Levi POV
By the gods...
The first thing Levi saw was blood.
It was everywhere.
Spattered on the walls. On the ground. Some drops had even reached the ceiling as Levi noticed when he tilted his chin up a bit.
What the hell happened here...?
The soft shuffling of footsteps behind him reminded Levi of the second person standing inside this room that was the embodiment of every child's nightmare.
He had expected the servant boy – Faris – to cringe. To step back, to scream maybe. To give him a hint as to what he was thinking.
But when he turned around to face the young man, Faris didn't even flinch.
His eyes followed the red lines on the ground as if everything he saw was perfectly fine. Nothing out of the ordinary. Not even his face paled at what his eyes took in.
"What are we searching for?", Faris asked while walking further into the room, his arms hanging by his side as if there weren't any muscles left to hold them up anymore. His steps were calculated, finding the small spaces in between all those puddles of blood.
As if this wasn't the first time he had walked inside this room.
As if his legs knew every angle in here.
When the boy turned around to face him, his expression not giving away his emotions for once.
Levi cleared his throat, hands behind his back.
"Something to find the Second Prince. Eyebrows sure won't be picky about what the fuck we're giving him as long as it helps with the search for that brat."
Faris simply nodded and although he was apparently unfaced by the horrors inside this room, he wouldn't even raise his hands to so much as touch anything lying on the ground or on the small desk in the corner of the room.
It was old and a leg broken.
The chair behind it had been thrown away. It was lying somewhere else completely. And on the edge of the wood there was the same red substance as anywhere else.
Levi didn't want to look around.
He had faced worse shit than that back then when Eyebrows hadn't been there to help him out yet. Hadn't gotten him out of the darkness the homelessness was offering him.
But to know that all that blood...to know who it's original owner was...
"How the fuck was the brat able to survive?", Levi voiced one of the thousand questions on his mind out loud, his eyes narrowed and his heartbeat a bit more accelerated than usual.
"Barely."
Faris' voice was cold.
Hard.
Full of empty emotions.
"What do you mean?" Levi stayed where he was, giving the brat his space.
This brat can't know more about what happened back then than anyone else. But maybe he isn't as unfaced as he appears to be.
Faris curled his fingers into fists, staring at one of the many bloody spots on the ground, the color ugly and dark against the floor. His dark eyes were concentrated on it as if he could remove it with the sheer power of his will.
"He barely made it out of the palace that night.", the servant rasped, not looking in Levi's direction. Levi wasn't even sure if Faris was talking to him at all or if he was simply stating the words his head provided.
"That's just guessing.", Levi murmured. "Even if the amount of blood tells us that the Second Prince should have been dead by then. Whatever attacked him wanted him dead."
"It's not whatever.", Faris whispered. "It has never been a creature, a mystery, a secret. Not to the prince. Not to the world. We all got split into the ones who know and the ones who want to believe."
"What the fuck are you brabbling about, brat?"
Faris raised his head and looked Levi straight into the eye.
The man shivered by the pure hate that burned in the boy's.
"It's not whatever.", the servant repeated, his fists shaking with burning anger. "It has always been human. Humanity is at fault and one of their kin is responsible for what happened in this room."
Levi listened to the brat, too caught up in the boy's words, spoken by heart and resonating in the room like the broken sound of an old instrument. Somehow his words seemed to belong inside of this room...
Faris knelt down on the ground, exhaling softly while his fingers stroked across the dark spot beneath him.
"The prince barely made it out of the room.", he whispered. "After the King's men tried to kidnap him...to take him away...he fought them with all his might. But it wasn't enough. They were stronger. And they let him bleed for daring to stand up against His Majesty's orders."
"How the hell can you know about what happened back then?", Levi barked, crossing his arms in front of his chest.
It pained him a bit that he wanted to believe the servant.
He wanted to believe the boy so badly...
Faris chewed on his lip, eyes trained on the ground.
If the ground and the broken furniture had souls...Levi was sure that they would bow to the dark aura that was swirling around Faris with his dirty blond hair and those stubborn eyes.
"I know what happened back then.", Faris hissed with shaking fists and closed his eyes for a moment, a frown appearing on his forehead. "And I know that...that the prince would have wanted you to know about it as well."
- - -
Eren POV
All the memories of the past played out in front of his eyes and Eren winced at the sounds he was hearing, the smells he breathed in and the pain he would never forget.
Levi was still standing next to him, looking down on him.
Eren inhaled shakily and opened his eyes, willing himself to concentrate on the remnants of what he had lived through all those years ago.
"It was a stormy night.", he began, not sure why he was trusting the other man with this information. Maybe he was making a mistake. Maybe...just...maybe...he wasn't. "The wind was howling, the branches of trees danced over the ground and fires went out due to the heavy rain."
He swallowed, thinking back to the sound of raindrops crashing against his window, his legs up against his chest and his arms around his knees as if this would protect him from what was to come.
"It was so dark...and the prince was alone. His mother had long left him, his brother was gone for the night and his father...didn't visit him either way. The prince was waiting for sleep to find him and to take him for another night."
Eren smiled softly, a dry laugh ripped from his dry throat.
It took him a moment to continue to speak.
Levi took his chance and asked with an unbelieving tone in his voice: "How come that you know so much about that night? It isn't even common knowledge so-"
Eren rose from the ground, his posture as straight as the strong trees outside in the woods. His eyes found Levi's in the dark of the room. For Eren it was storming and raining and it was cold and ugly and for Levi...for Levi it was a day like all the others.
Eren saw the memories of this room.
He felt connected to it in the ugliest ways he could think of.
He walked over to one of the walls, instinctively trusting his legs to carry him all the way. Eren reached out with his hands and his fingers found the cold and unforgiving stone.
"No! Stop! Please! My-Please!"
He winced, tears gathering in his eyes at the screams he remembered. Screams that were his own. Screams that he would never forget. Just like he wouldn't forget the pain of getting tossed against the wall hard enough for the back of his head to bleed.
"I know the Second Prince."
Afterwards Eren wouldn't even know why he told Levi something stupid like that.
He wouldn't have an answer for his sister.
Nor an answer for himself.
He inhaled.
He exhaled.
And for the first time ever...he trusted another person with his story.
(You all are so patient and I thank you for it! I can't tell you how sorry I am every time I make you wait but inspiration just didn't hit me. So...this time it is a longer chapter as well and I hope you like it just like always!
Eren wants to trust Levi and we will finally get to know what happened back then in the night Eren had to flee from the palace. But to do that he also has to lie to Levi...will this lie haunt him someday?
Do you maybe have a special request for the next POV? Or do you want to see some special Prompts - that are suitable for the story - between or for some characters as little paragraphs in between?
Always tell me what you think, what you want, what you dislike! I loooovvveee reading comments more than anything so don't hold back!)