Mikasa POV
She was sitting on the ground, some kind of strange brush in her hands. The raven-haired girl was scrubbing the ground with gritted teeth.
Of course she knew how to clean and how to do the simplest of chores. After all her brother wasn't all that excited about housework and leaving her new mother alone with all of it was impossible for her to do.
She didn't blame Eren. She knew that he would do it just as reliable as she did if his head wasn't somewhere else at all times. Even now, with their mission as a reason, she could hear him grumbling next to her.
"Doing something like that for that old sucker..."
"Eren, stop complaining. You know it is necessary.", she tried to reason with him just as she had always done those last weeks they had stayed in the palace.
"Doesn't mean I have to like it. Where is Armin? Isn't he supposed to help us?"
"He was called over by the gardener."
Eren looked up from his work, letting go of the utensils in his red hands. They weren't used to the lasting contact to cleaning supplies like those offered to them by some friendly servants they had met shortly after arriving in the palace.
Frowning he opened his mouth to ask his sister something when they were interrupted by a guard, that was walking by.
"You aren't here to chatter. Stop talking and start working.", the grumpy man groused and Mikasa only had to glance a second at her brother to know that he was short of exploding like the temperamental person he was so she stood up, hiding him behind her frame and bowed to the guard.
"I am very sorry. I was the one who asked him for cleaning supplies, he isn't at fault."
Mikasa lowered her head and hid the triumphant smirk when she noticed the faint blush on the man's cheeks.
"Yeah, yeah...whatever." The guard left them alone and Mikasa sighed in relief. Her face as stern as her voice she turned around to face her brother who she knew would protest against her trying to protect him once more.
"Eren, stop being childish. We can't afford drawing any attention on us if it isn't our will to do so."
He was so young. So innocent. Not touched by the darkness yet.
He met her hard eyes with unyielding anger but also a hint of understanding. His proud and stubborn nature held him back from apologizing or even loudly acknowledging his mistakes but Mikasa saw the shame burning under his tanned skin.
He hated being chastised by her. But she was the older one. It was her job to protect the brother who had once protected her. She owed him so much.
She hadn't protected Carla. She wouldn't make the same mistake twice.
"Guys!" Armin ran up to them, his clothes just as simple as theirs – oh, they had tried to force her to wear a skirt but she wouldn't be caught dead in one if she could help it somehow – and his grin so bright she couldn't help the little smile that tugged at her lips.
"You are back.", she greeted her friend warmly. He was smaller than them. His height hid the intelligent mind behind his innocent, wide eyes and the mop of unruly hair. It's color resembled the shining sun that had left them for the day, leaving only dark clouds and rain behind that was pattering on the pavement outside the small corridor they worked in.
Statues of strange creatures and people lined up on the wall and the marble floor was frigid cold underneath their legs. Mikasa had sat down on the scarf Eren had given her that day in the woods which made the whole experience a bit more bearable.
"What took you so long?", Eren asked at tad petulant but who could blame him for it. They were cold, their hands were hurting and if they walked on their knees for the rest of the day, they couldn't plague them more.
"The gardener has heard about the flowers I have kept in our room, Eren. He wanted to show me some of his own."
"Going with strangers, Armin? Mom taught ya better, didn't she?", Eren teased him. Mikasa tensed up at her brother's words. She was still afraid when their mother was a topic in conversations or if they were reminded of her somehow.
After her death she had expected him to be angry.
Furious.
She had expected him to scream, to shout – to react in any way. To show his grief like he showed all of his emotions. He wore his heart on his tongue no matter what. But since his mother's death he had been quiet. Not...brooding. Just quiet.
He still complained about things, he was still the same angry kid but...but he was different. Like the calm before the storm she waited for him to finally explode. To show his grief, the bone-deep pain she also felt.
Armin meanwhile blushed at Eren's comment and shook his head.
"What are you even talking about, Eren? Jean would say you have sniffed too many cleaning supplies."
Silence befell them at the mention of the boy's name.
A gloomy atmosphere darkened the light banter they usually would have with each other.
Things have changed, Mikasa thought when she looked at her two best friends, sad and filled with the need for revenge. Their happiness had disappeared with Carla. With Shiganshina. With the war that went on for five months now.
"We should get going. No need to be seen standing around a second time.", Eren grumbled and went on with scrubbing the floor. Armin and Mikasa watched him with worried faces. "Stop looking at me like that."
He didn't raise his voice. He didn't scream. He avoided meeting their eyes.
Mikasa sat down next to him and Armin followed her example. Together they cleaned the marble floor without uttering so much as a single word. Mikasa wondered if she would ever get her family back. After having lost the first one when she was too young to understand why.
Why did they have to be killed in front of her eyes?
Eren's POV
He remembered a lot about that place.
The sound of soft steps on the marble floor. The flowers in the gardens when spring came around and brought the sweet smell of wet earth and growing blossoms with it.
Eren strode through the halls. Strong pillars to his left kept the ceiling above his head; strong arms who couldn't be bothered by any storm or thunder. They separated the royal gardens from the stony façade of the palace walls.
Raindrops were calling out his name outside in the garden where the grass glinted like it was decorated with thousand tiny crystals. Even the greyish clouds who hid the sun away were unable to diminish the eternal beauty of the palace grounds.
Once Eren had loved to sit there – in the rain, in the cold. He adored the feeling of minuscule drops wetting his face, running down his cheeks like tears from the Gods above them.
He crossed the hands behind his back, feeling the blisters on the insides of his palms. He winced slightly and bit his lip, preventing anger and frustration from bleeding out of him in form of silent tears or thunderous screams of anguish.
How he wished to just tear down every single wall around him. To make this palace regret ever being built for assholes like his father. For the ones who married only to keep their wife captured in a prison of loneliness and depression.
Wives like his mother.
Eren closed his eyes, thinking of the last smile he had seen on his mother's face and breathing in the scent the rain carried with it.
"So the one thing I ask of you in a time of war and destruction is that you fight. Never give up when you know there is a chance for you to win."
"What's got you all brooding out here?"
He opened his eyes but refrained from turning around. He recognized the voice but was not sure the man behind him also did. It would be better for both if his identity didn't blow up so he lowered his head to make the front strands of his wig fall over the upper part of his face. Even though he was wearing contacts he couldn't risk getting seen by someone who knew him.
"I'm sorry, my Lord.", he whispered in a raspy voice and turned around, keeping his head low. He already knew who was standing in front of him and he didn't fancy meeting him already.
"I'm no Lord, brat.", the man scoffed but didn't say anything to correct the 'Lord' either. Eren wouldn't be the one to complain about it. Arrogant pack of wolves...
"I will take my leave then, strange soldier.", he mumbled with an eyeroll and made a step back only to tumble over his own legs. He gasped for air and squinted his eyes, expecting the unforgiving ground to hit the back of his head.
He fell...