Little Cassiopeia. Whatever shall we do with you?
The blood in her sets wrong, like the blood in him - DuCouteau is a name that has stood for longer than their father’s father’s father, and in the wake of Marcus’ rest there stands a beast and a knife to carry the name. Bless the eldest, as the enemies of their house say - the otjher children are blights at best, wretches at worst, and their worst secrets were kept behind half-opened doors for the longest time. Serpentine curses, however, are harder to hide.
It is a taboo to speak of the former lady in the building above the catacombs she resides in. Her chambers are as they were when she embarked one year before - cleaned, kept in a particular order of cold harmony, as Cassiopeia wanted it. Her personal attendants have kept it free of grime and dust, yet otherwise it remains untouched.
It continues to, as well, as she sits in darkness and tastes the burn of acid on her tongue. She has not seen sunlight since the day she embarked to travel back to Noxus Prime, waiting for the cover of night to cross into the capital. The only words she has exchanged with anyone since then was her sister, informing that not a single soul knew of her return. She lives now beneath marble stone. Yet she died in the tombs of the emperors, blood sick with acid.
Cassiopeia DuCouteau is alive. Cassiopeia DuCouteau is dead.
Maybe it’s the curiosity that brought Talon down here. Maybe it’s the agony of not knowing where she was that made him come. Maybe he wanted to see where scale meets flesh and how the bones work. Maybe he missed her. Maybe he wanted to laugh at her. She only knows he’s there when the peek of light from the furthest stairwell lights her lanterned abode some more.
His footsteps are quiet. Her slither is as well. She is curled in pillows, lounging as she would on her half-back sofa in her parlour.
“My dear, sweet baby brother. What is it that you have brought for me?”
