Armin POV
Since that man had saved him the other day Armin couldn't help but replay every single second of it, the incident playing out in front of his eyes again and again.
The blond hair, those hard and intelligent eyes...
His uniform had told Armin enough to know he must have been a higher-up. But just who was the man who had rescued him?
He sighed, stilling in his actions and putting the brush aside that he had used to scrub the dirty floor in one of the empty halls of the palace. He would have loved to be on kitchen duty or to spend his time in the library.
But when a servant girl had to stay in bed because of some sort of sickness he had promised her to take over the chores she was supposed to do herself.
That's why he had spent the last hour cleaning that hall, sometimes glancing at the portraits of Eren's ancestors on the walls. They all kind of looked like him and yet they didn't. Some of them were as dark-haired as he was, some were not.
Armin's gaze grazed especially one woman continuously – her skin was as dark as the wettest earth and shone just as beautifully. Magnificent eyes, emitting a dangerous aura that sent a chill down Armin's spine.
"Crown Princess Eryn. I can understand your fascination."
Armin flinched and slipped on the ground he had cleaned just a few seconds ago. Two hands caught him just as he was falling forward and a dark chuckle made him blush.
"It seems you are inclined to hurt yourself when I am close to you."
"N-No...not...not at all, sir.", he stuttered and looked up only to find that a pair of cunning eyes was already trained on him. He swallowed when his gaze fell on the plump lips of the older man and he straightened up to prevent being caught staring.
The man waited for Armin to find his balance. Trying to hide the red on his face and his neck he tugged a strand of hair behind his ear, not looking up at the handsome gentleman.
"You...you were saying?"
"The woman you were inspecting." The man didn't call him out on his attempt to divert the attention on the reason for Armin's mental absence and therefore on the reason for his frightful jump. "That's Crown Princess Eryn. Or better said she was. She was the grandmother of Crown Prince Zeke." The man lowered his eyes. "May he rest in peace."
"But she is...and the prince was...I mean..." Armin could have slapped himself for stuttering like that in front of the man who gave him an amused smile.
"She wasn't able to have children on her own so she allowed a mistress to deliver the children of her husband. But she was still recognized as their rightful mother."
Armin listened up.
"Their? There have been more but the King himself?"
"Yes. The King's little sister. Faye Yaeger."
Eren POV
"So answer me one question, brat. Since I get informed of every single prisoner in that basement, in those cells – why have I never heard about a servant like you having been down there?"
Eren cursed himself for letting his arrogance get the better of him. If Mikasa were near she would slap him for sure for bringing them in such danger with his stupid words.
He frantically tried to think of a way to explain what he had said.
"I...I meant...."
The officer stepped closer, his eyes so fucking smug. Eren felt heat spread in his gut and he swallowed, making a step back and bringing some distance between them but the general was quick to follow.
Eren bared his teeth at the smaller man, narrowing his eyes with visible tension in every part of his body. He looked for a way out of his situation, contemplating to just run away but he had learned the hard way that only prey ran away. You run; you get hunted.
"So? Humor me.", the general murmured. "What does a brat like you – who hasn't been here all that long – know about our basement? Our dungeons?"
He hissed at the general, showing his teeth and for a moment he felt...something. Something new. Something powerful.
It clawed it's way into his heart, screaming at him to take apart that human being threatening him without words, without voicing it out loud.
The general was taken aback by the strange noise and stared at him in disgust.
"Snarling like a dog. What do you think you are?"
The woman, who had been lying on the ground so far, rose and put a hand on the other man's shoulder, her face contorted in worry and interest.
"Levi, step down. Let the boy be, he was probably just bluffing."
And with those words that feeling inside Eren's chest disappeared. It became weaker, softer. Until it was nothing more than a rumbling in his gut. He breathed through his nose, closing his eyes and accumulated to the absence of whatever had possessed him seconds ago.
"Whatever, brat.", the man snarled.
Eren had heard the woman call him Levi.
General Ackerman. Levi Ackerman. So that's your name.
"I bluffed.", he said, his voice barely a whisper.
Cold. It was cold. And lonely.
"Of course I don't know anything about the dungeons."
It hurt. It just hurt so much and he...he couldn't escape.
"I have never been there. I lied."
His words were hollow, not a single one filled with the emotions connected to the memory of the time he had spent down there. Because of his father's whims. Because that bastard had decided to do so.
"Excuse me and forgive me, sir. Madame." He bowed to them and disappeared behind the bushes and statues of people and animals alike in the garden without sending them another glance.
He was shaking with anger and hate. Yet they weren't allowed to face his wrath.
Yet.
(....So. Eren felt something strange inside himself. Just what the hell could it be?
But finally we have some Eren x Levi interaction - even if it's small. That was a small chapter, I know. Maybe I will post another one today or tomorrow, depending on how writing the 'Silence' and the 'Running from you' chapters are going.)