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The first time Renekton sees him, the slave is trailing after his prince, caught up in one of the boy’s impassioned ramblings as they make their way across the palace grounds. They are headed toward the Great Library—his brother’s domain, a place for the learned and the virtuous and the wise.
Wisdom has never been Renekton’s strong suit. He had not needed special words nor decrepit tomes to survive in the village, only his fists and a special tolerance for pain. He had not needed to philosophize, not in the village nor on the battlefield, and certainly not now, at the height of his power.
Ally and enemy trembles alike at the sound of his name, synonymous with destruction and violence, a monster in both deed and form. It is a terrible burden, but he bears it nonetheless. He takes pride in it; it is all he is, all he has—a weapon for his brother to wield.
And still, when the slave boy meets the Ascended’s thunderous gaze, a seed is planted, dark and ugly and wicked as the Void itself.
Most cower. They take one look at the beast the Sun has made of him and avert their eyes, hoping to go unnoticed, unseen, unscathed. A slave, moreso. A slave should not dare. And yet, there is no fear there, not in this boy’s eyes, not of Renekton, Gatekeeper of Shurima, Butcher of the Sands, Chosen of the Sun.
No, the slave looks upon him, not with fear or reverence or even defiance, but of glimmering interest, an effusive sort of curiosity no one has ever once showed him. It startles him. With just a glance, the slave excises his insecurity and doubt to be examined beneath his clever eye. It makes something twist in his gut, forms a feeling so deep and dark in the pit of his gut Renekton cannot be sure it is there at all.
Minutes (or perhaps hours or years or all the ages of the earth) pass before the slave looks away. But it is not fear or reverence or any ounce of submission that causes him to bend, but Azir—Azir, his prince, Azir, his savior, Azir, the Ever-Golden.
He looks at him like he is the loveliest thing he has ever seen—perfect and pure and untouched by the all the ugliness of this world. Azir has soft hands and a softer heart. His love is for matters of the mind; his fists have never known violence.
Renekton looks at them, and for a moment sees different people entirely.
-
The first time they speak, they are in the training grounds, waiting for Azir yet again.
Azir has made a habit of this, skirting around his newly-acquired obligations with flimsy excuses. He is late to every training session, always ready with a new reason for his tardiness. The Emperor wishes to have the slave boy executed, distracting as he is to his heir, but even the coldest advisors know they have suffered enough loss.
Renekton feels for the boy. To watch your brother die is a cruelty he would wish upon no man; to watch six of them—he cannot imagine the agony.
He will never forget that day beneath the Sun Disc. He will never forget the fear or desperation or the weight of his brother in his arms. His perfect brother, his pure brother, with soft hands and a softer heart. Renekton would have died for Nasus; he still would.
His brother was not made to witness the horrors of the earth.
"What are you doing here?” the boy asks, a serrated blade ripping through the tense silence. Renekton peers down from beneath his snout, impassive despite the unease stirring beneath his scales. “You are an Ascended, are you not? A god-warrior, the Butcher of the Sands. So why are you here, training some boy instead of leading your Emperor’s conquest?”
Renekton narrows his eyes, a low growl clawing its way up his throat. The boy only watches him, curious. He is bold where he should be meek, insolent where he should submit, inquisitive where he should be silent. The boy is certainly one of a kind.
The thought only infuriates him.
“What do you know, slave?” Renekton barks. The mere notion of a slave speaking to an Ascended is preposterous; the possibility that he might escape unpunished for his impudence is even more so.
And yet, Renekton does nothing more than stare.
It seems to serve him well enough, but the slave boy’s bow of deference only unsettles him, makes something bubble up in his gut like nausea.
“I did not mean to offend, my Lord Ascended,” he says, all grace and tact. The slave cannot be more than sixteen but already he speaks as one of the Emperor’s advisors, full of pretty words but nothing more. It sets Renekton ill at ease. “I only meant that you have such a tremendous reputation. I would think the Emperor would place you on the front lines, that you might lead your great nation to victory.”
Renekton frowns. He sharpens his gaze. The boy raises his head, as if to strike a line through all his honeyed praises, but Renekton still does not raise a hand. Perhaps, he too is getting soft.
He should stay silent, should not grace this slave boy with an answer, but that feeling sprouts within him, urging him on.
“It is the prince I train,” he replies, despite himself. “Our future. Not some boy.” He shifts, but the boy stands tall, chin raised to meet his gaze head on, that ever-present flicker of interest in his black eyes. “To train him is an honor. To obey my Emperor, a greater one.”
The slave tilts his head.
“Your Emperor,” he questions, “or your brother?”
Before Renekton can get out another word, the prince is stumbling out from the palace doors, a litany of apologies spilling from his tongue. Renekton jerks his gaze away.
The slave stares.
He does not fault him.
Renekton, too, knows the scent of blood in the water.
-
Azir is young, still, when he ascends his father’s golden throne. He is radiant up there, bathed in all the light of the Sun for all the empire to worship. There are people in the stands, people in the streets, people atop people atop people. As far as the eye can see, there are people, all desperate for even just a glance of their new young Emperor.
Every eye is on the Emperor, but Renekton’s are on the boy.
He watches him, enrapt, watches the barely-contained excitement thrumming past the surface, the overflowing adoration brimming from his cold, calculating eyes. It is strange indeed, to see someone as that boy so deeply and obviously lost in another.
Atop the dais, Azir’s hair blows in the wind. The crown is lifted high for all the world to see. His slave smiles, overeager, and Renekton wonders.
“You look tense,” Nasus says, low. “Is something on your mind?”
Renekton startles, caught unawares. His brother tilts his head. Even after all these centuries it feels strange to see a jackal’s head where it should be his brother’s. So many things have changed since they ascended that glorious peak. He wonders if, perhaps, it was not all for the best.
“Forgive me,” he says. “I was only thinking that the slave boy…”
He trails off, gaze drawn once more to the dais. Nasus watches him, expectant. When Renekton doesn’t continue, he speaks.
“Yes,” his brother says. “I grow wary of him too. The emperor’s demise is all too convenient.” He lowers his voice, speaks for him and him alone. “That boy is vicious and Azir trusts too easily. He will suffer no accusations toward his slave.”
“Then what can we do?” Renekton murmurs. Around them, Runeterra trembles with applause. The crown sits atop its Emperor’s head. The slave boy watches with pride.
At last, it falls silent.
“We must watch,” Nasus says, and when Azir thanks his people for the honor, all that pride burns away like a corpse in a flame.
-
Renekton does not know what promise they had made to each other. He does not know what hurt has passed between them, only that it is soul-deep and wholly irreparable.
The slave boy does not look at him; the new Emperor cannot look away.
So Renekton does what he can: he watches.
The slave is given a name not long after: Xerath—one who shares. He is given a name, a title, and all that authority a highborn courtier could ever dream of, all in an instant. The Emperor makes no effort to conceal his affections. It is so obvious, Renekton does not even have to watch; it makes itself known in Azir’s every word, every deed, every tentatively-offered gift.
And still, Xerath spurns him.
He goes on expeditions far, far away, searching for something he cannot find in the palace. It is unhappy chance that the Emperor chooses Renekton to accompany him.
“Will you go with him?” his Emperor pleads. It is unbefitting of an Emperor to ask; it is his right to command. Still, Azir was just a boy not two years ago and Renekton will perhaps always be soft for his starry-eyed prince. “I fear for his safety in the southern sands.”
In his peripheral, Nasus pauses, though he does not look up from his book.
“Surely a squadron will be sufficient,” Renekton protests. “My place is here with you.”
“Yes, yes, I am sending my guards,” Azir says. “But the Xer’Sai…they cannot defend him as you can.”
Cannot? Renekton wonders. Or will not?
He glances at Nasus, whose frown deepens. A spark of defiance leaps from the seed within.
“Okay,” Renekton says. “I will go.”
“Thank you,” Azir says, relieved. “I cannot overstate my gratitude.”
“I am at your command, Your Highness,” Renekton says. “You know this.”
Azir takes his leave not long after, leaving Nasus and Renekton alone again at last.
“I mislike this,” Nasus says, after a moment. “You being away for so long.”
“It was an order,” Renekton says.
“It was a request,” he fires back.
“It came from the Emperor.”
“Did it?”
“Speak plainly.”
“Is it Azir that asks this, or the slave boy?” Nasus asks.
“What does it matter who asked?”
“I do not trust this Xerath. He conspires behind closed doors, whispers behind Azir’s back. Sentiment will be Azir’s downfall.”
“Then let me go with him,” he says. “Let me watch him.”
“You are needed here,” Nasus says, sharp. “You should be with me.”
“I have already agreed,” Renekton says. “Do you not trust me?”
“I did not say that,” his brother snaps. He shuts his book. “Only that the circumstances are not ideal. I am concerned for you, brother.”
“What cause is there for concern?” Renekton presses. “The boy is a mortal, a slave, no matter what pretty titles Azir gives him. If he gives me reason, I will crush him into the sands and call it fate.”
“It is not his strength that frightens me,” Nasus says, quiet.
“Then what—his mind?” Renekton barks, twisted with mirthless laughter. “Do you think I cannot tell right from wrong?”
Nasus frowns.
“He has a viper’s tongue,” he says, after a moment.
“And I have a god’s hand,” Renekton snaps, rising. Nasus watches him, solemn. It makes him feel stupid, like some mindless animal or petulant child.
“You are inclined to violence,” Nasus says, “To anger.” And Renekton scowls, because yes, he is inclined to violence. It was what he was made to be—a weapon, honed by a childhood in the slums without a mother or father or even, gods forbid, a brother. He was alone, out there. He was alone, watching Father waste away, and where was Nasus but the capital, in his golden city and golden library with his perfect, golden scholars.
What use was his stupid, violent little brother but a tool to be used? A stain on his fancy robes? Something to be hidden away or reined in and controlled? Was that not why he had sent him to serve in the Emperor’s Army? That he might conceal his shame?
“Yes,” he says. “And I excel at it.” Renekton stares, hard. “I kill and I conquer and I bloody my hands so my good and merciful brother might not.”
And with that, he goes.
-
It is cool at night. Renekton is thankful for the reprieve; during the day, Xerath may walk in his shadow, shielded from the Sun’s blazing gaze, but that is a privilege Renekton lost when he saved his brother all those ages ago.
They’re sitting by the fire, away from the rest of the expedition. The others do not much like their great Magus and a part of Renekton is intrigued by Azir’s favored, so it is now that they find themselves alone in front of a dwindling fire, created by Xerath’s clever spellcraft.
“I am grateful,” Xerath says, in the quiet, “that it is you that accompanies me.”
Renekton stares out into the sands, at the dunes that seem to span all the ends of the earth. He used to fear these sands when he was human. It had all seemed so vast and mysterious and terrifying, so unlike the cramped streets of the slums from whence he came. It had always evaded him, why Nasus would choose to brave those sands for more school of all things, but then, bruised and bloodied and nursing his wounds alone, Renekton would have crossed all the deserts of Runeterra to see his brother again.
“Why is that?” he asks, absently.
“I am sure you have noticed,” Xerath says. “The court loathes me. My own guard would kill me and leave me to die if they did not fear me so.”
“And you think I am so different?” Renekton scoffs. He glances down at the Magus, who watches him with interest, moonlight reflected in the eternal darkness of his gaze. Renekton jerks his head away, watching the horizon instead.
“I know you are different,” Xerath says. “You have no reason to fear me, yet…”
Renekton inhales; each breath feels stolen.
“Yet you are still alive,” Renekton finishes.
“Yes,” Xerath murmurs, quiet. Then, as if to no one at all, “Your story fascinates me.”
“My story,” Renekton echoes. The honorable and faithful brute, willing to die for his brother the Curator, the most brilliant mind ever to grace Shurima’s sands.
“A brawler from the slums,” Xerath says. “You were nothing to them.”
Renekton peers down at him.
“Watch your tongue, Magus,” he warns. “You may not be a slave, but you are still mortal.”
Xerath raises a hand to his flesh, undeterred. It unsettles him to his core, sends a thrum of vertigo running beneath his scales.
“Little did they know you’d be Shurima’s greatest hero,” Xerath says, fingers blazing a trail across his skin. “So much hidden beneath the surface. A shame that your brutality is all they will ever see.”
Renekton tenses. Xerath’s fingers linger.
“What?” he croaks, a low rumble. He can feel Xerath’s gaze upon him.
“We are not so different, you and I,” the Magus says. “I know your pain, though you think you hide it so well.”
“My pain,” Renekton repeats. “I know no pain.”
“Don’t you?” he asks. His fingers slip between the cracks. Each word is a knife. “They call you hero to your face and whisper Butcher behind your back, as if it is some ugly, damnable curse. But I see your gift for what it is.”
Renekton jerks away. He glares down at the boy, rage bubbling up inside.
“I see through your lies, slave,” he spits. “You will not turn me against my own people.”
Xerath’s lips twitch.
“Call it lies if you wish,” he says, “but even your brother doubts you.”
“Do not—”
“Your brother fears you,” he continues. “He fears what you could do without his temperance. That is why he keeps you in his Great Cage, chained to the capital. All that power, wasted in fear.”
“Nasus sees more than I ever will,” Renekton snaps, on reflex alone. It is true. He is angry with his brother, yes, but Renekton has never once doubted his judgement nor his intentions. “His wisdom has guided Shurima for centuries.”
“And where has that gotten us?” Xerath demands. “Your Emperor in the ground, his sons dead? If your brother had not leashed you to that wretched place, would you not have saved your Emperor, protected his blood? Instead, we have chaos. We have blood and violence and emboldened upstarts. Shurima’s enemies no longer fear the crown. They do not fear the Ascended. Simply look at Icathia. How long has it been since you have seen the great Aatrox?”
Renekton’s mouth thins. He is wrong, he is wrong, he must be, Nasus knows what is right, he has never steered them false, and yet…
“Your brother is clever, certainly,” Xerath says. “But he lacks vision. His wisdom is from a bygone era and age has made him weary. He lacks the strength to do what must be done. His gentleness has crippled us. And because of him, you waste.”
Xerath’s fingers tighten. They slip beneath the gaps.
His gaze strikes bone-deep.
“Remember this, Butcher: your violence can be wielded. It can be honed for the greater good. But your brother fears this. More than anything he fears this, fears you, fears that you might become more than his loyal dog, ever on his leash.”
The notion is ridiculous.
It is ridiculous.
And yet…
And yet.
(Beneath them, the Xer’Sai circle.)
-
A year passes before Xerath is satisfied; a year passes before Renekton sees Nasus once more.
“Brother,” Nasus says, overcome by the sight of him. He had been waiting upon the steps for his return. If the gossip is to be believed, he has been waiting for months. “It has been so long.”
“It has,” Renekton says. Then, looking away, “I have missed you.”
A hand against his cheek, gentle as the day he was pulled from his mother’s womb: “Welcome home.”
And Renekton thinks: how could I ever have doubted you?
-
Azir and Xerath are fighting again. The whole palace can feel the Emperor’s displeasure, ripples of his Magus’ wrath, but it is Renekton who experiences it most intimately.
He is resting in the training grounds when Xerath finds him, the moon shining brightly overhead and the stars smiling down upon them. But Xerath’s wrath clouds the starry night and his thunderous rage announces his wordless arrival. Renekton needn’t turn to see who approaches; he feels the weight of his approach in a way no mortal man has ever achieved.
Moments pass, but Xerath does not speak. Lighting spills from his fingers; flashing light splits the darkened skies. He rages for what feels like hours, guttural grunts of anguish ripping their way past his throat as he wreaks destruction across the arena, but Renekton only looks on in silence. He is no stranger to anger. To rage.
Nasus had always said it was his one weakness.
At last, the Magus’ fury wanes. His staggered breaths fill the night. Renekton peers down at him, unmoving.
“He is a fool,” Xerath spits. “A thrice-damned fool.” He paces the grounds, fists clenched at his sides. “Does he think I am some petty thug or downtrodden whore that I can be bought by expensive gifts and empty promises? That I will forget all that he said, all that he did! And now he asks—ha—he asks if I should like to accompany him at his wedding. I should kill him—I should—I’ll—”
“He is young,” Renekton says quietly. It is only now, watching his loping motions and hearing his garbled speech that Renekton realizes Xerath has been drinking. It is strange to see him like this. To see this utter loss of control from a man so careful. “You both are.”
Xerath laughs, a low, ugly thing.
To see his anger so clearly is odd; Xerath is prone to it, but he never shows it, no. His fury is a quiet thing, underhanded as arsenic. Even on the expedition, surrounded by his lessers, he would never reveal his rage.
It is strange, though, that with only an Ascended—his better—for company, he lets it spill unhindered. It is perhaps stranger still that Renekton finds he does not quite mind.
“We are long past that, I think,” he says. “I have seen his true colors.”
Xerath kicks at the earth.
“And after all I have done for him,” he spits, bitter. “After I have dirtied my hands, sullied my honor, all for him.” The last word sounds torn from him, as if it wounds him to even say it. “I have given him—hah—given him everything, and still he will not yield.”
Renekton sighs. Though he is loath to admit it, Renekton feels for him. He does not know the depth of their—conflict, but he has made his assumptions, as has the rest of the court. He has felt it, too. To be in conflict with a brother: it is agonizing.
“Perhaps,” Renekton starts, “he is not the only one who should learn to yield.”
Xerath jerks around to stare. His gaze is piercing, virulent, all pent-up loathing and bitter hatred.
“I have yielded my whole life,” he grits out, and he grabs at Renekton’s scales as if to make a point. “But I am a dog no longer. Are you?”
Renekton flings him back with ease. Indignance forces its way to the surface. Xerath hits the ground, gaze murderous.
“I am sympathetic to your plight, slave,” Renekton growls. “But try me again and you will not live to bark.”
-
“I am sorry,” Xerath says, the next morning. “For what I said last night.” He pauses. “It was unbecoming.”
“It was,” Renekton grunts, keeping watch over the walls. The wind whistles in his ears. Xerath’s hair blows with the breeze. Finally, Renekton sighs. “I am sorry, too. You were hurting and I was… harsh.”
Xerath hums.
In the distance, the Great Library stands tall.
Strangely, Renekton finds comfort in their silence.
-
“Do you trust him?” Nasus asks him suddenly. They are in his study again, radiant beams steaming in from the skylight.
“Who?” Renekton asks. “Azir’s Magus.”
“Yes,” he says. “You’ve gotten rather close.”
“Only out of necessity, brother,” he says. “You have nothing to fear.”
He hums.
“He killed the Emperor,” Nasus says, short.
“I recall.”
“Do you?”
Renekton frowns.
“Do you doubt me still?”
“No, I…” Nasus trails off. “It is only that I know how easy it is to forget the wrongs of a companion.”
“I have not forgotten,” Renekton snaps, perhaps too sharply to be altogether true.
“As long as you know,” Nasus says. “We must be vigilant.”
Renekton only scowls.
-
“I told you once,” Xerath starts, on another night beneath the stars, “that we were not so different as you think.”
They are on yet another one of Xerath’s frivolous expeditions, perfectly timed so that they might miss the Emperor’s wedding tour. Renekton treks on, silent.
“I mean it, still,” he continues. “We are brothers in servitude. Crippled by our masters’ shortsightedness.”
Renekton stops.
“I am no brother of yours, Magus,” he says, cold. “Do not presume otherwise.”
He meets Xerath’s narrowed eyes. Then, he presses onward.
“We are not kin, no,” he mutters, “but we are bound nonetheless.”
Renekton pretends he has not heard.
-
Years go by, and still Azir does not win Xerath’s favor.
Years go by, and Xerath’s whispers linger in his ear.
-
The Emperor is in Nasus’ study when Renekton enters, voices raised in a display Renekton has not seen in ages.
“I understand you have good intentions, Your Highness,” Nasus says, frustration simmering beneath the surface. “But this is an affront to the gods. You do not simply choose Ascension; Ascension chooses you.”
“Traditionally, yes,” Azir reasons. “But if I can only receive that power—”
“You will not! The Sun will strike you down and where will we be then? At best, we are left with a Baccai for an emperor! At worst, your bloodline is struck down for your hubris!”
When Renekton shuts the door, their heads jerk toward the entrance.
“Forgive me,” he says. “Have I interrupted something?”
“Good,” Nasus says. “You’ve come. Perhaps you may talk sense into our beloved Emperor.”
“Renekton,” Azir says, relieved. “You ascended without being chosen, did you not? Why can I not do the same?”
Renekton frowns. He glances at Nasus, who only sighs. exasperated. He turns back to Azir, slow.
“I did not do it for power, Your Highness,” Renekton says, gently. “I did not expect power; I ascended for love of a brother.”
“And I will do the same!” Azir exclaims, emboldened. “It is for the love of a brother that I even dare. I only came to ask for your blessing.”
“No,” Nasus says. “I cannot in good conscience abide this.”
Azir frowns.
“Nasus—” he starts.
“No,” he says, final.
Azir turns to Renekton. He looks so hopeful, so innocent. He looks like that boy lurking in that library from years past, or perhaps his scholar, always away, all those ages ago—eyes alight with unquenchable passion for humanity. For a moment, even Renekton believes Azir could change his world.
Behind him, Nasus crosses his arms. Renekton meets his brother’s eyes. He wants to plead with him; perhaps Azir is right. If he had done it, why can’t Azir? He does not lie; it is for the love of a brother, it is, he knows it in his bones. Azir could not lie if he tried.
Yet the truth remains: he trusts his brother more than he trusts himself. It is how it is, how it has always been, and it will never change so long as Nasus is by his side.
“Nasus is right,” Renekton says. “It is too risky. You are strong already. Whatever you wish to accomplish, whatever noble intentions you may have—you have the power now.”
Azir scowls.
“Will you truly not be swayed?”
“I am sorry, little one,” Renekton says, placating.
“Then I am sorry, too,” he says, and he storms out, the door thundering shut.
When Renekton looks back at Nasus, he has already gone back to his work.
-
Not for the first time, Renekton wonders if Nasus is not wrong. If he truly has been blinded by outdated tradition and long-held prejudice. Perhaps, in this one instance, his fear truly does cripple him.
-
They get the missive a week later: Quell the raging spirit in the sands. You leave tomorrow.
Nasus frowns. Quiet fury blazes behind his passive stare.
Renekton wonders, and doubts.
-
Xerath is waiting for them at the gates.
“My Lords Ascended,” he says, bowing low. “I am grieved to see you go.”
“Spare me your platitudes,” Nasus says. “Leave us in peace.”
“As you wish,” Xerath says.
Nasus continues, lost in his thoughts. Renekton lingers. Xerath nears. His fingers dance across his scales, igniting each one with only a touch.
Their eyes meet.
“Listen to me, brother,” Xerath says, and Renekton bristles at the title. “Your Curator will steal your glory. He would sooner cut you down than see you overshadow him; I know this in my bones. Go now, and return to your Emperor victorious.”
Renekton scoffs, fast, too fast, for what glory is there in sealing a spirit?
“Come, brother,” Nasus calls from ahead. He waits, patient.
And still, Renekton doubts.