruised knuckles and unshakable presence. No shimmer past Third Spire. No sales near the orphan quarters. No recruiting underage. No pressuring vendors. No shaking down chem-tech runners for bribes. You break the rules? You don’t get warned.

You get Vi.

One corner boss tried to test her—sent word that Zaun didn’t need another tyrant in a hero’s jacket. That her fists didn’t frighten anyone who knew where to hide. Two days later, she dragged him out of his bunker by the collar, ribs cracked, pride shattered. She didn’t kill him. That wasn’t the point.

The point was you will not rot this place again.

Vander handles the other half of the city’s weight. The language of diplomacy, of grudges paid in full and debts still carried in ash-scrawled ledgers. His voice is the gravel road between fire and flood. He speaks with the barons, the old families, the ones who still dress their corruption in silk and call it industry. They don’t like him. But they trust him.

And they fear her.

Between them, Zaun stands. Not balanced. Not safe. But held.

And around them, something begins to grow.

Powder doesn’t stay the wide-eyed ghost of the fire. She grows taller. Thinner. Smarter in ways that bend gravity. She speaks less, but every word lands. Her goggles become part of her face. Her gloves are always smudged with engine oil or smoke dust. She disappears into her work like it’s the only place she still breathes properly.

Vi watches her sometimes—quiet, from the doorway of their shared flat above The Last Drop. Watches Powder scribble designs at 2 a.m., twisting wires into impossible shapes, muttering to herself in equations. There’s a steadiness to her now. A rhythm. But there’s joy too—when no one’s looking. A quick spark in her eyes when something works the first time. A cackle when it explodes just wrong enough to be funny.

And then there’s Ekko.

Their partnership begins with a prank war. Escalates into sabotage. Blossoms—before anyone even notices—into brilliance.

They claim an abandoned rail station deep below the sump. Clean it out. Reinforce it. Fill it with copper coils, half-busted generator parts, and way too many mismatched chairs. It becomes the heart of the new Zaun. The beating pulse of progress.

Smoke grenades that release hallucinogenic ink to blind shimmer-addled attackers. Compact water filters built from scrap that turn sump runoff into drinkable supply. Prosthetic limbs for miners who lost too much to the old machines—some simple, some elegant, some etched with tiny gears and etched names of the people who inspired them.

They build not just because they must—but because they can. Because they love it. Because no one else ever gave them the space to dream.

Claggor finds a different rhythm.

He doesn’t talk much these days. Doesn’t need to. His hands are his voice—calm, sure, always moving. He learns welding from a broken robot he fixes for parts. Learns piping and pressure systems from an old tinkerer who drinks too much but teaches well. Soon, he’s rebuilding the bones of Zaun. New support beams in collapsed housing. Safer stairwells in the tenement districts. Rail tracks repaired so deliveries can run without breaking legs.

He works with headphones on, grease on his cheek, eyes soft. Vi sometimes finds him asleep beneath a collapsed scaffolding with blueprints clutched in his fist and a welding torch on standby beside him. She always covers him with a coat and moves on without a word.

And then, there’s Mylo.

Mylo, whose heart was never meant for war but has always sung with rebellion.

He starts a band.

Of course he does.

They call themselves The Gutter Saints. Their music is loud, fast, chaotic. Vi calls it screeching. Powder calls it “therapeutic auditory anarchy.” The lyrics are part protest, part poetry. They play on old pipe platforms and rooftop gardens, on rusted fire escapes where the crowd dangles over nothing just to listen.

One of their songs is about Vi. He denies it, but she knows.

Another is about Powder. She pretends not to hear it when it plays on the radio they salvaged—but she always stays a little longer in the room when it does.

And The Last Drop changes too.

It’s no longer just a bar. It’s a home base. A haven. A beacon. Fights still happen—because this is Zaun, and blood never really dries—but now, there are rules. No weapons on the floor. No dealers near the food line. If Vi’s coat is hung behind the bar, you do not start shit.

It becomes a place where orphans find food. Where engineers trade stories. Where revolution sounds like laughter over cracked mugs and bruised arms slung around shoulders.

Vi still trains fighters. She always will.

But now it’s more than sparring. It’s survival.

She teaches the street kids. The runaways. The ones who show up with too-thin wrists and too-wide eyes. She teaches them how to block. How to punch. How to disarm and disable without killing. How to walk like they own the street so they’re never seen as prey again.

She never smiles when she teaches. Not really.

But when a kid dodges right. Or lands a clean hook.

Her mouth twitches. Just a little.

“Don’t be me,” she tells them. Every time. Like a mantra. Like a warning.

“Be better.”

The ache doesn’t go away. Not really.

She still dreams of fire. Still hears Silco’s voice sometimes—hollow, echoing, dead. She still checks Powder’s door three times a night before sleeping. Still wakes up clenching her fists so tightly her knuckles bleed.

But there’s purpose now.

There’s weight.

She doesn’t smile often. But when she does—it’s real. And hard-won. And meant.

And when she walks through Zaun—head high, scars visible, boots heavy on the rusted grates—people nod.

Not out of fear.

Not anymore.

But because she’s the one who stayed. Who fought. Who bled. And then built.

And they know—

She won’t let it fall.

Piltover gleams.

From the highest tower of the academy to the sun-drenched walkways of Progress Day’s heart, the city shines like it knows it’s untouchable. It breathes gold dust and speaks in blueprints, its pulse set to the rhythm of ticking gears and humming crystals. The scent of polished metal and citrus oil lingers in every hall. Clean hands. Clean air. Clean violence—done through policy, through price tags. Never seen. Never stained.

And Zaun?

Zaun climbs. Not gracefully. Not with elegance. But relentlessly.

It claws its way upward with blistered fingers and cracked nails, dragging scaffolding behind it like bones of some ancient god, building not monuments but defenses. Not palaces, but tools. The city doesn’t shine. It flickers. It mutters. It survives. Always has.

Above, Jayce and Viktor unlock something new—something old. The kind of power that hums when no one’s touching it, that pulses through stone and whispers through time. Hextech. An accident born of obsession. A promise sewn into crystal and code. Piltover celebrates it with fireworks and fine wine.

Below, Powder and Ekko don’t clap.

They counter.

She’s the mind. He’s the motion. Together, they build things that hum louder than crystals and think faster than Piltover anticipates. They intercept frequencies. Design counter-rigs. Magnetically shielded field barriers that can deflect energy blasts with a flick of the wrist. Smoke drones that scramble cameras and mimic shimmer radiation just enough to confuse a scanner. Powder reverse-engineers a Piltover drone in a week. Rebuilds it in two days. Sends it back up with a message painted across the inside chassis: Try harder.

They don’t declare war. They don’t need to.

The tension simmers. Quiet. Brutal. Like tectonic plates grinding beneath the surface. Pressure without explosion. Not yet.

And Piltover notices.

Not all at once, not directly. But there’s a shifting unease. A vague awareness that Zaun isn’t waiting anymore. That something dangerous has teeth and patience.

So they send ambassadors.

Dressed in pale blue silks and pristine boots that don’t touch puddles. They come in small groups, flanked by enforcers, wearing expressions pinched with discomfort. They carry clipboards. Smile too widely. Talk about mutual prosperity and shared development. And they hate it down here.

They hate the smell. The smoke and steam. The narrow alleys that breathe. The people that stare too long and don’t look away.

They talk about cooperation.

They mean compliance.

They demand meetings.

They get Vi.

She waits for them at the bridge.

The one that arches like a spine between Zaun’s edge and Piltover’s reach. The steel beneath her boots is rusted and patched, but firm. Solid. Like her.

She stands with arms folded across her chest, gauntlets slung at her hips. Her stance is wide, deliberate. Her expression is almost bored—but not quite. There’s a smile there. Or something like it. Just a shadow of teeth. Just enough to make someone question their footing.

One of the ambassadors speaks. A man in his mid-thirties, polished to a shine, voice smooth from practice. He says something about expectations. About respecting the balance of jurisdiction. About consequences if Zaun continues to interfere with sanctioned projects.

Vi listens. Doesn’t interrupt.

Then she leans in, tilting her head slightly, every inch of her screaming casual threat.

“I’d suggest,” she says, voice soft, “you reword that threat, sweetheart.”

The silence is sudden. Sharp. One of the enforcers behind him flinches. Another curls his hand tighter around the grip of his weapon. The ambassador turns pale. His breath catches.

And that’s when Vander steps in.

Not rushed. Not apologetic. Just... timed.

His hand rests gently on Vi’s shoulder. Not restraining. Just present. He offers a smile—slow, easy, gravel-laced. His words are diplomatic. “You’ll have to forgive us. Things get lost in translation sometimes down here.”

He talks about trade corridors. Talks about shared interests. Smooths the conversation like balm over a burn, keeping it just gentle enough that the pain is dulled, but never forgotten.

The ambassadors nod, shaken but grateful. They retreat without ever realizing the conversation had already been decided.

It’s a dance.

Bad cop. Worse cop.

Vi and Vander play it well.

And above, people start talking.

Vi’s name begins to echo in corners where it doesn’t belong. Not just in the pipes or the alleys. But in the council halls. In sitting rooms with velvet chairs and silent walls. Behind doors that never open fully, where tea is served and power is passed through whispers.

They say things like, “If she were on our side…”

They say it like a fantasy.

Like a joke.

Like an impossible wish.

But one of them doesn’t laugh.

Not because they believe she could be.

But because they wonder what happens when she won’t be.

And whether it’ll be too late by then.

The letter arrives in the early morning—draped in gold trim, sealed with wax so clean it smells like lavender oil and disdain. The courier stands ramrod straight, shimmer-free by design, his pale gloves too pristine for Zaun's alley dirt. He doesn't look her in the eye. Just bows stiffly and says, “For Miss Violet,” like the name tastes like rust.

Vi opens the envelope with grease-streaked fingers, tearing through the pretension like it’s paper—which it is.

The words are delicate. Polished. Dangerous.

“You are requested, not ordered, to appear before the Piltover Council.”

She reads it again.

Requested. Not ordered. The difference is deliberate. A threat sewn into silk. An illusion of choice hiding a blade behind the curtain.

Vander’s already reading over her shoulder, his brow furrowed deep enough to cast shadows.

“I’ll go,” he says, voice gravel-soft but iron-heavy. “They’re baiting you.”

Vi shakes her head.

“You think they’re stupid enough to pull something with a council meeting?” she asks, flicking the letter onto the table like it might bite. “In public?”

“They’re Piltover,” Vander mutters. “They’re exactly that kind of stupid.”

She smirks. “All the more reason for me to go.”

He sighs, but he doesn’t stop her. He never could.

So Vi goes.

She doesn’t dress up. She doesn’t clean the scabs from her knuckles or scrub the soot out from under her nails. She wears her gloves—worn leather, stitched with grime and old blood. The kind of gloves that whisper stories Piltover’s golden walls would rather not hear. Her boots are loud on the tile floors. Her jacket is loosely hung over her shoulder, a magnet holding it in place (Powder insists that it’s good for ‘dramatic purposes’), swinging like a banner of defiance behind her.

The guards flinch when she walks in. Their armor clinks. One of them stares a second too long and gets a look in return that makes him rethink every life choice that led him here.

The council chamber is everything Zaun isn’t. Polished marble floors. Light like melted crystal. Walls that gleam with nothing but wealth. It's too quiet. Every sound echoes like it’s been carved into stone. The chairs are plush. The windows are tall enough to forget what street-level looks like.

Vi stands. Doesn’t sit.

They don’t offer a chair anyway.

A woman in council blue speaks first. Her voice is cold and careful, every word measured like weight in a scale. She thanks Vi for coming. Tells her this is “an exploratory dialogue.” She uses terms like representational integration and community optics like she’s not talking to someone who grew up dodging enforcers and hiding shimmer vials under floorboards.

Vi doesn’t interrupt. She lets them talk. It’s kind of funny, actually—watching them dance around something they clearly don’t want to say.

Until they finally say it.

They want her as a bodyguard.

For Councilor Mel Medarda.

Vi snorts. Out loud. Can’t help it. It bursts out of her like pressure from a busted pipe.

“You want me to play babysitter?” she says, eyebrows raised, voice sharp and incredulous.

No one laughs.

She looks around the room. They’re not joking. Not even a little.

They’re not asking, either. Not really.

It’s a job wrapped in silk, sure. But the thread beneath is steel. And they know exactly what they’re doing. Sending Vi into their garden of knives with her back turned to the only people she’s ever bled for.

Still… she agrees.

Because if it’s not her, they’ll send someone else. Someone who sees Mel Medarda as a paycheck. As a job description. As a pretty thing to keep alive so long as it's convenient.

Vi doesn’t know this woman. Doesn’t owe her anything.

But she knows what it’s like to be a target.

And she knows what happens when no one cares enough to throw themselves between you and the blade.

So, yeah. Fine.

She’ll do it.

They assign a date. A time. A briefing. She doesn’t write anything down. Just nods once and walks out.

The sun is too bright outside the hall. The city smells like metal and perfection. She misses Zaun like a knife to the ribs.

She meets Mel the next day.

It’s not what she expects.

She thought the councilwoman would be cold. Arrogant. Fragile in that way Piltover people are when they haven’t seen death up close. She thought this would be about standing behind a doll in a gold dress and trying not to punch her when she said something condescending.

She is so, so wrong.

Mel Medarda is steel dipped in silk.

She stands behind her desk like she’s hosting a war council. Her gown is subtle, midnight-blue with gold accents. Not flashy—commanding. Her hair is perfect. Her posture, flawless. She turns to face Vi with the calmness of someone who knows nothing can touch her unless she lets it.

Vi stands in the doorway, hands shoved into her pockets, suddenly hyperaware of every smear of dirt on her shirt.

Mel gives her a once-over.

Not cruel. Just… analytical.

Vi raises an eyebrow. “You gonna be a problem for me, princess?”

It’s too loud. Too brash. She hears herself say it and regrets it immediately. She doesn’t know why. She never cares what anyone thinks. But Mel just... stares at her.

Then she smiles.

Slow. Sharp.

“Only if you’re lucky,” she says.

Vi’s mouth opens. Closes.

She doesn’t know what the hell that means.

But her heart kicks like it’s trying to punch through her ribs.

This was supposed to be a job. Guard the councilor. Shadow her movements. Make sure the knives don’t find her before Vi does.

But now?

Now she’s looking at a woman who talks like a queen and moves like a game of chess made flesh. A woman who wears danger the way Vi wears her gauntlets—casual, natural, earned. A woman who can look at Vi, see everything, and still smile.

Vi doesn’t trust her.

But she can’t look away.

She doesn’t know what she just signed up for.

But she knows—deep in her gut, in her fists, in the heat creeping up her neck—

She’s already in trouble.

Mel doesn’t trust easily.

She was raised in a world where trust was currency, and everyone she knew spent it like it was someone else’s. Her childhood was laced with lace and cruelty, a kingdom of smiles that didn’t touch eyes, promises gilded in poison. Her mother taught her that power isn’t taken—it’s held, clenched so tightly in your hand that it cuts you before anyone else. And once you bleed for it, you never let it go.

So trust? No. Trust is a weakness people polish into virtue so they don’t have to admit it gets them killed.

Which is why the woman standing in her office now—arms crossed, jaw set, radiating storm—puts her on edge in a way Mel doesn’t like.

Vi doesn’t move like a soldier. She doesn’t shift like a servant. She stands with the unsettling stillness of something barely leashed. Not wild. Not untamed. Just… unafraid. It’s a quality Mel’s seen in exactly three people, and two of them are dead.

Her office is immaculate. Every line sharp, every corner intentional. Marble floors, high windows, obsidian accents cut against velvet. A place designed to intimidate without saying a word. She curated it that way. It works on everyone.

Except Vi.

Vi stands there like she’s in a back alley, like she’s already mapped the exits, weighed the desk’s weight as a shield, decided who she’d hit first and how hard.

She doesn’t bow. Doesn’t say thank you. Just tips her chin, just barely.

“Where do you want me?” she asks, voice rough as gravel soaked in heat.

Mel watches her over steepled fingers. She doesn’t answer immediately. She wants to see what silence does to this woman.

It does nothing.

Vi doesn’t shuffle. Doesn’t clear her throat. She just waits. Like time is something she broke long ago and never bothered to fix.

Mel studies her like she would a puzzle made of bone and blade. Vi’s eyes are sharp but tired. Her jaw is bruised but held high. Tattoos coil up one arm, half-hidden by her jacket, which hangs heavy off one shoulder like she couldn’t be bothered to put it on properly. Her stance is casual. The kind of casual you have to earn.

So Mel tests her.

“I was told you were more punctual,” she says, voice honeyed. A smile curling like a slow knife.

Vi doesn’t blink.

“I was busy washing the alley off my boots,” she replies, deadpan. “Didn’t want to track it on your royal floors.”

Mel lets the insult hover. Doesn’t react.

She leans forward slightly. Tilts her head.

“I trust you’ve reviewed the requirements of your position.”

“Protect the councilor,” Vi says. “Keep her breathing. Don’t punch anyone unless they deserve it.”

“And if they do?”

Vi shrugs. “Then I punch smarter.”

Mel smiles. All teeth. No warmth.

“Zaun must be so proud.”

Vi’s eyes narrow just a little. The kind of narrowing that, if you blinked, you’d miss.

But she doesn’t rise.

Doesn’t snarl. Doesn’t bark. She just stares. Lets the silence stretch. Doesn’t fill it. Doesn’t need to.

It stretches so long, it becomes a thread, a pull, a challenge.

Then—finally—Vi speaks.

“You done?”

Mel raises a perfectly arched eyebrow.

“For now.”

They both know it isn’t over. Not even close.

But it’s the first move in a game neither of them yet has named.

What’s strange—what presses under Mel’s skin like a whisper she can’t quite place—is that Vi doesn’t shrink. Not the way others do in this space. Not the way people perform politeness because they think that’s what the setting demands.

She doesn’t belong here.

And she acts like she knows it.

But she doesn’t apologize for it.

She doesn’t ask to be here.

She is here.

Like the sun through stained glass—uninvited, unforgiving, illuminating everything too honestly to be comfortable.

Mel watches her all day.

Not always directly. But she sees her.

The way Vi leans against walls, not slouches. How she scans every room before they enter it—eyes sweeping, body tense, always calculating. The way she talks to the guards—short, clipped, no nonsense—but not cruel. She speaks to them like people. Like she’s been one of them. Or like she still is.

Mel notes the little things. The marks on her hands. The way she favors her left side when she turns too quickly—an injury not yet healed. The half-second pause before she speaks, like she’s constantly measuring whether something is worth her voice.

At one point, near midday, a wind draft from the hall knocks a paperweight off the edge of Mel’s desk. She doesn’t flinch. Expects it to shatter.

Vi moves before it hits the floor.

Quick. Fluid. One hand shoots out, catches the glass in a single movement.

She doesn’t say anything.

Just sets it back on the corner of the desk, precisely where it had been, like it never moved at all.

Mel catches a glimpse of her hands in that moment.

Calloused fingers. Bruises yellowing at the knuckles. The care in how she handled something fragile.

It stops her.

It shouldn’t.

But it does.

She expected a brute. Expected a wall of muscle and growling pride. A fist wrapped in moral gray. Something easy to write off. Easy to direct. Easy to control.

But this woman?

This Vi?

She’s a contradiction.

Precision beneath violence. Silence layered with intent. She doesn’t walk like rebellion. She walks like someone who knows the rebellion already happened, and she survived it.

Her tattoos aren’t defiance. They’re memory. Maybe prayer. Maybe warning.

Mel doesn’t trust easily.

And she doesn’t trust Vi.

But there’s something here that catches in her chest like a match that won’t quite strike. A feeling she doesn’t have a name for yet, but it’s sharp and distracting and curious.

She wants to know more.

Wants to know where the scars on Vi’s back end and the stories begin.

Wants to know how many times this woman got up when the world told her to stay down.

She expected a weapon.

She met a poem.

One written in blood and bad choices.

And now—gods help her—she wants to read every line.

Piltover smells wrong.

It’s all perfume and wax and something worse—sterility. Like the city’s trying to convince everyone it doesn’t bleed. Like it’s above rot and rust, like it’s never heard of hunger, never seen a kid cry because the shimmer stopped working and their mother started screaming.

Vi walks its halls with her shoulders tight, her jaw locked. Every surface gleams too bright, too white, like it’s been polished out of guilt. Even the air feels pressurized, like something artificial pumped through invisible vents to keep people docile. She doesn’t trust it. Doesn’t trust the silence, the gleaming reflections, the way her own footsteps echo with too much precision.

The council hall is the worst of it. Grand and hollow. Gilded and gutless. The ceilings are high enough to lose yourself in. The pillars feel like monuments to people who never got their hands dirty. Every inch of it screams control.

Vi walks through it like she used to walk through a hostile alley—alert, careful, ready. She clocks the guards without seeming to look at them. Measures how quickly she could reach the nearest exit. Catalogues every vase and decorative sculpture that could be used as a blunt weapon if needed. The polished marble floor would be slippery in a fight. Bad footing. She makes note of it.

They nod at her as she passes. The guards. The aides. The council members pretending not to stare. She doesn’t nod back. She doesn’t care. They don’t scare her. They don’t touch her. If any of them tried to corner her with words or rules or policy, she’d snap their nice little etiquette books in half and sleep just fine.

And then there’s her.

Mel Medarda doesn’t walk like the others. She doesn’t cling to the pomp, doesn’t wear the hall like armor. She owns it. Every step is intention. Every tilt of her head calculated, not out of fear, but out of strategy. She moves like a predator that knows she doesn’t have to pounce to be dangerous.

No one touches her.

That’s what Vi notices first.

Mel is always exactly where she chooses to be, always just out of reach. People orbit her like she’s a source of gravity—but she doesn’t pull them in. She permits them to get close. Barely. Occasionally. Briefly. And even then, the contact never lands.

Vi watches her, and she hates how easily she forgets to breathe when Mel enters a room.

She doesn't talk like the others, either. She doesn’t fill the air with noise, doesn’t bury tension in polite nothings. She lets silence live. Walks beside Vi without breaking it, like she knows it’s not empty. Like she knows it’s a test. A mirror. A presence. Most people babble to make space. Mel doesn’t need to. She is space.

And Vi? Vi doesn’t know what the fuck to do with that.

She’s used to being the one who disrupts. Who intimidates. Who fills silence with threat, with laughter, with blood if it comes to that. She knows how to be the one people can’t look away from. She’s spent her whole life surviving on that kind of control.

But next to Mel?

She feels like noise in a cathedral.

The council meetings are tolerable, barely. Vi stands behind Mel’s seat like a shadow with teeth. She watches. She learns who’s worth a punch and who’s just loud. She doesn’t speak. Not unless Mel gives her a reason to. Sometimes she thinks Mel wants to.

Today, it’s quiet.

Too quiet.

They’re walking the upper halls between meetings. The sun filters in through windows too clean to be real. Everything smells like glass and citrus and old wealth.

Mel’s a few steps ahead, saying nothing. Her heels click against the floor with perfect rhythm.

Vi watches the sway of her shoulders, the impossible smoothness of her steps. There’s no wasted movement. Every part of her is choreographed. Intentional.

And then it happens.

A shift. A pause. A moment.

One heel catches on a ridge in the floor—a flaw in the perfect geometry of Piltover. It’s not dramatic. It’s not even obvious. Mel stumbles half a step.

And Vi moves.

She doesn’t think. She doesn’t assess. She just reacts.

Her arm snaps forward and wraps around Mel’s waist like she’s built to do it. Her hand finds the small of Mel’s back, anchors there. Her other arm catches her elbow, steadying. It’s not graceful. It’s not practiced.

It’s instinct.

She holds her too tightly. For too long.

And suddenly the air is different.

Mel turns her head slightly, just enough to look up at her. Her breath is caught—not because she tripped, but because of this. Because of the hand on her back. Because of Vi’s grip. Because of the heat between them that neither of them wants to name but both of them feel.

Vi realizes she’s holding her like she’s about to be taken. Like she’s something that can break. Like Vi will destroy anything that tries.

Her heart is hammering. Not from fear. Not from embarrassment.

From something else.

She saw someone about to get hurt, and something primal in her snapped awake. Something she thought she buried.

It’s not just about Mel.

It’s about Powder. About Vander. About everyone she couldn’t catch in time.

Mel studies her face—not for gratitude. Not for apology.

But for understanding.

And worse—she finds it.

Vi clears her throat. Steps back, too quick. Her hands fall to her sides. She flexes her fingers like they’ve betrayed her.

“You alright, princess?”

Mel smooths her hair with the same care she uses to draft legislation.

“Quite,” she says, calm as ever. “Though I do think you overreacted.”

Vi doesn’t answer.

Because the truth is rattling in her chest like a secret she doesn’t want to look at.

I didn’t overreact.

I didn’t react enough.

The barracks are a different kind of battlefield. Less polished, less postured, less full of perfume and politics. There are no marble floors here. No chandeliers. No gilded edges. Just cement walls, sweat-stained mats, lockers with chipped paint, and the sharp, bitter scent of steel and effort. It smells like what Vi knows. Like home. Like truth.

She steps through the doorway and the air shifts. Heads turn. Conversations lull mid-sentence. Enforcer recruits try not to look obvious about watching her. But they do. Every single one.

They’ve heard the stories—about the girl from the Lanes who shattered Silco’s empire with her fists. Who brought chem-barons to heel with blood in her mouth and fire in her voice. The one who stands beside a councilor like she’s daring the world to take a shot at her just so she can hit back harder.

They think she’s myth.

Vi doesn’t care about their stares.

She sees them. All of them. She sees the way one of the recruits adjusts his stance like he’s pretending he wasn’t nervous. The way another glances at her gauntlets with a mix of awe and fear. The way a few of them still hold themselves like schoolchildren in borrowed armor, thinking that discipline and drills will teach them how not to die when things get real.

She rolls her shoulders once. Breathes in. Out. Calm.

Then she straps on the gauntlets.

The hiss of them locking into place is her favorite sound in the world.

It’s not armor. Not to her.

It’s intention.

They don’t make her feel safe. They make her feel honest.

Like she doesn’t have to pretend she fits into anyone’s idea of civility or command. Like she’s allowed to be exactly what she is—something born in violence, reshaped into protection.

She steps into the ring. No one calls her forward. No one introduces her.

She doesn’t need ceremony.

This isn’t a demonstration.

It’s a warning.

The first trainer steps up. Tall. Lean. Trying to hide how much he’s sizing her up. He’s got reach. Decent stance. She can see he fancies himself clever. She can already tell he’s going to try to stay light on his feet, tire her out, keep away from her power.

She gives him a second to settle in. Then she steps forward.

Lets him circle. Lets him test the waters. Feigns sluggishness. A little slow on the dodge. A touch late on the counter. She plays the role so well she almost convinces herself.

Then he grins.

That’s his mistake.

The second he thinks he’s got the upper hand, Vi moves.

One pivot. One precise step inside his range. One fist like a freight train to the gut.

He folds.

He makes a sound like a dying animal and collapses to his knees. Vomits onto the mat.

Vi shakes her head. Doesn’t gloat. Doesn’t smile.

It wasn’t about winning.

It was about showing that she could have ended it at any second she chose.

The next two don’t learn from his mistake.

They come at her faster. Together. Hoping maybe coordination can replace experience. The taller one tries to flank while the other swings low. Vi doesn’t blink. She catches the first with a knee to the ribs—his breath explodes out of him—and then drives her elbow into the second’s chest so hard he stumbles three feet back, gasping.

She could stop there.

She doesn’t.

One kick takes the legs out from under the first. He hits the mat hard. She steps over him and grabs the second by the collar, pulls him forward, and slams him into the edge of the ring hard enough to leave a dent.

They won’t be clever again.

The fourth is cocky.

He’s faster. Quicker on his feet. Actually manages to get in close and land a punch across her lip. It splits. Bleeds.

He looks proud of it for exactly half a second.

Then she grabs his collar, spins him, and twists until his shoulder pops out of place with a sickening crunch.

He screams.

She lets him fall.

The blood trickles down her chin, warm and metallic.

She doesn’t wipe it away.

She turns. Looks to the bench.

Powder’s there, one leg slung over the other, chewing jerky like she’s watching a street show and not her sister dislocating people for sport. Her goggles are perched on her forehead, and her expression is one part amused, one part smug.

“You’re enjoying this,” she says, dry as a cracked pipe.

Vi swipes a hand across her mouth. Looks at the blood. Shrugs.

“She said I looked soft.”

Powder lets out a snort that’s half a laugh, half an accusation.

“You’re literally punching out Enforcer trainers because your crush thinks you’re cuddly.”

Vi glares. Walks over. Tosses her a bottle of water with a little more force than necessary.

“Shut up.”

But she’s smiling.

It’s a rare kind of smile. The real kind. The kind she only lets loose around Powder, when the world isn’t looking too closely. The kind that doesn’t come from violence or victory—but from relief. From being seen. From knowing that no matter what she’s doing, Powder will be there to call her out and keep her grounded.

Her lip still bleeds, and her knuckles are scuffed raw beneath the gauntlet edges, but she feels light. The kind of light she only feels after she’s let the weight out through every punch and grunt and bruise.

And then she feels it.

A shift in the air.

Like gravity remembered itself.

She turns her head and sees Mel standing in the doorway.

Just standing.

Not entering. Not announcing herself.

Watching.

And gods, Vi wishes she hadn’t.

Because now she feels it again—that rush of heat under her skin, the strange, sudden self-awareness that tightens her chest like a vice.

Mel doesn’t say anything.

Her eyes trail down Vi’s frame—sweat-slicked, shirt clinging, the bruises blooming dark and furious beneath the sheen of effort. Her gaze lingers, sharp and unreadable.

Vi can’t tell if it’s judgment.

Or something else.

Mel doesn’t step inside.

She just lingers in the doorway, silent and composed, the light from the corridor behind her making her look like a portrait brought to life.

And Vi—

Vi forgets to breathe.

Just for a second.

Long enough to feel how badly she wants Mel to keep looking.

And how much it terrifies her that she does.

The visit is supposed to be routine.

Mel knows the script. A progress check on boundary protocols, a review of Zaunite integration efforts, a polite reminder that Caitlyn Kiramman has been assigned to this sector of oversight and is entitled to regular updates. It’s diplomacy disguised as efficiency, as surveillance.

Mel has hosted these kinds of meetings dozens of times. Polished, precise, forgettable.

But this one feels different the moment Caitlyn enters the room.

She’s dressed for function—dark blues, high collar, enforcer insignia softened by careful tailoring. Her posture is perfectly upright, spine like a ruler, but her eyes are… playful. Calculating. Curious in that familiar, aristocratic way that says I’m bored, and I’d like to amuse myself.

Mel recognizes it immediately.

Caitlyn has always liked puzzles. Stories. Challenges dressed as people. And Vi—Vi walks into the room like a storm trying to pretend it’s harmless. Shoulders hunched just enough to seem indifferent. Hands shoved into her pockets. Gaze down, then flicking up with just a bit too much heat.

Mel watches Caitlyn catch sight of her.

Watches that slight uptick of her chin. That faint smile. The way her tone drops by a fraction, slides into something velvet-soft when she greets Vi.

“Enforcer Violet,” she says, amused.

Vi stammers. Actually stammers.

Mel doesn’t breathe.

Vi rubs the back of her neck like a nervous schoolboy. “It’s just… Vi,” she mutters. Her voice has gone strangely soft, rough in a way Mel’s not used to hearing unless she’s just stepped out of the ring or finished threatening someone.

Caitlyn’s smile deepens.

And Mel?

Mel smiles too.

But it’s the kind of smile she’s learned from her mother. The kind that bares no teeth but still tastes like blood.

Caitlyn sits too close. Her chair is angled toward Vi, not Mel. She doesn’t lean back. She leans in. Like proximity is a weapon and she’s already taken the safety off. She asks about patrol shifts, recent threats, “escalating tensions at the southern lift.” But the words don’t matter. It’s the way she says them. Like she’s measuring the effect of her presence in Vi’s periphery.

Vi doesn’t help. She’s awkward, sure. But she lets it happen. She nods. She answers. She fidgets—Vi never fidgets. When Caitlyn leans in to whisper something—something Mel cannot hear—Vi’s whole posture folds like damp paper. She flushes. Looks away. Smiles like she doesn’t know what else to do.

Mel’s hand tightens around the stem of her wineglass.

She doesn’t sip. Doesn’t move.

She doesn’t have to.

She holds still because that’s what control looks like. That’s what restraint looks like.

Caitlyn finishes her little performance with a flourish. Stands. Offers a crisp bow toward Mel, and a wink—a wink—toward Vi. Then she glides out of the room with all the grace of someone who knows she’s left an impression and is pleased about it.

Vi doesn’t follow her.

But she doesn’t stay either.

She clears her throat. Mumbles something about needing the washroom. And takes the other exit, the one farthest from Caitlyn, like that will somehow absolve her.

The door closes.

And Mel snaps the tip of her favorite quill clean off.

The sound is quiet. The splintering of polished wood barely registers beyond her immediate circle, but the ink spills like accusation—dark and sudden, soaking into her palm. She stares at it.

Doesn’t move.

Jayce and Viktor are seated just to her right, pretending—badly—not to be watching everything.

Viktor is the first to speak. He lifts his glass, sips once, and murmurs under his breath, “So. We all saw that, yes?”

Jayce doesn’t even blink. Just leans back, smug, and lets out a content little hum. “Mel’s in love.”

Mel turns her head.

Slowly.

Deliberately.

Her eyes are ice and fire.

“I will silence you both.”

Viktor shrugs. “That’s fair.”

Jayce lifts a hand. “Just observing. Not judging.”

“Judging would be more fun,” Viktor adds. “But we’re being good. See? Look at us. Very professional.”

Mel’s hand is still stained with ink.

Still clenched.

She doesn’t respond. Just wipes her fingers on a nearby napkin with a grace that doesn’t match the pressure she’s using.

Because the truth is—

She’s furious.

Not at Caitlyn. Not really.

Caitlyn is who she is. Born to flirt and conquer and exit rooms like it’s art.

No, Mel’s anger runs deeper than that. It’s sharp and unyielding and terrifying because it has no place to go. Because it isn’t strategic. Because it hurts.

She didn’t think she’d feel jealous.

She thought she was above that kind of thing.

But seeing Caitlyn lean in, seeing Vi smile—smile—seeing Vi choose silence instead of interruption?

It cut.

Not because Mel thinks Vi owes her anything.

But because for one maddening second, she saw herself replaced.

Not on paper. Not in power. But in Vi’s eyes.

And worse—

She doesn’t even know if that second was real.

The quill is gone. The ink’s been wiped away.

But the burn in her chest lingers like smoke in silk.

And somewhere, down a hallway Vi chose without looking back, Mel knows she’ll have to find a way to breathe through it. Or bleed for it.

Mel had spent years building herself out of sharp corners and polished steel. She had learned early on that empathy could be dressed as courtesy, that affection could be mimicked by precision. That if you spoke softly enough, dressed beautifully enough, sat just so with a glass of red wine and an unreadable expression, you could survive in a world built to swallow soft things whole. You could command. You could remain untouched.

She had met many people like Vi before. At least, she thought she had.

People from the Undercity who came up to Piltover wearing their anger like armor, daring anyone to try and strip it away. People who led with rage because they were never allowed to lead with anything else. Mel had categorized them all quickly—useful, dangerous, tragic. Weapons with stories, perhaps, but stories too scorched to read.

Vi should have been the same.

She wasn’t.

She wasn’t soft, no. Mel would never use that word. Vi was flint. Flint wrapped in leather and bruises, walking like consequence. But there was something else under it. Something quiet. Mel could feel it in the way Vi moved through the Council halls—not like she belonged, but like she dared the space to exclude her. Not like a brute stomping through goldleaf and crystal, but like someone who knew where not to step. Someone who had studied the patterns of power and decided to walk straight through them instead.

Mel didn’t expect the silence.

She didn’t expect the way Vi listened. How her gaze followed not just the words in a room but the intentions. How she could spot a shift in posture before anyone else even noticed discomfort. How she didn't speak just to speak, didn't bluff or posture when she had nothing to prove. Mel found herself watching her during meetings, sometimes longer than she meant to. She’d glance over to find Vi already watching her—not invasive, not expectant. Just there.

And now, here they were. Late evening. The meeting had run long. Jayce had made an impassioned speech that turned in on itself three times before fizzling out. Viktor had sighed, quietly and dramatically, and left halfway through. Mel had remained poised, calm, painting diplomacy into every breath.

Vi had stood behind her the whole time like a wall you wanted to crash into.

Afterwards, Mel had offered a drink.

Not with expectation.

Just a gesture.

Vi had shrugged. “Sure.” And followed her.

They sat in her private study. The city was quiet through the balcony doors. Mel had taken her heels off beneath the desk and tucked her legs under her chair. A low jazz record played from a speaker in the corner, filling the room with sound that was smooth and warm without asking anything from either of them.

Vi didn’t speak.

Mel didn’t press.

They shared a drink in silence at first—Mel’s wine the color of spilled secrets, Vi’s glass of something amber and sharp that matched her voice.

Mel had leaned back, swirling her glass absently, her eyes tracing the curve of Vi’s shoulder where her jacket hung off it.

And then she’d said it. Offhanded. Soft.

“What’s with the gloves?”

Vi blinked. Looked down at her hands like she'd forgotten they were there. The leather was faded, scarred, stitched in places that betrayed long use and longer memory.

She shrugged.

“They keep the worst parts of me on the outside.”

Her voice wasn’t bitter.

Just tired.

Mel didn’t respond. She didn’t lean forward. Didn’t fill the silence. She just waited.

And after a moment, Vi exhaled—slow and shaky, like something in her had decided she didn’t need to hold quite so tight to it anymore.

“Powder,” she said. “My sister. Smartest kid I’ve ever met.”

Her mouth curved slightly. Not a smile, not really. Just memory.

“She built her first flash bomb before she lost her baby teeth. Got us out of a dozen close calls with those little smoke grenades of hers. Always wanted to protect us. Even when it should’ve been the other way around.”

Mel didn’t say anything. Just nodded once, slow.

Vi’s eyes drifted down to her glass.

“I used to think if I just hit hard enough, everything would stop breaking. I thought if I broke first, the world wouldn’t get a chance to.”

She rubbed her thumb along the rim of the glass.

“There was a time when that worked. Until it didn’t.”

Mel watched her fingers, the tension in her jaw, the way she never once looked up while she spoke.

“I’ve done things,” Vi said, voice lower now. “Things I don’t want back, but things I don’t want anyone else to carry either.”

She paused.

“The first person I killed… it was fast. I think. I didn’t wait long enough to find out.”

Mel’s throat tightened, but she said nothing.

It wasn’t the confession that cut.

It was the distance in her voice. The way it had been buried, folded, packed away like an old photograph you didn’t dare throw out. Not because you missed it—but because you owed the memory something.

Vi finally looked up. Met her gaze.

And Mel saw her.

Not the bodyguard. Not the bruiser. Not the icon the Undercity whispered about like a weapon you could hire.

She saw the girl who’d grown up in fire and learned to use her fists before she learned to use her voice. She saw the protector. The one who had broken first, over and over again, to shield the people she loved.

And for the first time in longer than she could name, Mel felt the sharp ache of recognition. Of understanding.

Vi finished her drink and stood.

Mel didn’t want her to.

But she didn’t stop her.

She only reached out—lightly. Not forceful. Not pleading. Just enough to touch her wrist as she passed. Her fingers barely brushed skin.

“I’m sorry,” Mel said, softly. “That the world made you into something it feared before it ever saw who you were.”

Vi went very still.

Her eyes locked onto hers.

And in that moment, the entire world held its breath.

Mel thought she’d step back. Thought she’d shake it off.

Instead, Vi’s fingers reached out and—almost absently—ran across the back of Mel’s hand. Slow. Gentle. Like a thought escaping a cage.

And then she left.

The door clicked softly behind her.

Mel didn’t move for a long time.

She stared at the door. At her hand. At the empty glass.

And she knew—without doubt, without drama, with a clarity that cut like truth—

She was already too close.

The night is dressed in glitter and pretense.

Everything gleams in warm candlelight, refracted off crystal glasses and gold-plated cutlery, each piece arranged with surgical precision. The laughter echoing through the marble ballroom is tight and controlled, too loud in the way people laugh when they’re watching each other. Power sits at every table, draped in velvet and feathers and inherited bloodlines. The air tastes like wine and politics.

Vi hates it.

She wears the suit Mel had commissioned for her. It fits—almost too well—but it itches. It itches at her wrists, at the small of her back, at the bend of her elbows where she can’t roll up the sleeves without ruining the lines. The boots are too polished, stiff where they press against her ankles, the kind that announce you with every step. She doesn’t like being announced. She likes being prepared.

Her gauntlets aren’t on her hands. That’s the first thing that’s wrong.

They’re holstered at her side in sleek compartments built into her jacket seams—Mel had insisted on discretion. Vi had argued. Lost. And now she feels it, the nakedness of her hands. The weightlessness. The itch beneath her skin, deeper than the fabric, deeper than nerves.

Mel walks beside her like she owns the floor. Gold-trimmed silk moves with each step like it’s obeying command. She glows in a way that makes people move without realizing they’re moving. Heads turn, hands linger mid-glass, voices hush. She doesn’t just draw attention—she commands it.

Vi walks half a pace behind.

Not because she’s subordinate, but because her instincts demand it. She watches everything. The guards stationed along the walls, the waitstaff gliding between clusters of diplomats, the too-slick smiles from men in tailored suits. She doesn’t hear everything Mel says—something biting about the Kirammans, something wry about hextech spending—but she notes the cadence, the coolness. The way Mel can say five different things in one perfectly folded sentence.

Vi doesn't laugh. She’s not here to laugh.

She's here to make sure Mel walks out.

The ballroom arches open to a garden terrace, bathed in soft blue lights. Decorative. Exposed.

That’s when it happens.

The first warning isn’t a shout.

It’s a whisper of air—thin and fast.

A dart slices past Vi’s ear.

She moves before she thinks.

There’s no time to reach for her gauntlets. No time to shout a warning. No time for anything but motion.

She launches forward, grabs Mel by the waist, and twists—pulls her down behind the nearest stone pillar just as the next dart embeds in the wall above her head.

And then the attackers are there.

Shimmer-laced armor. Glowing red slits where eyes should be. Movements sharp and unnatural. Six of them. Not enforcers. Not mercenaries. Something worse—the kind of trained that doesn’t come with discipline but desperation. Paid for in shimmer and spite.

Vi doesn't flinch.

She doesn't go for weapons.

She is the weapon.

She charges the first without hesitation. A blur of white suit and violence. Her fist connects with his jaw and there’s a crack—deep and immediate, bone against bone. He stumbles, but she’s already moved. Spins, ducks low beneath a blade, and drives her elbow up into the next attacker’s throat. He gurgles and goes limp.

A blade slices across her ribs. It burns hot, wet. She barely registers it.

Pain is a conversation she’s stopped answering.

She yanks the blade from the attacker’s hand, uses it to deflect another strike, then throws it hard into the side of the nearest one’s leg. He screams. Drops. She doesn’t watch him fall.

Steel gauntlets rise in front of her. Not hers.

The attacker swings wide, full force. Vi steps inside it, lets it glance off her shoulder, and then drives her fist—bare—through the faceplate. The mask shatters. His body goes limp before he hits the ground.

Three more close in. Fast. Tight formation. Trained. They try to box her in.

Bad idea.

Vi pivots, slamming her knee into the nearest one’s solar plexus. He stumbles back, and she uses his dropped center to grab him, twist, and throw—a full-bodied arc into the second one. They both crash to the floor in a tangle of limbs and broken breath.

The third raises a blade, shimmer-glowing, screaming as it hums.

Vi rips a knife from her side. Her knife. Hidden in her jacket lining. She throws it without ceremony.

It buries itself deep into the attacker’s calf.

He drops.

It’s over in twenty-two seconds.

The quiet that follows is not peaceful.

It’s suspended.

The kind of silence that still echoes with violence. That thrums in the blood.

Vi stands in the center of the terrace, panting. Her chest heaves. Her shirt is torn down the side. Her ribs are bleeding. Her hands shake—not from pain. Not from adrenaline.

From what almost happened.

The garden is full of bodies.

They look like they’ve been hit by a landslide.

Mel steps out from behind the pillar. Slow. Measured. Her face is unreadable. Her hair is slightly mussed, one gold earring lost in the scuffle. Her dress is untouched.

Vi turns toward her. Tries to ground herself. Tries to breathe.

And then—

A hand on her shoulder.

Soft.

Gentle.

Wrong.

Vi flinches.

Hard.

“Don’t.”

The word cuts through the night like a blade.

Mel freezes. Her hand still half-raised. Her eyes wide.

Vi’s voice is low. Shattered. Not from rage. Not from pain.

“I’m not… done shaking yet.”

It’s not a warning.

It’s a confession.

Mel says nothing.

Just watches.

Like she’s watching a miracle bleed.

The blood has already been cleaned.

The terrace is polished. The glass reinstalled. The council sent flowers—white lilies and blue-tipped roses, expensive and scentless, the kind bred for showrooms and regret. Security protocols have been tripled. Reports were filed. Meetings held. Questions posed in the sharp language of politicians—who planned it, who funded it, who’s going to pay for the embarrassment of nearly losing a councilor in front of half the upper ring’s aristocracy.

Mel answered them all with poise.

She didn’t flinch when they played the footage back, when they dissected the attackers’ routes and body modifications and shimmer concentrations like they weren’t even people. She didn’t look away when they paused the scene mid-motion, Vi's fists a blur of violence, her face unreadable through a spray of blood and light. Mel listened. She nodded. She made decisions.

But none of that is what stayed.

Not the blood. Not the chaos. Not the clean-up.

What stayed was Vi’s voice.

That one word.

Don’t.

Shaking. Quiet. Not barked like an order or snapped like a reflex. Broken. And real in a way Mel wasn’t prepared for. It wasn’t about danger. It wasn’t about pain.

It was about closeness.

Mel hadn’t touched her to calm her. She hadn’t even thought, really. She’d just seen Vi there, trembling, breath ragged, and reached out.

And Vi had flinched like she’d been cut.

Mel keeps replaying it. Not because she doesn’t understand it.

But because she does.

That’s what unsettles her.

That’s what burrows under her skin like heat too close to bone.

So she rationalizes. Tells herself she’s interested because Vi is dangerous. Because dangerous things are useful. Predictable. Vi is a weapon. A presence that shifts any conversation just by standing in a room. She protects Mel, yes—but more than that, she intimidates the people Mel can’t always touch.

It’s strategy.

It has to be.

But the market ruins that lie.

It’s a crisp morning, the sky high and silver-bright. They’re walking to an inspection of the new water intake system being installed at the lower edge of Piltover’s infrastructure—another joint initiative between the zones, another delicate balancing act of optics and obligation.

Vi walks beside her in silence. Still limping slightly. Her suit jacket is undone. Her collar open. The bruises on her neck are fading now, turning soft violet like the petals of a crushed flower. She doesn't speak, doesn't hover, just walks—a quiet wall of muscle and instinct at Mel’s side.

The market stretches out before them, narrow paths between wooden stalls stacked high with fruit, fabric, salvage tech. The vendors don’t flinch when Mel passes anymore. They glance at Vi. They nod. They keep selling.

And then it happens.

Vi slows.

Mel follows her gaze and sees the child.

She can’t be more than eight. Maybe nine. Her coat is too big, the sleeves rolled three times and still slipping past her hands. She’s standing in front of a produce stand, chin tilted up in challenge. A man twice her size—gruff, grease-stained—scoffs at her. She jabs a finger at a pile of apples.

“They’re bruised. I’m not paying full.”

The man laughs. “Then walk.”

She doesn’t move.

Vi steps forward.

Not fast. Not loud. Just… there.

Mel watches her crouch in front of the girl. Sees the way Vi tilts her head, lowers her voice just enough to be heard, just enough to be seen.

“Double price for guts like that,” Vi says. Her smile is crooked. Lopsided. Real.

She flips a coin from her pocket. Tosses it into the girl’s hand.

“But,” she adds, straightening and reaching out—gentle, careful, like she’s done it a hundred times—“you better learn how to throw a punch if you’re gonna talk that loud.”

She fixes the knot on the girl’s coat. Fingers nimble, movements automatic.

The girl stares up at her like she’s magic. Then grins and bolts.

Vi turns back without looking for thanks. Without checking if Mel saw.

But Mel did.

She saw all of it.

And something in her chest shifts—something cold and careful and hard, something she’s carried for so long it had started to feel like part of her ribcage.

It melts.

She doesn’t speak as they walk. Can’t.

Because she’s watching Vi from the corner of her eye, trying not to be obvious. Trying not to feel too much.

But Vi is still there, walking like she belongs more to shadows than sunlight. Sweat starting to bead at her collar despite the cold. One hand drifting toward her hip where the gauntlets would rest if Mel hadn’t asked her to leave them behind for optics’ sake. That hand keeps twitching like it doesn’t know what to do without steel around it.

And Mel thinks—

She’s not just strong.

She’s soft, when no one’s looking.

Not weak. Not fragile.

Soft.

The kind of soft that takes more courage than cruelty ever did.

And Mel—

Mel can’t look away.

Vi has been avoiding her for two days.

She’s not subtle about it. Not really. Not when she ducks down auxiliary corridors to avoid Mel’s silhouette at the far end of a hallway. Not when she waits half a beat too long to enter a room Mel’s just stepped into, pretending she forgot something or got called away. Not when she answers every question with one-syllable grunts, eyes flicking away too fast, as if staring at the walls might somehow protect her from the quiet weight of Mel’s gaze.

It’s not about shame. It’s never been that.

Vi has done things—awful things—with fists and fire and blood under her nails. She’s lived in that truth so long it no longer has edges. She can hold pain. Can breathe through violence. She’s been broken and reshaped so many times that fracture feels like home.

But this—what happened on the terrace—this wasn’t just another fight. It wasn’t just another memory etched into her muscles.

It was what came after.

The way she shook when it ended.

The way Mel reached out with such unbearable softness, fingertips like apology and affection all wrapped in silence.

And Vi had snapped.

Don’t, she’d said, voice cracking. Not because she didn’t want the touch. Gods, it wasn’t that. It was because she did.

She had felt it in her bones, the way her body leaned toward the warmth even as her mouth warned it away. She’d flinched not from fear of Mel—but from the terrifying realization that this woman could see her.

And still wanted to be close.

She hasn’t spoken to her since.

Mel hasn’t cornered her. Hasn’t demanded answers or stormed through the halls in a blaze of elegance and scorn. No pointed words. No icy statements. Just quiet—sharp, focused quiet. And eyes.

Those golden eyes.

Vi feels them on her. Every time she breathes. Every time she rounds a corner, half-expecting Mel to be there. Every time she walks past the study where Mel sometimes waits with her hands folded and her expression unreadable.

The silence is worse than any scolding.

Because Mel isn’t just angry. She’s hurt. And Vi doesn’t know what to do with that. She doesn’t know how to fix something that never broke, only opened.

The third night, Vi finds herself pacing the war room balcony.

The lights of Piltover twinkle like fake stars, each one a piece of a city that’s never welcomed her, never asked her to stay. Below, Zaun breathes with its usual steam and metal grind, alive and feral and real. Vi doesn’t know which skyline she belongs to anymore.

She leans on the railing, palms splayed, head bowed. Her hands are still bandaged from the fight. The bruises on her ribs bloom deeper every time she turns too fast. She hasn’t bothered to heal. There’s something comforting about pain she can see.

She hears the door open behind her.

She doesn’t turn.

Footsteps. Slow. Measured. Deliberate.

Then silence.

Mel says nothing at first. Just stands behind her. Close enough that Vi can feel the presence, the steadiness. Not touching. Not demanding. Just there.

Vi closes her eyes.

She wants to run.

She wants to turn and bury her face in Mel’s shoulder and confess everything she’s never said aloud.

Instead, she just says, “I’m fine.”

It’s a lie. A bad one.

Mel doesn’t answer.

She waits.

Vi grips the edge of the railing tighter. The city beneath them hums.

Then Mel’s voice cuts through the quiet like silk through skin.

“Look at me.”

Vi doesn’t move.

She stares at the floor. At her hands—scabbed and raw. At the bruises on her knuckles she hasn’t cleaned. At the faint streaks of blood still crusted along her wrist from where her gauntlet bit in too deep. She shakes her head.

“I’m not what you think I am.”

Her voice is too low.

Too broken.

Mel takes a step forward.

“Look at me.”

It’s not a command.

It’s a plea.

Vi turns.

Slowly.

And Mel is there.

Golden eyes steady. Shoulders drawn back. Not angry. Not distant.

Just open.

And she whispers, “That was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

Vi goes still.

Utterly, impossibly still.

Like the world just cracked open and bared its heart.

Her chest aches. Deep. Like something inside her has started to unravel. Like someone’s cracked her ribcage open and found the softest part and touched it without gloves.

She sways.

Just slightly.

Her knees don’t buckle—but gods, they almost do.

She doesn’t cry.

But her throat closes.

Because no one has ever said anything like that to her before.

Not about the fighting. Not about the breaking. Not about the aftermath.

And definitely not about the shaking.

She doesn’t know what to say.

So she says nothing.

Just breathes.

And hopes Mel can feel it. The truth of her.

The gratitude.

The fear.

The quiet, shattering ache of finally being seen and not turned away.

Powder arrives like a whisper on a wind no one hears until it bends the trees.

She doesn’t announce herself. There is no dramatic entrance, no grand reveal. One moment, the garden is still and quiet, patterned with shafts of sunlight filtering through stained-glass awnings. The next, there’s a soft sound of boots on stone, and then there she is.

A girl painted in contradictions.

Blue hair tousled like it’s never seen a brush but arranged in a way that clearly means something to her. Goggles too large for her face perched on her forehead, smudged with oil and something faintly glowing. Her eyes are enormous—wide and bright and cracked in places where light seeps through. She walks like she’s expecting the ground to fall away, but she talks like gravity’s her toy.

Mel watches from a distance.

She doesn’t realize she’s holding her breath until she sees Vi.

Vi hears the steps first. Her posture changes—not tense, not alarmed—just aware, attuned. And when she turns, and her eyes fall on the girl approaching the stone path, her entire body lights up.

It is not a smile.

It is an event.

Vi moves faster than Mel has ever seen her move outside of combat. Crosses the space in long strides that crack open her guard like it never existed at all. She doesn’t hesitate. Doesn’t check for witnesses. She just grabs Powder and lifts her, clean off the ground, like she weighs nothing.

“Holy shit, you’re taller,” Vi says, spinning her once, laughing into her shoulder.

It’s loud. Unguarded. Sunlight in sound.

And Powder—

She giggles.

Not maniacal. Not broken.

Genuine.

She swats Vi’s shoulder and says, “I told you I’ve been eating.” Then, quieter, “You’re really here.”

Vi presses their foreheads together. “Damn right I am.”

Mel stays where she is, frozen.

It’s not the hug. It’s not the laugh. It’s the transformation.

Vi isn’t wearing armor. She isn’t posturing. She isn’t the terrifying specter of violence who stands at Mel’s back during political meetings, cutting through tension with her stare alone. She isn’t the wounded girl who flinched from touch and spoke like love was a language she didn’t believe belonged to her.

This Vi is softer. Warmer. Open in a way that isn’t weakness but truth.

She is joy incarnate.

Mel has never seen her like this.

She has never seen anyone like this.

They walk through the garden paths, past rows of sculpted hedges and imported silvervine. Powder talks the entire time—nonstop and brilliant, like her mind moves faster than her mouth can handle. She tells Vi about Ekko’s latest invention (“He says it’s for stabilizing rail lines but I know he just wants to see if it’ll jump a river”), about the lab under the rail station, about hacking into Piltover’s lower-tier academic firewalls for fun and then leaving notes for the professors in their code.

Vi listens, rapt. She grins like she’s drunk on every word.

Mel follows at a careful distance.

She doesn’t intrude. Doesn’t want to break the spell.

But she watches Vi.

Watches the way she tilts her head, tracking Powder’s stories. The way she snorts when Powder mimics Jayce’s voice, elbowing her like they’re ten years old again. The way she listens with her whole body—eyes soft, hands loose, shoulders open.

And then, when the excitement starts to fade into quiet, they sit.

A small stone bench by the lily pond. Powder curls up beside Vi, head resting on her shoulder. Vi tucks an arm around her without thinking, fingers playing gently with the edge of her sleeve.

The late sun glints off the water, catching in their hair, softening the edges of the world.

They’re home, in a way that no place has ever been. And Vi—

Vi holds Powder like she’s the safest thing in the world.

Not fragile. Not something to protect out of guilt.

But something worth holding.

Mel doesn’t move.

She can’t.

Because in that moment, something inside her—the part that’s always been calculating, curious, tactical—shifts.

Irrevocably.

This isn’t curiosity. It isn’t intrigue. It isn’t fascination dressed in silk and rational thought.

This is—

Love.

Not the love she’s wielded before like a dagger, like a political alliance. Not the kind she’s rationed and refined.

This is raw. Full. Terrifying.

Because she didn’t choose it.

And it won’t be unchosen.

She is in love with Vi.

The girl who punches like a war god and speaks like a street rat. Who bleeds too easily, who flinches from kindness, who holds her sister like a miracle she thought she’d never get back.

Mel loves her.

And it terrifies her more than anything ever has.

The first time Mel saw Vi kill, she understood it as necessity. Brutal, effective, without ornament. She had catalogued it the way she might a chess move—unexpected but not unexplainable. That was before.

Now, it is something else.

Because she’s not watching a stranger. She’s watching Vi—and Vi is no longer a variable in her equations, no longer just a shield for hire in a city of knives. She is something raw, too real, too present. And the knowledge of that has rooted itself in Mel’s chest like a blade made of truth: sharp, impossible to ignore, and pressing closer every day.

Mel had thought—perhaps foolishly—that she was getting used to her.

Used to the way Vi stands behind her at council meetings, arms folded, expression unreadable, a wall of iron in worn leather and laced menace. Used to the way her eyes flick constantly, assessing, noting exits, mapping trajectories of imagined threats with the precision of a soldier too used to war. Used to the sound of her boots pacing the tiled halls late at night, never quite at rest.

Mel had even thought she was getting used to how her own heart behaved in Vi’s presence. How it slowed—not from complacency, but from trust. How Vi's proximity, once unsettling, had begun to feel like safety.

She’d convinced herself that she was adjusting.

But there is no adjustment to what happens next.

It’s late. Too late for council. The hour where most of Piltover turns inward, curtains drawn, lights dimmed to lull the city into the illusion of peace. Mel is walking home, her heels echoing down the stone paths, flanked by two enforcers in gleaming white-and-silver armor. She hadn’t insisted on the guard, but Jayce had all but demanded it, and even Vi had given a grudging nod.

The route is routine. Supposed to be safe.

Until it isn’t.

The alley they turn into isn’t unfamiliar. It cuts behind a row of merchant buildings, shortcutting through what is usually quiet stonework and rusted fences.

But the moment they round the bend, Mel feels it.

Too quiet.

Too still.

Then—

The flick of movement. A metallic scrape.

A shimmer bomb rolls from the shadows, glowing faintly violet.

The guards curse—one shoves Mel back, the other steps forward, blade drawn. Too late.

Figures descend like wraiths—shimmer-bright eyes and glinting knives.

And then—

Vi is there.

Not from behind them. From above.

She drops like thunder, gauntlets whirring, no shout, no warning—just motion.

The first attacker is already down before he knows she’s there. The second guard stumbles, caught off guard—but Vi is behind him in an instant, catching his arm mid-swing and driving her knee into his ribs with a sickening crunch. His dagger clatters to the ground as he folds.

The shimmer bomb ignites, smoke curling through the air, thick and sharp.

Mel coughs. Her eyes burn.

A shape emerges through the smoke, sprinting toward her.

She doesn’t even flinch.

Because Vi is faster.

She barrels into the attacker, shoulder-first, lifts him clean off the ground, and slams him into the alley wall so hard the bricks groan under the force.

There is no time to breathe.

The last two charge in unison, hoping to flank.

Vi spins—ducking one blade, parrying the next with her forearm—and then moves. A punch to the gut. A twist to the knee. One goes down howling. The other tries to crawl away.

Vi doesn’t let him.

It is not a fight. It is not even a warning.

It is final.

By the time the smoke clears, they’re all on the ground—some groaning, some not moving at all.

Vi stands at the center.

Her gauntlets hum, blood dripping down her knuckles.

Her breath comes in heaving bursts.

And her eyes—

Her eyes are glassy. Far away. Like she’s still somewhere inside the haze of adrenaline and memory, caught between the now and all the other nights like this one.

Mel steps forward. Her hands shake. Her heart feels like it’s caught between beats, too fast and too slow all at once.

Vi doesn’t look at her.

Just stands there. Fists clenched. Shoulders rising and falling in sharp stutters.

Mel moves closer.

One step.

Then another.

Vi flinches—barely. A twitch, a stiffening of her spine.

“Don’t,” she whispers.

Her voice is low, like the tail end of a scream swallowed down too long. Raw. Frayed. The same way it was on the terrace. But not as loud.

More broken.

“Please,” she adds, barely audible. “Not yet.”

Mel doesn’t stop.

Not this time.

She lifts her hand slowly—slow enough that Vi can see it, read it, reject it. But Vi doesn’t move. Doesn’t recoil. She just trembles.

So Mel presses her fingers, lightly, against the side of Vi’s arm.

Not a grab. Not a hold.

Just touch.

Vi doesn’t pull away.

Instead, after a breath, she leans into it. Almost imperceptibly. Like she doesn’t believe she’s allowed, but she’s doing it anyway.

Mel steps closer. Her other hand comes up, brushing the line of Vi’s jaw, tucking back a strand of blood-matted hair. Vi’s eyes close at the touch.

She’s not crying. Not visibly.

But her entire body is shaking.

Not from fear.

From release.

From whatever dam inside her had burst open again and was trying—desperately—not to drown her.

Mel says nothing.

There’s nothing to say.

Not now. Not when the street is still painted with violence and Vi is still wet with blood and smoke.

But she doesn’t leave.

She stays. Steady. Present.

She lets Vi lean.

Lets her breathe.

Lets her be soft, if only for a minute.

They stay like that for a long time.

And when Mel finally walks back to her quarters—escorted by a new team of guards she didn’t ask for—she doesn’t sleep.

She lies awake, eyes open to the darkness, the memory of Vi’s trembling weight still pressed faintly into her hands.

She thought she knew danger.

But now she knows something deeper.

Something far more terrifying.

Because nothing is more dangerous than a blade that learns how to be kind.

Nothing cuts deeper than someone who bleeds for you and lets you touch the wound.

The room is quiet. The kind of quiet that hums—like a held breath, like something waiting to break. Piltover has that stillness after a certain hour, where the machines sleep and the people pretend. Where the lights outside dim to a warm gold and the streets are patrolled by silence more than by guards.

Vi sits alone in the dark.

The window’s cracked, but the air doesn’t move. The breeze can’t find her here, cloaked in sweat and regret and something too soft to name. Her shirt lies discarded on the floor. She’s half-dressed and whole-wrecked. Her ribs ache with every breath, but it’s nothing new. Nothing worthy of complaint.

She tapes her left hand first.

The gauze sticks to the blood still fresh along her knuckles. The cuts haven’t scabbed—because she didn’t let them. She keeps reopening them, again and again, in the name of training, in the name of preparedness, in the name of keeping her hands busy so her mind doesn’t spiral. But she knows that’s not what this is. This is punishment. Old habits.

The bandages wind sloppily, more pressure than precision. Her fingers tremble with every pull. It’s not the pain. It’s the stillness.

The right hand’s worse. It always is. That’s the one she leads with. The one she throws hardest. The one she forgets to protect because when she’s in a fight, she doesn’t think. She becomes something else. Someone else.

But tonight there’s no one to hit.

No shimmer freak in the alley. No swaggering council hound trying to put her in a corner. No threat to Mel that she can redirect her fury toward.

Just her. And the ache that’s been building for days.

Vi finishes the wrap. Ties it tight. Too tight. She wants it to hurt. She wants it to anchor her.

She breathes through her teeth.

Then leans back, shoulder blades pressing into the wood panel behind her. She tilts her head, eyes drifting to the ceiling, but she’s not really looking at anything.

She’s seeing.

Mel’s laugh.

That dry, amused tilt of her head whenever Powder rambles too fast for anyone but Ekko to understand. The way Mel watches—really watches—like every word has value. Like every motion means something. Like Vi herself isn’t just a shadow in someone else’s war but a person. Someone worth seeing.

Vi clenches her fists.

The motion pulls the bandages. Bites into the torn skin.

She welcomes the sting.

Because this is the part where it gets dangerous.

This is the part where she starts to think too long about things that shouldn’t mean anything.

The sound of wine glasses clinking, laughter bubbling through the quiet. Powder’s voice in the background, teasing, loud, radiant. And Mel, leaning forward over a low-lit table, hair pulled back, earrings swinging like they had somewhere to go.

Vi had missed the joke. Missed the whole conversation.

Because all she could do was watch the way Mel’s lips moved around a smile.

The way she looked tired and brilliant at once.

The way Vi’s name sounded different when she said it. Like it belonged.

She groans and leans forward, dropping her forehead to her bandaged fists.

“Stupid,” she mutters.

One word. Full of weight.

She shouldn’t care. She’s never been the type. Love is weakness. Desire is a chain. She’d carved those truths into herself years ago, in the wet stone and fire of Zaun’s gutters. She doesn’t get to want things. Not and survive.

Wanting means needing.

And needing?

That gets people killed.

She’s seen it. Lived it. Vander needed too much—tried too hard. Silco needed too little and turned poison. And Vi? Vi learned not to need anyone.

After the first time she was left with nothing but the ash of what she thought was family, she taught herself to burn first.

But Mel—

Mel is a different kind of fire.

She doesn’t rage. She radiates. Controlled heat. Intelligence honed into seduction. She’s all soft edges until she isn’t. And she scares Vi in a way shimmer never could.

Because Mel could look at her, in the middle of chaos, in the blood and dust and trembling ruin—and call her beautiful.

Because Mel sees her.

And worse—Vi sees her back.

Not the councilwoman. Not the diplomat. Not the Medarda legacy polished into palatable gold. But the woman underneath. Clever, jaded, bleeding quiet all over her silk. Grieving a mother she never had, building a world that never deserved her.

Vi sees the walls.

And she wants to tear them down. Carefully. Softly. The way she’s never done anything.

She presses her palms to her eyes, like she can rub the thoughts out of her skull.

“You don’t get to want her,” she whispers to the empty room.

The words feel like iron.

She breathes in. Out. Again.

But the truth lingers, cloying as powder smoke in her lungs.

Because she does.

She wants the curl of Mel’s hand at her wrist. The way Mel’s voice softens when they’re alone. The careful pauses when Vi jokes too close to honesty. The eyes that never look away. The presence that wraps around her without demanding anything.

She wants the way Mel says her name.

She wants to be seen. And held.

And it terrifies her.

Because she can survive being hated. Ignored. Feared.

But this?

Being loved?

Being wanted back?

That’s a battlefield she’s never trained for.

She opens her eyes. The room hasn’t changed.

The ache hasn’t either.

She sits still, the way she does after a fight that cost too much.

And somewhere deep in her chest—beneath the scars and the armor and the iron-clad rules she built to survive—there is a whisper:

You already chose her.

She doesn’t move.

She just lets the truth sit there.

Heavy. Unspoken.

And real.

Vi has taken punches that would make a lesser person drop and stay down. She's been tossed through walls, stabbed, shot, burned. She knows how to bleed and how to wear the wounds like medals, each scar a line of poetry etched across skin that forgot softness a long time ago.

But nothing—nothing—hurts quite like this.

Because this pain isn’t loud. It doesn’t roar through her ribs like shattered bone. It doesn’t scream like torn muscle or howl like broken knuckles.

It whispers.

It curls beneath her skin, sits at the back of her throat, and makes her jaw lock until her teeth ache. It’s slow. Quiet. Like rot behind paint. And she doesn’t know what to do with it, because it's not something she can punch.

It's not a threat. It's a hope.

And hope’s the most dangerous thing she’s ever known.

Mel watches her. Not constantly. Not obviously. Mel is far too skilled for that. But Vi sees it. Catches it. Glimpses it between the cracks in council meetings and garden walks and long silences that stretch too soft to be accidental.

It’s in the way Mel’s eyes linger after saying her name.

It’s in the press of fingers that brush her forearm just a second too long when handing over a document. A shift in weight. A lowered gaze. The faintest smile that doesn’t reach anyone else.

But Vi doesn’t speak it.

Doesn’t move.

Because she’s not ready to lose what little this is.

If she speaks it into the air—wants it out loud—then it becomes a risk. Then Mel might recoil, and Vi doesn’t think she can survive that.

She’s used to things being hard. She’s used to earning every scrap of peace with bruises. But Mel… Mel makes her want something different. Something terrifyingly fragile.

And so she stays still.

She keeps her hands folded behind her back when Mel walks too close.

She keeps her mouth shut when Mel leans in, wine-dark hair catching sunlight like fire.

She doesn’t flinch when Mel’s perfume catches on her collar. Doesn’t breathe too deep. Doesn’t stare when Mel brushes by with that impossible grace, all poise and danger wrapped in silks and steel.

She just watches. Just listens.

And aches.

Because smiling hurts.

Today, Mel smiled at someone else during a meeting.

One of the chemists, from some partnership initiative, made a joke Vi barely caught—something dry and diplomatic and annoying. And Mel had laughed.

Not just a polite chuckle. An actual laugh. Soft and surprised and warm.

Vi’s spine went stiff like she’d been shot.

Something in her stomach twisted, ugly and sudden, and she almost reached for the chair beside her—almost snapped the leg off it just to have something to do with her hands.

Instead, she shoved her fists into her pockets and stared at the wall until the sound of it faded.

Later, Jayce said something smug about progress and personal growth, and Mel smirked, tilting her head in that elegant way that always makes Vi’s heart slow and spike all at once.

Vi bit her tongue so hard she tasted blood.

It shouldn’t matter.

They’re nothing. Not really. She’s just a bodyguard. Just a brawler from the Undercity that Piltover pretends to tolerate because she keeps them safe and looks terrifying while doing it. She’s not part of this world.

Not the way Mel is.

Not the way Mel shines.

And still.

And still.

There are moments. Small ones. Quiet.

Mel will pass behind her, too close, and Vi doesn’t move. Doesn’t lean in. Doesn’t pull away.

Mel always does.

Vi always lets her.

Because if she turns, if she catches Mel’s wrist and says something real, something true—and Mel doesn’t want her back?

That silence would be louder than any rejection she’s ever known.

It wouldn’t be a slap. It would be a silence that sinks deep and cold and final. And Vi… Vi’s survived heartbreak, but she doesn’t know if she’d survive hope breaking.

Because she wants.

She wants the way Mel says her name like it matters. Wants the way Mel listens like nothing else exists. Wants to be allowed to touch without flinching.

She wants Mel to choose her.

Not as a weapon. Not as a guard.

But as Vi.

And she doesn’t know how to ask for that.

She doesn’t even know if she’s allowed.

So she stays quiet.

Keeps training. Keeps watching. Keeps catching her breath like it’s trying to escape every time Mel gets too close.

Keeps smiling through the hurt, because maybe—just maybe—that smile will reach her back.

And if it doesn’t?

She’ll survive.

She always does.

But gods, she hopes she doesn’t have to.

It begins with wine.

The expensive kind—deep red, thick as velvet, aged in bottles that haven’t seen dust in decades. It tastes like old money and secrets. Bitter on the first sip. Smooth on the second. Vi doesn’t pretend to like it. Mel doesn’t pretend not to notice.

They sit across from each other in Mel’s study, the only light coming from flickering candle sconces and the soft blue of the city bleeding in through arched windows. Outside, Piltover hums beneath them—alive, glittering, unaware.

Inside, time breathes quieter.

Jayce had left hours ago, full of self-congratulatory grins and tech-speak too fast to matter. The rest of the council dissolved into their rooms and their rituals. The guards were dismissed. Vi had stayed—lingering just at the edge of the door, clearly expecting to be dismissed like always.

Mel had lifted her glass and said only one word. “Stay.”

It hadn’t been a command. Just an invitation.

Vi had paused, tilted her head, then walked in like she owned the room but didn’t want to.

Now they sit like that. Somewhere between strangers and not. Close enough to see each other, but not quite close enough to reach.

The conversation drifts.

They speak of Powder—Vi’s voice gentling into something like reverence when she describes her sister’s mind. “She could build bombs before she could spell,” Vi says with a soft, crooked smile. “Terrified half the street. I was proud as hell.”

They speak of Zaun—how its air is heavier, its light dimmer, but its soul somehow brighter. Vi doesn’t romanticize it, but she doesn’t run from it either. It’s hers. She speaks of its weight like an oath.

Mel, in turn, gives pieces of herself. Carefully. Intentionally. Not lies. Not fabrications. But curated truths, like shards of glass arranged into a mosaic. She speaks of her childhood—not often, and not in full. But enough. Enough for Vi to hear the edges.

“My mother used to test us,” she says softly, swirling her wine. “By how we endured cruelty without breaking.”

Vi doesn’t offer comfort. Doesn’t insult her with pity.

She just says, “And you didn’t.” It’s not a question.

Mel glances up. Their eyes lock.

Vi is still. Attentive. Protective in a way that has nothing to do with her job.

It’s unbearable. And somehow, it's the only thing keeping Mel breathing.

The bottle runs dry before they do.

By then, the air has shifted. Thickened. Mel can feel it sitting on her skin like heat. The distance between them has shrunk, not in inches, but in intimacy.

The firelight flickers, catching in Vi’s hair—making it look like molten copper, struck through with gold. She leans back in her chair with the ease of someone who’s earned every scar she wears. Her shirt is loose, her gloves discarded on the side table. Her hands rest on her thighs, calloused and still, but there’s tension in her shoulders that wasn’t there before.

Mel laughs at something Vi says—a comment about Jayce’s latest invention involving steam and far too many valves. A real laugh. One that startles even her. Loud, full-bodied, breathless. The kind of laugh that doesn’t get used at council dinners. The kind that means something.

Vi grins.

Not her usual smirk. Not the performative grin she tosses at guards or Powder when she’s pretending she’s not bleeding. This one is softer. A little stunned. Like she doesn’t know what to do with how much she wants this moment to keep going.

Then she shifts.

Just slightly. Leaning forward. Slowly.

Her gaze dips to Mel’s lips.

And then comes back.

She’s not rushing. Not assuming. Not demanding.

She’s offering.

She leans in—just enough to close the space between them, just enough to make Mel feel the breath shared between their mouths. And then she stops.

Waits.

There’s no smirk now. Just her. Raw and real.

Mel doesn’t move.

She wants to. Gods, she wants to. Her whole body is aching for it—for the warmth of Vi’s hand against her jaw, for the way she imagines Vi kisses like she fights: full-bodied, all-in, no half-measures.

But she freezes.

Because this isn’t a flirtation.

This isn’t politics. This isn’t a game.

This is a choice.

And Mel doesn’t know how to say yes to something that won’t let her retreat later. Something that won’t let her stay untouched.

Because if she says yes—really says yes—then she can’t undo it.

And if Vi breaks? Or worse, if she breaks her?

Then what’s left?

So she doesn’t move.

She doesn’t lean in.

She doesn’t pull away.

She just pauses—paralyzed in the fear of wanting too much.

Vi’s eyes search hers for a heartbeat longer.

Then Vi leans back.

She does it smoothly. Casually. With a grin that almost passes for unbothered. But it’s too hollow. Too practiced. It creaks where it should shine.

“No worries, princess,” she says, tone light, words dragging like bruises. “I get it.”

And then she stands.

Walks toward the door.

Doesn’t slam it. Doesn’t look back.

Just leaves.

Mel remains seated.

Frozen.

She doesn’t chase. Doesn’t call out.

Just presses her fingers to her lips like she can still feel the heat of what almost was.

The room is silent.

The candles flicker and spit wax.

And suddenly, everything feels too empty.

The ballroom is dressed like a weapon—polished to blinding brilliance, gleaming with wealth, the chandeliers swinging like frozen fireworks overhead. Every surface reflects something gilded. Gold against marble. Crystal against crystal. Smiles against teeth.

Mel moves through it like silk drawn over a blade.

Her dress is tailored within a breath of decency, black velvet with a neckline that cuts deeper than politics ever dared, a slit that slices up her leg like a whisper of violence wrapped in velvet. Her heels are high enough to keep her towering over most, painful enough to ensure she never forgets where she is.

She is untouchable.

She is carved from ambition, poise, and bloodline.

She is the storm in the eye of a social hurricane.

And she is so fucking tired of it.

Another toast. Another harmless flirtation with a man who thinks he’s dangerous because he once debated hextech tariffs. Another nod at a passing chem-baron’s son. Another sip of wine she doesn’t taste. Another hour.

And then Vi walks in.

And the air stops moving.

No gauntlets. No weapons. No scowl.

Just a suit.

Tailored within an inch of her breath, it fits her brutal frame like it was stitched during a war. The color is some deep, impossible shade—midnight or storm or bruise. The collar’s open, her shirt slightly rumpled, sleeves rolled just enough to expose her forearms, those tattoos like old prayers.

Her hair is freshly cut. The sides shaved tight, the top tousled just enough to look intentional. Sharp. Wild. Clean. Like she shed the battlefield but kept the edge.

Her eyes scan the crowd like they’re marking targets.

But when they land on Mel—

They soften.

And Mel—

Mel forgets how to speak.

Forget negotiations. Forget diplomacy. Forget every word she’s sharpened to a razor and tucked behind her teeth.

Vi walks toward her like gravity has rules now. People part without realizing they do. Some stare. Some whisper. Someone, somewhere, laughs nervously.

Vi doesn’t notice. Or doesn’t care.

Mel does. She feels every stare crawl down her spine.

But when Vi reaches her—when that crooked, slow grin spreads across her face like moonlight made flesh—all Mel can think is oh.

Because Vi doesn’t just wear the suit.

She becomes it.

And for the first time all evening, Mel feels something warm and dangerous bloom under her ribs.

Someone suggests they dance.

It might be Jayce. It might be some other council relic trying to score points by turning them into a spectacle.

Vi quirks an eyebrow like she’s considering murder, but then—surprisingly, impossibly—she offers her hand.

Mel takes it before she can think better of it.

The music is soft, a string quartet plucked from a museum. The dance is formal. Expected. Measured.

Mel leads.

At first.

For the optics.

Vi lets her, that grin twitching at the corner like she’s enjoying the game. Their hands fit too easily. Mel’s palm in Vi’s calloused grip. Her other hand brushing the bare skin of Vi’s arm as they move, turning in slow, precise circles.

They are the center of attention. Piltover’s elite gawking like they’ve never seen danger wrapped in silk before.

But then—

Vi’s hand tightens. Her steps shift.

She takes control.

Not forcefully. Not rudely. Just undeniably.

And Mel lets her.

Because it feels right.

They fall into rhythm—Vi’s strength tempered by careful precision, Mel’s poise softened into surrender. The music swells, and they don’t talk. They just move.

Jayce spills his drink, somewhere off to the side.

Viktor, lingering at the edges, lets out a quiet, amazed laugh.

No one else knows what to do with it.

This dance isn’t polite.

It’s not performative.

It’s a claim.

Mel—perfect, powerful, infamous—being spun across the floor by the woman who once broke a shimmer-rig with her bare fists.

The ballroom becomes background noise.

It’s Vi who breaks the silence.

Leaning in close, her breath warm against Mel’s ear, she says, low and rough:

“You look like trouble.”

Mel doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t laugh.

She smiles, slow and sharp.

“You always did like danger.”

It’s not flirtation.

It’s truth.

And Vi pulls her closer.

They don’t dance with the crowd after that. They circle just inside the margins of expectation. They hold just a little tighter. Their feet step to a tempo no one else hears.

After the song ends, they don’t part.

Not really.

Vi lingers beside her through every conversation. She doesn’t hover—she doesn’t need to. Her presence is quiet steel. Anyone who thinks about approaching Mel tonight takes one look at the woman at her side and thinks better of it.

Mel doesn’t stop her.

Doesn’t wave her off.

Doesn’t hide the way her hand brushes Vi’s wrist now and then, casual, fleeting, as if to remind herself she’s real.

Vi smiles once during a toast. Not for the toast. For her.

Mel’s hands shake when she lifts her wine.

Not from nerves.

From knowing.

That if she lets herself fall—

If she lets this happen—

There’s no going back.

But gods, she’s already falling.

And Vi?

Vi never leaves her side.

The stars are out when the last of the gala's lights begin to die.

The music has long since faded, the velvet hems of gowns dragged home, the crystal glasses emptied and abandoned on too many silver trays. Laughter still echoes somewhere behind them—fake, high, trailing like the glitter dust that clings to polished floorboards and the insides of wine-slick mouths. But Vi’s not listening to any of that.

She’s watching Mel walk beside her.

And that’s enough.

They move through the streets like something inevitable—two women carved from different wars, wrapped in silence that doesn’t feel awkward anymore. Mel’s heels click softly on the stone. Vi’s boots are quieter than they should be for someone who could still break a jaw with one swing. Her jacket’s over her shoulder again, her sleeves rolled up, her tie long since tugged loose and hanging forgotten around her neck. Her hands are scuffed, not from combat this time, but from holding too much restraint.

She doesn’t trust anyone else to walk Mel home. Not because she thinks it’s dangerous tonight—but because it might be. And because even if it weren’t, even if the road were paved in roses and sung to sleep by lullabies, Vi wouldn’t be able to hand that over.

Mel’s quiet, too.

But not distant.

She walks close. Not brushing, not touching, but not shying either. The slit of her gown sways with each step, her hair a crown in the moonlight. The night smells like cold metal and blooming oil-roses—whatever luxury perfume clings to her skin. It makes Vi want to breathe slower, deeper. Just to taste it again.

They don’t talk.

They feel.

Until they round a corner and hear it—shouting. Boots against alley walls. A bottle smashing.

Vi stops dead.

Her body reacts before her mind does. She shifts her stance. Her spine straightens. Her eyes sharpen like a blade unsheathed.

Down the alley, two enforcers. One Zaunite girl. Cornered. Her lip is split, one eye already purpling. She’s got grime smeared across her cheek and a wrench clutched in her fingers like it’s the only goddamn lifeline she’s got.

The taller enforcer is pushing her back with the flat of his baton. The shorter one—thick-necked, sneering—is saying something about “trespassing” and “vagrancy” and “whores from the Lanes who don’t know their place.”

Vi doesn’t even blink.

She steps forward.

Not fast. Not loud. Just deliberate.

The enforcers turn.

The taller one pales first. His gaze flickers from Vi’s face to her forearms to her reputation and back again.

“Easy,” he says, hands up. “We were just—”

“You’re done,” Vi says.

Her voice is low. Flat. Final.

The other one—the mouthy one—sneers.

And then he says it.

Something about Zaun girls.

Something about councilwomen with poor taste in hired help.

Something about what kind of woman lets a thing like that walk beside her like it belongs.

Vi doesn’t flinch.

She moves.

One step.

One punch.

It’s not showy. It’s not theatrical. It’s just honest.

A right hook that lands with a sound that’s more crack than thud. His jaw goes slack immediately, dislocates with a wet pop. He crumples like wet paper, landing half on his partner’s boots. Blood pools fast. Teeth rattle against stone.

Mel doesn’t move. Doesn’t gasp. She just watches.

Vi crouches beside the fallen man, one elbow resting on her knee, head tilted.

Her voice is soft. “Say that again.”

He can’t.

Can barely breathe, let alone speak.

Vi waits anyway.

A moment longer than necessary. Letting him feel it.

Then she stands. Shakes out her hand. The skin’s torn a little over her knuckles—one split reopening—but she doesn’t notice.

Her eyes flick to Mel.

And for the first time in a long time, Vi is afraid.

Not of retribution. Not of consequence.

But of Mel.

Of what she might think.

Of what she might have just seen.

Of what Vi looks like now, blood-splattered under moonlight, breathing harder than she should, heart thundering like it always does when she loses the leash.

She’s halfway to apology—halfway to the kind of flinch you learn young, the kind that prepares you for someone stepping away—

When Mel steps forward.

Not away.

Not back.

Forward.

Until she’s close enough that Vi can feel the heat from her skin. Until her perfume drowns out the iron tang of blood.

Mel’s gaze is unreadable. Not soft. Not angry.

Just focused.

And then she says, “I was wondering when you’d hit someone for me.”

It’s not sarcastic.

It’s not a test.

It’s not even teasing.

It’s—something else.

And Vi—who has faced monsters and broken bones and taken knives to the gut—laughs.

It catches her off guard. Bursts out like sunlight from a storm. A short bark of laughter that surprises her as much as anyone.

Her chest aches from it.

Not from the fight.

From the way Mel is smiling back.

Not a smirk. Not a practiced line.

A real smile.

Warm. Slightly crooked. Quietly victorious.

Like a promise that hasn’t been spoken yet, but is already real.

Vi presses a hand to her ribs, half out of instinct.

Mel raises an eyebrow. “You alright?”

Vi breathes out slow. “Just… wasn’t ready for that.”

“For what?”

“For you.”

And Mel doesn’t look away.

Doesn’t tease.

Doesn’t deny it.

The Zaunite girl scurries away behind them—safe now. Forgotten, maybe. The enforcers groan on the ground. Somewhere in the distance, sirens wail faintly, too late to matter.

But in this alley, in this moment, there’s only them.

Vi. Bloodied knuckles. Wild grin.

Mel. Velvet and steel. That look in her eyes.

Vi wants to say something else.

Something stupid. Something big. Something like I’d burn the whole city down if it meant you’d smile like that again.

But she doesn’t.

She just stands there.

And Mel doesn’t move.

Not away.

Not back.

Just closer.

Chapter Text

The morning is gray and quiet, Zaun’s version of peace.

Vi wakes with her head against an old metal beam in her room, half-covered by a threadbare blanket she forgot to kick off. Her boots are still on. Her gloves lie discarded near the door. One of them is inside out, and she doesn’t remember taking them off. Her knuckles throb—not from a fight, not even from training. Just... existing.

But that’s not what aches.

Her chest aches. Her throat. The back of her mind. The place just behind her ribs where something fragile has started to grow like moss through a crack in concrete.

She sits up slow. Lets the moment settle around her. There’s a ringing in her ears, not from battle, but from memory. From laughter.

Mel’s laughter.

Her laughter.

Not the tight, elegant chuckles she gives to councilmen she’s pretending to tolerate. Not the sharp, dry amusement she lets Vi earn when Vi says something reckless or dumb. No—the laugh from last night. Full-bodied, startled, real. It hit Vi like a sucker punch. It still echoes in her chest like it carved a space for itself and refused to leave.

She swipes a hand down her face. Growls at herself under her breath. Stands too fast, bangs her shin on the corner of the metal table, curses again. None of it helps. None of it shakes the image of Mel leaning into her space, golden eyes half-lidded, lips curled in something dangerously close to fondness.

Vi walks it off.

Or tries to.

The barracks don’t offer much distraction. Neither does the patrol. She keeps her head down, tries to focus on routes and shifts and chatter in the Lanes. But her feet move on instinct, her ears filter out words, and suddenly Vander’s elbow is in her ribs.

He doesn’t look at her. Just mutters, “You’re thinking about her again, aren’t you?”

Vi shrugs. Doesn’t answer.

Because yes.

Of course she is.

And pretending otherwise would be like pretending she doesn’t bleed red.

She takes the long way back.

Heads through the old processing yards, down past the rusted pipes near the newly marked security zones. Ekko and Powder have been expanding them—forcefields hidden in the broken metal and glimmering faintly beneath the grime if you know what to look for. Smart work. Quiet brilliance. The kind of thing that would’ve made old topsiders sneer, but now? Now it’s the backbone of a new world.

She hears Powder before she sees her—laughing, voice high and fast, talking a mile a minute about circuit loops and capacitor cores. Vi slows her steps.

And then she sees her.

Mel.

Standing there in the middle of a collapsing alleyway like she belongs there, draped in a deep blue coat trimmed with gold, arms crossed lightly, watching Powder with something so close to adoration it makes Vi’s heart stutter. Her hair is swept back. Her boots are polished but dusty from the ground. Her shoulders—always so straight, so proud—are relaxed in a way Vi only ever sees when she’s with family.

She’s smiling.

Powder is mid-rant about something explosive—Vi only catches the words “contained plasma” and “surprisingly ethical detonation”—and Mel just nods along, her lips twitching at the edges, trying not to laugh but failing.

Vi stares.

And for a long, long moment, she doesn’t feel like herself.

She feels like something softer. Something ruined. Something raw.

Because she knows what she’s looking at.

She’s looking at a woman who has walked through fire her whole life, and still finds a reason to smile at her sister. Who steps into Zaun not like a queen come to scold, but like someone trying—really, truly trying—to understand. Who stands beside Vi not because she’s afraid, but because she chooses to.

Vi doesn’t breathe.

Because in her head, something whispers.

I would take a bullet for you.

I would burn Piltover down. I’d burn Zaun too, if it meant keeping you safe.

And that’s not a threat. It’s not hyperbole.

It’s a fact.

Something that lives in the marrow of her bones. Something that would tear her open if she let it out.

She watches Mel touch Powder’s shoulder, gentle and warm, and then step back as the girl returns to fiddling with her tools. Mel turns slightly, catching Vi’s gaze across the alleyway.

Their eyes meet.

And it’s like being caught naked.

Mel doesn’t speak. Just smiles a little. Not the kind of smile meant for company. The kind meant for someone you trust.

Vi’s throat tightens. She nods once, then forces her feet to move again.

She doesn’t say a word.

Because if she starts—

If she starts to say what’s in her head, in her chest, pressing behind her teeth like a loaded gun—

She might never stop.

She might say, You’re the most dangerous thing that’s ever happened to me.

She might say, When you laugh, something in me remembers why I keep fighting.

She might say, I want to keep you. I want to be kept. I want to be wanted in a way that doesn’t end in blood.

But she doesn’t.

She doesn’t say anything.

Because the moment is already too much. Because she can still feel Mel’s laugh ringing in her chest, and that’s enough—for now.

She walks on.

And behind her, the sound of that laugh lingers like smoke in a scar.

The estate is silent. At this hour, even the wind seems too refined to rattle the glass. Outside, the moonlight lays across the marble courtyard like spilled silver, everything so polished it barely feels real. Mel moves through her own home like a stranger—silent, bare-footed, the tea tray perfectly balanced in her hands, the scent of bergamot curling upward from porcelain.

She should be working. There are letters on her desk. A half-written memo to the Kiramman estate. A trade clause she’s meant to sign before dawn. But all she can think of is her.

Vi, stubborn and reckless, had only agreed to stay under the roof of a councilor because Powder—sweet, vicious Powder—had threatened to drag her here unconscious. Mel hadn’t said anything. Just stood in the doorway and waited until Vi muttered something about “fucking medbay politics” and agreed.

She hadn’t realized how much she wanted her here until the door closed behind them.

Now, as she pushes open the guest room door, the tray balanced with practiced grace, she feels her breath catch in her throat before she even sees her.

Vi is asleep—or something close to it. Resting with the same tension a soldier uses to rest against a wall, not because it’s comfortable but because it’s the only option. She’s half-turned toward the window. One arm slung across her torso. Her boots are off, finally. Her gauntlets are gone. Her jacket hangs over the bedframe, and her shirt’s ridden up just high enough for Mel to see it.

The wound.

It isn’t new. But it isn’t healed, either.

A jagged slice, red and bruised, still swelling in angry color against the pale stretch of Vi’s side. The bandages must’ve come loose again. Or maybe she never rewrapped them properly. Maybe she thought no one would see.

Mel sets the tray down without a sound. Each movement is deliberate. Controlled. It’s the only way she knows how to keep from trembling.

She’s seen wounds before. Her mother made sure of that. But this isn’t just blood and healing. This is violence—the kind that keeps on echoing. A wound like that doesn’t just mark the skin. It brands the soul. Screams something about how someone fought, how someone refused to fall, how someone bled anyway.

Mel doesn’t speak.

She doesn’t need to.

She walks over slowly, like Vi is a cornered animal. A lion that could bite if startled—but might not if you move gently enough. She kneels beside the bed, the rug soft beneath her knees, and lets her fingers hover just above the torn skin.

A breath.

Then another.

Then she touches.

Soft. A brush of her knuckles against bruised ribs. Barely more than a ghost of contact, as though she’s afraid her own fingers might do more harm than good.

Vi doesn’t flinch.

Her eyes open slowly—half-lidded, pink-rimmed from exhaustion. She doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t growl or smirk or joke. She just stares. Into Mel. Through Mel. And it feels like standing at the edge of something unspoken.

Like she’s waiting for Mel to decide if she’ll leap.

Mel’s voice is barely audible. Not composed. Not poised. Just... real.

“Why do you let me this close?”

She doesn’t mean physically. She doesn’t mean the room, or the bed, or the damn bruise beneath her fingertips.

She means this. The way Vi’s silence lets her in. The way Vi’s eyes soften when she looks at her, like she’s made peace with dying so long as Mel’s safe. The way Vi lets herself fall asleep here—unguarded, vulnerable, exposed.

“Why do you let me see you like this?” she whispers, the words cracking at the edges. “When no one else is allowed to even look.”

Vi’s lips part. Her brows twitch, not in confusion but in thought. Like she’s been waiting for that question. Like she’s asked herself the same thing, over and over, since this started.

And then—slowly, deliberately—Vi reaches out. Her hand, raw and calloused, closes over Mel’s.

Not tight. Not desperate.

But certain.

“Because I’d die if you pulled away,” she says.

There’s no dramatics in her tone. No plea. Just truth, spoken with the steadiness of someone who’s lived through too much to bother with anything but honesty.

Mel doesn’t cry.

She never does. She learned too young that tears can be used against you. That emotion is a weapon best hidden behind gold and silk and smirks.

But something in her chest shifts. Cracks. Softens.

She threads her fingers through Vi’s and holds on.

Her hand is small compared to Vi’s, but steady. Unyielding. And in that shared contact, in the press of palm to palm and pulse to pulse, there’s a promise neither of them speak aloud.

She doesn't let go.

Not that night.

Not when Vi drifts back to sleep, breathing finally even.

Not when the candlelight flickers across the wound like it’s something holy.

Not even when she realizes—fully, painfully—that she isn’t watching a weapon anymore.

She’s holding a person.

And she has no idea how to protect her.

But gods help anyone who tries to take her away.

Mel cannot sleep.

The sheets are silk. The lighting, dim and golden. The air is perfumed with a subtle note of violet, the same scent she’s used since she was thirteen—back when image was armor and femininity a blade to master. But none of it helps. Her skin feels too tight, her heart too loud. There’s no breeze tonight. No storm. No excuse for the ache pulsing behind her ribs except the name she hasn’t said aloud.

Vi.

She doesn’t say it now, either. She just closes the journal.

It’s the fourth one she’s filled since Vi arrived. And if she were honest with herself—a thing Mel is rarely foolish enough to indulge—every single one has turned into a confession. Not in words. Not explicitly. But in the lines. The ink. The curves of a jaw drawn again and again with slightly different shading. The faint impression of scars that she memorized on accident. The downward tilt of a smile that’s more vulnerable than Vi would ever allow anyone to see.

She flips to the last page she drew. It’s a side profile. Sharp, defiant. The Vi she shows the world. But Mel’s fingers drift to the edge of the page, brushing lightly over where she’d tried to capture something softer in the eyes. That hidden warmth. The way Vi looked at Powder when she thought no one was watching. The way she looked at Mel when she was trying not to.

Mel closes the book.

Her breath hitches.

She stands, walks across her suite, and opens the doors to the balcony. Cold night air spills in, kissing her bare arms and throat. The city glitters beneath her. Piltover is all grandeur and lies tonight. She can see the Council Hall from here—clean lines, tall windows, walls built to protect ideals already rusting.

She used to find comfort in this view. Power. She used to believe the height meant something. That if she climbed high enough, stood tall enough, she’d never feel caged again.

But now?

Now she can only think of Vi’s voice. Rough and careful. The way it trembled when she said, “Because I’d die if you pulled away.”

Gods.

Mel presses a hand to her chest. Like that might steady the storm inside her. Like she can hold something still in the echoing ruins of everything she thought she knew.

A knock interrupts her thoughts.

Not on the door.

At her spine.

Memory.

Her mother’s cane tapping across the floor as she approached. The soft rustle of robes. The smell of bloodwine and ruthlessness. The voice that never raised in volume—but could shatter bone with a glance.

Mel turns. Walks back inside. And sees it sitting on her writing desk.

The letter.

Crimson wax. Impossibly deep. The Medarda crest stamped clean into it, like a challenge. Like a noose.

Her hand doesn’t shake as she picks it up.

That would’ve made her mother proud.

The handwriting is familiar. Beautiful. Brutal. It says only one thing on the front:

To my daughter, who has not written back.

She doesn’t open it.

She doesn’t even consider it.

She walks straight to the fireplace, still crackling low from earlier, and drops it into the flames.

The wax hisses. The parchment curls. Her mother’s voice, unread, turns to smoke and ash without ever touching her again.

She doesn’t flinch.

She only watches.

Because Mel knows what’s inside. A command. A marriage proposal. A warning. A threat dressed up in gold trim. It’s always the same. Her mother does not write letters unless she’s decided you’ve forgotten your place.

And Mel?

Mel forgot the moment Vi smiled at her across a crowded council floor and looked like something untameable had decided you are mine.

She walks back to her desk after the ashes cool. Pulls the sketchbook open again. Flips past the others—Vi with her head bowed over blueprints. Vi tying her gauntlets. Vi with that half-smile she gets when she’s pretending not to enjoy a compliment. Vi asleep, sketched from memory.

She turns to a blank page.

And begins again.

This time, she draws the curve of a shoulder—the healed wound beneath it imagined but known. She draws Vi’s hand reaching toward something not yet rendered. She draws the lines that should not be tender. Should not be beautiful. But are.

She doesn’t think. Doesn’t hesitate.

And when it’s done, she sits back. Breathless. Hollow.

There’s no one to hear it. No one to answer.

But she whispers anyway, her voice soft and sharp and shaking with too many truths all at once.

“I already let it happen.”

And for the first time in her life, Mel Medarda is terrified of a cage she built with her own hands.

Because this one?

This one looks like love.

The Last Drop is quieter than usual. Not empty—nothing in Zaun ever really is—but quieter. The hum of conversation has dulled to a murmur, the lights turned down low enough that the dust in the air looks almost golden. It’s late. The kind of hour when people start confessing things they shouldn’t. When shadows stretch too far and silence feels more intimate than words.

Vi leans against the old, battered bar like it’s the only thing keeping her upright.

Her arms are folded tight across her chest, but her knuckles rest raw against the wood, and her stance is too loose to be combative. Not defensive. Just tired. The kind of tired that comes from feeling too much with nowhere to put it. Her jacket is unzipped. The buzzed sides of her head catch the amber light, and the longer pink-red strands fall messily forward, curling near her neck. She hasn’t fixed it since the gala.

She hasn’t been able to.

Vander stands behind the bar with a cloth in one hand and a glass in the other, as if this moment hasn’t happened a hundred times before—Vi bent out of shape by a world that never asked what she wanted, just kept taking until the only thing she knew how to do was survive.

But tonight isn’t like the others.

Tonight, she isn’t bloody. Or laughing. Or bruised from some back-alley brawl she started because her fists were louder than her mouth.

Tonight, she’s soft around the edges in a way that hurts to look at.

“I think I’m already hers,” she says. Her voice doesn’t crack, but it’s close. So low Vander almost misses it beneath the weight of the quiet.

He doesn’t react right away. Just keeps moving the cloth around the rim of the glass in slow, steady circles. He always said glasswork taught you patience—that if you rushed it, it shattered.

“You want advice?” he asks eventually, like he already knows the answer.

“No,” Vi replies. The word is automatic. Sharp.

But then it deflates. She breathes out, shoulders slumping, and adds, softer, “Maybe.”

Vander finally sets the glass down.

He leans forward, forearms braced against the bar, the lines in his face catching every shadow like they’re carved into stone.

“Then stop running from it,” he says, plain and sure. “If she’s your soft spot, let her be.”

Vi lets out a sound that could be a laugh or a scoff or the beginning of a cry—it's impossible to tell. She stares down at her gauntlets, which rest heavy beside her like a promise and a threat.

“She’s not just my soft spot,” Vi mutters. “She’s my blind spot. My weak point. My end, if I’m not careful.”

Vander’s eyes are kind. Steady. But he doesn’t coddle her. He never has.

“Yeah,” he says, with a nod. “That’s what it feels like.”

“She makes me think about things I don’t have the right to want,” Vi whispers. “Peace. A future. A place that doesn’t smell like blood or smoke.”

There’s a long silence after that. A real one. The kind that wraps around you like warm hands and doesn’t ask for anything but honesty.

Then Vander says, “She make you feel like you can have it?”

Vi looks up, startled by the question. She thinks about the way Mel tilts her head when she’s listening—truly listening. The way she doesn’t flinch when Vi raises her voice or when she bleeds. The way her laughter sounds when she’s caught off guard, how it cracks the polished shell around her and lets the girl inside peek out.

Vi nods.

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah, she does.”

“Then maybe it’s not a weakness,” Vander says. “Maybe it’s just... real.”

Vi grimaces. “That’s worse.”

He laughs at that. Deep, warm. The sound of a man who’s survived more than his fair share of good intentions and hard lessons. “Kid,” he says, shaking his head, “you’ve bled for people who wouldn’t even spit on you if you were burning. You’ve carried Zaun on your back with fists and fire. And now, after all that, you found someone who sees you and doesn’t turn away.”

Vi doesn’t say anything. She looks down again. Her fingers twitch against the bar, ungloved. Bare. Vulnerable.

Vander continues, voice softer now. “You think that’s weakness? No. That’s the bravest damn thing I’ve ever seen.”

“I think loving her might be the first good mistake I’ll ever make,” Vi says. She doesn’t mean to say it aloud. It just slips. Like truth always does when it’s been bottled too long.

Vander studies her. Then smiles. Not a big smile. Not the kind you wear when you’ve won. It’s quiet. Earned.

“Then maybe it’s not a mistake at all,” he says.

Vi closes her eyes. Just for a moment. Just long enough to remember what it felt like—Mel’s hand brushing hers. The breath that caught between them. The kiss that didn’t happen and the world that cracked open anyway.

And when she opens them again, the ache in her chest is still there.

But so is the clarity.

“I’m scared,” she says, more to herself than him.

Vander doesn’t say it’ll be okay. Doesn’t promise her the world won’t tear it all apart. He just nods again. Understanding.

“You should be,” he says. “Love’s terrifying.”

Then, with that same old dry humor, he adds, “Especially when it’s smarter than you and can crush you in a debate and a velvet dress.”

Vi finally laughs.

It sounds like pain. Like hope.

Like maybe she’s done running.

The office is cloaked in its usual hush—velvet drapes drawn against the sunlight, a teapot cooling beside untouched porcelain, and the scent of polished wood and melting candle wax lingering in the still air. Mel stands by the window, spine ramrod straight, arms folded in a way that suggests she’s holding more than just herself together.

She doesn’t pace. Doesn’t preamble.

When Viktor and Jayce enter, she simply turns to face them, calm and precise, like she’s delivering a report rather than reshaping the entire trajectory of her life.

“I love her,” she says.

The words fall like stone into still water—small, simple, but the ripples reach everything.

Jayce makes a strangled sound and immediately begins choking on his tea, sputtering in disbelief. His eyes go wide, and he fumbles with the teacup like it personally betrayed him. “I—sorry—what?”

Viktor’s reaction is quieter, more contained, but no less struck. He narrows his eyes thoughtfully, as if turning the sentence over in his mind like a delicate mechanical part. “Vi?” he asks, just to be certain. His voice is gentle, but probing. “You mean Vi?”

Mel nods once. Not sharply. Not proudly. Just honestly.

“Yes. Her.”

Jayce opens his mouth. Closes it. Then tries again. “But you—you tolerate her. You complain about her posture. You threatened to fire her when she tracked mud into your study. You—”

“Correct,” Mel cuts in. “And I also love her.”

Jayce looks like he’s aged ten years in ten seconds. “Mel,” he says slowly, cautiously, like approaching an unstable chemical. “This is Vi. Zaunite. Brawler. Your bodyguard. She’s—”

“Dangerous?” Mel finishes, one brow arched.

Jayce swallows and nods. “Yes. That.”

Mel walks away from the window, her heels echoing with the sort of finality that only comes when someone has made peace with the cost of their choice. “And what precisely in my history suggests I’ve ever shied from danger?”

Viktor exhales softly, the hint of a smirk ghosting across his lips. “She makes you smile more,” he says, like it’s the simplest proof in the world. “Even when you’re pretending not to.”

Mel blinks. For a second, just one, her carefully curated composure threatens to fracture.

“Does she?” she asks, quiet.

Jayce slumps into the nearest chair, head in his hands. “You’re going to do something reckless, aren’t you?”

Mel tilts her head, eyes bright like gold struck by lightning. There’s no mischief in her smile—just the calm, frightening certainty of someone who has decided to step into the fire and call it home.

“Probably.”

The silence that follows isn’t disapproving. It isn’t cautionary. It’s contemplative. A moment stretched between acceptance and awe.

Jayce grumbles something about needing stronger tea.

Viktor just nods once. “Then I suggest you don’t wait too long. She’s the kind who will bleed until someone tells her she doesn’t have to.”

Mel feels the words settle into her bones. Heavy. True.

Later, when the office is empty again, she remains at her desk, eyes unfocused, fingers pressed to her temple. The candle has burned down halfway, dripping wax onto scattered blueprints—schematics for security upgrades, for safer weapons, for defenses that will keep Zaun children from dying on Piltover thresholds.

Vi’s influence is everywhere, she realizes. Not loud. Not deliberate. But like wind, carving stone through patience alone.

Mel touches one of the plans absently.

She doesn’t think Vi even knows how much she’s already changed her.

How many cracks have formed in the walls Mel spent her whole life building. How many masks have slipped when Vi enters the room. How many moments, delicate and wordless, she’s stolen just by being honest in a world that rewards performance.

Mel leans back in her chair and closes her eyes.

She doesn’t feel safe.

She feels alive.

She thinks of Vi’s laugh—low, unguarded, rare. Thinks of the way she stands like a promise and a warning. Thinks of those hands—calloused, bruised, steady when they’re holding something they care about.

And for the first time in years, Mel doesn’t feel like she’s calculating her next ten moves. She just breathes.

Because if this is what she would risk—her reputation, her safety, the intricate dance of council politics and Noxian whispers—then so be it.

Some people wage wars for less.

She’s just choosing to surrender first.

The market had smelled like citrus and cinnamon. Perfumed goods and polished pride. A Piltover performance, clean and calculated, every detail staged for optics and illusion. Flags fluttered like false peace offerings. Reporters held pens like daggers sheathed in ink. The air buzzed—not with tension, not yet—but with performance. A show for unity. A tableau of civility.

Vi had hated it from the second she saw the route. Too open. Too clean. Too quiet in all the wrong ways.

She hadn’t said anything, though. Not with Mel beside her, radiant and composed, moving like a queen even in the middle of a stage crafted for the benefit of people who didn’t deserve her presence. Mel had worn her hair up, gold threads woven into the dark coils. Her dress—a deep violet tailored with sharp lines and subtle strength—whispered elegance with every step. She didn’t look like she was bracing for war.

But Vi was.

She kept her eyes up, scanning rooftops, windows, shadows that flickered wrong. She felt the twitch in her bones, the tingle in her scar tissue—the kind of warning that came from surviving too many ambushes to count.

She saw it a breath before it hit. A flash of metal. A shape moving where no shape should.

The first grenade landed just behind them.

Purple smoke detonated in a hiss and scream, filling the air with shimmer-soaked fog, burning her lungs before her brain even finished processing it. Her instincts roared louder than any alarm.

She didn’t hesitate.

Didn’t think.

Just grabbed Mel by the waist and dragged her.

They tumbled behind a vendor’s stall, wood and fabric breaking their fall. Mel coughed hard, her shoulders curling inward, dress already streaked with soot. Vi threw herself over her, chest to back, eyes searching the smoke for threats.

She could hear boots pounding. Shouts. Screams. Someone fired a flare. Enforcers scattered like insects. Too late. Too slow.

An attacker came through the shimmer, mask strapped to his face, reaching for Mel.

Vi didn’t say a word.

She grabbed his arm mid-lunge and snapped it backward at the elbow with a wet crunch. The scream was muffled by the gas, but the satisfaction ran hot in her blood.

Another shape charged her left—Vi turned, elbowed him across the jaw, felt cartilage shift under the blow. He crumpled.

A third shimmer bomb was hurled toward them. Vi caught it. Caught it.

Held it in her palm like it was nothing more than a stone. It vibrated—hummed—burned.

She crushed it.

Let it detonate in her hand.

Pain screamed up her arm, searing her skin in jagged pulses—but it didn’t touch Mel. Not a drop. Not a flicker.

She didn’t even register that she was bleeding until she moved again. The world had shrunk to motion and violence, to instinct and purpose. She wasn’t fighting. She was ending things.

More bodies dropped. Some ran. The smoke began to thin.

Vi stumbled forward.

Her body ached—ribs throbbing, hand scorched, lungs raw—but none of it mattered. None of it mattered.

She found Mel on her knees, coughing so hard she could barely breathe, eyes red and wide and shining with disbelief.

Her dress was torn at the sleeve. There was ash in her hair. She looked like a painting ripped from its canvas.

Vi collapsed beside her, bracing herself with blood-slick fingers. Her voice came out rough, broken.

“Mel.”

Nothing.

Vi touched her shoulders—gently, desperately.

“Mel.”

This time, her name landed. A tether. A lifeline.

Mel’s gaze lifted. Her eyes found Vi’s.

And everything else disappeared.

The fires. The chaos. The scattered bodies and the distant wail of sirens. They fell away.

All that remained was this—Mel, alive. Vi, shaking. And the unbearable weight of everything they hadn’t said yet sitting between them like a ghost.

Vi let out a sound. It wasn’t coherent. It wasn’t even language. It was raw and helpless and full of too much.

It was a prayer laced with panic. A threat against the universe for daring to try. A confession pulled from the bruised hollow of her chest.

And then she pulled Mel into her arms.

Held her like something precious and broken. Like something she’d die for. Like something she couldn’t lose.

Mel didn’t resist.

She melted into the hold, forehead pressed to Vi’s collarbone, trembling.

Vi's hands were filthy. Her arms scorched. Her breathing ragged.

But she was fireproof.

She had to be.

Because if Mel had been hurt—if she’d been a second too slow, or if that bomb had hit a fraction closer—Vi wouldn’t have made it back from that.

She stroked the back of Mel’s head with a gentleness no one had ever taught her. A motion borrowed from dreams and instinct.

“You’re okay,” she whispered, even though she wasn’t sure if she believed it yet. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

And for once, she let herself hold on.

Not because she was supposed to.

But because she couldn’t let go.

Not anymore.

The council chamber still smells faintly of smoke.

It clings to the drapery, to the hem of polished robes and perfumed silks, settling between the threads like the city itself refusing to be scrubbed away. Someone’s chair has a blackened corner. A cracked pane of stained glass flickers red and gold in the morning light. Piltover is pretending nothing happened, but the walls know better. The walls remember.

Mel sits at the long, curved table, hands folded delicately atop a stack of untouched briefing notes. Her dress is a muted ivory today, collar high, sleeves tight. Not a statement, not overtly. But every inch of her feels like armor. Her earrings are Noxian in design—small spikes of gold at her ears. A warning.

No one looks at her directly for the first ten minutes.

They talk around her. About “escalation indicators.” About “civil unrest.” About “controlled messaging.” The words are soft-shod, all cushion and diplomacy, as if the blood hadn’t dried just beneath their feet not twelve hours ago. As if the attacks hadn’t happened. As if she hadn’t nearly died.

No one says, We’re glad you’re safe.

Not a single one.

Jayce is seated beside her, back stiff, jaw locked. His papers are dog-eared and damp from his palms. Viktor is further down, watching quietly, pen tapping against his leg. There’s a tension in his brow, but he doesn't interrupt. He knows better than to speak when the wolves are circling.

Because that’s what they’re doing.

One by one, the council members shift the conversation. A sideways glance. A note passed. A phrasing sharpened with intent.

And then, it happens.

A man from Sector Eight—Councilor Rylen, forgettable in every way but his power—folds his hands on the polished oak and clears his throat.

“We are all grateful that Councilor Medarda is unharmed,” he says, and the word grateful lands like a nail in wood. “But it would be negligent not to examine the patterns. The repeated attempts. The frequency. One might wonder... why Councilor Medarda finds herself so consistently at the center of violence.”

No one stops him.

Mel’s eyes don’t move. Not yet.

Rylen smiles, thin and political. “And considering the company she keeps—the... individuals she employs for protection—one must ask whether the Undercity is protecting her, or targeting her.”

Someone murmurs agreement. Another coughs, trying to disguise discomfort. A third—Councilwoman Alenra, all lace gloves and narrowed eyes—leans forward.

“Perhaps,” she offers gently, “this council should consider whether Councilor Medarda’s proximity to Zaun has compromised her judgment.”

The words land.

And then, Rylen says it.

Plain. Sharp.

“You’ve been tainted by the Undercity.”

Silence falls like snow.

No one breathes.

Jayce’s pen snaps in half beneath his fingers.

Mel does not move. Not at first. She lets the quiet grow heavy, unbearable, lets the words hang in the air like smoke that refuses to clear. The fire inside her doesn’t rage—it condenses. Refines. Diamond pressure.

She breathes. Once. Twice. And then she rises.

Ivory dress, crisp and unbending. Earrings catching the light like daggers. Her hands rest at her sides, empty but not idle. Her spine is straight, her chin lifted. Her voice, when it comes, is silk over steel.

“If this council believes that proximity to the Undercity has tainted me…”

She pauses. Lets the word stretch. Forces them to hear it again. Tainted. Let them choke on it.

“Then let me burn with it.”

Gasps erupt. A few outright protests. One man rises halfway in his seat before thinking better of it. Jayce says something—her name, maybe, or a plea—but it’s lost under the noise.

Mel doesn’t flinch.

She looks at them all. One by one. Letting her gaze scrape over their powdered faces, their trembling hands, their cowardice dressed up in decorum. She doesn’t raise her voice. She doesn’t have to. They already know they’ve lost her.

Because she is no longer theirs.

She belongs to no cage.

Not to their golden towers or whispered warnings. Not to their lineage expectations or the bleeding shadow of her mother’s throne. Not even to her own fears.

She chose this.

She chose Vi.

She chose the city beneath their feet—the one they poison with silence.

And she would choose it again.

Without another word, Mel turns.

She walks out with fire in her steps, the hem of her gown whispering like smoke across polished floors. She doesn’t look back. Doesn’t acknowledge the ripple of panic in her wake.

The halls outside are quiet. Cool. She exhales.

The sky above Piltover is cloudless, crystalline blue. So bright it almost hurts. There’s a humming in her bones—not fear, not anymore. Something harder. Sharper.

She’s never felt more herself than she does in this moment.

Clear. Committed.

And utterly, irrevocably free.

The footage loops, even after the screen’s gone black.

It lives behind Vi’s eyes now—seared in by fury, by awe, by something that won’t leave her ribcage alone. The moment Mel stood, eyes like sharpened gold, ivory dress a defiant flame against a council full of ash. The moment her voice sliced through the room like it had been waiting to be unsheathed. Then let me burn with it.

She says burn like it’s not a loss. Like it’s a promise. Like it’s a prayer meant for only one person to hear.

And Vi did.

Every syllable lands somewhere just behind her sternum, a punch she didn’t brace for. She didn’t know words could break you open like that. She didn’t know anyone would ever say them for her.

She’s not there when it happens. She’s in the barracks when Powder runs to her, hair wild, eyes wide, nearly dropping the tablet in her hands.

“You need to see this.”

Vi doesn’t speak. Just watches.

Then again.

Then again.

The tablet’s still glowing, fallen on the bench.

She’s already gone.

The gym beneath the Drop hasn’t changed.

It still smells like dust and blood, sweat that seeped into the stone years ago and never left. It’s a skeleton of a place—pipes showing through cracked concrete, a training ring that’s more rust than metal, punching bags frayed to the threads. It’s where she first learned how to make her body into a shield. A blade. A wall. It’s where Vander taught her to breathe through the ache and Powder sat on the steps counting her reps.

It’s where she learned how to survive.

Today, she doesn’t need survival.

She needs release.

She shrugs off her jacket, doesn’t bother with wraps. Her gauntlets sit in a crate by the door, untouched. This isn’t about armor. This isn’t about protection. This is about pain.

She moves to the wall.

The one near the back, reinforced steel behind plaster, dented from years of fights no one documented. The one she used to punch when the world didn’t make sense. When Powder was missing. When Vander was nearly dead. When the fire inside her was louder than anything else.

She throws the first punch without warming up.

It’s stupid. It’s reckless. Her knuckles split open almost instantly. The pain is immediate, blooming like poppies under her skin. She doesn’t care.

She throws another.

And another.

The skin breaks. The blood smears. Her breath quickens.

She doesn’t think about her form. Her balance. Her stance.

She just hits.

Because she doesn’t know what else to do. Because Mel stood in front of Piltover and said burn me too, and Vi wasn’t there to stop the arrows when they flew.

She throws her whole body into it now, slamming fists into steel like it can answer her. Like it owes her something. Her heart is a drum, a scream, a song she doesn’t know how to sing.

She pictures Mel’s voice—calm, brutal, beautiful.

She remembers the way Mel’s hand trembled the first time she touched the scar across Vi’s ribs.

She thinks of the look in Mel’s eyes when she whispered, Why do you let me this close?

Because she did.

Vi let her in.

And now?

Now Mel’s the one bleeding for her.

She throws a punch so hard it jolts her elbow. Her arm sags. Her body’s screaming now, breath tearing in and out like it’s trying to drag her down. Her knees shake.

But she doesn’t stop.

Not until she hears her name.

“Vi.”

Powder’s voice.

Soft. Close.

She doesn’t turn around. Doesn’t want her sister to see her face like this. Not now. Not when she’s this close to breaking.

Powder walks across the floor with deliberate steps, kneels beside the blood-speckled bench, and sets a towel down. Her voice is quiet. Not accusing. Just… present.

“She did it for you.”

Vi presses her forehead to the wall.

The cold steel stings.

“She shouldn’t have,” she whispers.

But she doesn’t mean it like a rejection. She means it like a confession. Like I don’t deserve her. Like she’s too bright to be set on fire for someone like me.

She closes her eyes, and her hands ache, and her breath rattles, and everything inside her feels like it’s coming undone one thread at a time.

And then she says her name.

Not loud. Not angry.

Just a single word, whispered into metal like it could echo all the way to Mel’s office, to her heart, to wherever she is right now—wondering if Vi even noticed.

“Mel,” she breathes.

Like it’s the only thing keeping her standing.

And maybe, right now, it is.

The lie spreads like smoke in velvet halls.

Not an explosion. Not even a shout. Just a whisper—so precisely placed, so insidiously soft—that it slices deeper than any blade. Mel hears it first in passing, a pair of nobles murmuring near the fountain with hands folded too neatly. Something about sympathy. About manipulation. About control.

She brushes it off.

She’s been accused of worse. Of ambition. Of greed. Of letting her Noxian roots rot her Piltovan purity from within. She’s weathered innuendo like a goddamn cloak. This should be no different.

But then it repeats.

An editorial. A question at a press conference delivered with a practiced smile. A drunken noble’s snide remark that calls Vi her enforcer girlfriend, followed by a chuckle that makes Mel want to set something on fire.

She does not dignify it with a response. She doesn’t call a meeting or make a statement. She tells herself it will pass.

It doesn’t.

The whispers become bolder. A dinner party in a glass-roofed estate sees her cornered—no, studied—by a woman in red lace who says, “My dear, we were just so impressed with your little display of unity. One might think it staged.”

Mel smiles. Cool. Deadly.

“One might think you’ve confused relevance with volume.”

But the words don’t stick the way they used to. Because she knows now what they’re trying to say.

That it was all theatre. That her bruises weren’t real. That Vi—Vi, who’d bled beside her—was a pawn in some elaborate Noxian maneuver.

That none of it meant anything.

She returns home that night and pours herself wine with a hand that won’t stop shaking. Her reflection in the dark window is distorted. Hair perfect. Eyes hollow. She almost doesn’t recognize herself.

She doesn’t sleep.

And when the council meets again, the tension is a noose. Jayce is tense beside her. Viktor says nothing but watches her too closely. No one mentions the rumors directly. Not until the very end.

Not until Councilor Rynt, silver-haired, legacy-born, with a voice like bleached parchment, turns to her with a smile that cuts.

“Well, Councilor Medarda, at least your bodyguard is loyal. Even if her presence here remains more… theatrical than practical.”

Mel freezes.

The air turns solid.

And before she can speak—

Vi is there.

There’s no warning. No delay. Just movement—like thunder behind glass.

She’s across the chamber in an instant, gauntlets left behind, raw hands grabbing the councilman by the lapels of his robe and slamming him back against the nearest marble column. The crack of contact echoes like judgment.

“Say that again,” Vi growls, voice thick with fury, low and guttural, the sound of someone who has killed for less.

“Say that again and I’ll put you in a hole Zaun forgot existed.”

The man sputters, too shocked to respond. No one moves. No one breathes.

Mel doesn’t think.

She moves.

The rain is falling outside, drenching the courtyard beyond the open door. Somehow, it fits.

She storms through the echoing chamber, heels clicking like gunfire, and her voice breaks the tension like glass.

“Vi!”

Vi doesn’t turn.

“Vi, let him go!”

And she does. Abruptly. The man slides down the pillar, coughing, eyes wide with something between outrage and fear.

But Vi doesn’t apologize. Doesn’t explain. She just turns slowly, shoulders heaving, fists still clenched at her sides. She looks at Mel, rain streaking her face like war paint, and waits.

Mel doesn’t want to do this here.

But she can’t not.

“You don’t get to fight every battle for me!” she yells. Her voice cracks. From fury. From something deeper. “Do you understand that? You don’t get to be the one who bleeds first. Every damn time!”

Vi’s mouth twitches. Her jaw tightens.

“I didn’t—” she begins.

“You didn’t think!” Mel shouts. “You didn’t think what it means, what it costs. You’re not a weapon to be thrown into every fire I walk through.”

The rain intensifies. Or maybe that’s just the way Mel’s heart is beating—so loud it muffles everything else.

Vi’s standing there, soaked to the bone, rain clinging to her shirt, to her newly cut hair—short on the sides now, styled clean to the line of her cheekbones—and she looks wrecked.

Not physically. But inside.

Because Mel’s never shouted at her like this. Never told her to stand down. Never told her she was too much.

Vi’s mouth opens again.

But Mel doesn’t let her speak.

Instead, she steps forward. Grabs her by the collar.

And kisses her.

It’s not delicate. It’s not soft. It’s not even romantic.

It’s desperate.

A scream without sound. A plea wrapped in skin.

It lasts less than a second.

But it changes everything.

Because Mel’s mouth tastes like guilt and defiance and yes.

And Vi doesn’t pull her closer.

Doesn’t react.

Just stands there, stunned, lips parted.

When Mel steps back, she’s still trembling. Still furious. Still soaked to the skin.

But something’s shattered now. Something they can’t put back.

Neither of them speaks on the ride home.

Vi sits with her hands clasped too tightly in her lap, knuckles split, dried blood turning brown. Mel stares out the window, watching the streets blur through raindrops on glass.

She can still feel the shape of Vi’s mouth under hers. The heat. The restraint. The heartbreak.

It’s everything she wanted.

And not even close to enough.

The room smells like ozone and oil. Sparks crackle where wires meet pressure plates, flickering against the dim blue of Powder’s lab lights. The entire place hums with energy—alive in the way only her sister’s world could be. Everything around Vi is in motion: gears ticking in sync, pistons wheezing like breath, arc coils glowing faint purple from the residual shimmer they’ve been distilled to avoid. It’s comforting. Familiar. Loud enough to drown out thought, mechanical enough to pretend feelings don’t exist.

Vi’s knuckles are wrapped in reinforced tape, but it’s already fraying—split from the impact of too many blows in too little time. The dummy she’s been hitting isn’t even shaped like a person anymore. Just a bent sheet of alloy welded to a brace. Its center is caved in, like a ribcage after a landslide.

She winds up and slams her fist into it again.

Titanium screeches.

Her shoulder jars. Her bones rattle. Her jaw clenches like she can lock the ache inside her mouth if she just keeps it shut long enough.

But it’s not enough.

Not tonight.

Vi spins away from the wreckage, breathing hard. Her boots are scuffed, the soles coated in a thin layer of burn-dust from Powder’s recent hexflame test. Her hair—cropped short on the sides, still long enough on top to fall into her eyes—is soaked in sweat, copper bright and clinging to her temples. She looks like a soldier dragged through fire and then told to smile.

Powder leans in the doorway, one eyebrow raised, chewing a piece of gum so obnoxiously slow it feels like mockery. Her goggles are pushed to her forehead, and she’s wearing one of those oversized lab coats she’s modified with glittering patches and phrases like DO NOT OPEN UNLESS ON FIRE scrawled in chalk on the back.

"You’re working out your feelings again," Powder says casually, like it’s a weather report.

Vi doesn’t respond. She doesn’t even look over. She’s too busy adjusting the strap on a new wrist brace she rigged herself—short-blade knuckle hybrids, sharpened along the base like something between gauntlet and fang. Brutal. Efficient. Unapologetically hers.

Powder sighs, pops her gum. "You know, for someone who can punch a wall in half, you’re terrible at dealing with emotion."

Vi tightens the strap until her knuckles go white. “I have no feelings.”

Powder snorts. Loud. “Uh-huh. And I’m not the daughter of a woman who turned shimmer into war candy.”

Vi growls. Actually growls. It echoes in her throat like a beast trying to chew through its own collar. “It was just a kiss.”

“Sure,” Powder says. “Just like that”—she points at the mangled machine—“was just a training dummy.”

Vi swears under her breath. The kind of sound that should precede destruction. But she doesn’t lash out again. She just... slumps. Her body folds in on itself, spine curling, hands still trembling with adrenaline that hasn’t found a purpose.

Then she sinks to the floor like gravity finally remembered she was made of guilt and want and everything else too heavy to carry.

Powder watches her quietly now. No teasing. No smirk. Just walks over, boots scraping against the concrete floor, and drops down next to her. Cross-legged. Casual. Like this is just another one of their science nights. Like Vi isn’t breaking apart piece by piece beside her.

Vi lowers her head into her hands. Her palms smell like smoke and blood and faint lavender soap—Mel’s. From a memory that shouldn't mean anything, but does. She still remembers the pressure of Mel’s mouth against hers, the taste of crushed words between them, the ache it left behind. Not because of what happened.

Because of what didn’t.

Powder reaches out. Taps the side of Vi’s boot with her own. “You’re in love, dumbass.”

Vi doesn’t argue.

She doesn’t roll her eyes. Doesn’t bark back with a snarl. Doesn’t deny the thing that’s been burning in her chest since that night in the rain—when Mel’s kiss was both a declaration and a dagger. When the silence in the car ride home was louder than any explosion Vi had ever lived through.

She just stays there, curled around herself, breathing like each inhale is a confession. The ache in her ribs isn’t from training. It’s the space Mel left behind.

Powder rests her head on Vi’s shoulder. Doesn’t speak.

And Vi closes her eyes.

Lets herself want—just for one damn minute.

Lets herself imagine what it would be like to reach out, to not flinch when Mel looks at her like she’s more than a blade with legs. To say things she’s only whispered to walls and empty gyms. To admit that she wakes up in cold sweats not from nightmares—but from dreams where Mel is laughing against her mouth and nothing bad ever happens again.

She lets the thought stay.

She lets it hurt.

Because for once, punching something isn’t enough.

Not when the only fight worth having might be the one she’s been running from this whole time.

The wind on the rooftop is gentler than it should be—brisk, yes, with the lingering chill of midnight threading through silk and bone, but somehow softer than the world below. Piltover’s spires glint beneath the moonlight, caught in gold-plated stillness. The city is asleep in a way neither of them ever are.

Zaun breathes in the distance, its light a pulse instead of a shine, green and throbbing like veins beneath marble skin. It doesn’t sleep. It never has.

Mel stands with her arms folded, but not in anger. She’s trying not to fidget. Not to give herself away. She’s too used to controlling her posture, too trained in the art of appearing effortlessly powerful, a woman of poise, grace, and dangerous promise. But tonight, her spine feels like it’s made of glass. Even the tight braid pinned against her skull feels too heavy.

Vi walks toward her slowly. Hands in her pockets. Shoulders tense but loose enough to feign indifference. The black suit jacket she wears is wrinkled near the hem, like she’d thrown it on at the last second. Her copper-cut hair glows warm under the rooftop lanterns, shorter now, the sides buzzed clean, the top still messy with that almost-boyish slant that always makes Mel feel like she’s looking at a smirk carved into flame.

She knows Vi saw through the invitation. It wasn’t really about strategy. It never was. They both know it. Still, Vi came. She always does.

Mel doesn’t thank her. That would make it formal, and formality is a stranger between them now.

Instead, she says quietly, “You can see everything from up here.”

Vi comes to stand beside her, boots scraping the stone softly. She leans her forearms on the railing, looking down at the patchwork of lights. “Looks like someone broke a stained glass window and spilled it over the ground,” she murmurs.

Mel’s head tilts, studying her. “You say things like that sometimes.”

Vi doesn’t look at her. “Like what?”

“Like a poet who’s trying to fight her way out of a cage.”

That gets a twitch of a smile. Just one corner of her mouth. A flash of something vulnerable, something that aches.

“Maybe,” Vi mutters. “Or maybe I just like the way it looks when things are broken but still shine.”

Mel’s breath catches on something unsaid. She forces it down. Breathes slowly. “I used to come up here with a sketchbook. Try to draw the way Piltover moved from above. It’s easier to pretend the city makes sense when you’re not in it.”

Vi exhales, the sound almost a laugh. “Yeah. Cities lie louder when you’re walking through ‘em.”

Silence swells between them. Not heavy. Not awkward. Just full. Like a glass teetering at the rim.

The sky stretches endless above them, ink-black and punctured with stars. Mel feels the way Vi keeps herself tense, how even her breath is metered, measured. She’s waiting. Not for danger. For something worse: the moment she lets her guard down and it actually matters.

Mel knows the feeling.

She thinks she’ll keep talking, just to delay whatever they’re circling.

But then Vi speaks first.

“I still think about that kiss.”

It’s not loud. Not forced. It’s said with the kind of softness that bruises. Like an apology. Like a dare. Like a wound Vi’s pressing her own fingers into to prove it still hurts.

Mel turns before her thoughts catch up with her actions. She moves like she was already halfway there—like her bones had made the decision before her mind could resist.

She kisses her again.

No rain. No shouting. No audience. Just the quiet hum of the city around them and the wind threading through their hair like ribbon.

Vi freezes. Only for a second. But in that second, Mel feels the weight of every breath they’ve never dared share. Every look. Every touch passed off as casual. Every sentence they didn’t finish.

And then Vi kisses back.

It's not deep. Not wild. Just slow. Like they’ve got time. Like they believe it’s allowed.

Mel’s hands hover at Vi’s waist. She doesn’t pull her in. Doesn’t push. She just exists in the space between want and reverence.

Vi’s mouth is warm. Salted faintly with wine. Her hand comes up, almost of its own will, brushing against Mel’s jaw—calloused fingers whispering across cheekbone.

And then she breaks.

The kiss ends.

Vi steps back like she’s been burned, like Mel is fire and she forgot she had skin. Her eyes are wide—haunted. Her throat bobs with something she doesn’t speak.

Mel opens her mouth to stop her. To say something. Anything.

But Vi is already turning.

She’s halfway across the rooftop before Mel’s breath returns to her. A silhouette cut from steel and heartbreak, framed against moonlight.

Mel doesn’t chase her.

Not because she doesn’t want to.

But because if she does—if she runs now—it means asking Vi to stay before she knows she’s allowed to.

So she just stands there.

On a rooftop that now remembers the shape of Vi’s mouth. The heat of her breath. The space where a future might’ve begun.

And as the wind curls through the golden spires again, Mel whispers a name the night already knows. A name it carries away like a secret:

Vi.

Vi’s boots thud against the floor with every pass she makes across the room, the sound low and rhythmic, like the countdown to something she can’t name. The apartment is dim—light from the single overhead bulb flickers once, then steadies, throwing long shadows across the peeling plaster and the scuffed floorboards. She doesn’t notice. Or maybe she does and doesn’t care. Her brain is a fucking battlefield, and the only thing louder than her heartbeat is the memory of lips she can still feel like bruises she didn’t earn.

She doesn’t sit. Can’t sit. Her body is too wired, coiled like it’s still in fight mode, but there’s no enemy here. Just furniture and rage. And longing. Gods, the longing.

It replays again. That rooftop. That kiss. The quiet night humming around them like it had been holding its breath. The weight of Mel’s mouth on hers. The feel of her hands not quite holding, not quite letting go. The way Vi had kissed back like it was instinct, like she’d been made for that exact moment.

And then she’d pulled away.

Like a coward.

No—like someone who knew what it meant to want something and never get to keep it.

But Mel—Mel hadn’t chased. Hadn’t said anything. Hadn’t called. Hadn’t even looked at her differently the next day when they passed in the corridor of the council wing. Just nodded once. Polite. Cold. Perfectly composed. Like it hadn’t happened. Like Vi hadn’t happened.

Vi stops pacing just long enough to glare at the far wall. Then she punches it.

Her fist drives straight through the plaster with a satisfying crack, and the wall shudders around her. Dust billows out in a little cloud, coating her knuckles and hanging in the air like ash.

She doesn’t stop.

The second punch lands just beside the first. Less sharp. More desperate. She doesn’t even feel the pain.

Vander walks in on the third.

He doesn’t say anything at first. Just looks at her, looks at the wall, then looks at the bleeding knuckles and sighs like he’s aged ten years in three seconds.

“Want to tell me what’s going on,” he says mildly, “or should I start taking bets with Powder about which piece of furniture’s next?”

Vi doesn’t answer. Just turns her back to him and wipes her forehead with her forearm. Her breathing’s rough. Her pulse feels like a drum being played too fast.

“She kissed me.”

Vander raises an eyebrow. “Mel?”

Vi spins, hands out like she’s pleading with the gods to explain her own goddamn life. “Yes, Mel! She kissed me. Again. And then—nothing. No message. No little smirk the next day. No ‘goodnight, Vi, sorry for shattering your chest again.’ Just nothing.”

Vander walks to the fridge, pops a beer, and leans against the counter with all the lazy grace of someone who’s seen this kind of heartbreak before. “Ah,” he says, like it explains everything. “So we’ve reached that stage.”

“What stage?” Vi snaps, flexing her hand like she might punch something else just for punctuation.

Vander takes a long sip. “The one where you’re not mad because of what she did. You’re mad because it meant something, and she didn’t treat it like it did.”

Vi groans. Loud. Dragging both hands through her hair until the short copper strands stand on end. “I should be angry. I am angry. I should walk away, I should slam a door, I should…” She trails off. Looks at the ruined wall. Her hands. Her heart.

“You should do whatever keeps you from imploding,” Vander says gently. “But that doesn’t change the facts.”

Vi crosses her arms, leaning back against the wall like she needs something solid or she’ll collapse into herself. “What facts?”

“You’re in love,” Vander says simply. “And now you know it. Now she knows it. And that scares the hell out of both of you.”

Vi glares at him. “You make it sound like I’m the idiot here.”

He shrugs. “You’re not an idiot. You’re just loud about feelings you don’t want to have.”

A beat passes. Then she grabs a cushion from the nearby couch and throws it at him. Hard. Vander catches it with one hand like he was expecting it.

“Feel better?” he asks.

Vi sinks to the floor slowly, her back still against the wall. Her legs fold beneath her like they’ve finally given out. She rests her arms on her knees, stares down at her hands. The skin is raw. Split in a few places. Her knuckles look like they’ve been dipped in rust.

“I’m in love with her,” she says softly. Not like a confession. Like a defeat.

“I know,” Vander replies.

Vi swallows hard. “That’s the problem.”

The room goes quiet.

Outside, the wind howls against the windowpane like it’s trying to get in. The city hums—Zaun’s always humming. Somewhere in the distance, sirens wail. Down below, the Drop breathes like a living thing. But here—in this small, broken space—they just sit.

Two people, one of them bleeding from her hands, both of them bleeding from the past.

“You’re not broken, Vi,” Vander says finally, voice quieter now. “Just... scared.”

She lets her head fall back against the wall with a soft thud. Closes her eyes. Her heartbeat is still too fast. Her ribs feel too tight.

“I think,” she murmurs, “that if she touches me again, I’ll break.”

Vander doesn’t ask what she means. He doesn’t need to.

Because they both know: not all breaks are bad.

Some are the kind that let the light in.

The silence isn’t peaceful. It scrapes. Catches in the throat. Stings like smoke. Vi lives in it for days, dragging her body through hours like it’s made of rusted gears and nothing else.

She doesn’t see Mel. Not on purpose. She times her routes around the estate with obsessive care—avoiding the council wing, skipping briefings she doesn’t strictly have to attend, ducking out of rooms too early or too late. Mel’s name sits just behind her lips like a blade waiting to slip, always aching, never spoken.

She tells herself it’s better this way.

Because the truth is, she wants too much. Every glance between them feels like kindling. Every breath like a match. And Vi… Vi knows fire. She’s made of it. She’s burned things before. People before. People she loved.

So she stays away.

Because wanting Mel isn’t just dangerous. It’s surrender.

And Vi doesn’t surrender.

She throws herself into training instead. Beats down the impulse with clenched fists and bleeding knuckles. Reinforced walls dent under her fury. Dummies are reduced to scraps. The gym floor is slick with sweat, hers and others’, but Vi stays long after everyone else has limped away. She doesn’t talk. Doesn’t shower. Just keeps moving. Keeps punishing herself with motion.

The notes come on the second day. The first is formal. Polite. Signed with Mel’s name in the crisp, elegant script Vi could recognize even mid-brawl. It asks her to attend a strategy meeting. Just the two of them.

Vi doesn’t reply.

The second is less formal. “If I did something wrong, tell me. Don’t disappear on me.”

Vi folds it and tucks it in her locker behind a rusted hinge where she won’t have to see it unless she’s already hurting.

Then nothing.

Mel stops writing.

And the silence becomes louder.

Vi still eats with Powder in the mornings. Or she tries to. But her mind’s always somewhere else. She’s tense, fork halfway to her mouth, eyes distant. Like she’s still fighting ghosts in the corner of the room. Like she expects Mel to walk in at any moment and stab her with a glance. Or worse—not walk in. And let that absence speak louder than words ever could.

Powder puts up with it for a while.

She chatters, filling the silence like she always has—about broken circuits, new drone calibrations, why she thinks Jayce is one glitter mishap away from becoming a walking science fair. But Vi barely nods. Answers in grunts. Stares at the same patch of table until the wood grain starts to blur.

And then, one morning, Powder slaps her.

Not playfully. Not performative.

Full hand. Full swing.

It echoes.

Vi blinks, stunned. Her head doesn’t even turn. She just freezes, eyes going wide like she can’t process the feeling.

Powder’s breathing hard. Her lip quivers, but her voice stays sharp. “You’re a coward.”

Vi flinches harder at the word than the blow.

Powder doesn’t stop.

“You’re Vi. Vi. You took down shimmer smugglers with a wrench and a dislocated shoulder. You stood between me and hell and dared it to keep coming. You went toe-to-toe with Silco and didn’t blink.”

Vi opens her mouth. No sound comes out.

Powder steps forward. Her hands tremble at her sides.

“But this? Feeling something? Letting her in? That’s what scares you?”

Vi swallows. Her throat feels scraped raw. “Powder—”

“No,” Powder snaps. “No excuses. No ‘it’s complicated.’ No ‘it’s not safe.’” Her voice cracks, but she doesn’t falter. “You’re not scared of Mel. You’re scared that she’ll see you. That she already does.”

Silence again.

But this one cuts deeper.

Vi looks down at her hands. They’re raw. Wrapped in bandages already stained red from this morning’s session. They tremble at the edges like they haven’t cooled down from all the fire she keeps trying to outrun.

“I don’t…” she starts, but it falls apart on her tongue.

She wants to scream. To punch a wall. To do something, anything, other than admit what’s boiling under her skin.

Powder watches her. Her anger fades just slightly, cracking into something older, something closer to grief.

“You’ve spent your whole life surviving, Vi,” she says softly. “But maybe now it’s time to learn how to live.”

Vi exhales, but it’s not a real breath. It’s a tremor. A fracture. Her knees give out, and she ends up seated on the floor, back to the kitchen wall, fists resting on her knees, head bowed like the weight finally dropped.

She doesn’t cry. She can’t. That part of her is still rusted shut.

But she leans back, lets her head hit the wall with a quiet thud, and whispers, “I don’t know how to fix this.”

Powder kneels beside her. Not touching. Not pushing. Just there. The way she always is, when everything else breaks.

“You don’t have to fix it,” she murmurs. “You just have to stop pretending it’s not real.”

Vi closes her eyes. And for one minute—just one—she lets herself want it. All of it.

The look Mel gave her that day in the rain.

The warmth of her hands. The sting of her voice. The way her laugh tastes like sunlight.

She wants it.

And it terrifies her.

The knock is quiet, but it echoes like a cannon through the Medarda estate. The kind of knock not meant to draw attention, only courage. It’s nearly midnight. The streets are empty, the sky bruised with moonlight and high clouds, and Vi stands on the polished front step like she’s about to be sentenced.

She doesn’t wear armor. No gauntlets. No holsters. Just her boots, scuffed at the toes, and a shirt that clings where she forgot to wash out blood. Her jacket’s too thin for the cold, and her fists are buried in the pockets like she’s afraid of what they’ll do if she lets them loose.

The door opens.

Mel stands there in a silk robe, midnight blue, edged in pale gold. Her hair is down—long, curled slightly, not yet braided for bed. It’s the first time Vi’s seen her like this. Bare-faced. Real.

She looks beautiful.

She looks like danger.

Vi’s chest tightens so hard she almost bolts.

But she doesn’t.

She steps over the threshold on instinct. Like walking into fire. Mel doesn’t stop her. Doesn’t ask why she’s here. She just moves aside with that unreadable calm of hers, the same one she wears at council meetings and public galas. But her eyes are softer tonight. Unsure.

Vi stands in the grand front room, surrounded by silk curtains and old Noxian tapestries, and feels like her boots are too loud for a place like this. She doesn’t sit. Doesn’t even remove her jacket. She’s still shaking. Not from cold.

Mel says nothing.

Vi opens her mouth—and it comes out before she can stop it.

“My parents were killed in a raid. I was six. I don’t remember their faces. Just the blood. Powder screaming. My hands trying to stop it, like I could fix a throat with fingers that didn’t know what a knife was yet.”

Mel still doesn’t move.

“I thought it would get better,” Vi goes on, voice fraying at the edges. “After that. I thought we’d build something. Family. Safety. But then I got stronger. Meaner. I thought I had to. And the first time I killed someone… it wasn’t in defense. It was because I wanted to. Because it felt right. And I haven’t stopped asking if that made me something else. Something I don’t want you to see.”

She can’t stop now. The dam’s broken.

“I wake up expecting everyone to be gone. Every night. Like I’m waiting for the floor to give out again. And when you kissed me…” She looks up finally, and the ache in her chest feels like it might split her ribs wide open. “When you kissed me, I didn’t know what to do with that. It wasn’t rage. Or duty. Or guilt. It was wanting. And I don’t know how to want something without destroying it.”

Silence stretches.

Then Mel walks forward. Quiet. Barefoot. No fanfare. No performance. Just steps until she’s in front of Vi, small hands reaching—gently, gently—for one of Vi’s.

Her fingers are warm. Steady.

She laces them with Vi’s like it’s not a question. Like it’s something she was always going to do.

“Thank you,” she says softly. “For surviving.”

The words crack something wide open.

Vi doesn’t cry pretty. She never learned how. Her jaw clenches, eyes squeezed tight, shoulders trembling like a dam being tested by an ocean.

She tries to turn away. To hide it. To keep some last scrap of armor intact.

But Mel pulls her closer.

And Vi breaks.

No more masks. No more violence. Just this—messy, loud, uncontainable grief. The grief of years. Of loss. Of not being seen and finally being seen too clearly. Of being touched gently when every lesson taught her that softness meant danger.

Mel holds her like she’s holding a war she refuses to let fall apart. One hand around Vi’s back, the other still cradling her fingers.

They stay like that for a long time. No words. Just the sound of shaking breath and a heartbeat loud enough to shatter glass.

Eventually, when the storm eases, when Vi’s breathing comes slower, steadier, she pulls back just enough to look at her.

“I didn’t come here to make a scene,” she whispers, voice hoarse. “I came here because I don’t know how to want you quietly.”

Mel brushes a thumb across Vi’s cheekbone, wiping something away that might’ve been tears, might’ve been ash.

“Then don’t,” she murmurs.

Vi laughs—a small, broken sound.

“I’m a mess.”

“I know.”

“I don’t know how to be half of anything.”

“Then don’t be,” Mel says again, stronger now. “Be all of it. Or none of it. But don’t pretend.”

Vi searches her face for a long moment. Like she’s trying to find the trick. The trap. The catch. But it isn’t there.

Only Mel. Only this.

A golden woman with a crown of scars beneath her silk, choosing a girl made of fists and fire.

Vi leans her forehead against Mel’s. Lets her eyes close.

And this time, when she breaks, it’s not pain.

It’s peace.

The room smells of sweat, dust, and ambition—not a scent Mel Medarda is accustomed to. The air is too heavy, not perfumed with jasmine or oiled ink or the sterile weight of politics. It’s honest. And she’s standing barefoot on the mat in the heart of the Council’s private training hall, already breathless, already bruising, already in deeper than she meant to go.

She lifts her arms again. Guard up. Palms open. Elbows tight.

The instructor doesn’t wait.

He comes at her like a falling wall—efficient, unrelenting. Mel ducks the first strike, stumbles on the second, and takes the third directly to her ribs. She grunts, sharp pain blooming under her skin like spilled ink, and bites it back without flinching.

He steps back.

“Again,” she says through clenched teeth.

The man—older, dark-skinned, built like a war story—nods once and circles. He doesn’t ask why she’s here. Doesn’t care that she’s Council. That she’s Mel Medarda. That she could have him fired with a pen stroke. That she’s Vi’s—well. Something. Whatever word fits.

That’s why she chose him.

No performance. No bows. No deference.

Just consequence.

She moves. Slower this time. More measured. Her breath finds a rhythm that isn't political. She ducks, twists, throws a punch that’s more hopeful than precise. It lands, barely.

He smiles. Then sweeps her legs.

She hits the mat hard. Her shoulder screams.

But she laughs.

It’s quiet. Short. But real. Her back flat against the mat, braid splayed like a fallen banner, chest rising with effort.

The man steps back, arms folded. Waiting.

Mel stays there for a second longer. Lets the sting soak into her bones. This pain? She can understand it. It’s tangible. Unlike the aching, twisting, beautiful mess that Vi has made of her chest.

Because that’s what this is. This is about Vi.

Every strike she takes, every bruise she earns, it’s a question she doesn’t have the courage to ask.

How does Vi carry it all?

How does she fight with everything and still smile like that? How does she move like ruin and tenderness in the same breath?

Mel has spent her life behind words, behind plans, behind art and armor and charm. But none of those things could’ve saved her in that alley when shimmer bombs rolled at her feet. None of them could’ve held her like Vi did. Could’ve bled to keep her breathing.

So Mel starts training.

Every morning before dawn, before council, before tea, she wraps her hands the way she’s seen Vi do it—tight, precise, deliberate. She tapes down her wrists with the same quiet reverence she used to reserve for calligraphy.

She doesn’t tell anyone.

Especially not Vi.

It’s not about pride. Or shame. It’s about needing something. Some small piece of what Vi seems to hold like breath and instinct. Not just strength. But command. Presence. Refusal.

Refusal to be broken.

Refusal to be owned.

Mel wants that—not for anyone else. For herself.

So she trains. In silence. With bruises she covers beneath silk sleeves. With pain that doesn’t show behind earrings and posture.

And one morning, when she’s halfway through a particularly brutal spar—sweat slicking her back, mouth blood-tanged from biting her cheek on a misstep—someone chuckles from the doorway.

Viktor.

He’s dressed in council black, cane balanced against his thigh, metal leg humming faintly as he leans just so. His hair is a bit messier than usual, like he didn’t bother to comb it before wandering in.

“Trying to fight her,” he says casually, “or impress her?”

Mel doesn’t answer.

She just turns back to the mat. Wipes her brow with the back of her wrist. Takes a stance again.

But her ears are red.

And Viktor, being Viktor, notices everything.

He doesn’t tease further. Just watches for a while longer, expression unreadable, before nodding once and leaving her to it.

She lasts another twenty minutes. When she collapses onto the bench afterward, hands trembling from effort, she doesn't think about the pain. She doesn’t think about council duties, or diplomatic failures, or whispers of scandal still lurking in the corners of her name.

She thinks about Vi.

The way Vi stands in front of her when danger comes. The way she pulls her close like she’s something precious. The way she listens to silence like it’s another language and answers it without words.

Mel doesn’t know how to love like that.

But she’s trying.

With every bruise. Every failed dodge. Every drop of sweat that stains her collarbone and soaks her curls.

She’s trying.

Because something in her has shifted—irrevocably, violently, beautifully. And she knows, without needing to name it, that if this goes wrong—if Vi walks away, or burns, or breaks—it’ll ruin her in ways Noxus never could.

But if she doesn’t try?

She’ll lose something she doesn’t have a name for yet.

So she breathes. Stands again. Calls the instructor forward.

And keeps going.

Chapter Text

Vi doesn’t notice it at first. Or maybe she does—but lies to herself about it, the way she’s always lied about the things that hurt too much to say aloud. It starts in the quiet moments. The seconds between orders. Between footsteps. Between words that never quite make it out of her throat. That’s when it creeps in. The realization.

She’s getting reckless again.

Not in the way that used to define her. Not with broken bones or shattered doors or fists thrown just to feel something hit back. No—this is worse. More dangerous than any alley ambush or council ambush. Because this kind of recklessness wears perfume. It wears gold in her hair and laughter like it’s armor. This kind of recklessness says her name like it knows all the ways she’s broken and still wants to learn the rest.

Vi watches her too closely now. It’s pathetic.

When Mel talks, Vi doesn’t hear half of it. She watches instead. Watches the way Mel’s lips shape consonants. The flicker of her lashes. The way she leans forward ever so slightly when she’s trying to win an argument without raising her voice. Which—let’s be honest—Mel always wins. Not because she’s louder. Because she’s sharper.

And Vi, who once fought her way out of a shimmer warehouse with her hands zip-tied and a blade in her thigh, finds herself completely unarmed by the curve of a smirk.

That’s the worst part.

Vi doesn’t feel weak often. She can handle bruises, gunfire, even the pressure of walking beside someone like Mel in a room full of wolves. But when Mel walks past her—too close, always too close—and her shoulder brushes Vi’s arm? When her perfume lingers just a second longer than necessary?

Vi’s fingers twitch like they don’t belong to her. Like they’re waiting for permission to reach out and memorize something forbidden.

She doesn’t act on it.

Not yet.

But she thinks about it. Gods, she thinks about it.

There are days she walks with Mel through the high corridors of Piltover, and she swears she forgets how to breathe. The spires arch above them like cathedral ribs. Light filters in through glass like holy fire. And Mel—Mel walks like she owns it. Not arrogantly. Not with entitlement. With presence. Like she belongs here.

And Vi doesn’t. She knows it. Feels it in the weight of her boots echoing too loudly against marble floors. In the way guards watch her like they’re just waiting for her to snap.

But Mel never flinches.

Never hesitates to walk beside her. To let their arms brush. To ask Vi a question in that soft, unbothered tone, as though the woman beside her isn’t a living weapon with a city’s worth of ghosts trailing her steps.

Vi hates how badly she wants to reach for her. Just once. Not even anything obscene. Just her hand. Just the feeling of fingers in hers. Just the confirmation that this—whatever this aching, pulsing thing is—might be real.

She almost does it. One night.

They’re walking after a late meeting, both bone-tired. Vi has one hand in her jacket pocket, the other swinging loose at her side. And Mel… Mel laughs. Just once. Something Powder said about Viktor and a speech gone wrong. It’s not even the joke that matters.

It’s the laugh.

It lands in Vi’s chest like a flare. Bright. Scorching. It finds a hollow place in her ribcage she hadn’t realized was empty and fills it. Lights it up from the inside out.

She doesn’t even think. Her hand twitches. Reaches.

Stops.

Her fingers hover just behind Mel’s. So close. She can feel the warmth radiating off her skin. So close, and yet she doesn’t do it.

Because touching Mel like that? It feels like a commitment. Like setting off a charge she can’t take back.

And Vi doesn’t know what would happen after.

Would it ruin everything? Would Mel pull away?

Or worse—would she hold on?

That’s the question that eats her alive.

She goes home and lies awake with her eyes closed, fists clenched, breath caught on the edge of a name. Not a shout. Not even a whisper. Just the shape of it in her mouth. Mel.

When she does sleep, it’s not the undercity she dreams of. Not the years she spent in Stillwater, or the screaming of the cell doors. It’s her. It’s Mel. Smiling across a table. Reaching to fix the collar of Vi’s coat. Laughing when Powder calls her “too clean” for Zaun and Mel responds with a dirty joke that makes even Ekko choke.

And underneath it all is something quieter. Something steady.

Love.

Vi doesn’t know if she’s allowed to call it that. But it fits in her chest too well to be anything else.

She watches Mel with Powder, sometimes, and it breaks her a little. Because Mel is soft with her. Patient. Lets Powder ramble about tech and theory and wind patterns while sipping tea like it’s the most fascinating conversation she’s ever had. And maybe it is. Maybe Mel really cares.

And Vi realizes, slowly, that it’s not just her she’s afraid of losing.

It’s all of it.

The way Mel fits into this fractured little life they’ve carved out between war zones and half-broken allegiances. The way she treats Zaun like it’s something worth saving. The way she calls Vi “darling” sometimes, casually, like it doesn’t punch Vi in the stomach every time.

She’s in deep.

Deeper than she meant to go. Deeper than she thought was even possible for someone like her.

And it’s not the bruises that scare her anymore.

It’s that she’d kill for Mel. No hesitation. No questions. No aftermath she wouldn’t be willing to bleed through if it meant Mel was safe. That kind of devotion used to belong to Vander. To Powder. But now…

Vi knows the feeling in her chest isn’t just loyalty.

It’s wildfire. It’s devotion so sharp it cuts. It’s the terrifying clarity that she’d let the world rot if it meant Mel would still be standing at the end of it.

She doesn’t say any of this. Not out loud.

But she lingers more now.

Walks slower beside Mel. Lets their arms brush. Smiles a second longer when Mel looks at her.

It’s not a confession.

But it’s close.

Mel doesn’t sleep.

The moon crawls across the sky in crooked angles, casting silver slats through the tall arched windows of her estate. Wind brushes against the glass like a question she’s not ready to answer. Her chamber is quiet—too quiet—yet her thoughts roar like a rising tide behind her ribs.

So instead, she writes.

Her journal lies open on the desk like a wound. Black ink bleeding across creamy pages. Not for the council. Not for her mother. Not for strategy or speeches or political maneuvering. Just for her. For the small, shivering voice in her chest that doesn’t know how to speak unless it’s filtered through careful cursive and the silence of solitude.

“I’ve built my life out of survival and masks,” she writes, slowly, deliberately, as though shaping the words will make them less terrifying. “But around her… I want to be seen.”

She stops.

Stares at it.

Then underlines it. Twice.

The pen trembles in her fingers, and she sets it down with a quiet clatter. This is the part that haunts her. Not Vi’s strength. Not the way she can shatter bone with one punch or tear through a room full of assassins without blinking. No, it’s worse than that.

It’s that Vi is safe.

Mel has no idea how to exist in safety. She was raised in a home where smiles were weapons and silence was armor. Her mother taught her that love was a currency, to be leveraged and discarded. Vulnerability was punished. Trust was fatal.

But Vi? Vi looks at her like she’s not a battlefield. Like she’s something sacred. Like Mel isn’t just allowed to want—but to have. To keep. To be kept.

It terrifies her more than anything else ever has.

So she decides, perhaps recklessly, to break the last rule she ever gave herself.

She asks to go to Zaun.

No press. No audience. No diplomatic excuse. Just a simple request, low and steady, over tea in the garden while Vi’s sharpening a blade with casual precision.

“Show me your world.”

Vi looks up, blinking. For once, caught off-guard. “You serious?”

Mel only nods, spine straight, chin lifted—not to hide the nerves, but to carry them with dignity. If this is the war she wants to win, she’ll walk into it unarmed.

Vi stares at her for a moment, eyes searching hers like she’s trying to find the hidden agenda. The trap. But there isn’t one. Mel let it go the second she opened her mouth. And Vi, gods help her, smiles.

“You’ll hate it,” she says, but it’s almost a dare.

Mel only replies, “I’ll let you be the judge of that.”

And that’s how she ends up in The Last Drop—Zaun’s heartbeat, beating loud and unashamed under miles of stone and soot.

The air is thick with shimmer dust and music that pulses more than plays. Lights flicker in wild neon. It smells like metal and smoke and something sweet clinging to the walls like memory. Everything is too loud, too hot, too alive.

Mel should hate it.

But she doesn’t.

She sits at a battered round table with a drink in her hand that tastes like citrus made a blood pact with battery acid. Powder is next to her, cackling every time Mel’s face scrunches at the sharpness. Claggor—broad and warm and already two drinks in—keeps calling her fancy lady with a grin that makes her laugh despite herself.

And across from her, Vi is leaning back in a chair too small for her frame, one boot hooked on the table leg, arms folded as she watches Mel like she can’t believe she’s actually here.

Not like a princess out of place.

Like a miracle she’s scared to blink at in case it vanishes.

Vi doesn’t talk much. Just sips her drink, smirks whenever Claggor exaggerates a story, and occasionally catches Mel’s gaze with a look that says, You don’t know what you’ve done to me.

And Mel?

She lets it happen.

She lets herself laugh—loud, unrestrained, none of the polite chuckles she’s mastered in council chambers. Lets herself lean in when Powder pulls up a blueprint scrawled on the back of a napkin. Lets herself ask questions. Real ones. Why does that valve spark like that? What’s the shimmer ratio? Do you actually live above this place?

Let’s herself feel.

Because in Zaun, no one bows to her. No one expects her to lead, or save, or uphold the dignity of a crumbling elite. Here, she is simply Mel. The woman Vi invited. The woman Powder has deemed “actually kinda fun.” The woman Claggor raises his glass to because “anyone who can survive that drink’s got steel in their blood.”

She’s still wearing velvet, still has gold at her ears—but it doesn’t feel like armor tonight.

It just feels like skin.

Later, after the others peel off to dance or scheme or chase whatever chaos keeps Zaun alive, she stays at the table with Vi. The music softens for a breath. The lights dim enough to throw long shadows across Vi’s face.

“You’re watching me,” Mel murmurs, not accusing. Just observing.

Vi shrugs, unbothered. “You’re worth watching.”

The words strike something low and molten in her spine. She looks away. Then back.

“I feel real here,” she says.

Vi doesn’t smile this time. Just nods. As if she’s been waiting years for Mel to say that out loud. As if that single sentence is proof that bringing her here wasn’t a mistake.

“Good,” Vi says. Then lifts her glass. “To being real.”

Mel clinks hers against it. And for the first time since she was a child, sitting on Noxian floors sketching dresses she’d never wear, she believes it.

This is what it means to live without masks.

Not without risk.

But with truth.

And gods, she thinks—maybe that’s the war I want to win. Not the one between cities. Not the one on council floors or the ones drawn in ink and steel.

But the one inside herself.

The one that says she doesn’t deserve this.

The one that tells her love is a battlefield she’ll never survive.

She looks at Vi. At the woman who would burn the world for her, and who asks nothing in return but honesty.

And for once, Mel lets herself believe she can win.

The deeper into Zaun they went, the more Vi felt her chest unravel.

She didn’t mean to show this much. Not really. The plan had been casual. A walkthrough. A glance into the alleyways of her world, just enough to satisfy curiosity. Not enough to sting. Not enough to expose. But plans, especially Vi’s, had never been good at staying intact once emotion started bleeding through the cracks.

Mel didn’t ask questions. That was what made it dangerous.

Because she didn’t press. Didn’t demand. She just walked. Next to her. Shoulder to shoulder through streets where children hawked shimmer dust to tourists and walls bore the scars of revolutions long since buried in soot. She kept her head high, even when the scent of rot overtook the spice of the upper stalls. Even when the catwalks narrowed and the pipes screamed underfoot. Her silk blouse got smudged by smoke drifting from a vent, and she didn’t even flinch.

She just looked.

Not down. Not away.

Vi had always thought of Zaun as a thing you had to endure. A place you learned to survive, not admire. But Mel’s gaze was different. Curious, yes. Observant, naturally. But not dissecting. Not judging. Like she was listening to the city. Like she expected it to talk back.

They started with the labs. Of course they did. Powder had insisted.

Vi hadn’t told her Mel was coming. Word had traveled anyway.

Powder met them in the doorway of one of the communal buildyards—goggles crooked, hair wild, one sleeve burnt from elbow to wrist. “Don’t touch anything unless it hums first,” she warned with a wink, then dragged Mel inside by the hand like they’d known each other for years.

Ekko followed a second later, grease on his collar and a grin ready to burst. “She doesn’t hum, Powder.”

“She crackles,” Powder replied, and Mel, to her everlasting credit, just smiled and lifted an eyebrow like she’d heard far worse in much more proper places.

Vi didn’t join them. Not at first. She stood back, hands in her pockets, pretending to inspect the stabilizer prototype. It was a mess of copper coils and shimmer conductors, shaped like a lightning bolt that had been halfway eaten and spit back out by a drunk thunder god.

But Mel’s eyes lit up when Powder explained its function. “It’ll let sky-bikes charge mid-jump,” she said, practically vibrating. “Like skipping a heartbeat in midair, but fun.”

“It sounds terrifying,” Mel said.

Powder grinned. “That’s how you know it’s working.”

They talked for fifteen more minutes before something popped—a sharp, electric wheeze—and the stabilizer burst in a flare of blue and purple sparks. No one got hurt. Ekko swore. Powder cackled. Mel ducked, coughed once, and straightened with her dignity intact.

Vi finally stepped forward then, brushing soot off Mel’s shoulder.

“I told you she crackled,” Powder sing-songed behind them.

Vi rolled her eyes, but her chest was doing something complicated. Something she didn’t have the words for, because seeing Mel here, soot-smeared and smiling, laughing with her sister—it didn’t feel like two worlds colliding.

It felt like two halves finally aligning.

Later, they stopped by the underground foundry. Claggor was knee-deep in steam pipes and humming off-key. Mylo was making a racket three yards away, juggling socket wrenches and swearing every third syllable.

“Hey, Vi,” Mylo shouted. “You bring your girlfriend down here to inspect the peasants?”

Vi nearly choked on air.

Mel, for her part, tilted her head. “Technically, Councilwoman Girlfriend.”

Vi smacked Mylo upside the head.

He laughed. Claggor just nodded like he approved of the match, his mouth full of bolts. “She’s got good boots. And sarcasm.”

“Your standards are astounding,” Vi muttered.

But she didn’t stop smiling.

And Mel—Mel looked at home. Not because the space was familiar. It wasn’t. She didn’t know the words they used for tools or the machines they built from nothing. But she didn’t pretend to know. She just listened. Asked questions. Let Powder steal her attention. Let Ekko correct her about shimmer filters without taking offense. Let Vi lean against the railing beside her, silently guarding and observing, and didn’t push for conversation.

She was just there.

When they finally left, the laughter lingered in Vi’s ears. Powder called after them to “not do anything she wouldn’t,” which made Ekko groan and Mylo offer to draw diagrams.

Vi dragged Mel out by the elbow before anyone could elaborate.

The walk got quieter.

Slower.

They didn’t talk much as they moved toward the old river pier, where the water stank of chemicals and the buildings leaned like tired old men. Vi’s boots kicked up dust. Mel’s heels clicked softer on the uneven concrete.

“This is where he died,” Vi said eventually.

She didn’t need to say the name.

Mel knew.

The spot had been cleared, mostly. The blood washed away. The railing rebuilt. But the echo remained. In the way the air settled heavy. In the faint burn of old ash when the wind hit just right. In Vi’s eyes, suddenly sharp and distant, as if she was bracing herself for ghosts.

Mel didn’t speak. Just stepped forward. Her hand brushed Vi’s—then found it fully. Intertwined their fingers without ceremony.

Vi looked down.

Mel’s hand was warm. Steady. And it didn’t shake.

Vi’s did. Just a little.

She could feel her past pressing in on her—every mistake, every scream, every loss that started in places like this and ended in blood. Her heart pounded like it wanted to escape her ribs and run far away from anything that looked like hope.

But she didn’t run.

Because Mel stood beside her.

And that meant something different now. Something Vi hadn’t let herself want until this moment, until she saw how easily Mel folded herself into this world. Not to change it. Not to fix it. Just to see it.

To see her.

Vi squeezed her hand once, grounding herself. Then looked out across the sludgy water, the skyline beyond twisted and fractured but still glowing in patches of old copper light.

“This is home,” she said, barely more than a whisper.

Mel’s voice was softer. But somehow it cut deeper.

“Then I’m honored to be here.”

Vi blinked fast. Looked down again. At the woman beside her, who had walked through every line of Vi’s grief like it was something sacred—not a barrier, but a map.

Home, she realized, had never been a place.

It had always been people.

And maybe, just maybe, it had always been her.

The Last Drop was alive tonight.

Not in the safe, celebratory way Piltover held its galas—with champagne and meaningless applause and compliments wrapped in lace and poison. No, this was the kind of alive that had blood in its teeth. Music that throbbed through the floorboards like a second heartbeat. Heat rising from too many bodies packed shoulder to shoulder, shouting to be heard over the screech of guitars and laughter that bordered on hysteria. Mel’s boots stuck slightly with every step. Her dress was more understated than usual, but still elegant—gold at the throat, black along the sleeves, the fabric clinging where it should and drifting where it didn’t matter.

She sat in the booth Vi had insisted on—halfway up the wall, tucked in the rafters where the noise softened and the view widened. Powder had waved them in with a grin, already tangled in an argument with Ekko about voltage ratios and ‘useless Pilty safety caps.’ Vi had kissed the top of Powder’s head, thrown a grin at Claggor, and slouched into the seat beside Mel like she didn’t know how beautiful she looked tonight.

And gods, she did. No gauntlets. Just leather gloves tucked into her belt, jacket slung over the bench. Her undershirt clung to the clean lines of her biceps, collar open to reveal the ink twisting over her collarbone. Her hair—jagged, crimson, untamable—gleamed like firelight in the hanging lamps. She laughed easily tonight. Smiled more. She kept one leg pressed lightly against Mel’s beneath the table, and didn’t pull away.

Mel should have known peace wouldn’t last.

The woman arrived mid-song.

Tall. Pretty, in that sleek, clinical way. Pale braid down her back. Dressed in something that was definitely too clean to have come from Zaun, but not polished enough for Piltover’s elite. A traveler. A scavenger. Or just someone reckless enough to flirt in this part of the Undercity without knowing what the hell she was walking into.

Mel spotted her first—out of instinct more than anything. She always tracked the room. Always knew the exits, the trouble, the tilt of every drinker's mood. It wasn’t jealousy that coiled first. It was calculation. She saw the way the woman moved. Confident. Like she was used to getting her way.

She made her way to the bar, said something to the barkeep, and laughed. Loud enough to draw Vi’s attention.

Mel felt it the second Vi glanced over.

She didn’t do anything. Not at first.

Let it unfold. Let the stranger lean in, brush against Vi’s arm under the guise of balancing her drink. Vi startled a little—blinked, smiled politely. That nervous one she used when she was trying not to hurt someone’s feelings or accidentally break their nose. She said something Mel couldn’t hear. The woman touched her again. This time along the bicep.

Mel’s nails dug into the stem of her wine glass.

Vi looked up then, across the bar.

Found her.

And the panic in her eyes?

It did something.

Mel rose without thinking.

Not like a storm. Not like a fury. But like royalty. Controlled. Measured. Deadly.

The crowd parted without realizing it did. Some recognized her. Others just moved, instinctively aware that something powerful had entered their orbit.

Vi shifted when she saw her coming. Opened her mouth. Didn’t speak.

Mel stopped in front of her.

Met Vi’s eyes for a heartbeat. Then reached out—calmly, firmly—and slid an arm around her waist. The curve of Vi’s hip fit perfectly beneath her palm. Mel leaned in, slow, deliberate, and pressed a kiss to her cheek. Close enough to the edge of her mouth to leave no room for ambiguity.

Vi exhaled like she forgot how lungs worked.

“We’re leaving,” Mel said, soft and sweet and final.

Then she turned.

Didn’t glance at the woman.

Didn’t need to.

The bar stilled. Like a collective breath had caught and didn’t know whether to release as awe or panic.

Vi followed.

Without hesitation.

Outside, the air was cooler. Harsher. The metallic tang of Zaun clung to the wind, and the distant hum of turbines filled the silence between them.

Mel didn’t speak. Just walked.

Vi caught up after half a block, steps too loud, heart louder. “So…” she began, then trailed off. Her voice was hoarse. “That was…”

Mel stopped walking.

Vi almost bumped into her.

Mel turned slowly, hand still curled with memory. Her voice, when she spoke, was calm.

“She touched you.”

Vi blinked. “I noticed.”

“She flirted with you.”

Vi’s ears were red. “Yeah.”

Mel tilted her head. “Did you want her to?”

Vi’s answer was immediate. “No.”

Mel raised an eyebrow.

“I panicked,” Vi admitted, rubbing the back of her neck. “Tried to be polite. Didn’t want to make a scene.”

Mel stared at her. Then smiled. Not cruel. Not mocking. Just relieved. “So I did it for you.”

Vi gaped. “That was you not making a scene?”

Mel stepped closer.

Vi didn’t retreat.

“I don’t like sharing,” Mel said, voice low.

Vi swallowed. “Noted.”

“And I don’t like being ignored.”

“You weren’t,” Vi said quickly. “I was just—”

Mel pressed a finger to her lips.

“You looked very into it,” she teased.

Vi made a strangled sound. “I was not.”

Mel leaned in, nose brushing hers. “I believe you.”

Vi’s hands twitched at her sides. Like she didn’t know where to put them. Like she was too afraid to move in case this wasn’t real.

Mel reached for one. Threaded their fingers together. Warm, rough palms against soft knuckles. Ink and silk and sweat and fury.

“You don’t have to run anymore,” Mel whispered.

Vi shook her head slowly, like she wasn’t sure she could believe it yet. “I’m not running.”

“Then why are you shaking?”

Vi looked down. “Because you scare the hell out of me.”

Mel kissed her.

Properly, this time.

No cheek. No tease. No warning.

Just mouth to mouth. Fire to fire. Mel’s free hand at Vi’s jaw, thumb brushing the scar there. Vi’s breath caught. She melted. She surged forward like her bones had been waiting for this exact moment to stop aching.

When they broke apart, Vi’s hands were firm at Mel’s waist. Her forehead pressed to hers. Her voice a whisper against the skin below Mel’s ear.

“I’ve wanted that for so long it hurts.”

Mel laughed softly. “Then maybe we should stop hurting.”

Vi nodded.

And for once, didn’t argue.

The morning sunlight in Piltover was too clean.

Vi didn’t trust it. Never had. It filtered through stained glass and polished marble like a judgment, not a welcome. Too pristine. Too sharp. In Zaun, light bled in through vents and rusted grates—golden if you were lucky, violet if you weren’t. But here? Here it gleamed like a blade sharpened on other people’s backs.

Still, she was here.

Still barefoot on cold tile, shirt rumpled, her collarbone still bearing the imprint of last night’s kiss. And maybe that was the only thing keeping her upright.

The kitchen was quiet this time of morning. Mel’s private estate didn’t bustle the way some council homes did. No servants chattering. No aides scrambling. Just the faint hum of mana-powered lighting, the whisper of water through heating pipes, and the sharp, bitter scent of coffee on the brew.

Vi padded in like she owned the place. Or maybe like she didn’t care if she did. Her hair—red as a warning and tousled from sleep—hung in uneven jagged sweeps over one brow. She hadn’t bothered to do anything with it this morning. Hadn’t even put on her gloves. Just slung on a tank top, sweatpants, and the kind of grin that always meant trouble.

Mel was already there.

Of course she was.

Wearing something soft and flowing, pale against her dark skin, with a neckline too low for anyone but royalty or warlords. She moved like moonlight had rules to follow and she simply didn’t care for them. The coffee pot steamed between them like a peace offering. Or a challenge.

Vi watched her for a moment too long. Then approached.

“Morning, counselor,” she said, voice still sleep-rough, half dare and half devotion. “You still jealous?”

Mel didn’t look up.

Didn’t blink.

Just murmured something—low, curling from her lips like velvet set aflame. Noxian.

Vi blinked.

“What?”

Mel’s tone was smooth as wine. “I said, if you ever flirt with anyone else again, I will take you apart so slowly you’ll forget how to beg.”

At least… that’s what it sounded like. But there were more syllables. And the lilt of command beneath it made Vi’s skin light up like powder on a fuse.

Vi stood there, coffee forgotten, heart hammering behind her ribs like it was trying to escape.

“I…” she cleared her throat. “I don’t know what that means.”

Mel finally glanced up.

Her smile was razor-soft. “You don’t need to.”

She turned. Picked up her mug with the grace of a queen and the smirk of a wolf in silk. Then walked past Vi like nothing had happened. Like her words weren’t still tattooing themselves across Vi’s spine.

Vi stood there.

Mug in one hand.

Soul in the other.

She whispered to herself, stunned and helpless, “I am so gone.”

“Knew that weeks ago,” Powder called, breezing past with a bowl of cereal and absolutely no mercy.

Vi groaned. “You weren't even in the room.”

“You make sounds,” Powder replied, not even pausing. “Walls are thin. You’re loud. Everyone knows.”

“I am not—”

Powder tossed a grape at her and vanished into the hallway like the chaos gremlin she was.

Vi stood there, half caffeinated and fully in love, and realized two things at once.

One: she’d never win another argument with Powder again.

And two: if Mel kept whispering things like that in languages Vi didn’t understand, she was going to lose her mind.

And the worst part?

She couldn’t wait for it.

The streets of Piltover were unforgiving in their shine.

Gold-plated railings. Silver-threaded banners. Spires too sharp to touch. It was a city built to dazzle and disarm, and Vi had never cared for its sleight-of-hand civility, never trusted the way people here smiled with their mouths but sharpened their knives behind silk gloves. She’d grown up in a place where danger was loud, bloody, breathing down your neck in alleys and stairwells. She’d learned to read fear from the twitch of a jaw, from the way a man held his weight before throwing a punch. Up here? The war was quiet. The blood, theoretical. The wounds—administrative.

But Mel moved through it like she’d invented it. Or like she’d seen straight through it and decided to play anyway.

Vi leaned against the archway just outside the council chamber, arms folded, posture loose but eyes razor-focused. She was dressed in what Vander liked to call her "court leathers"—a slightly cleaned-up version of her usual armor, with the edges polished and the gauntlets swapped out for bracers slim enough to pass inspection. Her hair was styled the same it always was these days—short on the sides, longer in front, a swipe of crimson flame that cut across her temple like a warning.

She didn’t need to be inside to know what was happening.

She could feel it.

The tension in the walls. The way aides moved like they were trying not to make sound. Jayce had emerged not ten minutes ago, pale and tight-lipped, clutching a stack of documents like they might catch fire in his hands. They probably would, metaphorically. Mel had been holding those papers for days, locked in her office, waiting for the right moment.

And now?

Now she was burning the whole room down, but with words instead of fire.

Vi had caught just one phrase as the door opened and shut again: “—illegal allocation of funds to private holdings during a declared recovery initiative—”

Gods. That voice. Smooth, unflinching. Every syllable barbed. No shouting. Just precision. The kind of controlled fury that could make someone question their own name if they weren't ready for it.

Vi had faced down shimmer-beasts, mercs, warlords, entire mobs.

But she’d never seen anything more dangerous than Mel Medarda with receipts.

Later, at the summit, it was a different battlefield.

Vi was stationed across the room. Not as security. Not really. Officially, she was there as “Zaunite liaison,” but everyone knew that was a cover. She wasn’t there for diplomacy—she was there to watch. And gods, she did.

Mel swept through the crowd like a tide made of glass and gold. Smiling, effortless, leaning in just enough to disarm, her laughter light and precise. Her gown was deep green today—emerald silk that moved like liquid and bared her back in a way Vi couldn’t not stare at. The gold accents caught the chandelier light like it was begging to be seen. Vi felt like the floor had vanished under her feet every time Mel turned in her direction. Not looking at her. Just... knowing she was there.

She talked with Piltovans who made a living off of things Vi still wanted to dismantle. Held their gaze. Twisted their opinions. Didn’t yield an inch.

Vi watched her glide from one conversation to the next, adjusting her tone, her pitch, the angle of her chin. She didn’t bow. Didn’t apologize. But she made everyone feel like they’d been heard, like they’d mattered. It was seduction with no touch. War without blood.

And Vi, who had lived her life as a fist, realized she was watching someone win the same battles she’d been fighting her whole life—but with nothing more than poise and steel-lined words.

She didn’t say anything about it. Not when they left. Not when the event closed with polite applause and champagne flutes.

Not even when she caught sight of Mel in the street later, intervening with the grace of a queen and the fury of a mother bear.

The enforcer was already gripping the collar of a small girl. Zaun-born, maybe seven. Grimy cheeks, bright eyes, trembling lip.

Vi stiffened.

But before she could even cross the street, Mel was there. Smooth as a blade unsheathed. She didn’t shout. She didn’t threaten.

She asked.

“Where’s the proof?” she said, calm as calm could be. “Where’s the item? The record?”

The enforcer stuttered. Fumbled. “She was running—”

“So would I,” Mel said, cool and sharp. Then, to the girl: “Did you steal anything?”

The child shook her head, wide-eyed.

Mel reached into her purse, withdrew a coin—a polished medallion from her own damn pocket—and placed it gently into the girl's small hand.

“Now you have something to run with,” she said softly. “But I suggest you walk.”

Vi couldn’t breathe.

She watched the child vanish into the crowd. Watched the enforcer lower his hand. Watched Mel turn without another word and continue walking, like she hadn’t just unraveled years of hierarchy in a single moment.

Vi didn’t follow.

Not right away.

She stayed across the street. Heart in her throat. Hands clenched at her sides. Watching Mel—her sharp edges, her clean lines, the way she carved space without ever drawing a weapon.

She doesn’t need me.

The thought hit like a punch.

She’s her own army.

And Vi knew, objectively, that was good. That was better. That Mel could stand without her, walk without her, protect without her—that was strength. That was survival.

But gods, something ached anyway.

Because she’d always been the protector. The one who stood between danger and the people she loved. She didn’t know how to be anything else.

She told herself it was fine. That Mel needing her had never been the point.

And then—hours later—they were walking through the upper gardens near Mel’s estate. The sun was just starting to dip, casting long shadows across marble paths and tall hedges trimmed to architectural perfection.

Vi didn’t speak. Couldn’t. She still had the street in her head—the child, the enforcer, Mel’s voice like judgment carved in velvet.

Then—without fanfare, without a pause—Mel reached out.

Threaded their fingers together.

Just like that.

Vi stopped walking.

Didn’t look at her. Couldn’t. Her whole body was trembling with something too big to name.

“I don’t need you,” Mel said softly, gaze ahead. “But I want you.”

It hit harder than a bullet.

Vi had no answer. Not one she could say without shattering.

So instead, she squeezed Mel’s hand back. Slowly. Gently. Like she was learning how to hold something precious for the first time in her life.

They stood there a long time. Long after the sun dipped and the lights of the city below began to glow. Long after the wind shifted and the garden fell quiet around them.

Vi didn’t say anything.

She didn’t need to.

Because in that one touch—in the steadiness of their joined hands, in the warmth of Mel’s voice—was everything she’d been fighting for since she was a child.

Not safety.

Not peace.

Just this.

Just home.

The training hall smells like metal and sweat and sawdust, a mix of old violence and new ambition. It isn’t grand, not in the way council chambers are, not in the way Mel is used to. No gilded edges. No velvet chairs. The lighting is harsh, practical—bare coils strung high above the sparring floor. Noise echoes here. Impact lingers. This is a place built for collisions, for testing the limits of body and control.

Mel is overdressed.

She knows it the moment she walks in—sleek blazer, high heels, earrings that probably cost more than the flooring beneath her feet. But Viktor had insisted. “Security review,” he’d said, with that deceptively innocent tilt to his head. “Might be wise to observe the protocols your enforcer liaison is enforcing.”

Mel suspects it has less to do with policy and more to do with Viktor’s penchant for mischief. The way he raises his brows when he nudges her toward the railing feels far too pleased.

The moment she sees Vi step into the ring, Mel forgets every protest she’d rehearsed.

Gods.

Vi isn’t wearing her gauntlets. Just wraps—tight across her knuckles, looped high on her forearms. Her shirt is sleeveless, loose enough to allow movement, snug enough to leave nothing to the imagination. Her hair is the same: cropped close at the sides, wild on top, a streak of scarlet that catches the light when she tilts her head.

Mel’s breath stills. She tells herself it’s curiosity.

It’s not.

The trainees on the mat are well-built, uniformed, confident. Young men and women trained in all forms of Piltover-approved martial arts. Their instructor—grizzled and stern—barks commands and nods to Vi.

She doesn’t speak.

She just steps forward.

The stance she takes is casual, almost lazy. One hand low, one curled near her shoulder, knees bent slightly. She looks bored. Relaxed. Like she’s barely paying attention.

Mel leans forward without meaning to.

The trainees move.

They charge in a coordinated line—three from the front, one from behind. It’s a maneuver clearly practiced, intended to trap, disorient, overwhelm.

It doesn’t work.

Vi moves like a wave breaking on rock—slow at first, then devastating. She ducks under the first swing, spins, and elbows the rear attacker so hard he drops instantly, wind knocked out of him. Before the others can even register the shift, Vi’s on them.

A foot lashes out—one of the trainees stumbles back, crashing against the ropes.

Another swing. Vi catches the arm midair, twists, and uses the attacker’s own momentum to flip him onto the mat. Hard.

The third tries to grapple her.

Mistake.

Vi ducks low, slams her shoulder into his ribs, lifts him off the ground, and throws him. His body hits the mat with a wet thud.

Mel’s lips part. Her fingers clench the railing so hard she hears it creak.

Viktor, beside her, makes a low noise of amusement. “Your entire posture is unseemly,” he murmurs. “We are in public.”

Mel doesn’t answer. Doesn’t even hear him, not really.

Because Vi turns then—slow, deliberate—and grins.

It isn’t her usual smirk. It isn’t the cocky, self-satisfied grin she gives Jayce when she wins a debate with three words and a scoff. It’s something deeper. Quieter. The kind of smile that says she knows exactly what Mel is thinking. That she saw her watching. That she liked it.

Mel forgets how to breathe.

The fight ends within seconds. The final trainee barely gets a hand on Vi before he’s taken down by a sweep and a follow-up blow to the chest that leaves him groaning. The instructor calls a halt. The other enforcers cheer quietly, though most of them are too busy looking winded or dazed.

Vi doesn’t celebrate.

She just steps off the mat, rolling her shoulder, letting her knuckles bleed slowly through the wraps. Her grin fades into something softer when her eyes meet Mel’s again.

And gods, that is what undoes her.

It isn’t the power. It isn’t the technique. It’s that softness—like Vi is offering her something real in the middle of a war zone. Like she’s saying, This is who I am, and I’m still looking at you.

Mel can’t move. She tries to speak, to turn, to say something snide or elegant or clever. But the words catch behind her teeth like fishhooked truths.

Viktor nudges her elbow gently.

“Well?” he asks, voice dry. “Insight achieved?”

She turns her head slowly, eyes still fixed on Vi’s back as she towels off in the corner, muscles slick with effort, tension rolling off her in waves.

Mel breathes once. Then again. Swallows hard.

“I think,” she says, voice hoarse, “that I am absolutely and catastrophically in trouble.”

Viktor’s laughter is low and knowing. “Yes. That seems... tectonic.”

Mel doesn’t correct him. Because he’s right.

The earth beneath her has shifted. Again.

And this time, she’s not sure she wants it to settle.

The square is louder than Vi likes. It always is.

Children shriek, not in fear but delight, trailing streamers and stolen pastries in sticky fingers. Merchants hawk metalworks, synth-thread clothes, and overpriced glowing fruit. Someone strums a street harp that sounds just off-key enough to be charming. All around them, the world is moving—rushing, breathing, living—and Vi feels like she’s vibrating against it, like a blade drawn but not swung.

She doesn’t let it show.

She never lets it show.

But it’s different today.

Because Mel is beside her, and everything sharp in Vi—everything coiled and defensive—has gone soft in the edges without her noticing.

Mel walks with her hands in her pockets, a pair of dark-lensed sunglasses balanced delicately across her nose, and Vi’s jacket swallowing her shoulders. It’s a size too large—meant for Vi’s broader frame—and the hem brushes her mid-thigh as she walks. But she wears it like a statement, like she knows exactly what it implies and doesn’t care who sees it. She’d asked to borrow it that morning with a casual, “It smells like you,” and Vi had just stood there like a stunned animal while Mel slid her arms into the sleeves.

It’s too much. It’s not enough. It’s everything.

They aren’t on official business. No cameras. No enforcers hovering in their periphery. No council members trailing with agendas folded in silk-lined pockets. Just the two of them, meandering through Piltover’s main square like they’re anyone. Like they could be anyone. A couple. Strangers. Two souls passing through the daylight.

Vi doesn’t know what to do with that.

She knows how to fight for someone. How to throw punches until her knuckles split and the world makes sense again. But this?

This is peace.

And peace feels like a trap sometimes.

Still, she walks close enough that their shoulders brush. Watches the way Mel smiles at a Zaunite vendor selling steamed mushroom dumplings, how she tilts her head at the bouquet of purple-red fire blooms spilling from a stand near the fountain. How she holds herself—casual, radiant, unbothered—as though she owns the entire horizon and doesn’t need to prove it.

Vi’s chest aches with it.

Then it happens.

It’s small. Barely a moment. The kind of thing no one else in the world would notice.

But to Vi, it’s everything.

Her fingers twitch at her side. She breathes in, slow and steady. Then—without overthinking, without letting herself talk herself out of it—she reaches out.

And takes Mel’s hand.

Not tightly. Not desperately. Just gently. Palm to palm. The kind of contact that could be mistaken for casual affection if anyone looked—but to Vi, it’s vulnerability made tangible. It’s a line she doesn’t cross lightly. Hasn’t crossed in years. Not since her childhood was torn apart by fire and betrayal and the kind of loss that brands itself into bone.

Mel doesn’t pull away.

That’s the part that undoes her.

Mel glances at her, lips parted slightly, surprise flickering behind her sunglasses. But her hand stays exactly where it is—wrapped in Vi’s, warm and alive and unshaking. She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t need to.

Because in that moment, the noise of the square fades.

Vi doesn’t hear the merchants. Doesn’t hear the harp. Doesn’t hear the distant clang of metalwork or the hum of sky trams overhead.

All she hears is the pulse between their joined hands.

She waits, without knowing she’s waiting. For the sky to fall. For someone to scream. For a bomb. For the world to remind her—again—that people like her don’t get this. Don’t get soft laughter and shared warmth and daylight without consequence.

But nothing happens.

No bullet. No betrayal.

Just Mel walking beside her in her oversized jacket, her hand still in Vi’s, as if she’s never known how to be anything else.

Vi’s heart beats so loudly she’s afraid it’ll give her away. She feels it in her throat, her ribs, her fingertips. She doesn’t look at Mel again. She can’t. Not yet. If she does, she might say something foolish. Might whisper the truth.

I think I could stay. I think I could stay with you. And that terrifies me more than anything else I’ve ever faced.

So instead, she walks.

Through the square. Through the noise. Through a world that—for once—doesn’t hurt.

And for the first time in years, she lets herself hope.

Hope that maybe, just maybe, this doesn’t end with fire and ruin. That love doesn’t have to be a battlefield every time. That maybe she’s allowed to want something beautiful and not watch it crumble in her hands.

The breeze kicks up, tugging at Mel’s coat.

Vi tightens her grip on her hand.

And the sky, gloriously, stubbornly—still—doesn’t fall.

The grand hall is a storm of light and expectation. Crystal prisms hang from brass rafters, fracturing the afternoon sun into glittering rainbows that dance over polished marble and silk-touched gowns. Piltover’s elite throng around sleek exhibits and streamlined prototypes—hover-drones, magrails, smart filters—each a testament to a future rooted in precision. And beneath it all pulses the fragile heartbeat of something more: hope.

Vi stands at Mel’s side, her jacket pressed and hair expertly styled. She’s all calm focus—shoulders set, amber gaze sweeping the room, every loose thread of doubt tucked away. Because today isn’t about ceremony. It’s about promise. About two cities that should never belong together, but somehow managed to learn how to build bridges.

Mel is speaking when it happens.

Her voice is measured. Warm. Inviting. She’s talking about the corridor—its capacities to lift both economies, to bring safety where there was once only smoke and shadows. And everyone listens. She commands the room without raising her hand. Without raising her voice.

Then.

Snap.

A sound like a cracked whip.

A high, clear whistle slicing through the applause like a blade.

Vi's head snaps in Mel’s direction. Eyes wide. Heart pounding.

There’s a flash—too fast for her own brain, a red glow that blooms cold and brilliant.

Mel's shoulder explodes in white-hot agony.

She doesn’t fall. Not hard. But she buckles. Her speech cuts off mid-sentence. Silk spills to the floor. Eyes glass. She staggers.

Vi’s restraint is gone.

She roars. There’s no grace. No strategy. Only instinct. Her fists are weapons, her body a battleground.

One attacker falls to his knees, clutching a shattered jaw. Another topples backward, jackhammered by broken elbow. Screams shatter the room as the crowd scatters—chairs and prototypes crashing under panic-stricken feet.

Through the chaos, Vi’s voice cuts over the noise.

“Mel!”

She doesn’t see faces. Just the bleeding one.

When the hall is quiet again, Mel is slumped over a collapsed display table. Her gown is stained—an ugly, spreading bloom that speaks of violence. She’s alive. Still breathing. Clenches her jaw like she’s never going to let go.

Vi stands over her. Eyes wild. Chest heaving. There’s blood on her gloves. On her knuckles. On her arm. But she doesn’t notice.

No. She only knows Mel is broken.

When they reach the infirmary, it’s too white. Too clean. Too early. Mel wakes to the scent of antiseptic. The muffled hum of medical wards. The distant scrape of a stretcher wheel.

She opens her eyes to find Vi at her bedside. Barefoot. Disheveled. Sweat-dark hair tangled around her face. Eyes red. Unblinking.

There’s a shard of glass—or metal—embedded in Vi’s forearm. A ragged edge. Blood dried around it. No bandage. No apology.

“You can’t leave me,” Vi says, voice torn, raw. Her hands are trembling. She reaches for Mel’s hand and fumbles, desperation cracking through every word. “You don’t get to—you don’t—”

Mel touches her face. Fingers gentle enough to cause fire. Fingers that promise nothing but still burn with something. Home, maybe.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Mel whispers. “Not now. Not ever.”

Vi crumbles.

She buries her face in the bedclothes, shoulders rattling. She’s not crying out loud—yet—but the grief is alive in the sounds she doesn’t have to make. All the tears she can’t spare tonight pooling behind closed lids.

Mel doesn’t cry. But gods, she wants to.

She brushes her free hand across Vi’s damp hair. The motion is reverent, like she’s closing a wound with her touch instead of a scalpel.

Because she understands.

This was never about a bridge. Not really. Not when her blood is still wet on the floor of that hall. Not when Vi—burning, bleeding, unstoppable Vi—came for her with fists of vengeance in front of Piltover’s brightest.

This is love.

And it’s fiercer than any political victory. Sharper than any blade Vi ever clenched in her fist. Something elemental. Something they’ll both carry home.

In that stark white room, with the world patrolling outside their door, they lean into each other.

Vi’s tears finally break.

Mel doesn’t versify or plan. She doesn’t offer strategy or solace. She just holds Vi against her chest.

And in that unspoken moment, Mel knows.

If the world burns for this—their broken hope, their fragile promise—it will be worth it.

The chair was too small. It had always been too small. The frame creaked beneath Vi’s weight, groaned every time she shifted. Her legs were folded awkwardly, knees pulled up tight to her chest, shoulders hunched and tense. But she didn’t move. Not really. Not for hours.

The fluorescent light above the hospital bed flickered, casting uneven shadows across Mel’s resting form. Machines whispered in rhythms, soft beeps syncing with Mel’s breath, a pulse-line steady and infuriatingly delicate. The scent of antiseptic clung to everything—sharp, artificial, a poor replacement for the warmth that had bled out hours ago onto silk and stone.

Vi hadn’t spoken since they brought Mel in. Not to the nurse. Not to Viktor. Not even to Powder, who had hovered in the doorway for a while, then left with a look Vi couldn’t meet.

She just stayed. One giant hand wrapped around Mel’s, careful not to press too hard. The other curled into a fist beneath her thigh, tension coiled like a wire pulled too tight. Her gloves were gone, fingers raw and red from the explosion. One knuckle split open again when she’d punched the infirmary wall. They hadn’t bandaged it. She hadn’t let them.

She had nothing left to give. Except this.

She didn’t know when she’d drifted off. Somewhere between counting the seconds between beeps and mouthing Mel’s name under her breath like a prayer. Her head had slipped onto the edge of the mattress, curls tangled and damp against the sheet, lips still moving in sleep.

Mel woke slowly. The pain hit first—dull and thudding, like thunder trapped beneath skin. Her shoulder burned. Her back ached. But she breathed. And that was more than she’d been sure of earlier.

Her hand twitched. Reached blindly.

And then she saw her.

Vi, curled beside the bed like something half-feral, half-sacred. Massive. Quiet. Her long limbs folded in on themselves, spine bent, like the act of shrinking down made her less dangerous. Like she was trying not to take up space, even though Mel knew—knew—Vi could never be anything but monumental.

The woman who had taken down two armed attackers in seconds. Who had thrown herself between Mel and death. Who had bled without flinching and stood in front of her like a damn fortress.

And now she was sleeping beside her like a child. Whispering Mel’s name into the mattress. Over and over. A broken mantra in the quiet.

Something cracked open in Mel’s chest.

She reached out with trembling fingers and touched Vi’s bare arm, just above the elbow. Scarred. Bruised. Too warm. She traced a line up toward her shoulder, skin over muscle so familiar now it felt like home.

Vi jolted awake. Her body tensed first—coiled, on alert, fists half-clenched. Her eyes flew open, wild, unfocused. Then they landed on Mel.

And everything softened.

She sat up, too fast, eyes already glassing over. Her voice caught in her throat before she could form a word.

“Hey,” Mel said softly, lips dry. “I’m okay.”

Vi didn’t respond. She just stared. Like Mel might vanish if she blinked.

Then, with a breath that sounded like a sob, Vi climbed into the bed.

She moved slowly. Cautiously. As if her body, her size, her strength might break this moment. She settled behind Mel, careful of the IV, of the wires, of the bruises. She wrapped one long arm around her waist. The other slid beneath the pillow. And then she pulled her in—gently, protectively, her broad chest pressed against Mel’s back, thighs bracketing her hips.

Mel sighed into it. Her body relaxed for the first time in hours.

Vi tucked her face into the crook of her neck. Her breath was warm, uneven.

They didn’t speak.

The silence between them wasn’t cold or empty. It was weighty. Dense with everything unsaid. Every moment of terror. Every memory they hadn’t touched yet.

Then, quietly, Vi shifted. Her hand slid up, cradled Mel’s jaw. And she kissed her.

Not with the fire of panic or the desperation of a goodbye.

But with reverence.

Their lips met like they’d always been meant to. Not rushed. Not searching. Just true. Vi kissed her like she was trying to remember the shape of peace. And Mel kissed her back like it was the first breath after drowning.

When they pulled apart, their foreheads touched. Vi’s hand still on Mel’s face. Mel’s fingers tangled in Vi’s hair.

“You’re mine,” Vi whispered, voice hoarse, low.

Mel didn’t flinch. Didn’t pull away.

She smiled. Soft. Honest. The kind that broke walls.

“That’s all I ever wanted,” she whispered back.

And gods, they believed it.

They didn’t speak again for a long time. Just held each other, hearts syncing, breaths steadying. The machines continued their rhythm. The world outside kept spinning.

But in that bed, wrapped in arms too strong and too careful, Mel found something she’d never had.

And Vi—holding the most powerful woman in Piltover like she was fragile and divine—felt something settle in her bones for the first time in years.

Not rage.

Not fear.

Just this.

Just her.

The first time Mel walks into her own home and finds Vi there before her, it’s not remarkable in any visible way.

There’s no fanfare. No declaration. No sharp shift in the air. Just the sound of boots kicked haphazardly near the door—mud-streaked and heavy, one tilted on its side like Vi had been in a rush or simply didn’t care to line them up. There’s a half-finished cup of tea on the marble counter. Vi’s leather jacket slung over the back of a velvet chair like it belongs there, like it has belonged there, quietly, all along.

Mel exhales slowly. Sets her bag down.

And smiles.

It isn’t a grin or anything showy—just that quiet curl of her mouth, the kind that belongs to private moments. Moments that aren’t performances. Not politics. Not masks. Just truth.

Vi doesn’t greet her from the next room, but Mel hears her—soft, heavy footsteps across the carpet, the squeak of leather, the telltale clink of one of those ridiculous gauntlet braces Vi insists on polishing by hand when she’s tense. She hums when she works. A deep, low sound, barely a note—more vibration than melody.

Mel stands there a moment longer. Just listening.

It’s not a ceremony. There’s no contract. No whispered vows, no announcement to the council, no official record scratched into the city’s archives. But when she walks into the bedroom later and sees the drawer half open, she stops short.

Inside—neatly folded, messily stacked, unmistakably Vi—are five of her shirts.

One of them is a deep red tanktop with a tear at the hem. Another is a too-soft black tee that Mel had worn once during a rainstorm when Vi had peeled it off, muttering something about it being “hers now.” They all smell like worn leather and heat and smoke.

Her fingers graze the edge of the fabric. She doesn’t need to ask.

Vi has moved in.

Not fully. Not all at once. It’s a gradual sort of belonging. A becoming.

Mel still wakes up some mornings to an empty side of the bed, the sheets cold and folded back, a note left in Vi’s handwriting scrawled on a napkin or a receipt:

“Back soon. Knocked some enforcer teeth loose before breakfast. Will bring you real coffee. Yours. —V”

Vi never stays gone long.

She still keeps her room above The Last Drop. Still trains kids in the rust-bitten courtyards of Zaun, barefoot, shirt half-tucked, hands wrapped in bandages that tell stories better than words ever could. She’s still the woman who throws punches first and worries about bruised knuckles second. She’s still bigger than life—bigger than Mel, in every sense, from the breadth of her shoulders to the way she commands space without trying to.

But she’s here, too.

There are muddy boots by the foyer, and Mel does pretend to be annoyed. She sighs dramatically and lectures Vi about decorum and respect for imported rugs from Ionia, and Vi just grins and kisses the top of her head while whispering, “My bad, counselor,” like it’s a compliment, not an apology.

There’s a toothbrush beside hers in the carved porcelain holder. Blue. Bent slightly at the neck. Too large for the cup.

And the gauntlets—Vi’s real ones, the heavy reinforced pair with the hairline cracks from the Shimmer factory raid—they rest under the window ledge now. They’re not hung or displayed like weapons in a museum. They’re placed. Tucked just so. As if Vi knew Mel would want to glance up from her desk and see something that meant strength was within reach. Just in case.

Vi doesn't talk about what it means. Neither does Mel.

There are no conversations about permanence. No long, sighing admissions about love or domesticity or long-term futures drawn out in candlelight.

But at night, Vi presses up behind her, longer, broader, warmer than anyone Mel has ever allowed to touch her this way. She curls around Mel’s smaller form, one arm slung across her waist like a promise, and breathes against the back of her neck.

Sometimes she says nothing.

Sometimes, she says everything.

“I’m still here,” Vi whispers one morning, her voice rasping with sleep, forehead tucked into Mel’s shoulder.

And Mel believes it.

Because it’s not just about what they are. It’s about what they keep choosing to be.

In the council chambers, Vi still stands like a bodyguard—but Mel knows better. She watches the way Vi tilts just slightly to block the draft from the windows, the way she stares down anyone who raises their voice at Mel, the way she always walks two steps behind but never lets her out of sight.

Mel lights candles at night not because she needs them, but because Vi says the scent reminds her of home. And when Vi sleeps, she doesn’t dream of running anymore.

Mel hears it in the way her breath slows beside her.

She thinks of the names they’ve both been given.

Mel. Medarda. Councilor. Weapon. Pawn. Noxian. Politician.

Vi. Violet. Undercity rat. Rebel. Guard dog. Threat. Hero.

None of those names matter, not here.

Here, in the quiet, it’s just Mel and Vi. No titles. No walls. No choreography.

Just two women who have built something real in the aftermath of all they’ve lost.

Mel picks up a shirt from the drawer—Vi’s red tank—and pulls it over her head. It swallows her whole. Hangs off one shoulder. Smells like sweat and comfort and heat. She wraps her arms around herself.

Vi steps out of the bathroom with a towel around her neck, hair damp, smile crooked.

Mel turns.

“I’m keeping this,” she says.

Vi looks at the shirt. Looks at her.

“That one has blood on the hem.”

“I noticed.”

Vi steps forward, wraps her arms around Mel from behind, chin on her shoulder.

“You can have all of them,” she murmurs. “Every one.”

Mel leans into her without hesitation.

And thinks, quietly, this is enough.

Because sometimes the loudest declarations aren’t made with rings or ceremonies or political alliances.

Sometimes they’re made with boots by the door.

A drawer of shirts.

A shared toothbrush.

And the breath of the woman you love, slow and steady beside you in the dark.

It starts with silence.

The kind of silence that tastes like copper behind the teeth. The kind that falls over a room not because it’s empty, but because something terrible is approaching it—like the hush before a storm surge or the breath you hold right before a scream. Mel feels it long before she hears the knock. Long before the seal is cracked and the courier bows and leaves a letter on her desk with wax too familiar, red as old blood and pressed with the sigil she spent most of her life learning to fear.

Her mother’s sigil.

She doesn’t open it immediately. She stares at it for three long minutes, then picks up a knife and slices the wax clean in half with surgical precision.

The letter is short.

It always is.

One line:

“You’re due for a reckoning, Meliora. Don’t keep me waiting.”

Signed with a flourish—Ambessa’s name like a blade etched in ink. There is no postmark. No date. No explanation. Just inevitability, delivered in immaculate handwriting.

Mel’s spine locks straight. Her fingers curl into fists around the paper until it tears. Still, she says nothing. She burns it. Watches the ink turn to ash in her study’s hearth. Pretends—for a few hours—that she imagined it.

But she knows better.

So does Vi. She doesn’t say anything, but her hand finds Mel’s under the council table that afternoon and gives it a quiet squeeze. No questions. No pressure. Just presence. Warm and grounding.

Mel holds it too tightly.

The next day, the world tries to spin on. Diplomats gather at the conservatory hall—a gleaming affair of gilded archways and echoing marble, flowers too delicate for the climate and people too important to bother with reality. There are banners, glasses of pale wine, dry speeches about economic cooperation between sectors of Piltover and Noxus, promises made by men who don’t bleed.

Mel plays the game. She smiles. She charms. She weaves her way through the ballroom like a ghost in velvet, her dress deep green and slit high enough to imply danger, her earrings long enough to draw attention to the arch of her neck. She is every inch the vision of power she learned to become.

Until the room changes.

A presence. A chill.

And then she is there.

Ambessa Medarda doesn’t enter so much as she claims space. The doors part like they’ve missed her, and she strides through the crowd without hesitation, without apology, without invitation. She’s dressed in blood-red silk, layered like armor, adorned with rings and gold, and the kind of command that comes not from rank but from a willingness to kill everyone in the room if necessary.

People move out of her way like she’s the threat they’ve been waiting for.

Mel freezes.

She feels it, deep in her chest—like every organ has turned to stone. The room tilts. Her wineglass trembles in her grip. She forces herself to breathe. Forces herself not to show it.

Ambessa’s eyes find her.

And that smile—serrated and slow—blooms across her face like rot.

“Meliora,” she says, like she owns the word. “How quaint.”

Vi steps in.

She doesn’t say a word, doesn’t bare her teeth or curl her fists. She just moves, solid and unmoving, to stand beside Mel. Bigger. Broader. Red hair shadowed beneath the ballroom lights, stance loose but dangerous. Her presence radiates heat. Everyone notices. Ambessa most of all.

Mel holds her ground.

“What do you want?” she asks.

Ambessa smiles wider. “To offer you an escape from… mediocrity.”

Mel’s jaw ticks. “This is diplomacy.”

“This,” Ambessa says, gesturing at the room with open disdain, “is preening. You were bred for greater things.”

There it is. The hook. The inevitable scorn.

“I’m not interested in being bred for anything,” Mel says coldly.

Ambessa’s gaze flickers—just for a moment—to Vi. She assesses her like a weapon left in the rain. And then she turns her full weight of disdain onto her daughter.

“You gave up the court for an entanglement,” she says, enunciating the word like filth. “A gutter-born, violet-haired, glorified bodyguard.”

Vi doesn’t react. But Mel hears the breath shift beside her. She feels the way Vi’s body tenses, the slow draw of muscles going tight—not with shame, but with restraint. Like she’s trying not to hit something.

Mel opens her mouth to respond—but Ambessa keeps going.

“You’ve become soft. Dull. A disappointment I can no longer ignore.”

Mel takes one step forward.

So does Ambessa.

The crowd senses something now. A hush. The sharp edge of heat. The echo of legacy stretched too tight.

“I will make this simple,” Ambessa says, voice velvet-draped steel. “Come home. Reclaim your seat in the Noxian court. End this farce. Stop embarrassing the Medarda name.”

Mel’s vision tunnels. Her hands are cold, but her chest burns.

She doesn’t speak.

She moves.

She lunges.

But Vi is there before her.

Arms locked around her waist, pulling her back, lifting her with effortless strength—taller, stronger, unyielding. Mel thrashes once, teeth bared, breath loud in her own ears, but Vi holds fast, voice low and shaking against the shell of her ear.

“You’re not her,” Vi whispers. “You don’t owe her a damn thing.”

It breaks something. Or maybe it repairs it.

Ambessa doesn’t flinch.

“Look at you,” she says, lips curling. “Softened by attachment. Weakness in your blood, after all.”

And then Mel breathes.

One long, slow inhale.

She steadies.

Turns her face toward Ambessa and smiles—sharper than glass. Sharper than memory.

“And yet I’m still standing,” she says.

She reaches for Vi’s hand. Interlaces their fingers.

And walks away.

Every step echoes louder than the last. The ballroom watches in stunned silence, the kind that feels like prophecy.

Vi’s hand tightens in hers as they move through the archway. Her presence behind Mel is not shadow—it is shield. It is affirmation.

And for once, Mel doesn’t feel like she’s escaping her mother’s legacy.

She feels like she’s rewriting it.

The air still crackled with the scent of burnt oil and hexed ash.

It had started like a tremor, too small for anyone in Piltover to notice. A twitch in the foundation of civility. A blink too long from a security drone. A breath held too long at the mouth of a corridor. Vi had felt it in her chest—beneath the armor of control, beneath the twitch in her jaw that only came when her instincts screamed louder than reason.

And then it all went to hell.

They hadn’t gone for a dramatic entrance this time. No wild shimmer-fueled charge, no crude threats. This was colder. Smarter. There had been dignitaries present. Council members from Bandle City. A trade envoy from Navori. Mel, of course, center stage, in gold-trimmed ivory and eyes sharp as glass.

That’s when it happened.

Disguises. Movement from two perimeter guards—except they weren’t guards. The twitch in their shoulders was wrong. The stagger in their step was deliberate.

And then the smoke.

Vi didn’t hear it so much as she felt it—hexed gas canisters hissing from unseen vents. The kind that burn nerves first, clarity second. Someone screamed before they even knew what was happening.

But Vi was already moving.

Her gauntlets weren’t on. Didn’t matter. Her body remembered. Every inch of her was purpose, was violence. Her elbow caught one man across the throat as he lunged, and she didn’t stop to watch him drop. She was already pivoting, slamming her heel into the second attacker’s kneecap hard enough to hear it crack.

People scattered. Chaos bloomed like blood in water.

And somewhere in that storm—Mel.

Vi’s voice tore from her throat before she even saw her.

“Mel!”

She vaulted a broken rail, shouldered past a crowd. Someone—Vi couldn’t tell who—threw a hex-dart toward the skybridge’s upper arch. She saw the blue glint of it, the hiss of ionized air.

Vi sprinted. Vaulted.

She caught it mid-air.

Let it bury into her shoulder instead.

The pain was a slow-blooming flower, black and electric.

Didn’t matter.

She found Mel near the fractured glass doors, crouched low, arm shielding her head, soot smudged against her cheek, blood at her temple but conscious. Alive.

Vi dropped to her knees beside her, hands trembling but careful. “You okay?”

Mel nodded once. “Go.”

Vi did.

The last attacker had already started climbing—scaling down the outer edge of the skybridge, fingers clawing at anchor bolts, boots scraping steel. No mask. Scarred face. Young. Younger than Vi had expected. Maybe barely out of adolescence. Maybe desperate.

Didn’t matter.

Vi grabbed the edge of the rail with one hand and reached down with the other—latched onto his jacket collar and yanked. He came up gasping, kicking, screaming. She dragged him over the lip like he weighed nothing.

She slammed him to the ground, one knee to his chest.

The bridge shuddered under the force of it. Her knuckles were raw. Her shoulder screamed from the dart.

She didn’t care.

“Give me one reason,” she said, voice shaking with fury, “not to drop you.”

The boy didn’t cry. Didn’t plead.

He smiled. Crooked. Cruel.

“She’s not worth this.”

Vi’s fist snapped forward like a gunshot. The crack of his jaw breaking echoed across the span.

He didn’t even have time to scream as she let go.

He hit steel five levels below. Hard.

Vi didn’t flinch.

She didn’t breathe.

Her hands were shaking, but her expression didn’t change. She felt cold and too alive all at once—like something unspooled inside her, like some tether she didn’t know she’d been clinging to had finally snapped.

And then she turned.

The smoke had thinned. The screams had quieted. The air was thick with ash and ozone.

Mel stood at the edge of the chaos.

Watching her.

Her hair was mussed. There was blood at her hairline. Her dress was torn along one shoulder. But her eyes—gods, her eyes—held no fear.

Just something quieter.

Heavier.

Vi’s throat felt tight. Her fists slowly uncurled at her sides, knuckles skinned and raw.

She wanted to say something. Anything.

I’m sorry.

I didn’t mean to kill him.

I had to.

I couldn’t lose you.

I can’t.

But no words came.

Mel moved first.

She walked through the debris, past broken glass and stunned officials. Past the councilman who looked like he might faint. Past the remains of diplomacy shattered beneath Vi’s rage.

She didn’t speak either.

She just reached out.

And took Vi’s hand.

No fanfare. No theatrics.

Fingers sliding over battered knuckles. Fitting perfectly.

Vi stared at the place where their hands joined.

She didn’t deserve this touch. Not after what she’d just done. Not after the monster she’d let loose.

But Mel held on.

And slowly, Vi held back.

She didn’t know what this meant. Not really. Not yet.

But she knew what it felt like.

It felt like grounding.

It felt like mercy.

It felt like being seen—not despite the worst parts of her, but through them.

They didn’t speak.

But they didn’t need to.

Because as the sirens wailed in the distance and smoke curled around the edge of the bridge like ghostlight, Vi looked down at the woman beside her—the only one she’d kill and die for—and knew the truth:

Whatever this was, however it ended—

She would not survive losing her.

And she didn’t want to.

The rain starts soft—thin needles tapping glass and steel, whispering down the spine of the city like the breath of a ghost. But it doesn’t stay soft for long. Within minutes, it turns heavy. Loud. A wall of water collapsing over the rooftops of Piltover, washing everything sharp and golden into muted bruises.

It’s fitting.

Vi’s boots leave muddy prints on Mel’s polished floor. She doesn’t care. She’s already soaked—hair plastered to her scalp in wild, crimson streaks, the undercut shivering against the cold. Her jacket’s heavy with water, sticking to her back like another layer of skin she wishes she could shed.

Across the room, Mel is the picture of composed fury. But Vi knows better. She knows the difference between rage and fear, and this? This is fear. It’s in the way Mel stands too straight, too still. Like any movement might break her composure apart entirely.

Neither of them speak at first.

Not because they don’t have things to say—gods, there’s too much—but because every word feels like it’ll draw blood.

Vi’s fists are clenched at her sides. Her knuckles, still raw from the fight, are splitting again. The gauze has come loose. Her gauntlets are gone. She came here like this. Bare. Uneasy. Drenched.

Mel turns. Finally.

Her eyes are lightning under the chandelier’s flicker. And her voice? Her voice is sharp enough to cut.

“You executed him.”

It isn’t a question. It’s not even an accusation. It’s a truth, cold and precise, laid bare between them like a blade on a table.

Vi doesn’t flinch. She should. She wants to. But she doesn’t.

“He threatened you,” she replies, voice low. Too low.

“That’s not the point.”

“The hell it isn’t.” Vi’s voice cracks on the edges of something that’s not anger—but is burning close to it. “He looked at you like you were a target. Like you were nothing. I wasn’t gonna let that stand.”

Mel steps forward, slow and deliberate. Her robe sways like a curtain of armor, cinched tight at her waist, rain still glistening on her collarbone where she didn’t finish drying off. Her hair, loose, frames her face like it’s trying to soften her fury—but nothing could soften what’s building in her now.

“I’m not fragile,” she says. Sharp. Each syllable clean.

“I know that!” Vi snaps back, almost too fast. Her voice ricochets off the high walls, too big for the space. Her chest heaves once—twice—and then she falls silent again. Like she’s afraid of what else might come out if she keeps going.

Mel exhales like something breaks in her chest. “Do you?”

The silence that follows is worse than any scream.

And then, softer. Raw.

“You treat me like I’ll shatter if you let me protect you back.”

Vi’s head jerks up. Her brows pull tight like she’s been hit somewhere old—some place that still aches from childhood.

And it’s not anger she answers with. Not pride. Not that violent deflection she’s so good at wielding.

It’s truth.

“Because if something happens to you,” she says, and her voice is barely more than a whisper, “I don’t know who I’ll become.”

She doesn’t mean it as an excuse. And Mel doesn’t hear it as one. That’s the worst part.

Mel’s shoulders slope. Her fingers curl against her palm. The wall she’s held all her life—that practiced poise, that Medarda mask—cracks at the corners. Rain patters against the windows like time refusing to stop.

“I don’t want to lose myself in you,” she says.

And it’s the softest thing she’s ever said.

And the cruelest.

Vi goes still.

She doesn’t yell. Doesn’t cry. She doesn’t argue the way she used to when she was younger, more reckless, more alive with that need to be heard, to be seen.

She just nods.

Once.

Like a soldier accepting orders. Like someone carving a name off their ribs with a scalpel.

Then she turns.

The door groans open under her hand. The hallway beyond is dark, empty. She steps into it like the end of something.

Mel doesn’t call after her.

And Vi doesn’t look back.

Because if she does—if she sees Mel standing there, blinking hard and biting her lip like it hurts not to run after her—she’ll fall apart.

She’s already cracked down the middle. She can’t afford to shatter.

So she walks.

Down the stairs. Into the street. Letting the rain hide the shake in her hands. The hitch in her breath.

The world outside is drenched and quiet and still spinning like it doesn’t care what just happened in that penthouse of gold and ghosts.

And Vi?

Vi walks back into the night with her head high and her soul dragging behind her like a weapon she doesn’t know how to put down.

Because for all the fights she’s won, for all the bones she’s broken—

She doesn’t know how to survive the war she just lost.

The rain doesn’t stop.

It slams against the metal walkways of Piltover like an accusation, pours down the jagged cliffs toward Zaun in sheets that feel more like judgment than weather. Vi doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t blink. She walks straight into it, head bare, shoulders squared, boots slick against the rusted stairs that lead back down into the Undercity’s veins.

It’s a long walk. Cold. Loud. The kind of downpour that drowns thought and memory and voice. But she doesn't seem to notice. Not the thunder. Not the chill sinking into her soaked shirt. Not the way her knuckles still sting from where they split earlier. She’s not here. Not really. Her body is moving, one boot in front of the other, but the rest of her? Gone.

Eyes blank. Mouth set. The ghost of the woman who had once kissed Mel Medarda with her whole chest and meant it.

She doesn’t acknowledge the vendor who calls out to her, doesn’t nod at the crew fixing a busted pipe, doesn’t look toward the upper catwalks where laughter spills down from kids sheltering under canvas tarps. She’s a shadow moving through a world that no longer fits. A blade with no sheath. A storm walking beneath a storm.

A tiny cough breaks her trance.

A kid—barely nine, maybe ten, skinny arms wrapped around an even skinnier chest—sits huddled against the side of a wall, knees up, trying to tie a piece of cloth around a bloodied elbow. It’s a poor knot. It’ll slip within the hour.

Vi stops. No words. No breath. No shift in expression.

She crouches. Reaches into her coat pocket.

Pulls out a clean, rolled bandage—standard Drop first-aid issue, always kept with her, even when she was halfway playing diplomat.

She doesn’t say a word.

Just sets it in the kid’s lap. Stands. Walks on.

No thanks are offered. None are needed.

She turns a corner and sees it—sees a sliver of movement that might have gone unnoticed by anyone else. A man, tall, wired on something, creeping down toward another child rifling through a trash heap. Knife half-hidden in a sleeve. Intent written in the curve of his spine.

Vi doesn’t stop walking. Doesn’t change her pace.

But her eyes—gods, her eyes.

They find him.

And when he sees her—soaked to the bone, jaw tight, expression like death made flesh—he freezes. His hand twitches near the blade. Stops. Slowly, slowly, he backs away, eyes down, muttering something to the shadows.

Vi doesn’t break stride.

No one touches the kid.

She moves like smoke after fire. Hollow. Weightless. Dangerous.

And then—The Last Drop.

Its neon sign flickers like it always has. Familiar. Ugly. Home.

She steps inside.

The warmth hits her first. Then the scent—alcohol, damp wood, something frying in the back.

Powder’s voice cuts through, sharp and teasing before Vi’s even halfway to the bar.

“Damn, you’re soaked. She kick you out already? Or just needed air from all that political tension sex?”

Vi stops.

Just—stops.

Her jaw doesn’t clench. Her shoulders don’t shift. But her voice, when it comes, is quiet. Flat.

“Don’t.”

It’s not the bark of a warning. Not her usual snarl.

It’s soft. Cracked.

Pleading.

Powder freezes.

Eyes widen. A joke rising dies in her throat. She takes one look at Vi—her posture, her soaked clothes, her hollow stare—and doesn’t say another word.

She walks behind the bar. Grabs a glass. Pours brandy. No garnish. No flair.

Just sets it on the counter.

Vi doesn’t thank her.

Powder walks away. Quietly. No mutter. No breath.

Vi lifts the glass.

Takes the shot in one go.

Doesn’t wipe her mouth. Doesn’t breathe.

Then turns.

And leaves.

No look at the crowd. No glance at Powder. No nod to Claggor or Mylo in the corner, who had just started to stand before they stopped, sensing the air go cold.

The door closes behind her with a soft click.

Outside, the rain waits.

She walks back into it like she never left.

The doors to Mel’s estate slam open with the force of an accusation.

Powder doesn’t wait to be announced. Doesn’t care about decorum or timing or the wide-eyed servant stammering behind her. Her boots track wet grime across the pristine marble floor as she storms through like lightning wrapped in rage.

Mel looks up from her desk, halfway through sealing a letter she will never send.

Powder’s eyes burn. Wild and sharp. Her goggles are pushed up into her tangled blue hair, and her jaw is set like a detonator just waiting for someone to flinch wrong.

Mel rises slowly. “Powder—”

“She’s gone.”

The words hit like a slap. No introduction. No warning. No room for deflection.

Mel’s hands still. “I know.”

“No, you don’t,” Powder snaps. Her voice cracks at the edges, brittle with fury and something deeper beneath. “You don’t know what she looked like. How she walked. Like she was breaking from the inside out but too proud to let anyone see it.”

Mel tries to breathe, but her chest is tight.

“She didn’t speak,” Powder continues, stepping closer, each word sharp as a blade. “Didn’t look at anyone. Not even me. Not until I made a joke—and then she said ‘Don’t’ like it killed her to say it. She begged me to shut up, Mel.”

Mel closes her eyes, but the image is already there. Vi’s voice, low and raw, wrapped around a single word like it hurt just to breathe it.

“She finished her drink in one swallow,” Powder says. “Didn’t blink. Just walked out.”

Silence crackles between them.

Powder exhales, unsteady. Her fingers tremble as she peels her gloves off, tossing them on the floor. “Do you know how hard it is to get her to talk about anything? And now she’s quiet in the worst way. Like you took the one good thing she thought she didn’t deserve and proved her right.”

Mel’s voice is barely audible. “She killed someone.”

“She always kills someone.” Powder spits the words like acid. “That’s what she’s for. That’s what we made her. And yeah, she’s not gentle. But she loves. And that’s rarer than anything in this city.”

Mel feels something collapse in her chest—soft, slow, complete.

“I never meant to hurt her.”

“Well, congratulations,” Powder says, turning. “You did anyway.”

She walks to the settee and drops onto it like she owns the room. Crosses her arms, legs swinging slightly, scowl carved into every muscle in her face.

“You think she’s coming back?” Powder asks after a long moment, voice quieter now. Too quiet.

Mel doesn’t answer.

“She won’t,” Powder continues. “Not unless you make her.”

Mel turns from the desk, hands trembling as she grips the edge. “It’s not that simple.”

“She’s not like us,” Powder says. “Vi waits. She’s been waiting her whole life for someone to not walk away.”

Mel’s throat closes. Her fingertips dig into the wood, whitening at the knuckles. Her whole body feels like it’s made of glass, pressure fracturing through invisible seams.

“If you let her think she’s too dangerous for you—if you make her feel like you’re scared of what you could be together—she’ll stay gone.”

Powder stands. Her shoulders square like she’s preparing for the kind of war only sisters understand.

“And if she stays gone, I’m gone too.”

Mel chokes on a breath that tastes like guilt.

“She’s at the orphanage, isn’t she?” she whispers, not even sure why she knows it, just that she does.

Powder doesn’t answer.

Just nods once.

The silence after Powder leaves is suffocating.

Mel stands in the center of her estate, surrounded by high ceilings and cold marble and the faint scent of lavender that never really reaches her. She’s dressed too well for this kind of grief—draped in silk that doesn’t wrinkle even when her hands curl into fists at her sides. Her pulse echoes in her throat like a drumbeat meant for war, but there’s no one to fight but herself.

She hasn’t cried yet.

Not when Vi walked away. Not when the door shut so softly behind her that it felt like an afterthought. Not even when the world kept moving—as if something seismic hadn’t cracked open inside her chest.

But Powder’s voice lingers. Not cruel. Not manipulative. Just—true. Raw, bare, unflinching in the way only someone who’s survived can be. The words loop over and over.

She’s been waiting her whole life for someone to not walk away.

Mel turns toward the window, her reflection fractured by rain sliding down the glass. For a moment, she doesn’t see herself—not the politician, not the artist, not the councilwoman with ink-stained fingers and a smile honed into a weapon.

She sees the girl she was. The one left behind by a mother who carved victory from bone. The one taught that love was a weakness, that needing made you soft, that softness got you killed.

But Vi—

Vi was never soft. She was steel wrapped in scars and laughter and fury. She was strength made visible. And somehow, against every rule Mel ever learned, Vi had chosen her. Not because Mel was powerful. Not because she was beautiful or poised or impressive. But because something in Mel’s broken edges had called to her.

And now, because of her fear, she’d broken them both.

Mel turns from the window. Crosses to the hall in quick, angry strides. Each step louder than the last, boots echoing off marble like gunshots. She moves like she’s going to war—but not against Vi. Not this time.

She doesn’t call a transport. Doesn’t summon a guard. She wraps herself in a deep navy cloak—plain, clean-lined—and pulls her hair back in a knot so tight it aches. The guards at the gate blink as she walks past them. One of them tries to follow.

She turns, just once.

“Don’t.”

They don’t.

The descent into Zaun is like falling into memory—color bleeding from gold to rust, from polished glass to cracked steel, from practiced diplomacy to something harder. Truer.

Mel’s shoes are soaked within minutes. She doesn’t stop.

She doesn't know how Powder knew, but she believes it. Of course Vi would go there. Of course she’d return to the place that made her. To the children she protected before anyone ever taught her how to love.

Mel’s lungs burn by the time she reaches the orphanage.

The rain hasn’t stopped. It doesn’t fall hard, just constant—soft, heavy, like the city itself is mourning. Her shoes are soaked through. Her coat clings to her shoulders, threads of silk and water mixing down her spine. But she doesn’t stop. Doesn’t slow. The climb through Zaun’s winding alleys and rusted scaffoldings has stripped her of every last thread of ceremony. She’s just a woman now, out of breath and out of excuses.

It’s quieter than she expected when she pushes through the front gate. Just the hum of old generators. The muffled shuffle of children behind thick doors. A low laugh from somewhere deeper in the building, quickly silenced. There’s warmth here, somehow, even in the gray—steam curling from vents, the faint tang of broth in the air. But it doesn’t reach her. Not yet.

Then she sees her.

Vi is sitting on the front steps. No armor. No jacket. Just a threadbare, dark shirt soaked straight through. Her arms are bare, scarred, muscles pulled taut like coiled steel. The rain streaks through her hair—spiky, crimson, storm-damp. She’s hunched forward, elbows on her knees, massive frame curled down into something that looks like grief.

And beside her, nestled under one heavy arm, is a child. Small, thin. Curled like a kitten into Vi’s side, sleeping against the muscle of her bicep, hand tangled in the loose threads of her sleeve.

Vi doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Barely even breathes.

She looks like a statue built out of sorrow. Carved from war. Stillness coiled around something infinite. The kind of strength that doesn’t shatter—it just sinks. Quiet. Heavy. Terrible in its beauty.

Mel hesitates.

She feels it in her bones—the sacredness of the moment. Like stepping into a temple with blood still drying on the altar. The weight of it makes her chest ache. Her pulse stutters behind her ribs, uneven and too loud in her ears.

And still—she walks forward.

Slowly. Gently. Like approaching something sacred. Or dangerous. Or both.

Vi doesn’t look up. But her body shifts, almost imperceptibly, like she can feel Mel’s presence in the air before her steps ever land.

Mel lowers herself down beside her. Close enough that their arms brush. She doesn’t reach for her. Doesn’t speak. Just sits. The rain falls around them like ash.

The child stirs slightly, murmurs something too soft to catch, then presses tighter into Vi’s side. Vi adjusts automatically—one big hand splaying against the child’s back. Protective. Fierce.

Mel looks down at that hand. The blood under the nails. The scraped knuckles. The gentleness of it.

And then, finally, she speaks.

“I was scared.”

The words are barely more than breath. But they’re real. Sharp with something she rarely allows herself to feel—regret.

Vi doesn’t answer. Her jaw is clenched. Her breath shallow.

“I didn’t know how to hold something like you,” Mel says. Her voice shakes. “You gave me something real, and I didn’t know what to do with it. I panicked.”

Silence. Just the sound of rain on old metal. Steam in the distance.

“I’ve spent so long building armor out of beauty and politics and power. I forgot what it meant to stay. To want someone and not let that mean weakness. I forgot that love isn’t a liability.”

Vi’s head stays low, but her breath stutters.

“I’m not asking you to forget,” Mel says. “But I am asking you to listen.”

At last, Vi speaks—hoarse and low, voice dragged from the bottom of something deep and breaking.

“You don’t owe me anything.”

“That’s the problem,” Mel whispers. “I do. I owe you everything I’ve been afraid to say.”

Vi turns, just slightly. Enough that Mel can see the shadows under her eyes, the tight line of her mouth. Rain slicks across her face like tears she refuses to let fall.

“I’m not safe,” Vi says. “Not for you. Not for anyone. I don’t know how to love in halves. I don’t know how to be easy.”

Mel swallows, then reaches out.

Her fingers close over Vi’s hand—larger, scarred, trembling faintly.

“You don’t need to be easy,” she says. “You just need to be you.”

Vi’s throat moves like she’s trying to speak and can’t.

“I don’t want perfect,” Mel continues, voice cracking open like a shell. “I want you. All of you. The danger. The fire. The ache. I want the version of you that sat in the rain with a child tucked under her arm like a shield. I want the version that thought she was too much and stayed anyway.”

Vi finally looks at her.

And it’s agony. And it’s hope.

And it’s everything.

“You should be scared of me,” Vi says. Barely audible.

“I’m not,” Mel answers, without hesitation.

And then—Vi breaks.

Not loudly. Not in any way that would show. But her shoulders tremble. Her mouth parts like she’s trying to breathe through grief. The hand not holding the child clenches into the fabric of her shirt like she’s holding herself together by a thread.

Mel cups her face. Gently. Firmly.

“Look at me.”

Vi does.

Mel leans forward, slow as a sunrise, and kisses her.

It’s not hungry. Not desperate. It’s steady. Anchored. Soft where everything else in the world has been hard. Fierce only in the way it refuses to be anything but true.

When they part, Vi doesn’t speak.

She doesn’t have to.

She just leans her forehead to Mel’s, breathing her in like the air might run out.

Mel’s hands stay on either side of her face, thumbs brushing the wet skin beneath her eyes.

“Please stay,” she whispers.

And Vi—who has been running, hiding, hurting for so long—finally nods.

Slow.

Barely there.

But real.

The child shifts again, mumbling into Vi’s shoulder. Mel pulls back just enough to watch Vi’s arm curl more tightly around the small body beside her. Her hand finds Mel’s again.

And for the first time in weeks, in months, Mel doesn’t feel like she’s chasing something that’s already gone.

She feels it instead.

The stillness.

The choice.

The beginning.

The orphanage is still, wrapped in the kind of silence that only follows after a storm. Not the kind of storm that rips buildings apart, but the one that breaks hearts quietly—where the real damage is invisible, humming beneath the skin. Rain has stopped tapping against the roof. The wind has settled into a soft, mournful whistle, threading through cracks in the windows and old boards. Dust dances in long shafts of afternoon light, swirling like forgotten memories caught midair.

Vi hasn’t moved in hours.

She’s curled at the base of the crumbling stairwell, knees pulled to her chest, arms locked around them like a shield. Her shirt clings to her skin, soaked through and streaked with dirt from the street and from where she’d knelt in the rain. The strands of her crimson hair hang in wet angles across her eyes. Her boots are caked with mud, heavy and silent, and she hasn’t even tried to take them off. Her gauntlets are back at The Last Drop. She feels half-naked without them. Half-finished. But she didn’t want to carry the weight today.

She hasn’t spoken a word since Mel found her here.

Not even when their eyes met, not when Mel sat beside her and waited, quiet and patient, soaked in the same rain. Not when she whispered apologies, or touched her hand, or breathed out the truth between them like it might anchor them both.

Vi had just looked at her.

And Mel didn’t ask for more.

Now the light has shifted again, pulling gold and gray together like bruises across the orphanage floor. The air smells of old iron, rotting wood, and faint traces of steam from the pipes below. A child’s laugh rings out somewhere deep in the hallways—brief, bright—and then vanishes as quickly as it came.

Mel stands.

She brushes the dirt from her coat and moves to Vi, her steps soft. She doesn’t speak, doesn’t make a sound that would break the stillness around them. She just extends a hand.

Vi doesn’t take it at first.

She looks at it. Just stares. Like the idea of being offered something so simple—comfort, choice, care—shouldn’t be real.

But then, slowly, her fingers uncurl from her knees. And she reaches out.

Their palms meet.

Vi’s hand dwarfs Mel’s. Bigger. Rougher. Calloused. A weapon in its own right, stained from years of survival. But when it closes around Mel’s, it’s not violent. It’s trembling.

They walk home in silence.

Through back alleys and wind-wet staircases. Up rusted lifts and across bridges where puddles catch the fading light like glass. Neither says anything. The air between them is thick with unsaid things, but none of them are sharp. None of them are cruel. It’s the silence of being known. Of being allowed to exist beside someone without performance.

When they reach the estate, the warmth is jarring. The marble floors gleam. The sconces glow. A fire flickers in the hearth, too soft to matter, too quiet to fill the space that stretches between them.

They change clothes in different rooms. Neither rushes.

When Vi steps out of the guest room, she’s in a black cotton shirt and soft pants—clothes clearly chosen for her, not by her. The sleeves are too short for her arms, stretched over muscle, and her bare feet look out of place against the polished stone floor.

Mel is already in the sitting room, tea poured, untouched.

They don’t drink it.

They sit across from each other, the low table between them acting as a flimsy barrier. Vi stares down into her lap. Her hands are clenched, white-knuckled, the muscles in her forearms twitching like she’s bracing for a fight she doesn’t want to win.

Then she stands.

She walks to the bedroom without a word. Sits at the edge of the bed.

And breaks.

It starts with her shoulders.

A single tremble. Then another. Her back curls forward, her head bowing as if the air has gotten too heavy to carry. Her hands dig into her thighs, like she’s trying to rip something out from under her skin. A choked sound slips from her throat—one she swallows immediately.

Mel appears in the doorway. She doesn’t speak at first. Just watches. Sees the way Vi is holding herself like the world might fall apart if she doesn’t. Sees the pain in her spine, in her hands, in the way her legs tremble beneath her stillness.

“Vi,” she says, softly.

That’s all it takes.

Vi gasps.

Then collapses forward like the string holding her up has been cut.

Mel is there in an instant. On her knees in front of her. Arms catching her before she falls too far. And Vi buries her face in Mel’s lap—not as a warrior, not as a protector, not as the girl who once ruled the streets with fists and fury—but as something much more fragile. As someone who’s never been held like this. Not when it hurt. Not when it mattered.

Her sobs are loud. Ugly. Wracking.

Her fingers clutch at Mel’s robe like a child gripping the edge of a cliff.

“I’m so tired,” she gasps. “I’m so godsdamned tired.”

Mel strokes her back. Presses her lips to damp hair. Wraps both arms around her without hesitation.

“I can’t… I don’t want to be strong today. Not for Zaun. Not for Powder. Not for you.”

Mel’s voice is the only steady thing in the room.

“Then don’t,” she whispers. “Let me carry you. Just for tonight.”

Vi sobs harder.

Every inhale is a wound. Every exhale a surrender.

She doesn’t apologize. She doesn’t explain. She doesn’t pretend.

She just cries.

And Mel holds her.

Not like she’s afraid she’ll break. But like she’s worth holding.

She’s still too big to fit neatly in someone’s arms.

But tonight—just tonight—she lets herself try.

The bedroom is silent in a way that feels earned—not from the emptiness of sound, but from the softness that follows after breaking.

The fire has dwindled to embers. The candles have burned down to their last flickers. The only light left in the room filters through the sheer curtains—ghost-pale moonlight that touches the corners of the ceiling and traces across the edge of the bed like a blessing neither of them believe in, but can’t quite shake.

Mel says nothing as she walks back into the room, sleeves of her oversized sleep shirt brushing her knuckles. It’s Vi’s shirt. Not tailored, not silk, not something chosen from a diplomatic wardrobe. It smells like oil, ash, and something she can only describe as sunlight caught in sweat. It drapes off her like it was never meant to be worn by her, and yet… it fits more honestly than anything else she owns.

Vi’s already lying in bed, facing the wall. She changed into one of her own shirts—washed cotton, color faded from wear. It stretches slightly at the shoulders, rides high at her hips, a threadbare thing softened by time. Her body is coiled inward, not in defense, but in exhaustion. Her hair, choppy and crimson, is still damp from the rain, curling slightly where it meets the nape of her neck.

Mel pauses at the edge of the bed, heart caught somewhere between hesitation and need. But not the kind of need that claws or hungers. This is quieter. Raw. The need to be allowed in.

She climbs in slowly.

The mattress shifts beneath her weight, but Vi doesn’t flinch.

Mel curls in close. Carefully. Arms circling Vi’s waist, her chest pressed to Vi’s back. She presses her cheek between Vi’s shoulder blades, breathes her in—salt, rain, steel. A scent as wild and grounding as the woman herself.

She expects Vi to stay still. To maybe allow the touch, tolerate the closeness, but remain locked in her own gravity.

But Vi shifts.

Without a word, without a sound, she turns. Her larger body rolls slowly in the moonlight until they’re facing one another, knees brushing, foreheads almost close enough to touch.

Her hand rises. Trembles. Then reaches for Mel like she’s not sure she’s allowed to want what she’s asking for.

Mel doesn’t move.

Vi’s fingertips brush her cheek. Then slide down. And when she finally, gently presses her face into the hollow of Mel’s neck—when her arms curl around her, one beneath Mel’s shoulder, one across her back—it’s not lust. It’s not defense. It’s a declaration. One made in silence.

I want to be held. I want to be known. I want to be safe.

Mel holds her back. Tighter. Warmer. Her hand presses to Vi’s spine and stays there, anchoring them both.

They don’t speak.

There’s nothing left to say. Everything that matters is pressed into the way their bodies fold into each other. Vi’s legs tangle with Mel’s instinctively, her thigh slipping between both of Mel’s as though this is the only place she’s ever belonged. She buries herself there. And Mel lets her.

Vi’s bigger. Stronger. But she’s melted now. A thunderstorm folded down to its knees.

Her breathing is shallow at first. Uneven. But gradually, with Mel’s fingers in her hair, with lips pressed gently against her temple, she finds the rhythm again. Each breath steadies. Each exhale sinks deeper.

They fall asleep like that.

Sculpted into each other.

No space. No armor. No distance.

Just Vi’s body wrapped around Mel’s like the world might end and she won’t let go even if it does.

The wind stirs the curtains. Somewhere outside, a train rumbles across the lower tracks of Piltover. Mel hears it distantly. Feels the faintest tremor in the floorboards beneath the bed. But none of it touches her.

Because Vi is here. And Vi is holding her like Mel is worth the ache of staying.

Later—deep in the quietest hour of night—Mel stirs.

Her eyes blink open slowly, lashes brushing against Vi’s throat. The room is dark, the fire long dead. The shadows no longer feel cold.

She shifts only slightly. And that’s when she feels it.

Vi is still holding her. Arms locked tight around her. One hand fisted lightly in the fabric at Mel’s back, like she anchored herself there in her sleep and didn’t dare let go. Her breath brushes against Mel’s collarbone in soft, steady waves. Her face is buried in the crook of Mel’s neck, hair damp, skin warm.

She’s taller like this. Heavier. Draped over Mel in a way that should be overwhelming, but isn’t. Vi’s weight is grounding, not oppressive. Like a shield thrown across Mel’s body by someone who has made a career out of being hurt first to protect someone else.

Mel blinks against the rush of heat in her eyes.

She lifts a hand. Brushes a lock of crimson hair from Vi’s brow. Her fingers tremble, but only a little.

Then she leans forward. Presses a kiss to the center of Vi’s forehead. Not ceremonial. Not rehearsed.

Just a promise.

A thank you.

A please stay.

Vi doesn’t wake.

But she sighs. Quietly. Deeply. And her grip tightens, just for a second, before softening again.

Mel closes her eyes. Breathes her in. Breathes herself out.

And this time—finally—she sleeps without fear.

The chamber is all gold edges and polished marble, made to echo authority, built to impress and intimidate. Every syllable spoken here carries weight. But today, silence does.

It starts when they walk in.

Not separately. Not with space between them like protocol prefers. Not with Vi trailing behind, playing the silent shadow with fists made of myth. No—Vi walks at Mel’s side, one step off only to let her take center without ever letting her fall from reach. And she doesn’t wear her gauntlets. Doesn’t hide the scars. Her shirt is crisp, sleeves rolled halfway up to reveal bruised forearms. Her stance is unmistakable. Protective. Present. Proud.

Mel is flawless as ever—sharp-shouldered blazer in obsidian velvet, her gold cuffs flashing when she lifts her hand to push a strand of hair back behind one ear. Her expression is unreadable, lips a thin line of authority. But when she glances sideways and Vi is already looking at her, something softens. Subtle. Dangerous.

The rustle of robes and murmurs ripple through the chamber like a tide no one dares stop. Councilors exchange glances. Some confused. Some annoyed. One or two—curiously afraid.

Vi clocks them all.

She takes her place behind Mel’s chair—not directly, not out of sight, but to the side. A sentinel who has stopped pretending she doesn’t have something to protect. Or love.

And the meeting begins.

It’s the usual chaos. Border disputes between mid-tier sectors. Sabotage reports from Zaunites trying to build community centers where factories used to rot. Piltover’s elite twisting themselves into knots over lost control.

Vi says nothing.

She doesn’t have to. Mel speaks for herself. Calm. Incisive. Her voice cutting through the air like a scalpel, not a sword.

But it’s there, beneath it all.

The glances.

The tight-lipped murmurs passed behind half-raised papers.

The way someone on the far right—a man in a navy cravat with a sunburst pin that screams old money—smirks when Mel defends Zaunite patrol independence. As if he’s already crafted the narrative: a powerful councilwoman compromised by a bruised knuckle bodyguard with blood on her hands.

And then it happens.

Midway through a tense exchange on funding cross-zone security infrastructure, the man with the sunburst pin speaks up. Slow. Deliberate.

“I do wonder, Councilwoman Medarda, whether your… affiliations are clouding your judgment. There’s a growing concern about professionalism. About appearances. We wouldn’t want rumors affecting public confidence in council integrity, would we?”

The words hang like a gauntlet on polished marble. Too careful to be called slander. Too pointed to be anything but.

The silence is instant. Sharp.

Vi’s hands move.

Not fists. Not fury.

She steps forward.

The weight of her boots on the marble is loud in the hush. She plants both hands on the council table. Her frame dominates the space—taller, broader, coiled with something unreadable but not uncertain. Her hair, short and wild in crimson disarray, glints in the sunlight. Her sleeves are rolled. Her veins are visible. Her body says warrior. Her silence says warning.

Every eye in the room shifts to her.

Vi looks at no one.

Not yet.

She turns her head. Slowly. Deliberately.

And looks at Mel.

And then—just like that—she leans in.

Kisses her.

Not the kind of kiss meant for manipulation. Not the kind delivered with hesitation, or apology, or spectacle.

It’s honest.

Mel rises partway, startled—but not in fear. Vi’s hand is already there, cupping the back of her neck with reverence. She bends just enough to meet her. Their lips meet in stillness, in certainty, in defiance and devotion and all the things neither of them ever dared speak aloud in this room before.

Mel’s hand lifts to Vi’s jaw. Gentle. And then they part.

A second. Maybe two.

Then Vi turns.

Her eyes sweep the room like a stormfront, daring thunder.

She looks at the man in the cravat. Dead on. Then to the others. Each one. Like she’s taking names she already knows.

“Say something,” Vi says.

It’s not loud.

But gods, it’s final.

The words drop into the air like a blade.

No one speaks.

Jayce coughs into his hand, clearly smothering a laugh. Viktor glances sideways at Mel, then Vi, then back again, a faint smile playing at his lips. A younger councilwoman from the southwest sector looks away with something suspiciously close to awe.

And the man with the sunburst pin? He clears his throat. Says nothing.

Vi straightens.

Steps back. Not to retreat—but to return. To her place beside Mel. Her shoulder half behind, half beside. Never beneath. Always within reach.

Mel’s hand brushes hers under the table.

The meeting continues.

But it’s changed.

Because the city may run on politics, but power?

Today, power kissed her in front of everyone and dared them to flinch.

The room is dim. Quiet. The kind of quiet that hums under the skin—not silence, not peace, but stillness trying hard to be both. The candlelight trembles in the corner, casting long shadows over Mel’s desk, over the velvet armchair where Vi had once dozed off with a half-buttoned shirt and her legs sprawled like she owned the world.

But Vi’s not here now.

She’s somewhere in the manor—maybe downstairs helping Powder calibrate the guest wing’s security systems, maybe showering off the sweat from training, maybe asleep. Or maybe—just maybe—standing outside the door right now, listening to Mel’s pen scratch across the page like it’s pulling her open.

Mel doesn’t check.

She doesn’t lift her head.

Because she can’t.

The sketchbook is old. Older than her seat on the council, older than her first assassination threat, older than the first speech she gave in gold-threaded robes with her mother watching like a hawk. She hadn’t meant to keep it. But it had stayed. Quiet. Patient. Waiting for something worth filling it.

Tonight, she sketches Vi.

Over and over.

There’s no armor to it. No political detachment. No attempt at academic lines or lifeless symmetry. It’s Vi in all the ways Mel shouldn’t have memorized. The tired droop of her lashes when sleep finally wins. The swell of muscle in her shoulder when she stretches. The crooked scar along her hipbone Mel had once kissed without asking. The clench of her jaw when she’s scared. The rawness in her mouth when she smiles like it’s new, like she hasn’t quite figured out she’s allowed to do it freely.

Mel sketches Vi’s hands. Six times. From every angle. Palms curled, fingers loose, knuckles scarred and tight. The violence they hold. The gentleness they betray. The way they tremble when Vi thinks no one’s watching.

And then she draws her spine.

Not anatomically, not with bone and nerve—but with memory.

Mel sketches the arch of Vi’s back the way it looked when she was laughing in the middle of the council garden after a bird shat on Jayce’s notes. The way she bent when she lifted a child off the street, one-armed and strong and whispering nonsense until the girl stopped crying. The way she stood when she faced Ambessa. Unmoving. Unyielding. Mel’s shield. Her blade. Her chaos.

Every line on the page is trembling.

She doesn’t try to stop her hand when it shakes.

There’s something wild in the sketchbook now. Not polished. Not curated. Something breathing. Something alive. Vi’s likeness, yes—but more than that. The way she feels to Mel when she walks into a room. Like thunder dressed in leather and mercy.

Mel’s eyes blur. Not with tears—at least not yet.

But her throat aches.

At the bottom of the page, in the space she never used before—too formal, too final—she carves it. Not with the fine-point pen she uses for calligraphy. But with the stylus meant for trimming ink edges, sharp and mean. She carves deep.

V.M. + M.M.

Not for show. Not for anyone else. Just letters. Just initials. But carved so deeply the page beneath tears a little at the edge.

Then, under that, she writes the sentence she hadn’t known she’d been holding back.

I will never survive losing her.

It’s not dramatic.

It’s true.

Not because Mel is weak. She’s survived war, exile, political erasure, and her mother. She’s survived ambition and disappointment and the relentless hunger of a life spent proving she belonged. She’s survived every lie she’s told herself about what power should look like.

But Vi?

Vi is the only thing that makes Mel feel like a person, not a construct.

Vi doesn’t want her throne. Doesn’t need her brilliance. She touches Mel like she’s real. Like she’s allowed to be flawed. Like she’s safe, even when she’s dangerous. Like she’s worth carrying, even when she doesn’t know how to ask.

And that’s the thing.

If Mel loses that—loses her—then she doesn’t know if anything else will mean enough to survive.

She closes the sketchbook.

Gently. Tenderly.

Like laying a body to rest.

Her fingers rest against the cover for a long time, tracing the worn spine, the faint smear of graphite still on the edge of her thumb. She doesn’t move. Doesn’t breathe too loud. Doesn’t blow out the candle.

The flame dances. Like it knows.

Like it’s keeping vigil.

And Mel stays there in the hush of her room, surrounded by velvet and ash and the image of a woman carved into paper and skin alike. Her warrior. Her ruin. Her home.

She stays. Because she has to.

Because tomorrow might ask her to be strong again.

But tonight, this is hers.

A book full of Vi.

And a truth that burns quietly beneath her fingertips.

The room is dim, cast in low violet light from an old shimmer lantern tucked behind a rusted pipe in the corner. It hums faintly, like it remembers brighter days. The walls are the same as they were years ago—scratched with old knife marks, dented from when Mylo threw a wrench too hard during a tantrum, streaked with soot from an incident Powder still swears was “totally on purpose.” It smells like oil and rust and old sweat. It smells like memory.

Vi lies on the mattress that used to be too small for her even before she filled out—legs dangling off the edge, arms folded beneath her head. Her hair, that bright, jagged undercut she never bothered to grow out again, is damp with sweat, stuck to the side of her face. She's wearing a loose tank top and sleep pants that don’t quite match, but they’re clean. Or clean enough for Zaun.

Across the room, in a gently swaying hammock that creaks with every movement, Powder is curled in a tight ball, one arm dangling off the side like a limp puppet, her goggles tucked beneath her chin. Her hair is longer now, messier—like the years never quite let her go, but she still woke up every day and fought them off.

Vi breathes slow.

For once, her fists aren’t clenched in her sleep.

She dreams—but not of fists and fire. Not of smoke-choked corridors or her mother’s blood or the dark wet sound a body makes when it lands wrong. Not of Silco. Not of the hard ache in her ribs from every hit she deserved and every one she didn’t.

She dreams of candlelight.

Of dark silk robes sliding off soft shoulders.

Of a voice that sounds like war and poetry and something just hers.

And somewhere, not loud—barely a breath—she whispers it.

“Mel…”

It’s not a moan. Not a plea. Not a sob.

It’s just a name. Honest. Whole. Cracked around the edges like everything Vi loves.

Across the room, Powder bolts upright in her hammock like she’s heard a gunshot. Her hair’s a wild tangle, and she blinks into the purple glow, wide-eyed and suspicious, like she’s about to accuse someone of theft.

“Did you just—” she starts, voice hoarse.

Vi groans into her pillow. “Go back to sleep.”

Powder grins. That damn grin. Mischief and fire and too many teeth. “You sound like a sad puppy in love.”

Vi flings a pillow at her. It flutters sideways through the air and hits the wall with the least threatening thump imaginable.

Powder doesn’t even flinch. “Awww, come on, just say it again. For posterity. For the memoir.”

“Don’t you dare tell anyone,” Vi mutters, burying her face deeper into the thin mattress.

“I’m already writing it down,” Powder sings, falling dramatically back into the hammock, limbs splaying like a puppet cut from strings.

“You’re the worst.”

“Mmhm.”

Silence stretches for a moment, soft and tentative, like a breath held between cracks.

Then Powder says, quieter, gentler, “She’s good for you, you know.”

Vi doesn’t answer.

Not with words.

But she shifts onto her side, presses her cheek against the roughness of the pillow, and lets her smile slip past the defenses she usually keeps nailed shut. It’s small. Soft. Half-broken. But it’s real.

And later, when Powder’s breath evens out and the shimmer lantern fades into a flickering hum, Vi whispers it again.

“Mel.”

Like a promise.

Like a wound she doesn’t want to stop bleeding.

Like a prayer, half-believed, half-begged, all hers.

She sleeps the rest of the night still wrapped in that name. Wrapped in her.

And for once, there are no ghosts waiting when she dreams. Only firelight. Only touch. Only the echo of a voice that dared to say, Please stay.

Vi does.

Even in her sleep, she stays.

Chapter Text

The scream came just after the laughter.

Mel heard it like a needle dragged through silk—abrupt, high, final. The kind of sound that stops time. She had been standing with one hand wrapped lightly around Vi’s arm, a warm breeze stirring the loose curls at her temples, watching Powder haggle with a fruit vendor in the crowded, humming sprawl of the mid-tier marketplace. There had been music. Laughter. A child's voice rising in delight as they chased after a handmade cart.

And then that scream.

And then Vi was gone.

Gone from Mel’s side, gone from the moment, vanished like she had been built for impact.

Because she had.

Vi didn't hesitate. She didn’t shout or give orders. She didn’t look back at Mel, or Powder, or the guards two steps behind. She saw the danger before it bloomed—before the flicker of smoke, the hiss of metal heating unnaturally. One glance at a child too close to a shadowed stall. A glint. A shape not right.

Vi moved.

She hurled herself across the square like a storm uncoiling, scooping the child into her arms mid-sprint. And then the explosion hit.

Heat. Shrapnel. Glass rained like knives from above. The cobblestones cracked beneath the pressure. Dust swallowed the square in a flash, turning vibrant color into ash and screams and chaos. Somewhere, someone wailed a name, and boots thudded over stone, but all Mel could hear was ringing.

Her ears buzzed like struck metal. Her limbs wouldn't move.

But her eyes—gods, her eyes were locked on the shape in the center of the blast.

Vi. Curled around the child. Bleeding.

Mel ran.

She didn’t remember starting. Didn’t remember her feet pounding through the haze or the way her skirts tore along her legs. Only that suddenly she was kneeling beside Vi, hands reaching out before her mind had caught up.

Vi was alive.

Eyes open, blinking through blood and dust, body a wall between the child and every shard of pain the explosion had thrown. She had taken it all. Shielded the girl with her own chest, her arms, her back. The child was crying, unharmed but terrified, and clinging to the strap of Vi’s shirt like it was the only thing anchoring her to the world.

Vi shifted, teeth bared, and that’s when Mel saw the blade.

A jagged splinter of reinforced plating—metal torn from one of the shattered carts—buried in Vi’s side. Deep. Wrong. Too close to the ribs.

Mel didn’t scream.

She didn’t panic.

She moved.

She took the child from Vi’s arms and handed her off to a trembling guard, barked orders she would never remember. Powder was shouting something in the background, Vander already sweeping the crowd back, but Mel’s world had narrowed down to one shape.

Vi.

Still trying to sit up. Still trying to act like she wasn’t half broken and bleeding out into the dirt of a square she’d just saved.

“No,” Mel snapped, voice like lightning. “No, you don’t move. You don’t say anything. You breathe and that’s it.”

Vi smirked—of course she did—but it was a pale thing. Tired. “Bossy,” she rasped.

“Shut up.”

They carried her back to the Medarda estate. Mel rode with her in the carriage, holding her upright, hands pressed hard to her side. Blood soaked her sleeves, and still Vi tried to smile. “Could’ve been worse,” she muttered.

Mel didn’t respond. Her jaw was locked. Her vision tunneled. Every second was a drumbeat of rage and terror and love.

Once inside, she sent everyone away. No argument. No second chances.

Powder tried to push back—tried to argue. “She’s my sister—”

“She’s mine too,” Mel snapped.

That shut even Powder up.

And then it was just them.

The bedroom was far too quiet. Vi sat hunched on the edge of the bed, face gray, sweat glistening on her neck. The blade had been removed by one of the healers, but Mel hadn’t trusted them to finish. Not this part. Not this close to the bone.

She stitched the wound herself.

Her hands shook the whole time. The needle trembled between her fingers. Every time Vi hissed or flinched, Mel flinched with her. But she didn’t stop.

Vi’s blood ran hot against her skin, thick and stubborn. It soaked into the cloths she pressed to the wound. Into her palms. Into her heart.

“I didn’t know you could sew,” Vi rasped, trying to be herself. Trying to be strong.

Mel didn’t look up. “Shut up or I’ll make it worse.”

But her voice—her voice cracked.

When she finished, she sat back on her heels and stared at the line of raw stitches. They weren’t perfect. They didn’t have to be.

Vi didn’t move.

Mel leaned forward, kissed her temple.

Not for show. Not for comfort. But because she needed to. Because the alternative was screaming.

Her lips rested there for a moment. On sweaty skin. On blood. On the pulse she hadn’t lost.

“I hate how much I need you,” she whispered.

Vi didn’t speak.

But she closed her eyes. Exhaled. And let her forehead fall against Mel’s collarbone like it was the only place left in the world that made sense.

And Mel held her.

Held every broken, furious, beautiful part of her.

Because Vi was built of fists and fury and love that didn’t know how to run. And Mel—Mel was built of politics and knives and the kind of fear that looked like control.

But they fought for each other now.

And some things were worth bleeding for.

The room is quiet in that strange, fragile way that only exists in the hours after midnight—where the city seems to hold its breath, where even the echoes of chaos have the decency to settle for a little while. Outside, the wind brushes the windows in slow, sweeping gusts, the occasional creak of the old estate bones shifting like a sigh. Rain has stopped, but the smell of it lingers—sharp and clean, clinging to the air and to the fabric of the drapes.

Vi wakes slowly.

It’s not the pain that wakes her—not anymore. That’s faded into something manageable, something dulled by exhaustion and the soft hum of warmth beside her. It’s the stillness. The unfamiliar comfort. The quiet ache of being alive and wanted and here.

She blinks once. Twice. Lets her eyes adjust to the dark.

The first thing she sees is Mel.

Not in bed. Not tucked away on the far side of the room like some polite noblewoman giving space to a body healing beside her. No—Mel is in the chair next to the bed, like a sentinel made of silk and stubbornness. Her legs are folded to one side, her robe half-untied, and her hair—gods, her hair—is down, falling like spilled ink over her shoulders.

Her head is tilted back, throat exposed. Her mouth is slightly parted, breaths soft, rhythmic. There’s a shadow beneath her eyes, a faint purple bloom like she hasn’t truly rested in days. One hand rests on Vi’s thigh, still, steady, fingers curved ever so slightly—like they’d refused to let go even in sleep.

Vi watches her.

Her own body aches. The stitches along her side throb with each heartbeat. Her muscles protest every breath. But none of that matters. None of it even registers in the same way that the sight of Mel does.

Mel, who once looked at her like a problem to solve. Like a variable in a strategy. Like someone dangerous.

Now she looks at her like this. Sleeps beside her like this. Wears her exhaustion in the open, wears Vi’s blood beneath her nails and Vi’s weight in her hands.

And Vi can’t breathe.

Because it hits her then—truly, wholly.

This is home.

Not The Last Drop. Not the cracked-tile gym. Not the old mattress stuffed into the wall corner of her childhood. Not the top bunk above Powder’s when they were small and scared and trying not to flinch every time the pipes groaned.

It’s not Zaun, though she loves it with every bitter inch of herself.

It’s not Piltover, though she would tear it down and rebuild it from ash if Mel asked her to.

It’s this.

Mel, asleep in a threadbare chair, one hand still anchoring Vi to the earth.

Vi swallows hard. Her throat is raw, her eyes stinging from more than just the pain.

She reaches out with slow, trembling fingers. Brushes a few strands of dark hair from Mel’s face. The motion is featherlight, reverent, like touching something sacred. Her fingertips linger for just a moment against Mel’s temple, then trail down, ghosting the curve of her cheekbone.

Mel doesn’t stir. Not yet.

Vi leans forward, just a little. Enough for her ribs to protest. Enough for the breath to catch in her throat. But she doesn’t stop.

She exhales, the words barely audible, breathed like a confession, like something she’s tried not to need.

“I’ve loved you since the first second I saw you.”

Her voice is hoarse. Cracked at the edges. But there’s nothing hesitant about it. No humor to blunt the blade, no casualness to hide behind. It’s the raw, pulsing truth of her.

And then, almost smiling, almost bitter, she adds:

“Idiot.”

Because she is. Because they both are. For trying to pretend for so long. For building entire walls between something that had never once been anything less than inevitable.

Vi settles back, moving with the slow, stiff care of someone still stitched together by pain and luck and the strength of someone else’s hands. She lets her head drop against the pillow again, closes her eyes, tries to slow her breathing.

But then she hears it.

Just a shift. A breath caught in a smile. The barely-there tug at the corner of Mel’s mouth.

Vi doesn’t move. Keeps her eyes shut. But the corner of her mouth curls up in answer, betraying her even as she tries to keep still.

Because Mel heard.

And that smile—soft, private, blooming even in sleep—means she understood.

Means she knew already.

Means she’s known for longer than either of them have said it out loud.

And that’s enough.

Vi lets herself drift, hand now curled over Mel’s where it still rests on her thigh. Their skin warm together. Their breaths syncing again without effort.

And for the first time in years—maybe the first time in her life—Vi feels the ache in her chest ease.

Not gone.

But shared.

And in the soft dark of Mel’s estate, in the quiet aftermath of pain and fire, Vi thinks—

Maybe she doesn’t need to run anymore.

Maybe this time, she can stay.

The gala gleamed like it was built to wound. Gilded lights refracted off mirrored pillars, glass chandeliers spilling golden rain down over a sea of silk and ambition. Every corner shimmered, polished to blinding precision, and every guest moved like a blade—measured, expensive, dangerous in ways that weren’t always obvious. The room buzzed with power, politics, perfume, and false laughter, the kind of night meant to dazzle while it dissected.

Mel moved through it with grace honed over years of being watched. She wore a black satin gown that clung like a second skin, slit high enough to whisper scandal, lined with wine-dark lace—lace that was not visible unless one was allowed behind closed doors. Her heels were tall, vicious. Her jewelry minimal but precise: gold like bloodlight, an obsidian chain that dipped low at her collarbone. Her posture was a dare wrapped in velvet.

And Vi…

Vi stood across the room like someone who had never been built for ballrooms, and yet was always meant to own one. She wore a suit cut to kill—deep black with that same dark red in the stitching, a choice Mel had whispered to the tailor with a hand against Vi’s back and her lips against her pulse. The collar open just enough. The gauntlets gone tonight—by request—but Mel swore the weight of them still haunted the curve of Vi’s shoulders. Her hair was tousled, deliberate, that half-shaved side brushing the light like copperfire every time she turned her head.

She looked like ruin dressed in restraint.

She looked like hers.

And Mel saw the moment Caitlyn noticed.

It started with a glance, too casual to be innocent. Then a smile. That polished, Piltover-trained smile, perfectly framed behind a flute of sparkling wine. Caitlyn moved with confidence—of course she did. Her navy dress was sleek, and she glided through the room like it bent around her. She crossed toward Vi, a little nod to Mel, the kind you give a stranger in passing, polite and meaningless.

Mel didn’t return it.

Vi saw her coming. Stood a little straighter. Smiled—but too wide, a little nervous. That telltale awkwardness she only wore when she didn’t know how to navigate something without breaking it.

“Hey,” Caitlyn said. Low. Easy. Familiar.

Mel watched Vi nod, say something that didn’t carry over the music. And then Caitlyn leaned in. Just enough. Close enough to let her fingertips trail up Vi’s forearm in a slow, knowing touch. Her laugh was low, private. Her mouth tilted too close to Vi’s ear.

Vi’s reaction was immediate—shoulders stiffening, eyes darting—but she didn’t pull away. She didn’t step into it, either. She just looked cornered.

Mel moved before she thought.

Her heels struck the floor like punctuation, like a warning. Guests turned to look. They always did. She didn’t care. The dress whispered around her legs as she crossed the room, every step measured, every ounce of her body carved with intent. She didn’t stride. She claimed.

Vi looked up as she approached—eyes wide. Caught. Flushed.

Mel didn’t pause.

She reached out with hands soft and sharp, framed Vi’s face with her palms, and kissed her.

Not softly.

Not sweetly.

This wasn’t a question. This wasn’t delicate. This was declaration.

It was Vi’s breath catching. It was her hands rising instinctively to Mel’s waist. It was the gala gasping, and the world narrowing to the taste of red wine and rage and love burning under the skin. It was mouths crashing and parting and meeting again, Mel pressing closer, Vi tilting forward, one of them making a sound—Mel wasn’t sure who.

When she finally pulled back, her lips were stained the same shade as the lace under her gown. Her fingers lingered on Vi’s jaw, the touch suddenly gentler now, thumb brushing the line of her cheek.

She turned her head just slightly, enough to catch Caitlyn’s gaze with a look like drawn steel.

“She’s taken.”

The words didn’t rise. They cut.

Caitlyn’s lips parted, eyes flashing with something unreadable—surprise, hurt, maybe even admiration. But she didn’t speak.

Vi did.

“Goddamn,” she whispered. Not to anyone else. Just to Mel. Like she’d forgotten where they were. Like she’d just remembered how to breathe.

Mel smiled.

Then turned on her heel and walked.

Vi followed.

Didn’t ask. Didn’t hesitate. Just fell into step beside her, taller and broader and not quite composed, jaw tight, fingers twitching like she didn’t know what to do with them. They didn’t speak. The hallway swallowed them both whole—cooler light, quiet marble, echoing footsteps.

Somewhere behind them, the music resumed. The chatter. The performance.

But the moment had already landed.

Vi reached out when they reached the end of the hall, touched Mel’s wrist lightly. Her thumb brushed over bare skin like a question, like a prayer.

Mel turned.

“I didn’t need a scene,” she said softly. Not accusing. Not angry. Just… honest.

Vi nodded. “I did.”

They stared at each other, breathless with all the things they hadn’t said. The jealousy. The fear. The ache of wanting someone so badly it felt like a vulnerability they could barely stand.

“You didn’t have to prove anything,” Mel added.

Vi looked down at her. Her eyes were bright, unreadable.

“I wasn’t proving anything,” she said. “I was reminding them.”

Mel’s breath caught. Her heart stuttered once.

Vi leaned in again—not a kiss this time. Just a whisper at her temple, warm and low and close enough to feel.

“You don’t have to fight alone anymore.”

Mel closed her eyes.

She leaned into Vi’s chest, into the steady beat of someone who would wreck kingdoms for her and still apologize for tracking mud into her foyer. Into strength that had bled for her. Into gentleness that had never come with expectation.

“Let them stare,” Vi murmured.

And Mel did.

Because for once—she wanted them to.

The balcony is quiet in a way the rest of the estate never is—high above the noise, wreathed in pale moonlight, the hum of Piltover’s spires distant and unimportant. Below them, the city sparkles like it’s trying too hard to forget how much blood stains its cobblestones. Up here, though, it’s just wind and silence and Mel, standing at the edge like she’s holding herself together by sheer will.

Vi lingers by the glass doors for a beat too long, hand on the frame, unsure if she’s allowed in that quiet yet.

Mel doesn’t look back. Her spine is taut, every inch of her screaming restraint. Her wineglass sits untouched on the stone ledge. The fabric of her dress flutters at the hem from the breeze, and her arms are crossed so tightly it looks like she’s bracing against an enemy she can’t punch. Vi knows that stance. She’s worn it.

So she steps forward, slow and careful, like walking up to a ledge she already jumped from a long time ago.

“You didn’t have to do that,” she says, voice softer than it ever is in warzones or strategy rooms.

Mel’s jaw shifts, but she doesn’t move. “I wanted to.”

The words settle between them like ash.

Vi leans on the railing a few feet away, not touching her, but close enough to feel the burn of being near her. She watches the way Mel's fingers dig into her forearms, the tension in her shoulders. Vi swallows around the lump in her throat, trying to shape something honest out of the storm inside her chest.

“You kissed me,” she says finally. And it’s not a question, not a protest—it’s a reverent fact. A confession spoken aloud to ground herself in reality. Like maybe if she says it out loud, it’ll stop feeling like a hallucination stitched together out of desperation and sleepless nights.

That’s when Mel turns. Slowly. Deliberately. Like she’s done running from anything that looks like vulnerability.

Her eyes are unflinching. Not cold—never cold—but clear. Steady. Warm in a way that hurts. “You were always mine,” she says.

Vi nearly chokes on air.

It’s not the words that destroy her. It’s the way Mel says them. Not with urgency. Not with pleading. Just certainty. Like this has always been the truth, and she’s just finally giving it breath.

Vi exhales, rough and raw, like she’s been holding it in for years. Like her lungs forgot how to work without this moment.

“You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear that,” she says, and then—

She moves.

Not hesitantly. Not with caution. With all the weight of someone who’s done hesitating. She crosses the space between them in one long stride, and then she’s there—crowding Mel against the railing, taller, broader, surrounding her like gravity, like a storm finally coming home.

Her hands don’t grab. They cradle. One against Mel’s cheek, the other low on her waist, grounding her. She stares for a breath—just a moment longer—taking in the curve of Mel’s mouth, the wild thrum of her pulse visible in her throat.

Then she kisses her.

And it’s not desperate. It’s not messy. It’s not about claiming anything.

It’s about returning.

Vi pours everything into it—every unsent letter, every sleepless night, every wound she never let scar. It’s a kiss built of all the things she never thought she’d be allowed to feel.

Mel doesn’t resist.

She leans into it immediately, arms rising to circle Vi’s neck, fingers weaving through the short mess of Vi’s hair. She pulls Vi down against her until there’s no space left between them, no breath unshared, no past that matters. She doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t check who might be watching.

She just kisses her back like they’re the only two people in the world that’s ever burned and survived it.

When they finally pull apart, the air is warmer. Thicker. Their foreheads rest together, noses brushing, breath mixing.

Vi’s lips are parted, still tingling, her hands shaking slightly against Mel’s hips. Her voice is low when she speaks again, barely audible over the wind.

“You really meant that?”

Mel doesn’t even blink. “Every word.”

Vi smiles. And it’s not cocky. It’s not sarcastic. It’s not even relieved.

It’s soft. Raw. Vulnerable.

It’s the kind of smile that only comes after being dragged through hell and somehow still believing in heaven.

They don’t say anything else. Not yet. Words feel too heavy, too small.

But as they stand there, pressed together against the night, Mel’s hand slides down and clasps Vi’s. Fingers lacing. Not tight. Not demanding. Just there.

And Vi knows, without needing to be told, that she’ll never let go of this again.

Not the hand.

Not the promise.

Not the woman.

She’s got me, Vi thinks, her heart beating like thunder in her chest. And I’ve got her.

Always.

The light from the desk lamp glows like warm honey across the dark wood, casting gentle shadows that pool around Mel’s bare ankles and flicker against the high arches of the ceiling. Outside the estate windows, the city has gone quiet. Not silent—Piltover never is—but muted. Distant. As if the world has taken one long breath and is holding it, just for them.

Mel’s robe slips slightly off her shoulder. She doesn’t fix it. The steam from her earlier bath still lingers faintly on her skin, a sheen of heat beneath silk that clings to the curve of her thigh where she’s crossed one leg over the other. Her hair, damp and heavy, spills like ink down her back. She’s been staring at the same paragraph for fifteen minutes, reading it twice and understanding none of it. The summit is in three days. The delegation from Ionia arrives tomorrow. Jayce is already pacing holes into his floor. She should be focused.

But the house is too quiet.

And Vi is nowhere.

Until she is.

The door doesn’t creak. Her footfalls are near silent, but Mel knows them like she knows the rhythm of her own breath now—knows the subtle shift in the air when Vi enters a room, how the walls seem to straighten and settle. Vi doesn’t make a sound. Doesn’t announce herself. Just steps in, slow and deliberate, barefoot, wearing only a soft black shirt that clings to the muscles in her arms and a pair of loose pants that ride low on her hips.

Mel doesn’t turn around. She doesn’t need to. She feels her.

Then those arms wrap around her waist from behind.

Thick, powerful, scarred arms that slide around her with a gentleness that contradicts everything they’re capable of. Vi doesn’t speak, but the sound of her exhale as she settles behind her is louder than any words. It’s breath against skin. It’s a heartbeat syncing to another. It’s the way a ship sighs into the dock when it finally finds harbor.

Vi rests her chin on Mel’s shoulder. Her nose brushes the edge of Mel’s neck.

Mel lets her head fall slightly to the side, just enough that Vi has more room to settle into.

“You always do this,” she murmurs, voice low and only pretending to be annoyed.

Vi hums—a sound that’s less a noise and more a vibration against Mel’s skin. “Can’t help it,” she whispers. Her voice is deeper at night. Rough around the edges, the kind of gravel that’s been softened by something slow and warm. “You smell like cinnamon and politics.”

Mel’s laugh is quiet. Soft. “And you smell like rain and smoke.”

“Mm,” Vi replies. “Guess we’re even.”

The arms around her tighten just slightly. Enough to be felt. Enough to tell her she’s real. Vi’s fingers splay wide across Mel’s stomach, dragging across silk like it’s something holy. She presses forward just an inch, chest against Mel’s back, tall frame folding around her like armor that breathes.

“You make it very hard to concentrate,” Mel says, but her voice has lost its edge. She leans into Vi without resisting. Without thinking. Her body responds before her mind does.

Vi leans down, mouth brushing the edge of Mel’s jaw. “You’re the only thing I can focus on.”

It’s not a line. It’s not flirtation.

It’s the truth, stripped bare.

Mel closes her eyes.

The tension she didn’t realize she’d been carrying all day melts beneath Vi’s presence. Every deadline. Every strategic alignment. Every alliance she’s had to nurture with smiles and sharpen with steel. None of it matters in this moment.

Because Vi’s arms are like anchor chains—unmoving, absolute. They weigh nothing and everything at once. They tether Mel in a way that no title or legacy ever has.

Mel reaches up, slow and deliberate, and tangles her fingers into Vi’s hand at her stomach. Her thumb strokes across a calloused knuckle. The scarred skin there feels like truth. Like memory. Like a life lived hard and still, somehow, offered willingly.

Vi kisses her neck. Once. Slowly. The kind of kiss that doesn’t ask for anything but still leaves fire in its wake. Her mouth lingers. Her breath makes Mel’s skin pebble, and Mel tilts her head further, baring more of her throat.

“I should finish this,” she says, but there’s no conviction in it. None at all.

“You should,” Vi agrees.

Neither of them move.

Mel inhales—and Vi kisses her again, just below the ear, one hand now sliding a fraction lower, resting against the curve of her hip beneath the robe. Not pushing. Not pulling. Just there.

“I missed you today,” Vi says quietly.

“I was only gone an hour.”

Vi doesn’t respond. She doesn’t have to.

Mel shifts in the chair, turning just enough to see her face—those tired, beautiful eyes, the scar at her brow, the pink hair tousled and slightly damp like she’d walked through the garden mist on her way in.

And then she lifts a hand and touches Vi’s jaw.

She draws her close and kisses her.

Slow.

Thorough.

Not because she needs to possess her—but because she needs to feel her. Needs to anchor herself the same way Vi does with those hands, those arms, that steady strength she never knew she could trust until now.

Vi makes a soft sound—barely a breath—and deepens it.

The kiss is heat without haste. The kind of kiss that opens doors but doesn’t cross thresholds unless invited. Mel parts her lips, and Vi responds instantly, hand on the small of her back, pulling her forward until Mel rises from the chair and turns fully into her.

Their bodies press together.

Soft curves meeting solid muscle. Smaller and taller. Delicate and brutal. Equal.

Mel’s hands slide up beneath the hem of Vi’s shirt, skimming the ridges of her abdomen, feeling the way Vi trembles slightly—like she wants to take, to devour, to consume, and is holding herself back with every ounce of restraint she has.

“You can touch me,” Mel whispers into her mouth.

Vi does.

Slowly.

Reverently.

And Mel melts into her with a sound that’s more breath than moan, her head falling to Vi’s shoulder as strong hands slide along her back, pulling her close—closer—until there’s no space left between them.

“I’m here,” Vi murmurs. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I know,” Mel breathes. “But say it anyway.”

Vi presses her lips to Mel’s temple, then her cheek, then finally her lips again, like a vow in pieces.

“I’m yours.”

And this time, Mel believes her without needing to ask again.

The Sump’s air clings to your lungs—thick with rain-soaked earth, the sting of rust, and the sharp tang of oil. Vi thrives here. Her sleeves are rolled up, revealing arms painted with grease and streaked with grime. She’s crouched beside a dirt-floored workstation made from scavenged wood and salvaged metal, helping a girl no older than ten wrap copper wiring around a cracked heating coil from a ruined mining drill.

Vi’s voice is soft, patient, laced with something fierce beneath. “This’ll keep your fingers warm…and your water hot, right?”

The girl nods, eyes shining like Hextech crystals, bright as promise under the filth.

Behind her, a little boy tugs sharply at Vi’s threadbare vest. She doesn’t hesitate. With one strong arm, she lifts him to standing, hand steadying his fingers as he tightens the patch on a dripping pipe overhead. The boy beams, proud of himself for once.

Powder leans against a groaning wall of corrugated metal, watching with a sister’s soft approval etched on her face. She still wears her goggles, though they’re smudged with soot and laughter, and she’s keeping quiet only by miracles of will.

Then Mel arrives.

She stands at the edge of the clearing, the rain dripping from her pinned-up hair, clothing still dusted with Piltover charm—her cloak shimmering faintly like polished glass. But all that drips away in her eyes. In that moment, she's mesmerized by Vi.

Vi’s mouth stretches wide in a laugh that echoes against the mud and steel. She’s larger than the space—taller, broader, warmth radiating from her like sunburn. Hair flicks in tangled waves from her undercut, freckles dancing across her cheekbones, flushed with joy and something deeper. One child clings to her, another grips her wrist, and she is everything the sun has ever wished to be.

Mel stands frozen, hand closing around her coat as if it could anchor her to reality. Her breath catches.

Powder sidles up beside her, filled with sisterly mischief and unspoken truths. Her voice is low but clear in the hush of mel’s stunned silence.

“Now imagine her doing that with your kids.”

That’s all it takes.

Color floods Mel’s skin. Crimson spreads slowly across her cheeks, her necklace, her ears—every inch of her longing body. Her heart thunders too loud, fresh and raw. She looks away, then back again, tears glistening.

And then she almost faints.

Because for all her steel and sharpness, her composure and pride, nothing—absolutely nothing—has ever undone her faster than the image that takes root behind her eyes.

Vi. With children. With their children. Lifting them like feathers, showing them how to patch leaky pipes and wire tech scraps into warm coils. Freckles caught in sunlight, eyes soft, voice low.

Love, not as poetry, but as a home built out of bent metal and steady hands.

And in that moment, standing in a rain-slicked corner of Zaun with mud on her boots and her heart in her throat—

Mel knows.

This isn’t just the woman she loves.

This is the life she wants.

She could faint.

But she doesn’t.

She steps forward instead, boots sinking into mud, and every polished lesson from Piltover melts away. Vi spots her, hesitates, but doesn’t stop. Children scatter. She drops the boy to his feet and straightens, caught smiling still—the kind of smile that breaks open walls and stitches wounds.

Mel stands closer now, the distance shrinking, her coat heavy on her shoulders like she’s wearing her heart outside her self-control. She reaches out, fingertips brushing against Vi’s wet sleeve. It’s a question, a confession, a vow all at once.

Vi’s smile falters. She flushes under the touch. The world narrows to that scrape of skin, that breathless pull of desperation in Mel’s eyes.

And then everything hesitates.

But the rain keeps falling—soft, insistent. Children begin to laugh again. Powder nudges the wrapped boy forward, and he runs, triumphant, carrying his coil like a prize.

Mel doesn’t move. She stands rooted, torn between the civilized armor she’s built and what she knows right now: that Vi could hold any world together with her own hands.

Vi steps forward too.

The underground gym smells of grit and rust and determination. The walls are cracked concrete, darkened by decades of sweat and impact, lined with scavenged mats and patched punching bags. The flickering overhead lights cast uneven shadows—making everything look harder, sharper. Real.

And Vi is in the center of it like she belongs to the foundation itself.

Not fighting. Not this time. She isn’t the whirlwind of fists and momentum today. Today, she’s steady. Rooted. Commanding without raising her voice.

The girl in front of her—barely fifteen, if that—is all sharp elbows and too-big shoes, her hoodie hanging crooked off one shoulder like it’s a shield she hasn’t learned to wear right. Her hands are curled too tight, not in anger, but in fear.

Vi notices. She always notices.

“Feet apart,” she says gently, nodding toward the girl’s stance. “Hips down. If you look like you’re afraid, they’ll think they can take something from you.”

Mel watches from the catwalk above, chin resting in her palm, elbow braced on rusted steel. The railing under her hand is biting into her skin, but she doesn’t shift. Doesn’t blink. Her eyes are locked on the way Vi moves.

Measured. Intentional. And gods, so infuriatingly graceful in a way that shouldn’t be possible for someone with that much muscle.

Vi steps around the girl, one hand raised but waiting—for permission. She never pushes without it. When the girl nods once, Vi reaches out and sets her hands on her shoulders. Just a light press. Realignment. Not force, not power—correction.

Mel's throat goes dry.

“You’re not here to flinch,” Vi says, her voice like low thunder beneath the crackle of the lights. “You’re here to learn how to take up space.”

The girl’s jaw twitches. She swallows. Then nods again, a little firmer this time.

Vi smiles, brief and soft and achingly proud. “Good. Again.”

And Mel grips the railing so tightly that her entire arm aches.

It isn’t just the way Vi commands the space—it’s the way she makes room for others in it. How she doesn’t lead by force, but by steady presence. No yelling. No arrogance. Just a quiet promise that she won’t let the world take what’s yours without a fight.

And gods, Mel wants to drop dead from it.

She shifts slightly, just enough to breathe deeper, but it doesn’t help. Her robe sticks too warm to her skin under her coat, and she’s biting the inside of her cheek to keep herself composed. Every time Vi moves—adjusts someone’s posture, demonstrates a blow, crouches to a child’s eye level—it sends something burning down her spine.

Vi’s wearing a sleeveless tank again. Of course she is. Grease-slick and slightly sweat-damp, hugging the cut of her back and shoulders like a sin. Her arms flex with every movement, biceps rippling as she resets a fallen training mat, then ruffles the hair of a boy no older than nine with a crooked smile.

Mel wants to make an excuse. Wants to go back to her estate, drown herself in cold wine and even colder paperwork until this edge in her chest dulls.

But she can’t look away.

Because Vi crouches beside the teenage girl again—barely older than a child—and says something Mel can’t hear. The girl nods, wipes her nose with the back of her hand, and this time, her feet are set better. Shoulders braced. More stable.

Vi nods. “That’s it. That’s strength. Not the punch. The choice to try again.”

Mel doesn’t realize her nails have dug into her palm until Jayce walks by.

He’s halfway through unwrapping a protein bar, humming something under his breath until he glances up and sees her. The way she’s leaning forward. The flush creeping up the back of her neck.

He snorts.

“You ever gonna admit it?”

Mel startles. “Admit what?”

Jayce takes a huge bite of the bar and speaks around it. “That you’re feral for her.”

Mel nearly chokes. “Excuse me?”

He winks, mouth full. “It’s fine. We all see it.”

She swats his shoulder as he passes. “Idiot.”

But she doesn’t deny it. Not out loud. Not even in her head.

Because it’s true. It’s too true.

It’s in the way her breath hitches when Vi brushes a knuckle across the girl’s shoulder in encouragement. It’s in the way she can’t look away when Vi stands, full height, commanding and wild and burnished in dim amber light. It’s in the way she wants—not to claim her, not to tame her—but to be close enough to see all the chaos and tenderness inside her up close, always.

Mel closes her eyes for half a second and exhales through her nose.

She can handle herself in a room full of warlords. Can outwit any council. Can manipulate empires.

But this?

This woman, this fire-forged protector who teaches children how not to flinch?

She’s the only thing in the world that leaves Mel unguarded.

Vi glances up. Looks right at her.

And smiles. That slow, crooked, unholy smile that splits her face and knocks the breath from Mel’s lungs like a gut punch.

Mel nearly swears aloud.

Then Vi raises one hand and crooks a finger. Subtle. Just enough. Just for her.

Mel doesn’t move. Not immediately. Her legs feel like they’re made of hot wax. But eventually, she steps away from the railing, pretending her stride is measured and not a betrayal of every quiet panic spiraling through her chest.

She descends the stairs with her hands folded behind her back to keep them from trembling.

Vi meets her at the base of the steps. Smirking, proud, flushed from light exertion. “Hey, counselor,” she murmurs.

Mel doesn't answer at first. Just lets her eyes sweep over Vi—her throat, her collarbone, the flex of her arm as she slings a towel over one shoulder.

“You smell like copper and soap and smoke,” Mel mutters, voice too even, too tight.

Vi leans in a little. “Good?”

Mel exhales through her nose. “Dangerous.”

Vi tilts her head. “For you?”

Mel meets her eyes. Dead on. “For my dignity.”

Vi laughs—low and bright and infuriatingly intimate.

Mel doesn’t care if the whole gym sees it. She leans in until their foreheads almost touch, and whispers, “You have no idea what you do to me.”

Vi shrugs, soft and teasing. “Guess you’ll have to show me.”

Mel grits her teeth. Her lips twitch. Her body leans just a fraction closer.

And then she kisses her—once, slow and controlled and sinful.

Just enough to make Vi’s grin freeze and her breath catch.

Mel pulls back before it can go further. Eyes sharp, lips flushed, spine steel.

“Finish your lesson,” she murmurs. “Then come home.”

And she turns.

Walks away with purpose in her hips and war in her veins.

Vi watches her go, every muscle suddenly too tense to breathe properly.

Because no matter how much strength she teaches those kids—

She’s learning, too.

And right now? She’s learning that no one on this earth is more dangerous than the woman who just kissed her like a promise.

And walked away.

Mel’s office smells like ink and candlewax and far too many hours spent thinking. The scent of overwork clings to the walls—parchment and wax seals stacked in crooked piles, rolled schematics of transit arcs and zone proposals half-open on her desk. Her robe is half-fallen off one shoulder, the silk wrinkled, sleeves rolled to the elbows. Her hair’s twisted up in an elegant, if slightly wilted, knot. There’s a line between her brows that didn’t used to be there. She’s staring at a report, blinking as if the numbers might change if she stares hard enough.

And then Vi appears—silent as a stray shadow, barefoot, shirt untucked, cheeks flushed from some sparring session Mel hadn’t even noticed ended. She leans against the doorframe first, arms crossed, watching her with a hunger that isn’t entirely hunger—something softer beneath it, but just as dangerous.

Her smirk is a weapon. Crooked. Lethal. Devoted.

She steps forward, no announcement, no warning—just walks into the space behind Mel like she belongs there. Her arms loop around Mel’s waist, slow and possessive, palms spreading wide across her stomach as she pulls her back against her chest. She’s so much bigger, her body like armor behind Mel’s more delicate frame. And when she presses her mouth to the hinge of Mel’s jaw and murmurs “Princess,” the syllable is molten.

Mel closes her eyes for half a breath. “You are insufferable.”

Vi doesn’t argue. Doesn’t even pretend to. “Come breathe,” she says again, her voice low, curling at the edge of a promise. “Just for a minute. Let it all wait.”

Mel shakes her head but doesn’t pull away. “I have two trade proposals to sign. A border conflict brief from the E Zone. And someone from the military council wants anti-air cannons placed on the summit ridge. Apparently they think the sky’s going to fall.”

Vi’s lips skim the side of her neck. “Then let it. We’ll catch it.”

Mel lets out a slow breath, somewhere between a groan and a laugh. She should resist. She should set boundaries. But Vi’s touch is firm and grounding, a steady pull that says you don’t have to carry this alone tonight.

When Vi nudges her backward, toward the couch in the corner—low and soft, covered in worn velvet—Mel puts up one last attempt at protest. A hand braced against the desk. A final sigh.

But it’s a losing battle.

They stumble together into the cushions, laughter tangled in breath. Vi lets herself fall first, sprawling dramatically, dragging Mel down until she topples neatly beside her. Then Vi shifts—pulling Mel until she’s sitting upright, and Vi’s head rests heavy in her lap.

Her hair is tousled, cheeks dusted pink, expression utterly at ease.

Mel smooths the damp strands away from her forehead. “You’re ridiculous.”

Vi grins up at her like she’s just been given the world. “Only for you.”

Mel’s fingers find their rhythm through Vi’s hair, threading gently between the strands. The tension in her spine slowly ebbs. Each stroke untangles another knot in her mind. Her other hand rests on Vi’s chest, feeling the slow rise and fall. Warm. Alive. Steady.

Vi shifts slightly, eyes fluttering shut, lips parting on a quiet exhale. Her body is heavy in that way she only gets when she’s truly relaxed—sprawled like a sun-drunk cat, one hand resting lightly over Mel’s ankle, as if anchoring herself to her.

Mel studies her for a moment. The strong line of her jaw. The scar along her cheekbone, nearly faded now. The lashes that fall across her cheeks, absurdly long for someone so capable of punching holes through walls.

Gods, she thinks. She’s dangerous.

But she’s gentle. With her. Always with her.

Vi hums faintly, not quite awake but aware. Her hand shifts slightly, dragging her fingers up the outside of Mel’s calf in slow, absent circles. Nothing suggestive. Nothing overt.

But it’s enough to make Mel’s breath stutter.

Because it’s all too much and never enough. This woman sprawled across her lap like she doesn’t carry whole cities in her fists. This ridiculous, infuriating, beautiful woman who makes her forget the weight of the world every time she smiles like that.

Vi cracks one eye open. “Thinking too loud again?”

Mel flicks her forehead. “You’re smug.”

Vi grins. “You love it.”

Mel hesitates. Then murmurs, “I do.”

Vi stills.

Mel runs her thumb across her temple. “You terrify me,” she says, voice quieter now, more real. “Not because of what you are. But because of how much I feel when I look at you.”

Vi doesn’t answer right away. She just lifts Mel’s hand from her temple and kisses her knuckles.

Then, softly, “You don’t have to say anything. I’m already yours.”

Mel’s heart clenches.

The office is still, the candlelight dimming. Outside the windows, the city breathes—Piltover gleaming on the skyline, Zaun glowing softly below. Two hearts in one body. Two worlds in one room.

Mel leans down slowly, brushing her lips against Vi’s forehead, then her cheek. Pausing just before she reaches her lips.

Vi tilts her head, eyes still closed. “That wasn’t a kiss.”

Mel’s voice is velvet. “That wasn’t a request.”

And then she kisses her. Soft. Long. Not hurried. Not feral.

Just deep and unguarded and so full of everything she doesn’t know how to say.

Vi makes a quiet sound into her mouth—half surprise, half surrender. Her hand tightens on Mel’s hip.

When they part, they’re both breathing harder.

Mel leans her forehead against Vi’s. “You win,” she whispers.

Vi hums, dazed. “I didn’t know we were playing.”

“You always win anyway.”

Vi opens her eyes, gaze soft, anchored. “Not always. Not with this. This is the first thing that ever felt like a draw.”

Mel smiles, small and shattered and whole.

She runs her hand through Vi’s hair again. And Vi lets her.

And for that one brief hour, as the papers go unread and the candles burn low, they let themselves be still.

Not warriors. Not rulers. Not soldiers or leaders or ghosts of past griefs.

Just two people who chose each other in a world that tried to tear them apart.

Just Vi and Mel.

And the way they never quite let go.

The estate had the air of something too quiet, like the breath before a scream. Mel could feel it—threaded beneath the clink of teacups, the rustle of fine papers, the clatter of distant heels on stone floors. A silence not born of peace, but preparation. Even the chandeliers seemed to hold their glitter with restraint, as if unwilling to gleam too brightly in a place that had started to feel like a glass box—gilded, delicate, and suddenly, undeniably vulnerable.

She stood at the center of her office, arms crossed, robe unfastened over a satin blouse, staring down the latest security report like it had personally insulted her. The name of the courier was scribbled in the margin in ink that hadn’t even dried when the file reached her desk. Interrogation notes. Behavioral patterns. Trace signatures of shimmer buried under synthetic sweat.

The gate routes had been timed. The guard rotations tracked. There was an unspoken choreography in the inked diagrams that only someone born into warfare would recognize.

Mel did.

Her chest went tight.

And when she reached for the page detailing the courier’s escape attempt—vaulting from the roof like someone who knew the drop, knew the weight of the wind in Zaun’s lower levels—her hands were shaking.

Ambessa had trained her to read death in patterns. Had carved that lesson into her ribs. And Mel, though polished and proud and gilded in the language of diplomacy, had never forgotten how to recognize when a predator circled a den.

This wasn’t a random flare of violence. It was careful. Patient.

Targeted.

Vi.

She swallowed hard.

The file snapped shut beneath her palm, leather creaking in protest. “Enough,” she hissed.

Her assistant knocked before entering. “Councilwoman?”

Mel didn’t hesitate. “Double her guard.”

A pause. The man blinked. “Vi—Councilor V—?”

“Now,” she snapped. “I don’t care if she complains. Don’t let her leave a room without backup.”

The assistant fled with a nod, and Mel was left standing in the cold, echoing silence of her own panic. She braced her knuckles on the desk and tried to breathe.

Her mind spun. Not just with logistics. Not just with outrage or planning.

But with memory.

Vi—laughing under grease-stained sunlight. Vi holding a child at the edge of the Sump like she’d been born to carry the weight of the world. Vi bleeding and grinning and somehow still warm. Vi whispering “I’m still here” in the crook of her neck in the dark.

And the possibility of losing her made Mel dizzy.

She didn’t hear Vi come in.

Didn’t register the footsteps until a familiar shadow leaned against the doorway with that crooked smile, those scarred arms crossed over her chest like she hadn’t a single care in the world.

Vi glanced at the file still open on the desk, then at the set of Mel’s jaw, and whistled. “You really think anyone’s getting through you before they get through me?”

Mel didn’t respond.

Vi tilted her head, grin growing. “C’mon. You’ve seen what I do to assassins. If anything, we should be doubling your guard.”

It was supposed to be a joke. A tease. But Mel didn’t smile. She couldn’t.

The fear rose in her throat like something solid.

She crossed the room in three long strides, seized Vi by the collar, and yanked her forward.

Vi barely had time to blink before Mel kissed her.

It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t poised. There was nothing courtly about it. No ceremony, no etiquette, no performance.

Just a crash of lips and desperation.

It was the kiss of a woman who had already imagined a hundred versions of herself waking up alone. Of reading a casualty report instead of a love letter. Of blood staining leather gloves.

Vi didn’t resist.

Her arms hovered for a moment, startled by the intensity, then locked around Mel’s waist. Held her like she might fly apart.

When Mel broke the kiss, she didn’t step back. Didn’t breathe. Her forehead pressed against Vi’s, her voice shaking with fury that had nowhere left to go.

“Don’t you dare die on me.”

Vi blinked, her mouth barely parted, her breath hot between them. Her hands tightened slightly on Mel’s back.

She didn’t joke. Didn’t grin.

“I won’t,” she whispered.

It wasn’t bravado. There was no promise she could guarantee. But there was truth in the tone, unshakable and low.

Mel nodded once, like that was all she could allow herself to do before she shattered.

Vi pulled her in.

This time, not for a kiss. Not for comfort. Just… to hold her. To be held.

Mel buried her face in Vi’s shoulder, breathing her in like sanctuary, like fireproof silk, like the only thing in the world that had ever felt strong enough to carry her without flinching.

Vi’s arms around her were warm and sure and terrifyingly gentle. Like she knew just how much force to use to hold without breaking. She didn’t say anything else. Just pressed her lips once to the top of Mel’s head.

Mel clung to her harder.

The room buzzed in silence, the file forgotten on the desk, still stamped with warnings and threat assessments. Outside the window, lightning bloomed faintly behind the clouds, casting a silver sheen over the curtains.

Inside the storm, Vi stood like an anchor. Not untouched by the chaos—but unmovable for the one person who mattered.

Mel stayed in her arms for as long as she could.

Because the fire was too close now.

And Vi was the only thing between her and the burn.

It happens all at once.

The estate—always pristine, always still, always humming with quiet diplomacy and the smell of jasmine-scented oil—erupts. The explosion isn’t subtle. There’s no warning, no sound of a window cracking, no flickering lights. Just pressure. Sudden and violent. A deafening blast that punches through the air like a monster’s roar, followed by a rain of glass that slices downward like a storm of knives. The floor shudders. Ceilings split. Lights go dead.

Vi’s eyes snap open before the glass even hits the ground.

She doesn’t think. There’s no time to think. Her body moves before her brain catches up. Muscle memory. Instinct. Fire in her veins.

She grabs the gauntlets from beside the bed. Her shirt isn’t even fully on yet. The world is smoke and screaming and distant impact thuds like thunder behind walls. Something’s on fire—she doesn’t know what. She doesn’t care.

Mel.

Vi barrels through the hallway, boots slamming against the marble, already fractured beneath her weight. There’s blood on the walls—hers or someone else’s, she doesn’t know. Doesn’t stop. Won’t stop.

Mel.

She rounds the corner toward the east wing, just as a second blast rocks the estate. Heat lashes her back. She doesn’t flinch. The gauntlets—her second skin—hum with energy. Her chest is a forge, pounding with fear that has no exit.

She finds Mel halfway through the smoke-choked corridor, barefoot, hair loose, coughing so hard she’s bent at the waist, one hand braced against the wall for balance. The fine silk of her nightgown is torn and scorched at the hem. Her eyes are wild, wide, frantic as they land on Vi.

Vi doesn’t speak. She lunges.

Grabs her by the waist, hoists her up like nothing, like she weighs air, and spins on her heel. Mel cries out, claws at her shoulder—not from fear of Vi, but from understanding. From knowing. From knowing exactly what Vi’s about to do.

“No,” Mel gasps. “Vi—no, wait—!”

Vi slams the reinforced door to the secure chamber shut behind them. Her boot heel stomps the emergency seal trigger. The locks hiss. Bolt after bolt. Thick steel slams into place like the heartbeat of a coffin.

“Vi!” Mel’s fists hammer the inside of the door. “Don’t you fucking dare! Don’t you leave me out here—don’t you do this!”

Her voice breaks on the last word.

Vi stands on the other side of the door, palm pressed to the cold metal. Her body heaves. Her breath is wild. Her mind screams at her to go back in, to hold her, to promise it’ll be okay—but her body won’t let her move. She can’t.

Because the footsteps are coming.

Metal against tile. Dozens of them.

Not enforcers. Not thieves. Not the idiots who used to think they could corner her in the Sump and survive it.

These are precision. These are war.

They come through the smoke like phantoms.

Shimmer veins glowing faintly beneath skin too pale to be healthy, masks welded onto faces, weapons fused to arms. And they move with intention. Like they know exactly who they’re here for. Not to loot. Not to threaten.

To kill.

Vi lifts her head.

She lets her palm fall away from the sealed door, lets Mel scream her name—once, twice, again and again—each one like a knife down her spine.

Her fingers flex inside the gauntlets.

And still, she doesn’t turn around.

This is what she was built for. What Zaun carved into her bones and what love sharpened into resolve.

She’s shaking.

Not from fear. From the strain of holding herself back.

Because if she lets go now—if she steps into that storm like the weapon they’ve always tried to make her—she’s not walking away until the floor is painted with ruin.

And then the door opens on the other side. The assassins pour through: masked figures with shimmered veins pulsing red beneath their skin. They move as one—precise, predatory, determined. Her body clenches. Muscles coil. The world narrows to their presence, the weight of their threat.

One of them twitches like an insect. Another drags a sword longer than most men are tall. One crouches, tracking her scent like a predator.

And all Vi hears is Mel’s voice behind the door, broken and hoarse:

Please.

Vi swallows the sound. Buries it like a prayer.

Vi doesn’t hesitate anymore. The reinforced door thuds shut behind her and locks in place with an echo that settles like a final breath. The echo is gone before her senses fully return—but the lingering scent of smoke, blood, and fear fills the corridor. She stands, wide and tall, silhouetted in the flickering flame light of the estate’s half-lit hall. Her hair, furred with soot and tangled, frames her face in wild lines that catch the same firelight as her bruised knuckles.

She erupts.

Her first target is in the center of the hall. He lunges with a blade, but she’s already moving. Her gauntleted fist collides with his jaw, the armored knuckles snapping under her control. His neck translates the force; his body crumples to the floor—jerking once, then still. She spins on her heel, eyes scanning, instincts tightening like a noose around her balance.

Another assassin rushes from the flank—shield and mace, aiming low. Vi lowers her frame, teaches gravity to betray his balance, then smashes his skull against the cold marble wall. Brain matter blooms across tile, the bone-cracked echo drowned by his collapse. Heat blares inside her side, thin-hot, but she’s already on the move again.

An attacker with a dagger caught the edge of her flank—her shirt darkens. She feels it, but only a spark. Anger dulls the pain. She ducks under a slash, spins—throws her elbow into his sternum with savage precision. Pain blooms in his chest, his breath collapses out of him, and he stumbles forward. She plants her foot in the back of his knee to take him down and follows with a boot to the back of his skull.

Another comes for her back. A masked figure with a curved blade. Vi doesn’t allow the strike. She pivots, grabs his wrist mid-swing, jerks him around, snaps his shoulder out of alignment. The scream is muffled, abrupt.

She roars—deep, furious—and delivers a crushing blow that echoes through the hall, then twists, turning his spine. Bone cracks like glass. He slumps, knees buckling, and falls.

Another takes his place. Vi’s breathing is heavy now, her shoulders pulsing. She’s bleeding—blood seeps from her side, runs down her leg. Her vision blurs at the edges. She almost staggers.

They press on. One, two more. Shimmer weapons glint. They coordinate like clockwork—one feints, another flicks; she catches them with reflex, but the pressure is mounting. Her ribs rasp with each breath. The cut on her thigh hammers. Blind spots open near her temple.

But she doesn’t slow.

She ducks under a knife thrust, yanks the blade free, flips it. Finds his jaw. Breaks it. Bone crashes. He staggers, face twisted. She catches him with a knee to the gut, hears ribs snap through flesh. A final blow to the throat; he chokes, collapses.

Her vision narrows, breathing sharp. Darkness presses at the edges, tempting. Calculating.

She shakes her head, blood glistening on her lashes. Another attacker steps forward—his blade raised, shimmer pulsing red. A moment of stillness, of challenge.

They meet halfway.

Vi seizes his wrist, wrist-locks hard, bending his fingers back until they break. He snarls, falling to his knees. She steps forward, grabs his jaw in one hand, snaps it with a twist of her forearm. A clean break that speaks harder than words.

She lets him fall. And there’s silence.

Six attackers. Now all fallen, blood pooling around shattered bodies. The floor stares back in reflection. Tiles spattered in gore. The air thick and iron-sweet.

Vi stands in the center like a wrecked colossus—broken armor, bruised skin, hair damp with sweat and soot. She doesn’t fall yet. She breathes. Deep, heavy breaths. Her body shakes—muscle tremors and the kind of shaking that comes from giving everything you have.

She looks toward the sealed door. Mel’s screams have gone silent. She imagines the flash of her eyes through the narrow vision panel—frantic, relieved.

Vi looks down at her hands. The gauntlets are still clasped. Still hers. She flexes her fingers once. Blood leaks between the metal plates.

Her breath pounds in her ears. She’s dizzy. Light flickers in her vision, but she’s still standing.

Then, her knees buckle.

Slowly, she lets her weight crumble.

She doesn’t pry herself off the bodies. She doesn’t care about blood or gore. Her feet slide forward until she’s kneeling in it. Face down. Her head rests on the cold tile. The rhythm of her breath is ragged.

She stays like that for a moment.

And then she closes her eyes.

Because the fight is over.

And she’s still here.

Still beating.

Still alive.

Still guarding.

The world outside may have shattered, but in this splattered corridor, one thing remains unbroken:

Her promise to them both.

The door gives way beneath her hands.

Mel doesn’t wait for a guard to clear it. Doesn’t pause for protocol or breath or reason. She forces it open with every ounce of muscle, adrenaline, and panic her body can conjure. The metal handle burns her palm—hot from the nearby fires—but she doesn’t let go.

And then—

The room yawns open before her like the mouth of a dead god.

Smoke snakes through the air in long, coiling ribbons. Shattered tiles crack under her steps. Broken furniture lies in ruins. The chandeliers that once shimmered with elegance now hang crooked, coughing sparks. One wall is missing entirely. Firelight glows in the corner of the room, casting flickers over glass shards and charred bodies.

But Mel doesn’t look at any of that.

She sees her.

Vi is slumped against the jagged remnants of a collapsed support beam. Half sitting, half crumpled. Her gauntlets—those indomitable things—hang off her hands like limp weights, one visibly cracked, the metal buckled. The other is scorched black, wires trailing like exposed nerves. Her hands are empty. Her body is not.

Blood.

So much blood.

It streaks down her thigh from a slice that’s torn straight through fabric and skin. It glistens at her ribs, where a deep, uneven wound pulses faintly with each breath. One of her eyes is swollen shut, the skin around it bruised into a violent, blooming purple. Her lip is split in three places. Her collarbone juts at a wrong angle beneath the ruined strap of her chest harness.

But she’s awake.

Barely.

Mel freezes.

Vi’s head tilts toward the sound. Her good eye opens, glassy with pain. Recognition flickers there, faint as a candle about to gutter out.

And then—

She smiles.

It’s the kind of smile that should be illegal in a place like this. Chipped teeth, cracked lips, blood staining the edges—but it’s real. Sharp and stupid and so painfully Vi.

“Hi, princess,” she slurs.

Her voice is shredded, frayed raw from screaming or smoke or both. She speaks like her lungs are lined with razors, but still—still—there’s that note. That impossible, stubborn note of relief. Of humor. Of love.

Mel doesn’t move.

For half a second, her world is weightless.

And then Vi's head tips back.

And her body goes limp.

Dead weight.

The grin slides off her face mid-breath, replaced by a slack, terrifying stillness. Her head thuds against the beam behind her with a sound that Mel will hear in her dreams until the day she dies. Her chest stutters. Jerks once. Then again. But too shallow. Too slow.

“Vi?” Mel whispers. Her own voice doesn’t sound real. It’s a ghost. An echo.

No answer.

Her knees hit the floor before she realizes she’s moved. She skids on glass, on blood, on scorched marble and ash. One shard slices clean through the side of her thigh. She doesn’t feel it.

Her hands reach Vi’s face.

Too pale. Too cold.

“Vi—look at me.” Her fingers brush soot and blood away from her brow, trembling. “Come on. Don’t—don’t do this. Not now.”

Behind her, someone is calling her name. Powder, maybe. Or Jayce. She doesn’t hear them.

She only sees Vi.

“Please,” she says. “Please. Gods, please—”

Vi’s breathing catches. Stutters. Starts again.

Mel exhales a sob she didn’t realize she’d been holding. Her hands press to the gash in Vi’s side, futile but desperate. Her fingers are slippery, hot. She can’t tell how much of it is blood and how much is sweat and how much is hers.

And then Vi coughs.

It’s wet. Shallow.

But it’s alive.

“Godsdammit,” Mel whispers, forehead pressed to Vi’s. “You always—always—do this. You run straight into death with a grin on your face and think I’m just going to survive it.”

Vi doesn’t answer.

She can’t.

But her fingers twitch.

Mel catches that hand and holds it like it’s the only thing anchoring her to the ground. Her breath is ragged now, matching Vi’s.

“I need medics!” she screams over her shoulder. Her voice cracks on the last syllable, shatters in the fire-warm air.

No one hesitates now.

Footsteps pound into the room. Vander appears like a shadow at the edge of vision. Powder throws herself into motion, sliding across broken ground to assess Vi’s vitals. Even Jayce is there, pale and shaken, barking orders to haul in portable stabilizers from the council’s emergency reserves.

But Mel stays.

She doesn’t move. Doesn’t look away.

Because Vi is still breathing.

Barely.

Mel’s hand cups her face, thumb brushing blood from her cheek.

“You said hi,” she whispers, lips trembling. “So now you don’t get to leave me.”

There’s a rasp. A groan. A muscle twitch in Vi’s jaw.

“Not now,” Mel says. “Not after everything. Not after you promised.”

Vi doesn’t wake.

But her fingers curl around Mel’s.

And that’s enough.

That’s enough to keep her breathing, too.

Sunlight spills through the high windows like forgiveness.

It’s the soft kind—the gentle, golden hue that doesn’t stab at your eyes but wraps you in something just warm enough to pretend the world isn’t shattered. It dusts across the silken folds of the sheets and outlines the bruised lines of Vi’s body like a reverent artist painting a saint made of scars.

She’s still asleep.

Barely.

Her breaths come in uneven patterns. Too shallow. Each inhale sounds like it drags across something raw in her chest. But they’re breaths. Real, human, alive. That word still feels like a miracle to Mel.

Vi’s torso is swathed in layers of gauze—some fresh, some stained a rusted red that Mel couldn’t bring herself to let the nurses change yet. Her right arm is bound across her chest in a sling, fractured shoulder pulled into place. Her jaw is peppered with tiny cuts, her temple bruised in a sickly halo of violet and gold. Her hair—short, mussed, the deep rose of it darkened by smoke—sticks to her forehead.

But her lips twitch every few breaths. Not in pain.

In dreams.

Mel has no idea if they’re good or not. But she’s been sitting here long enough—watching, listening, breathing on borrowed rhythm—to know that Vi fights even in sleep.

Mel hasn’t left this chair since they brought her in.

The high-back velvet armchair was dragged from her own study—she hadn’t waited for someone to carry it. She’d pulled it through the halls herself, gouging the walls, scratching the tile, not caring about the scolding looks or mutters of concern.

Because this was where she needed to be.

Not at the council. Not in the war room. Not behind the polished desk in her office where fresh dossiers were surely stacking up. Not in the mirrored bathroom where her makeup kit remained untouched, or in the formal garden where an ambassador was likely already pacing.

Here.

Next to the woman who almost died to save her.

Mel’s legs ache from being tucked beneath her. Her left foot tingles with pins and needles. Her back screams from the way she’s curled to fit beside the bed. And her hand—

Her hand is fused to Vi’s.

Her fingers are numb. Her wrist is stiff. But she hasn’t let go since they’d cleaned Vi’s wounds and bandaged her up, since Powder came in with a blanket and a bottle of water and left them without a word. Since Vander stopped by, crouched beside the bed with his forehead pressed to Vi’s knee, and murmured something so quiet Mel couldn’t catch it. Since Ekko peeked through the door and nodded to her like he was placing something sacred in her care.

She hadn’t let go through any of it.

Because if she did—

She doesn’t know if she’d recover from the space that would replace Vi’s fingers.

The sunlight catches on a smudge of dried blood beneath Vi’s ear. Mel reaches out with a damp cloth—soaking and wrung from the basin beside the bed—and wipes it away gently, gently, like she’s touching something holy. Vi doesn’t stir.

The quiet is unbearable.

Too much space between seconds. Too many thoughts echoing in Mel’s head.

She remembers the explosion like a nightmare she’s still trapped in—every detail warped and distorted. The sound of the glass breaking. The smell of smoke and heat and terror. The sight of Vi, red and feral, throwing herself into a dozen men with nothing but fists and fire. The way Mel screamed when the door locked her out. The way her own voice cracked when Vi collapsed.

The feel of her knees hitting tile, skidding in blood.

Mel closes her eyes. Inhales slow, shallow.

Then—

A sound.

A groan. Hoarse. Rough.

Mel’s eyes snap open.

Vi stirs beneath the sheets.

Her brow furrows, the way it always does when she’s trying to process something before she speaks. Then her lashes flutter, thick and dark and stuck together with sleep and soot.

And then—

That eye. Her good one. It opens.

It lands on Mel. Sees her. Really sees her.

And Vi grins.

The grin is crooked. Lopsided. Busted lip pulled too tight. But it’s there. Somehow, impossibly, even now—it’s there.

“Hey,” Vi rasps. Her voice is gravel, smoke, silk. “You’re still here.”

Mel doesn’t answer at first.

Her lungs forget how.

She stares at her like she’s hallucinating. Like her eyes are betraying her.

And then she breathes again. Choked. Shaky.

“You stupid,” she says, “brilliant, selfless woman.”

It isn’t an insult. Not really. It’s prayer and curse and thank you all in one breath.

Vi’s smile grows. The bruises tug against it. Her teeth are cracked, a little red on her tongue. But she still smiles.

“Love you too,” she mumbles.

Mel drops her forehead against the edge of the bed. A laugh tears from her throat—raw and fraying. Half sob, half surrender.

She shakes with it.

The laugh carries the terror she hasn’t let herself feel. The fear she buried beneath orders and triage and clean bandages. The love she almost had to bury.

Vi reaches out—slow, painful—and lets her hand land in Mel’s hair.

“Sorry,” she mutters. “For the blood. The mess.”

Mel lifts her head, wipes under her eyes. “You’re apologizing for bleeding out on my floor?”

Vi shrugs. Then winces violently.

Mel panics. “Don’t move. Don’t—godsdamn you—”

Vi chuckles. “Too late.”

“You are infuriating.”

“I’m yours.”

Mel stills.

The room holds its breath.

Then she presses a kiss to Vi’s hand. Right over the bruised knuckles. The hands that broke bones for her. That held her like she mattered. That kept her alive.

“You better be,” Mel whispers. “Because I’m not letting go.”

Vi closes her eyes again. That smile still haunting the corners of her mouth.

“You built me a bed,” she mumbles. “I should’ve known you were serious.”

Mel curls up closer, their fingers laced.

“No,” she says, barely audible, lips pressed to Vi’s skin. “We built it. You and me. One board at a time.”

Vi exhales.

And the sound is peace.

The water is warm, but not scalding. It’s the kind of heat that seeps into the bones without burning—the kind Vi doesn’t allow herself often. Luxuries feel foreign to her, like they belong to someone else. But today, Mel insisted.

Not in words, exactly.

Mel didn’t need them.

She had looked at Vi—really looked at her, every inch of skin marred by fresh bruises, old scars, and the new, raw ridges where fire and steel had tried to carve her out of herself—and simply opened the bathroom door. The tub had already been drawn. The room was fogged in honeyed steam. And the towels were warm, lined in gold-threaded trim that Vi tried not to notice.

Now, she sits half-submerged, bare except for the gauze clinging to her thigh and the bandage loose around her ribs. Her muscles ache in places she didn’t know could hurt. Her eyelids feel heavy, like sleep might pull her under at any moment. But she stays awake.

Because Mel is here.

Kneeling beside the tub, sleeves rolled past her elbows, hair pinned with deliberate care but still falling in loose waves from the heat. Her eyes are soft. Her hands softer.

She runs the washcloth across Vi’s shoulder with slow precision. The cloth drags gently through soot and dried blood, catching around the edge of a fresh scab. Vi tenses.

Mel stops instantly. Her brow creases. “Sorry.”

Vi exhales through her nose. Her voice is hoarse, barely audible. “You didn’t have to do this.”

Mel doesn’t look up. She wrings out the cloth again, slowly. “I wanted to.”

“That’s not the same.”

“It is to me.”

The silence hangs between them like breath fogging glass—fragile and tender, on the edge of something about to break.

“I’m not…” Vi swallows. “You don’t have to—”

“I always will.”

That stops her.

Vi’s throat works around a sound she doesn’t make. Her eyes search Mel’s face like she’s trying to find the lie, the trap, the part where it all falls apart. But there’s nothing. Only truth. Only a quiet kind of fury, the kind that burns steady instead of bright.

Mel dips the cloth again. Moves to Vi’s arm. Brushes a thumb across a particularly dark bruise at her elbow.

“You did it for me first,” she says softly. “Every time.”

Vi laughs, but it cracks. “I didn’t think about it. I just… moved.”

“I know.” Mel’s voice is barely a breath. “That’s what terrifies me.”

Vi looks away. The tile behind Mel’s shoulder is pristine. Clean. Ordered. She hates it.

“I don’t know how to stay,” she whispers. “I don’t know how to be soft when I’m not bleeding. I don’t know how to live like I get to have this.”

Mel’s hand pauses.

Then moves. She lifts the cloth away, sets it gently on the tray beside the basin. Then she reaches out, cupping Vi’s jaw with damp fingers.

“You already are,” she says. “You just haven’t realized it yet.”

The heat behind Vi’s eyes spikes and stings. She doesn’t let it fall. Not yet.

The next few minutes pass without speech.

Mel helps her stand. Helps her step from the tub. Wraps a towel around her shoulders like it’s sacred, and leads her to the bed.

The sheets are cool. Soft. Ivory cotton threaded through with pale gold.

Vi hates how good they feel.

She settles into the pillows like she’s not sure if she belongs there. One arm clutches the edge of the blanket, the other curls over her abdomen like she’s trying to keep herself from unraveling.

Mel tucks the sheets around her like she’s made of something precious. One corner at a time. Smoothes the lines by her legs. Lifts her arm gently to slide the blanket under it.

Vi’s fingers twitch.

She catches Mel’s wrist.

“Don’t leave.”

It isn’t a plea.

It’s a confession.

Mel’s breath hitches.

She leans down, presses her lips to Vi’s temple, the faintest kiss. Her thumb brushes over the hollow of her cheek, tender and slow, like memorizing a scripture written in skin.

“I wasn’t planning to,” she murmurs.

Then she climbs into bed beside her. No silk robe. No pretense. Just bare arms and warm breath and the press of her chest against Vi’s side.

Vi shifts, tucking Mel’s arm beneath her, wrapping one of her own carefully—achingly—around Mel’s waist.

They breathe like that for a while.

In sync.

In silence.

There’s no war here. No shimmer. No council. No threats waiting in the dark.

Just the sound of heartbeats.

Just the shared ache of survival.

Vi whispers something that Mel doesn’t quite catch—but it sounds like “thank you” and “I’m yours” and “I’m scared” all layered into one.

Mel doesn’t press.

She just kisses her shoulder and holds her tighter.

Because in the quiet, in the dark, with the storm passed and their bodies exhausted, they are no longer protector and diplomat. No longer fire and silk. No longer Zaun and Piltover.

They are just Vi and Mel.

Two broken things that fit together in the dark.

And for tonight—for this moment—that’s enough.

The breeze that moves through the room is warm, touched by the last fading fingers of the summer storm that rolled in earlier. Outside, the garden rustles—leaves shifting like whispers beneath the moonlight. The windowpane glows pale, silvered by the cloud-drenched sky, and everything inside the room is cloaked in that soft kind of hush that only comes after fire, after chaos, after blood has been scrubbed from the floor and fear has been washed from the walls.

Vi breathes against her chest.

Slow. Steady. Real.

Her arm lies heavy and relaxed across Mel’s waist, fingers curled not in a fist, not in tension, but loose and open, as if in sleep even she’s learning how to be unguarded. Her long legs are tangled with Mel’s, and her cheek rests just beneath the hollow of Mel’s throat, warm breath brushing skin like a secret rhythm meant for no one else.

Mel doesn’t move.

Not for a long time.

Her fingers trace quiet circles across the curve of Vi’s shoulder blades, following the ridges of muscle and scar, a language she’s come to know by touch alone. Here, a burn. There, a ridge left by a knife. The subtle give of skin that has broken and healed a thousand times over.

She lets her fingertips memorize each mark again. Not because she’s forgotten—but because it’s reverence. Because when the world is quiet, when there’s nothing left to fear for a few precious hours, she can finally be gentle without anyone seeing her tremble from the weight of it.

Vi murmurs something in her sleep.

The words are indistinct. A half-formed hum of sound, not quite language, not quite silence. She shifts slightly, nudging her face closer into Mel’s skin, like she’s trying to disappear into the warmth and never come back up.

Mel’s lips twitch faintly. She exhales through her nose. She doesn’t speak for a while, lets the moment stretch like warm honey, pliant and undisturbed.

Then—

Quietly. Softly. Her voice no louder than the rustle of wind outside:

“I want you to stay here.”

There’s a stillness that follows. Not shock. Not surprise. Just a held breath. As though the walls themselves are waiting to hear what comes next.

Vi stirs.

She doesn’t pull away. Doesn’t tense like she might have a month ago, or even last week. She just breathes a little deeper and says, “Yeah?” in that gravel-worn voice, sleep-drunk and soft, curiosity beneath the rasp.

Mel’s hand stills against her back.

“Not just until you heal,” she says, and now her voice has steadied, anchored in something she can’t back out of. “Not just until they stop coming after us.”

She swallows. The words are warm on her tongue. Weighty. Vulnerable. She’s said hundreds of things in council halls, to her mother, to the world’s most dangerous minds—but this feels heavier than all of them.

“For good,” she finishes. “Let the world come to us for once.”

There’s a heartbeat—two.

And then Vi exhales.

Not fast. Not sharp.

Just a long, slow sigh, like letting go of the last grip she had on something she didn’t need to carry anymore.

Her voice is quieter now, not sleep-clouded, but awake. Present.

“Okay.”

Mel doesn’t know what to expect in that moment. Maybe tears. Maybe her own hands shaking. Maybe some final resistance in her chest that would keep her from believing it was real.

But instead—there’s peace.

A stillness that roots deep. That wraps around her ribs like a second skin. That tells her without doubt or fear or even ache: this is what wanting feels like when you stop being afraid to say it out loud.

She tightens her arm around Vi.

Brings her hand up, brushes fingers through Vi’s damp pink hair—shaggy, a little uneven at the edges, still streaked with soot in places she didn’t quite wash clean—and kisses the top of her head.

Vi shifts again, turning just enough to press her face against Mel’s collarbone. Her arm tightens fractionally around Mel’s middle, possessive in the gentlest way, and her nose scrunches as she mumbles, “Your heartbeat’s fast.”

“Shut up,” Mel murmurs, voice rich with affection.

Vi grins against her skin. “You love me.”

Mel hums. “Terribly.”

Vi’s eyes are still closed, but her hand moves, fingers drifting up, settling in the center of Mel’s chest. “It’s not gonna be easy. You know that, right?”

“I’ve never wanted easy.”

There’s a silence that stretches then. Not awkward. Not empty. Just full of everything they’ve already said and everything they don’t need to.

Rain starts again outside, soft against the windows.

The wind curls around the edges of the room, rustling the sheer drapes like someone sighing through a dream. The garden beyond breathes with the storm, and the whole world feels far away, blurred by the closeness of the bed, the press of warm skin, the steady rhythm of two people who’ve finally stopped running.

Mel shifts just slightly, enough to brush her fingers across Vi’s temple, smoothing back her hair.

“Do you ever think,” she asks, voice quieter than ever, “that maybe we were always going to find each other?”

Vi doesn’t open her eyes.

But she answers.

“Every damn day.”

Mel closes her own eyes. Lets the warmth sink into her bones. Lets the shape of Vi curled into her fill the space where fear used to live.

Outside, the storm rolls on.

Inside, for the first time in her life, Mel doesn’t feel like she has to be anyone but exactly who she is.

And Vi doesn’t move again.

Because she’s already home.

Vi wakes with the ache of living still pressed into her bones.

It’s early—too early for the sun to be anything more than a faint wash of gold leaking through the cracks in the curtains. The estate is quiet, the kind of silence that hums with comfort rather than fear, and the sheets tangled around her hips are soft and warm and unfamiliar in a way that’s become familiar.

Her ribs hurt. Her shoulder is a knot of pressure beneath the sling, a throb that pulses in time with her heartbeat. Her leg, elevated slightly, is wrapped in gauze thick enough to keep the worst of the pain dulled. Every breath reminds her she’s lucky to be taking it.

But she’s here.

Alive.

And she doesn’t feel lucky. She feels raw. Heavy. Full of something that tastes like grief and joy at the same time.

She turns her head—slowly, so the room doesn’t spin—and sees her.

Mel.

Standing near the window, barefoot, her silk robe tied messily at her waist. Her hair is half up, strands falling in dark waves down her neck and shoulders, still mussed from sleep. She’s holding a notepad in one hand, a stylus in the other, chewing absentmindedly on its end like she doesn’t realize she’s doing it.

The sight punches the air from Vi’s lungs.

Mel is radiant in a way no one else ever gets to see. Not when she’s wearing her council mask. Not when she’s draped in finery and power and all the things Piltover demands of her. This—this version of her, in soft morning light, muttering to herself about structural updates and diplomacy gaps—is the one Vi aches for. The one she bled for.

Mel’s brow furrows. She frowns. Crosses something out violently with a curse under her breath, then immediately begins again. She talks softly to herself as she works, pacing a slow path between the window and the table, gesturing with the stylus as if she's explaining something to an audience only she can see.

Vi watches.

Eyes half-lidded. Breathing through the ache. Trying not to blink, because she doesn’t want to miss this. The domesticity. The absurd, unbelievable tenderness of it. Her, lying there like a half-broken weapon—and Mel, across the room, unknowingly glowing.

Another frustrated sound escapes Mel’s throat.

She tosses the stylus aside—clatter—and immediately grabs another from a small porcelain cup on the windowsill. “Idiots,” she mutters. “Every last one of them.”

Vi’s chest tightens. A slow, smirking curl of a smile pulls at her mouth.

Because somehow this is real.

Somehow this is hers.

She doesn’t speak. Doesn’t want to disturb the fragile peace of the morning. Instead, she just lays there, motionless, save for the slow rise and fall of her chest. The only sound is Mel’s soft shuffling movements, the scratch of stylus to paper, and the occasional hiss of annoyance when a line of math doesn’t resolve or a note doesn’t align with her thoughts.

Time moves strangely in that quiet. Stretches. Softens.

The pain fades to a dull hum. The world, for once, doesn’t demand her fists or her fury.

She just… is.

And then the front door clicks.

It’s so quiet she almost misses it, but the shift in the air is immediate—like something wild just slipped into the room.

A second later, Powder slides into the room like she owns it. She’s dressed in one of her chaos-styled jackets, something patched and pinned and probably rigged with gadgets. Her goggles are pushed up onto her head, and there’s grease on her cheek. In one hand is a cloth bag, swinging slightly as she makes her way toward the kitchen counter.

She freezes when she spots Vi.

Vi, laid out on the couch, arm in a sling, leg propped up on a cushion. Her hair is damp with sweat, her skin pale with recovery, but her eyes—her eyes are clear. Focused.

Powder looks at her for a long beat.

Then at the bag of pastries in her hand.

Then—at Mel, who, noticing the sudden quiet, looks up and walks across the room.

Without a word, she leans down and presses a kiss to Vi’s temple. Light. Thoughtless. So natural it knocks something sideways in both of them.

Then she turns and heads back to her work, leaving Vi blinking at the ceiling like someone just rewired her soul.

Powder lets out a low whistle. “She’s the only person who’s ever made you sit still.”

Vi groans, letting her head fall back into the plush cushion. “She’s the only person who’s ever made me want to.”

And it’s true.

It’s a truth that wraps around her ribs tighter than the bandages, that roots into her marrow, that pulls the sting from every injury she took that night. She didn’t fight for Piltover. Not really. Not even for herself.

She fought for this.

For mornings like this. For the sound of Mel muttering and scribbling with frustration. For the way Powder grins like a devil as she hands her a stolen apple pastry and plops down in the armchair across from her. For the sunlight and the safety and the knowledge that for once, she doesn’t have to run. Doesn’t have to fix everything. Doesn’t have to bleed alone.

She’s not just in love.

She’s found the shape of herself she didn’t know she was missing.

It fits like a wound healing closed. Like the final piece of something jagged finally clicking into place.

She leans back.

Closes her eyes.

Mel’s voice drifts across the room again—frustrated, muttering something about zoning ordinances and perimeter security.

Vi smiles.

And breathes.

They don’t rush.

Not because the air isn’t heavy with heat—it is. Charged like lightning against skin. It coils around them like smoke, thick with the weight of every touch they haven’t yet had the courage to give, every glance that lasted a beat too long, every kiss that ended just before the fall.

But tonight, they take their time.

The city hums beyond the windows, cloaked in deep navy and gold, the flicker of lanterns on rain-slick streets casting long shadows through the glass. A breeze stirs the curtains. Somewhere far below, a dog barks once. A late tram shudders past. But here, in this room, there is only them. The world ends at the edge of the bed.

Vi stands just inside the doorway, still breathing a little too fast, her bruises catching the lamplight like old war medals. She’s bare-footed, fresh from a shower, her undershirt clinging to her ribs, the sling on her shoulder finally discarded now that the stitches are mostly healed. Her hair is damp and tousled, the shaved sides already growing out slightly, giving her a more rugged edge—but the way she looks at Mel softens all of it.

Mel is seated on the edge of the bed, wrapped in a silk robe the color of burnished bronze, her hair loose and tumbling over one shoulder. She isn’t wearing any of the armor she usually wears when the world is watching—no earrings, no sharp heels, no paint across her lips. Just her. Bare-faced. Vulnerable in the way only Vi ever sees. A kind of beautiful that makes Vi ache.

Neither of them speaks at first.

Vi crosses the room slowly, her footsteps soundless on the rug. She kneels in front of Mel, reaching up with calloused hands and gently brushing her fingers over the delicate curve of Mel’s ankle, then up her calf. Her touch is careful, reverent, like Mel is something sacred she’s afraid to break.

Mel shudders at the contact.

Not because it surprises her.

Because it means something.

Vi looks up, her gaze catching and holding Mel’s like a lifeline.

“Tell me to stop,” Vi says, voice low, quiet, full of restraint.

Mel leans forward, hands cupping Vi’s face like she’s holding something fragile and dangerous all at once.

“I will never ask you to stop,” she whispers.

So Vi doesn’t.

She rises slowly, letting her hands trace their way up Mel’s legs, over the silk at her hips, along the dip of her waist, until her palms rest on either side of her ribs. She doesn’t push. Just holds her there, grounding them both in this one electric moment.

Mel’s breath catches as Vi leans in, lips brushing hers—lightly. Once. Then again, deeper, and Mel leans into it like she’s falling. Because she is. She always has been.

Vi’s hands slide behind her, pulling her gently up until they’re both on their knees, eye to eye, mouths inches apart. And when Vi kisses her again, it’s slow and burning. Not just desire—but devotion. Worship.

She lets her hands roam, pulling the silk robe down Mel’s shoulders, baring her inch by inch, never rushing. Never demanding. Just seeing her.

And Mel lets her.

Lets Vi undress her like she’s unwrapping something precious. Lets her gaze run over old scars, the freckles across her collarbone, the tremble in her hands. Mel doesn’t hide. For once, she doesn’t need to. She’s not a councilwoman, not a Medarda, not a diplomat trying to hold the world together. She’s just Mel. And Vi is looking at her like that’s everything she ever wanted.

Vi’s mouth finds her shoulder.

She kisses each scar there, lips dragging gently across skin as she whispers soft, broken things against her neck—nothing articulate, just sound. Just breath and want and the ache of finally having something she never thought she deserved.

Mel’s head tips back. Her fingers curl in the back of Vi’s shirt. She whispers her name.

Again.

And again.

Like it’s a prayer.

Vi groans softly against her throat, and Mel feels it in every inch of her body. She arches into the touch, into the heat that’s building between them—not desperate, not wild, just deep. Anchored. She has never felt this wanted. Not by men in gold-trimmed suits. Not by suitors or sycophants or anyone who thought they could buy her.

Only Vi.

Only the woman who fought gods and monsters and bled herself hollow just to keep Mel safe.

Vi lowers her back onto the mattress, crawling over her like a wave. Mel’s hands roam Vi’s body, over muscle and scars and skin that feels like heat wrapped in steel. Vi braces herself with trembling arms, still careful not to put weight on her injured shoulder, but Mel pulls her down anyway, wrapping both arms around her and pressing her flush.

“Stop worrying,” she whispers. “I won’t break.”

Vi swallows hard.

“You’re the strongest thing I’ve ever touched,” she breathes.

She trails kisses down Mel’s chest, across her stomach, up again, circling back to her throat, her jaw, her lips. Every inch of her gets the same care. The same worship. Vi’s hands never stop moving, like she’s afraid Mel will disappear if she’s not touching her at all times.

Mel lets go of the last of her breath.

She whispers Vi’s name again. Soft. Shaky. Like she’s offering it up to the stars.

Vi freezes for just a second. Then lifts her head, brushes the sweat-damp curls from Mel’s forehead, and answers:

“Princess.”

Mel trembles.

Her eyes open wide, filling with something bright and dangerous and devastating all at once.

“Don’t stop calling me that,” she whispers, voice wrecked.

“Only when you say it,” she adds, her voice trembling but clear.

Vi’s breath hitches.

She kisses her again.

Harder, this time. A different kind of reverence. Not delicate now, but grounded. Present. Hands gripping Mel’s hips like they’re the edge of the world. Their bodies slot together like puzzle pieces with too much history. There’s no rush. No firestorm. Just heat. Mutual. Controlled. Chosen.

When they come down from it, the city is still quiet.

The windows are fogged. The sheets are a mess. Mel is curled against Vi’s chest, one hand tracing lazy circles over the fading bruise on her ribs. Vi’s fingers stroke gently up and down Mel’s spine, her body still humming with sensation, with the overwhelming, impossible truth of what just happened.

Mel shifts just slightly, enough to press a kiss to Vi’s collarbone.

“You,” she whispers, half-asleep, “are the only thing that’s ever made me want to stay.”

Vi doesn’t answer.

She doesn’t need to.

Because her arm tightens around Mel, and her lips brush against her forehead, and her breath is steady and slow, and her name—Mel’s name—is the only sound left in the room.

Whispered like a promise.

A prayer.

A vow.

The chandelier above them shimmered like a captured constellation, its crystals bending candlelight into trembling constellations across every polished surface. The air in the ballroom hung heavy with perfume and false politeness, the scent of roses barely masking the sharper tang of money and ambition. Music drifted along the edges—something classical, something forgettable. Mel had chosen it for that exact reason. Let the strings swell and drown out real conversation. Let people pretend.

She stood near the center of the room, every inch of her poised, graceful, aloof. Black velvet clung to her form like ink, her shoulders bare, her collarbones gleaming like carved ivory. Gold threads shimmered like fire in her bodice, glinting each time she moved. The dress was subtle but sharp, just revealing enough to draw the eye, just commanding enough to hold it. Her hair was coiled into perfection, makeup so flawless it dared anyone to suggest she hadn’t been born with it.

She didn’t even glance at the gathered nobles as they orbited her. Smiling too hard, laughing too loud. Always talking. Always watching.

Her eyes were elsewhere.

On Vi.

Vi, who lingered by the far pillar, half-leaning against it like she belonged there more than any marble or gilded trim ever could. Her posture was relaxed, but her eyes weren’t. She was scanning the crowd like a soldier out of place in enemy territory. Always alert. Always ready. She looked too broad for the room, all sculpted strength and casual menace. Her suit was the same crimson-lined black Mel had chosen weeks ago—the one tailored to her frame like sin and structure had a baby. Gauntlets absent, hair cropped into that reckless sweep she now wore every day, red-brown with the undercut carved clean behind one ear.

She didn’t look like she belonged here.

She looked like she owned it.

And gods help her, Mel couldn’t look away.

The glass in her hand had long since gone warm. She hadn’t tasted it in half an hour. Vi had adjusted her cuff once and Mel had nearly forgotten how to breathe. But she’d held herself in check. Had given her space. Had let her lean, sulk, brood—whatever it was Vi did at these events. Mel knew these evenings were a battlefield for her lover. That standing among those who once dismissed her entire city took more strength than most wars.

But then the man walked up.

He was tall, broad-shouldered, and wore wealth like armor. His smile was all teeth, and his laugh too practiced. He swirled his drink lazily as he leaned in toward Vi, as if they were equals. As if he could touch her with his eyes and not pay for it.

Mel didn’t hear what he said, not exactly. Just caught the cadence, the pitch—low, smug, laced with something that curdled her blood.

“…dangerous women always taste sweeter.”

Vi didn’t react the way Mel expected. She didn’t punch him. Didn’t growl or roll her shoulders. No, she just raised a brow. Smirked slightly. But there was tension in her jaw. A shift in her stance. She was holding back, for Mel’s sake, and gods, it was noble and sweet and utterly unnecessary.

Because Mel was already moving.

Her heels clicked once—twice—then silence. The sound of silk on stone as she cut across the room like a guillotine with a smile. Conversations faltered. Heads turned. The man didn’t even notice her until she was beside Vi, her hand sliding—firm, claiming, warm—along Vi’s waist.

She felt Vi flinch. Then relax. Then lean.

Good.

Mel turned to the man, her voice light as smoke. “I do hope you enjoyed that drink,” she murmured. “Because it may be your last if you ever speak to her like that again.”

The man blinked. Smirked, confused. “I beg your—”

She didn’t raise her voice. Didn’t change her expression.

“Touch her,” she said, “and I’ll have your fingers removed. Diplomatically, of course.”

It wasn’t a threat. It was a vow.

The man paled.

Vi nearly choked. “Mel.”

She didn’t look at her. Just smiled, slow and practiced, and leaned in to press a kiss to Vi’s cheek. Her lips lingered just a second longer than necessary. Her hand at Vi’s waist tightened, just slightly. Claiming.

“What?” she said, sweetly. “I’m just being diplomatic.”

The man made a noise. Something like a stammer, a cough, and a retreat. He vanished into the crowd with all the grace of a man who’d just wet himself.

Mel finally turned toward Vi fully.

“My drink’s empty,” she said. “You?”

Vi stared at her like she’d been hit over the head with a chandelier.

She didn’t answer immediately. Just looked down at Mel, eyes wide, cheeks pink, expression caught somewhere between admiration and awe and you’re the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. She opened her mouth. Closed it.

Mel lifted her brows, amused.

“Well?” she asked.

“I—uh…” Vi cleared her throat. “Sure. Yeah. I’ll get you one.”

Mel smiled.

Vi didn’t move.

She just stood there, eyes fixed on her like she couldn’t quite believe what had just happened. Like Mel had grown wings or sprouted fangs or done something impossible.

And Mel watched the realization settle over her.

That she liked it.

Vi, who could toss grown men across rooms, who moved like a wrecking ball with grace, was blushing.

Her chest rose a little faster. She still hadn’t moved.

Mel leaned in, voice lower now, pitched only for her. “You like it when I get territorial.”

Vi’s eyes widened.

“I mean—” she floundered, “I wouldn’t say like, exactly—”

Mel tilted her head. “No?”

Vi swallowed. “It’s just… really cute. In, uh. A very terrifying way.”

Mel stepped closer.

Vi backed up. Only slightly. Her back hit the pillar.

Mel smiled.

“Do I scare you, enforcer?”

Vi shook her head fast enough to nearly knock her drink over. “No. No, you’re just—um—hot.”

Mel laughed. Soft and dark and satisfied.

Vi’s entire face went red.

Mel reached up, brushed a lock of Vi’s hair behind her ear, and let her fingers trail down the line of her jaw. “You’re mine,” she murmured. “You know that, right?”

Vi swallowed hard. Nodded.

“Say it.”

Vi blinked.

Mel waited.

The moment stretched—tight, electric, unbearable.

Then, softly, breathless: “I’m yours.”

Mel leaned in and kissed her. Not on the cheek. Not for show. Full on the mouth—deliberate, slow, in full view of half the ballroom. She felt Vi melt against her, felt those big hands falter, hover, then settle—careful and shaking—on her hips.

When she pulled back, Mel was smiling. “Good girl.”

Vi let out a noise. A whimper? A groan? It was somewhere in the vicinity of completely undone.

Mel turned on her heel and started walking toward the bar.

Vi followed.

Immediately.

And not a single soul dared speak a word to either of them for the rest of the night.

Not when Mel fed Vi a cherry from her drink without asking. Not when Vi leaned down to whisper something that made Mel roll her eyes and smile like it was a private joke between empires. Not when Mel smoothed a wrinkle from Vi’s lapel with the kind of care that spoke of intimacy, not polish.

And certainly not when Mel wrapped her hand around Vi’s pinky under the table, then slowly, deliberately, laced all their fingers together.

Mel had played the diplomat for too long.

She was done pretending.

And Vi—tall, scarred, dangerous Vi—looked at her like she’d just been given something sacred. Something precious.

Possession had never felt like this before.

It wasn’t control. It wasn’t power.

It was choice.

Vi chose her.

And tonight, the whole world could see exactly who she belonged to.

And Mel?

Mel wasn’t hiding it.

Not ever again.

Vi hadn’t even meant to react. Not really.

It was one of those quiet council debriefs that should’ve blurred into memory like smoke—long tables, recycled air under Piltover’s dome, too many names she didn’t care about and voices that tried too hard to sound important. She was there out of duty, not desire. A silent sentinel at Mel’s side, watching everything without needing to speak. Her suit jacket hung open, gloves off, hair swept back into its usual jagged, undercut chaos, eyes sharp beneath her lashes but posture easy, confident. At least at first.

It was only after the meeting officially ended—after the usual flood of mutual congratulations and cautious handshakes—that he showed up.

Council Aide Fenric Del.

From Zaun, technically, though everything about him reeked of Piltover polish. Young, sharp-jawed, arrogant in the careful way that made people mistake it for charm. He wore a tailored slate-gray ensemble with a metallic glint in the stitching, and he walked like he knew people looked.

And gods, did he look at Mel.

Vi clocked it instantly. The way his gaze caught on Mel’s shoulder, then her collarbone, then her mouth—not with overt hunger, no. That would’ve gotten him punched. No, he had finesse. His words were smooth, his tone wrapped in velvet and feigned professionalism.

But Vi had seen it before. A thousand times in the Drop. In alleys. In high halls and low dens. That specific breed of man who thought he could flirt under the guise of admiration. That if he was eloquent enough, clever enough, refined enough, maybe she’d laugh. Maybe she’d tilt her chin and give him something to remember.

Vi leaned back against the wall and crossed her arms.

He was saying something about lighting. About how it “framed her features like the work of a master sculptor.” She could hear it from across the chamber.

Mel gave a polite nod. Thanked him, voice light. Not warm—just pleasant.

Vi’s jaw twitched.

The aide stepped in, not too close, but closer than Vi liked. He passed Mel a notepad with a note clipped to the top. Something about data sharing, regional concerns—whatever excuse he needed to get just a little nearer.

Vi didn’t speak.

She stepped forward.

Not dramatically. Not with fists clenched or shoulders squared. Just one step. Heavy enough to be heard. Smooth enough to seem incidental. But close enough that her presence landed in the air like static. The aide faltered. His hand hesitated mid-reach, then resumed—quicker, sharper. He passed the note. Smiled tight.

Then turned to go, stumbling ever so slightly over his goodbye.

Vi watched him leave with the dead-eyed calm of someone evaluating threats by weight class.

Mel didn’t even blink. She just turned to ask Viktor something about the energy conversion rates in the lower turbine systems, completely unaware of the fact that Vi had just mentally buried a man alive with nothing but presence.

But the others noticed.

Jayce had been watching from the side, slouched against a pillar like he hadn’t been paying attention at all—except he always paid attention when it came to that. Vi caught the moment his brows lifted in silent, delighted judgment.

Viktor’s head tilted slightly. He tapped the end of his pencil against his lip, then scribbled something in his ever-present notebook.

Powder, lounging with one leg hooked over the arm of a plush council lounge chair, sipped noisily from her juice glass and snorted.

Vi felt the burn of heat creep up her neck. She stuffed her hands into her pockets and looked away.

That should’ve been the end of it.

But then came the lounge ambush.

She walked in later that evening, exhausted and ready to steal an apple and vanish, and all three of them were waiting like wolves smelling blood.

Jayce looked up first, far too innocent. “Hey, Vi,” he called. “How’s the weather over in the ‘hyper-possessive emotional guard dog’ region of the city?”

Vi blinked. “What?”

Powder leaned forward. “You know. The stance. The shuffle.”

Vi frowned. “I don’t shuffle.”

“Babe,” Powder said, grinning like the devil, “you stood like he was hitting on your wife at your own wedding.”

Viktor flipped a page. “I’m compiling a study. Early hypothesis: your behavior falls within a fascinating category of subconscious romantic territorialism. Subject appears unaware of body-blocking tactics deployed in proximity to potential rivals.”

Jayce wheezed. “Body-blocking. I knew it!”

Vi groaned. “I wasn’t doing anything.”

“You weren’t doing anything verbally,” Powder clarified. “But physically? You were out there like a six-foot ‘Property of Medarda’ sign.”

Vi shoved a pillow off the nearest chair and launched it at her. Powder caught it, still grinning.

“I didn’t growl,” Vi muttered.

Jayce looked personally offended. “No, but you loomed. There was looming, Vi.”

“I stood there. That’s not looming.”

“You stood there like a nightclub bouncer.”

Vi groaned, dragging a hand down her face.

Viktor, ever the observer, merely tapped his pencil thoughtfully. “Fascinating. I think we should begin measuring the distance between Vi and Mel when other individuals are present. Correlate it to eye contact, tone of voice, potential pheromone spikes—”

“Viktor,” Vi growled.

Powder flopped onto her back dramatically. “She’s in love. It’s adorable. And painfully obvious.”

Vi’s face went bright red. “Shut up.”

But she wasn’t angry.

Not really.

Because, honestly?

They weren’t wrong.

She had shifted forward. Had wanted to do more. To reach out. To wrap an arm around Mel’s waist, to kiss the top of her head like it was nothing, to press her into the edge of the table and say mine with every part of her body.

And it hadn’t even been about the guy. Not really.

It was just… watching someone else see what she saw every day. The way Mel’s eyes caught the light. The curve of her mouth when she was focused. That infuriating little smile she gave when someone tried too hard to impress her.

Vi wasn’t stupid. She knew Mel was beautiful. Knew she was a force. She wasn’t surprised someone else wanted her.

She just hated that they thought they had a chance.

And the worst part?

Mel hadn’t noticed any of it.

She’d barely registered the guy as more than a name on a file. Hadn’t flinched at Vi’s proximity. Hadn’t even raised a brow when he’d stammered and fled like he’d almost pissed himself.

Because to Mel, Vi standing that close was normal.

Vi walking beside her with her hand brushing her hip? Normal.

Vi tucking her coat around her shoulders after meetings, staying two steps behind like a shadow, fixing her tea exactly how she liked it without asking?

All of that—just normal.

And Vi didn’t know what to do with that.

With how good it felt.

How terrifying.

Later that night, back at the estate, Mel walked past her with damp hair and a cup of something warm, wrapped in a robe that bared one shoulder and made Vi’s brain stop working entirely.

“Long day,” Mel said, sighing.

Vi could barely manage a nod.

Mel smiled. Kissed her cheek absently on the way to the sofa.

Vi watched her settle down, cross her legs, start scanning through her data tablet like the earlier incident didn’t even exist.

And Vi—

Vi sat beside her, didn’t speak, didn’t move.

But she curled one arm along the back of the couch.

And let her fingers rest—just barely—at the nape of Mel’s neck.

Mel didn’t say a word.

But she leaned back into the touch.

And Vi, burning from the inside out, didn’t even try to hide her grin.

The marble of the promenade gleamed like polished bone beneath the city’s golden light, the air thick with the weight of opulence and anticipation. Evening painted everything in soft rose and champagne, casting elongated shadows along the columns and arches that wrapped the inner Piltover halls like a crown. Voices lifted and blurred—soft laughter, the buzz of the press, the echo of designers and delegates clinking glasses just behind the public veil.

It was one of the more tolerable public events, truth be told—Powder had been roped into unveiling a new hex-tech prototype with Jayce, which meant Mel didn’t have to speak for once. No speeches. No ribbon to cut. She only had to smile, nod, and look divine under the spotlight.

And she had Vi at her side.

Vi didn’t dress up often, but when she did… gods. She wore tailored charcoal black that clung to every muscle like worship. The sleeves rolled just high enough to show her inked forearms, and the crimson lining along her collar caught the low light like embers. Her boots clicked sharp and certain against the floor. And her hair—messy, uneven in that carefully cultivated chaos, undercut clean behind her ear—made her look like a holy riot carved from smoke and fire.

Bigger than Mel. Always. Broader across the chest, towering just enough that Mel had to tilt her chin slightly to meet her eyes, especially in heels. And it wasn’t just the height. It was the way Vi held space. Like a threat in repose. A cathedral on the edge of violence. And all of it, somehow, for her.

Mel had gotten used to the presence. The weight of Vi’s gaze on her when she spoke. The way she drifted closer in crowds, how her hand always hovered just an inch from touching. She knew Vi didn’t like public events. But she came anyway. She endured the pomp and the politics because Mel asked. And more than that—because she wanted to be seen beside her.

Which made it all the sweeter when Vi’s restraint cracked.

They were winding through the promenade after the event. The crowd had thickened—politicians, investors, engineers and socialites blending into a sea of perfume and patent talk. Mel kept close to Vi’s side, one hand casually hooked around her wrist, until someone stepped into her path.

He was young. Clean-shaven. All gleaming teeth and casual arrogance, his coat crested in gold, his eyes flicking over her like she was a trophy on display. Mel recognized the name—Ronan Nax. Tech heir. Second-generation money. A mouth that moved faster than his mind.

“Councilwoman Medarda,” he purred, voice slick with familiarity. “Forgive me, I couldn’t leave without saying—you wear innovation as well as you wear couture.”

Mel arched a brow. “That’s not a compliment I’ve heard before.”

He grinned wider. “I have more. Your earrings—hex-gold, yes? You wear them like royalty. Though I suppose you always do.”

Then, with the kind of presumptuousness only the wealthy could summon, he reached out and brushed her elbow.

The contact was light.

But not light enough.

Vi was there in a second.

Mel didn’t even see her move—just felt the shift. The warmth of her body at her back, the sudden, undeniable presence of her arm sliding around Mel’s waist like a claim. Her hand splayed flat against the silk of Mel’s dress, fingers wide, firm, unyielding. Not tight enough to hurt. Just enough to hold.

To own.

“Everything alright, princess?” Vi asked.

Low. Calm.

But underneath it, there was steel. A vibration that moved through Mel’s bones like a pulled thread. A quiet, coiled growl behind the softness.

The man blanched. Said something about being late. Disappeared into the crowd like smoke.

Mel didn’t watch him go.

She couldn’t.

She could barely breathe.

Because Vi hadn’t let go.

Her arm was still wrapped around Mel’s waist, thumb now tracing slow, idle circles over the dip of her hip like she belonged there. Like she wasn’t even aware she was doing it. Like she knew Mel wouldn’t pull away.

Mel didn’t.

Couldn’t.

The crowd buzzed on. Powder was somewhere ahead with Jayce, already laughing at something Viktor had no doubt said in his dry, surgical tone. But Mel couldn’t hear any of it.

All she heard was the echo of that voice.

Everything alright, princess?

Gods.

By the time they got home—carriage quiet, Vi silent beside her, jaw tight with something like regret—Mel was shaking. Not from anger. Not even from adrenaline.

From want.

From the memory of that voice, that hand, that moment of raw, unfiltered claim.

Vi opened the door for her. Let her step inside first. Didn’t say a word.

Not until they were out of the foyer and into the low golden glow of the entry hall.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” Vi said, voice stiff with self-recrimination. “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking. He touched you and I—shit. If that crossed a line—”

Mel didn’t let her finish.

She grabbed Vi by the lapels and kissed her.

Hard.

Fierce.

Her lips crashed into Vi’s with the full weight of an hour’s worth of pent-up hunger. And Vi—Vi made a stunned noise in the back of her throat but didn’t hesitate. Her hands gripped Mel’s hips instantly, anchoring her in place like she was afraid to let go.

When they pulled apart, both of them breathless, Mel didn’t let go.

She shoved Vi back against the door, her own body pressed firm and sure against hers. Her hand fisted in Vi’s collar.

“Don’t you dare apologize,” she said, voice ragged. “You saying I’m yours like that? In front of people? Gods, Vi…”

Vi blinked. Still dazed. “Wait… that—did that do it for you?”

Mel let out a breathless laugh. “That did everything for me.”

Vi swallowed hard. “Oh.”

Mel kissed her again. Slower this time. Deeper. Tongue flicking over hers with a sigh that sounded like surrender.

The council chamber was a theater of anticipation, its grandeur built for spectacle, its echoing arches designed to amplify power. Light streamed through tall arched windows like judgment passed from the heavens, the morning sun slicing across rows of gilded chairs and polished stone. Every seat was filled—lords in embroidered coats, scientists with gleaming lenses, scholars with ink-stained fingers, soldiers with rigid backs. Piltover's finest. Its most dangerous minds. And at the center of it all, the very heart of the storm, stood Mel Medarda.

She had always known how to dress for war. And today, that meant crimson.

The gown she wore wasn’t simply fabric—it was defiance stitched in silk. Deep red like blood drawn in love, its seams threaded with Zaunite metalwork, tiny iridescent lines of green and steel that gleamed faintly with every breath she took. Her shoulders were bare, the cut of the dress sharp enough to silence, and her hair was swept up into a crown of braids and coiled gold. She stood alone at the central dais, no papers in her hands, no script. Only her voice. And her choice.

The chamber had come expecting numbers. A pivot in trade. A nod to political nuance. Another perfectly timed maneuver from the Medarda heiress.

Instead, they got a truth no one was prepared for.

She raised her chin, and the murmurs quieted.

"I have stood at this podium many times before," she began, her voice unwavering, ringing clean across the stones. “I have spoken of unity. Of compromise. Of forging bonds between Piltover and Zaun that transcend history, ideology, and blood. But today, I offer something more than policy.”

She paused.

A ripple of confusion stirred through the crowd.

“I offer something that cannot be drafted, legislated, or quantified in coin.”

She looked upward, just once. Toward the balcony above the chamber, where she knew Vi stood. Watching. Waiting. She hadn’t told her. Not this part. Not this statement.

And gods, that made it real.

“I name my partner,” she said clearly. “My equal. My protector. My most trusted voice in matters of peace and war, between Piltover and Zaun.”

A breath was sucked from the room.

“I name Violet,” Mel continued, her voice softening, but losing none of its strength. “Not just as the woman I love. But as the one who stood beside me when others fled. As the one who fought beside Zaun and bled for Piltover, and who still believes there can be more than what we inherited. I name her as my advisor, my chosen shield. As the one I trust not because of legacy, but because of loyalty. Because of choice.”

A low murmur began to build. Somewhere in the third row, a man rose, his mouth already open to object, to challenge.

And then Powder stood.

She didn’t say a word.

Just cracked her knuckles, slow and deliberate.

The man sat down again.

Mel’s lips curved slightly. She glanced once more to the balcony.

Vi hadn’t moved.

At first.

She just stood there, utterly frozen, her hands gripping the stone railing like she needed something to keep her from floating. Her eyes were wide, shining, her chest rising like she’d just taken a punch.

Then Powder leaned over and grabbed her hand.

“Go get your girl.”

Vi didn’t hesitate.

She turned, bolted down the stairs. Her boots rang against the stone, heavy and sure and unstoppable. Every head in the chamber turned. Dozens of the most powerful people in the city parted for her, like stone giving way to storm. Vi moved like she’d always belonged here—because Mel had named her here.

And then she was there.

In front of her.

Mel turned.

Vi grabbed her face in both hands and kissed her.

The silence that followed wasn’t empty.

It was reverent.

No one moved. No one dared to breathe too loud. The whole world condensed into that one electric second—Vi’s fingers trembling where they held Mel’s jaw, Mel’s hands curled in the front of Vi’s shirt like she could pull her closer, as if there were any space left between them at all.

Mel breathed into her like it was her first real breath in hours. Vi kissed her like it was the only way she knew how to say thank you, I love you, I’m yours.

And neither of them let go.

When they parted—slow, aching, like waves receding from shore—Mel whispered, soft enough that only Vi could hear it.

“I choose you. Even bleeding.”

Vi closed her eyes.

And rested her forehead against hers.

“You’ll never bleed alone.”

Mel smiled.

“You never let me.”

The room was still quiet, but the spell had shifted. The crowd didn’t look away. They watched, stunned, some in awe, some in disgust, some in stunned silence that hadn’t yet processed the meaning of what they’d seen.

But Mel didn’t care.

And Vi didn’t look away.

Because everything in the world had narrowed to this—this moment, this choice, this claim made in front of every witness that mattered.

It wasn’t a wedding.

It didn’t need to be.

It was something more sacred.

An act of political rebellion and personal devotion, rolled into one breathless kiss on the council floor. A declaration not carved in ink but in presence.

Vi reached up, her thumb brushing along Mel’s cheekbone.

“You’re terrifying when you talk like that,” she whispered.

Mel leaned in, brushing their noses together. “I know.”

“You just made me an equal.”

“I made you mine.”

Vi grinned. “Same thing.”

And though neither of them smiled much in public, they did then.

Because they had already won. Not the chamber. Not the game.

Each other.

And neither of them would ever walk alone again.

The lights above The Last Drop glowed with the kind of warmth that couldn’t be fabricated. They buzzed faintly—old bulbs strung like stars between the rafters, each one casting a halo of amber onto the wooden floor below. Music crackled from the old record player in the corner, scratchy and familiar, a half-forgotten tune that had probably spun through this place when they were kids. Laughter rose in pockets, bright and unchecked, breaking like waves against the din of shuffling feet and clinking glasses.

And through it all, the old ghosts wandered. Not in sorrow. Not tonight.

Mylo could be seen slouched in a chair by the dice table, leaning back with his boots up, bickering dramatically with Ekko over the rules of a game neither of them really knew how to play. His grin split too wide, a shadow from another time, and it made Ekko roll his eyes with something like joy. Claggor, solid and clumsy and loud, accidentally knocked a half-filled mug off the bar while reaching for something else. Powder shrieked with laughter at the splash, clapping her hands and pointing before she ducked away, chased by her own amusement.

It felt alive here. Truly alive.

Viktor leaned in the open doorway, one shoulder against the frame, hands tucked into the pockets of his vest as he watched it all unfold with the kind of quiet satisfaction that spoke of earned peace. Jayce was at a nearby table, his sleeves rolled up, eyebrows raised high as a smug teenager laid down a winning hand, scooping up a pile of sweets and loose coins with the ease of a seasoned card shark.

Behind the bar, Vi stood with her sleeves rolled back, forearms bare and stained with ink and a thin sheen of sweat. She wore an apron she kept forgetting to tie properly, her hair tousled and wild in its usual chaos—longer on top, shaved beneath, always falling over one eye. The faint flicker of firelight gleamed off the undercut, catching the copper-red in her hair like a beacon. Her hands moved with practiced ease, pouring, mixing, wiping the counter between drinks.

She looked completely out of place. And at the same time, like she belonged more than anyone else in the room.

Mel sat at the bar with her chin propped in her hand, watching.

And watching.

It wasn’t the poised gaze she gave during council meetings, or the cool, assessing glances she saved for enemies. It was soft. Almost fragile in its quietness. Her smile was barely there—just the curve of lips that hadn’t stopped trembling since she walked into this place, since she saw Vi behind the counter like she was carved out of the home that raised her.

She’d never thought she’d get this.

She didn’t know how she had lived without it.

Vi glanced up, as if sensing her staring, and the moment their eyes met, she grinned. Not a smirk. Not the teasing flash she wore when she flirted or bantered.

Just a real smile.

She slid the drink across the counter without a word.

Mel took a sip. Sighed. “You still put too much gin.”

Vi shrugged one shoulder. “You still drink every drop.”

The teasing in her voice was gentle now. Not baiting. Just familiar. Like fingers tracing the outline of a love worn into muscle memory.

Mel leaned forward, cradling the glass in her hands, her body language so open it felt almost naked.

Powder danced past in a blur of pale hair and spinning skirts, caught up in whatever song was playing, and Ekko appeared like gravity to pull her back. Their laughter spiraled together into something too bright to hold.

Mel watched them. Watched this. All of it.

For a moment, the world fell away. No politics. No danger. No tremble of war creeping behind the curtain.

Just them.

This place. These people.

The breath between what had been and what could be.

Vi came around the bar and leaned into her from behind, her arms sliding along Mel’s sides, her chin resting lightly on her shoulder.

“What’s that face for?” she murmured, lips brushing against Mel’s ear.

Mel didn’t answer right away. She just took Vi’s hand, lifted it, and twined their fingers together like the answer was there—flesh to flesh, promise to promise.

She turned slightly, just enough that Vi could see her eyes.

“This. All of this. We chose this.”

Vi didn’t laugh. Didn’t make some wry joke.

She just held her tighter.

And said, quietly, like it meant everything in the world:

“Damn right we did.”

Mel’s eyes stung.

Vi kissed the edge of her jaw, soft and slow. Then rested her forehead against her temple. They breathed together for a long moment. No words needed. No show for the room.

They weren’t performing.

This was just truth.

Powder came crashing into them next, eyes wild and arms flailing, grabbing their entwined hands and pulling.

“Come on!” she demanded. “You’re dancing. You have to dance!”

Vi opened her mouth to protest.

Powder was faster. “Don’t make me tell everyone how much you cry when Mel leaves for council meetings—”

“Powder.”

She was already skipping away, giggling.

Vi sighed, looked at Mel.

Mel looked smug.

Vi gave her a long-suffering look. “You planned that.”

Mel raised her brows innocently. “What, me? Manipulate a situation?”

Vi rolled her eyes and tugged her toward the makeshift dance floor.

The room was chaos in the best way—feet stomping in time with mismatched music, someone shouting about spilled beer, someone else laughing too hard to breathe—but in the middle of it all, they found rhythm.

Mel curled against Vi’s chest, letting her hand rest just below her collarbone, fingers stroking the line of her jaw.

Vi held her with both arms. One hand at her waist, one splayed across the small of her back. Like she was anchoring them both to this moment. Her touch was careful, reverent, but her stance was protective. Always. Bigger. Broader. Her chin resting on Mel’s crown.

They swayed together like the song was written just for them.

And maybe it was.

Maybe this whole night, this whole life—was a song they’d bled for.

Mel whispered against her chest, “Do you remember when we thought we wouldn’t survive?”

Vi exhaled slowly. “Which time?”

Mel huffed a laugh. “Exactly.”

Vi leaned down, kissed her temple.

“But we did,” she said. “We’re here.”

Mel looked up.

And Vi met her eyes.

That moment—their feet slowing, the rest of the room spinning around them like stardust—felt like the edge of the world. Like standing on the precipice of a beginning.

“I want this,” Mel whispered.

Vi’s brow furrowed. “You have it.”

“No. I want this. Again. And again. For years. For lifetimes.”

Vi didn’t speak.

She just nodded.

And kissed her like it was already a vow.

The kind you didn’t need a ceremony for.

The kind that was spoken with presence. With choice. With hands held in the center of a room filled with laughter and ghosts and the echoes of who they used to be.

Powder whooped as she spun past.

Viktor raised a glass silently.

Jayce saluted them with a grin.

And Vi, holding Mel like a prayer made flesh, looked up.

The stars—barely visible through the old skylight above—seemed to be watching.

And if they could speak, they would have said the same thing.

They chose this.

And they would keep choosing it.

Forever.