#Halkin | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

kriz-fics · 2 years ago

Text

The Sword’s Legacy

Series Summary: As the heir of your father's lands, you have grown up knowing that one day you must wed to your House's advantage, and there's no better catch than the younger son of the Magister himself. Meanwhile tensions within the king's court are set to come to a head at any moment - it just needs that spark to send everything ablaze. Now in a court more dangerous than the one you entered, you find distraction and joy in the company of the beautiful boy with the beautiful eyes. You can only hope to weather the storm you can sense brewing in the horizon.

Masterlist

Chapter Twelve: Blood and Knights

Pairing: Eren Jaeger x Female Reader

Genre: Royalty AU, Historical Fantasy AU, Romance, Politics, Warfare, Eventual Smut (future chapters)

Length: 8.5K

CW: Graphic violence, YN being horny (not graphic, unfortunately. Not yet, at least ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) )

Tut-tut, it looks like rain.

The fact of which does not please the more uppity lords, Eren observes, eyes flickering from one delicate man to the next and trying not to let his disdain bleed into his features. That little mouse of a man, Anton Taran, looks as skittish as the pest he resembles; the Procurator’s small watery eyes dart to the sky above and back to the orating king, hands behind his back and bouncing ever so lightly on his heels, eager to scamper into his nice and dry hole before the sky breaks. Proctor Nick is little better standing next to him. The slight curl of his lip and the way those deep-set eyes sweep out across the grounds and into the gray above gives away his sentiments about the weather. Near the center of the line of councilmen Willy Tybur stands beside Lord Grisha, mouth set in a thin line as he looks upon the proceedings with his best approximation of the courtier’s hollow face stamped upon his highbred visage. Like his fellows, he is showing undue interest in the ether and their environs. It cannot have been any plainer that these men are in a tizzy to make an end of things quickly.

It is not as if they don’t have a bloody canopy above their feeble heads. Even the king and his son seem made of sterner stuff. The Prince of Crownglen Urklyn Reiss is standing upon the covered stage at the center of the newly rebuilt village, grave and regal, as his father Rod Reiss I holds forth at the front of the platform. The royal pair does not give two shits about the weather, which is more than can be said for their prickly underlings.

What is a little rain upon their noble bodies? It is only water.

Eren shifts a little in his place within the squires’ row, the weight of plate and mail upon his person a familiar load, comforting even. He and his peers are standing below the stage to the right, close enough at hand to their masters should they have the unfortunate need to be squired for that day. The masters, barring the Lord Commander, are standing below the stage to the front, a forbidding barrier between the highborn and the low.

The royal pair, the Conclave, the lords Skaryn and Halkin, and the guards - the Royal Guard among them - are the only ones of the court in attendance at the royal pardon. The rest of the nobility are at Merrydell, awaiting their coming so they may feast and celebrate the end of the Northern Matter beneath the Skaryns’ roof in the company of those who have been pardoned.

Mossreach is unrecognizable from the desolation it had been half a year ago. The burnt-out husks and the dead buried beneath snow and crows have been cleared away. Banners of a dozen colors flutter everywhere, green and red, maroon and white, purple, purple most of all from the royal standards flying the royal sigil: the head of the Founding Titan, with its purple eyes large and haunting and flaring, upon a purple field. The cottages that litter the sward are freshly-thatched and new-made, the land green and lush and unburnt. Even its people have been restored.

The king’s speech washes over Eren, something about the Mother’s mercy and the Father’s forgiveness and what other diplomatic tripe his Heralds have taught him to say to appease his malcontent masses.

Which is all well and good, for these ones. The cleared-away dead will beg to differ, their living kin more so. But as they have been banished to their true homes in the Midlands, they can hardly raise a hue and cry. Not that they truly can. Whatever hues and cries they may have raised have fallen on deaf ears, as the grievances of their northern foemen had fallen on deaf ears at the start of all of this.

And thus do the tables turn. So much for the Father’s justice. Rows of northmen face the platform, eyes trained on their king. Some are tall, some are short, some young, some old, some slight and some stout, yet somehow, they all look the same in Eren’s eyes. It is the hardness in their bearing, the hardness of the North, the same hardness he sees in Robert the Lawyer, who is standing beside the Crown Prince with that proud mien blazing like his red robes. Even their elderly, their women, and their children have traces of it, Eren can see as he watches them stand at the fringes of it all, every bit as stony as their men. Hard lands breed a hard folk.

Admiration rises in him, despite all. They may have escaped justice for the lives they took so savagely yet there is something laudable about the way they fought for what is theirs by rights. Had the crown set out to crush them at the very onset of their offensive, Eren knows they would be hard-pressed to smash them down. They are the sort of foe he can enjoy pushing against, a foe strong of will and might.

Willy Tybur turns his head a fraction, to look towards the bordering woods for the hundredth time. Eren follows his gaze and looks upon the fount of his greatest shame. He feels his insides shrivel up at the memory but forces himself to hold and keep his eyes fixed on the green.

Half a year gone and still it will not leave him no matter how much he thinks he has put it behind him. He wonders if he will ever truly be free of it and feels cold. The prospect of carrying that weight for the rest of his life is not an appealing one. I’ll rid myself of it for good and all no matter what it takes. He will know when to stop moving when needs must. Redemption is not beyond him yet.

A shadow stirs within the trees. Eren narrows his eyes, squinting at the treeline. Shades? But shades shine silver…

Ping!

The sky breaks at last, and Eren inwardly scowls as the fat droplets batter his helm, filling his ears to bursting with the endless clangor of ringing steel. He will be deaf by day’s end, like as not, with a splitting headache to boot. He would have removed the helm yet etiquette demands it stays on. This is not the first he’s worn steel in such weather yet he always removes the headpiece when not in active combat; he’d rather suffer the torrent full-on than go mad from that metallic racket.

Dusk seems to fall early today and the loud crashing of the rain upon them all only adds to the din inside his head. The world shrinks to his helm. Ping, ping, ping, ping, ping. So when the men come boiling out of the woods, their war cries one with the storm, Eren can only stare, uncomprehending.

Screams join the discordant symphony, and then madness besets them all.

Bodies are flying everywhere, men, women, and children all a-flutter like a flock of startled pigeons in some park, seeking to evade the oncoming attackers. They need not have bothered with that very convincing display; the raiders give them no more heed than Eren would an ant beneath his feet and flow right through them as water flows through rock.

Battle is joined moments later and there is no more thought, only the ancient animal wisdom of the flesh that tells him to move.

To be still is to die.

And he is moving, running, running toward his master with his sword in hand. A man looms out of the wet like a leviathan from the deep but Eren bulls forward with nary a pause. The outlaw bellows and swings down his hammer; Eren dodges aside, and his blade punches through leather, steel, and flesh. He pulls his sword free, feeling the steel scrape bone, and is moving once more before the corpse can hit the ground. He dispatches a second and a third man in like manner, and at last he is beside his master, guarding his back as a good squire should.

There is no end to them, these leviathans from the deep. Hardly has he cut down one than another will take his place, and the world tapers down to action and reaction, kill or be killed.

It is sometime later - a minute, an hour, a day - when Eren realizes his master is nowhere to be found. The tide of battle has parted them and there are only enemies. He hacks down across the face of a northman hard, and his head dissolves into bits of brain and bone and blood. Another falls beneath his steel, blood spurting from his open throat. And still they come, again and again and again, until somehow they are not.

The brief respite allows Eren time to take stock of his surroundings properly. He has been driven back to the canopied platform where the king had made his speech. He sweeps his gaze around, hardly sparing the scattered corpses around him a second thought, and watches the chaos of battling men amidst falling rain. He is utterly confounded by it all. They laid down their arms and swore never to take them up again. A faint whimper resounds from somewhere close by, and he turns, eyes widening in shock at the sight of the king huddling beneath the covered stage. Why is he still here? Where are the guards? Eren runs to him at once.

“Your Majesty, you have to get out of here!” he calls over the pouring rain and heaves at the royal arm to get him moving. The king looks up at him with terror in his wide blue eyes, but recognition soon follows and he is moving, meek and unresisting as the son of his Magister guides him away from the horror and the savagery.

They have hardly gone a couple of yards when something rams into them, knocking the king and squire off their feet and sending them sprawling in the mud. Eren rolls onto his back, stunned, the taste of rain and mud heavy on his tongue. The force of the charge had wrenched his sword from his hand and sent his helm flying off his head, though he is hardly given time to mourn the loss.

A man is atop him all of a sudden and silver steel gleams bright and deadly at him out of the murky gloom. There is no time for thought or fear. Eren grabs his foeman’s arm with both hands as it falls toward his face, and their lethal struggle commences. The man claws uselessly at one of his gloved hands, trying to pry his fingers open, but Eren holds on the tighter and pushes, straining with gritted teeth. The blade is all he can see, it is the only thing that exists in the world, the blade and its tip sharp as any needle, any razor… and it is coming ever closer no matter how much he pushes, closer and closer to the center of his forehead…

The northman pulls back an arm, his hand closing into a fist. Eren sees and catches the blow one-handed but near pays for it with an eye. The enemy’s blade slips and slices him clean just above his eyebrow, and the left half of his world goes black as blood drips down his eye.

There is no pain yet the sensation of steel cutting his flesh sends a shock of clarity through him as though he has been doused with ice-cold water. He manages to get a leg beneath the man’s ribs and knees, hard. That shock of clarity lends strength to his limbs, and the outlaw is tossed aside, wheezing.

Eren does not wait for him to recover. He scrabbles, half-blind, in the mud for his sword, feels relief - sweet, blessed relief - course through him as his fingers brush against something hard and metallic. Footsteps splash behind him and he does not pause to think. He strikes, his sword swinging out in a perfect arc, and his foeman falls back into the mud to rise no more. Eren leaves him there, with half his entrails spilling out onto the watery ground, to search for his king.

He finds him where he first saw him, beneath the wooden scaffolding of the stage. They had not gone very far before the dead man accosted them. “Your Majesty, it’s all right, I can keep you safe,” Eren avows, reaching for his liege. The smell of fear bears toward him and it smells of piss, faint and dampened by the rain yet wholly recognizable, as the king holds onto him with surprising strength. Eren pays it no heed. Piss, shit, blood, and sweat, the soldier learns to tolerate all, even the foulest of stenches. It is the stink of battle, and delicate men with delicate noses do not long survive in the field. The king is well within his rights to piss in terror.

His Majesty and his acting guard once again make for safer ground, though where that is Eren does not know. Still the rain pours down in ceaseless buckets, and it welds his left eye close. There is as yet no pain but he knows that is not a good thing; he is not even sure the bleeding has stopped entirely. They have to get to safety and soon. For loathe though he is to admit it, something deep, deep down inside him recognizes that he is in no good state to be fighting much longer, with half his vision compromised such as it is. The king will not be harmed under his watch, gods help him.

Men dart around them, friend and foe both, their footsteps churning the red-brown mud into a frothing boil. Eren surveys the gray village as best he can with only one eye, looking for the royal congregation, or better yet a temple so they may claim the right of sanctuary…

The gods are with him, and he almost sinks to his knees in relief at the sight of a temple at the borders of the village - ruined, crumbled, blackened with fire but still a temple, and still well-placed to grant them safety by all the laws of the land.

Pain, red pain erupts up his right arm, and he drops his sword to the muddy ground. An arrow, he thinks with mild surprise as he stares down at the shaft protruding from his armored limb. It had punched through the plate as though it is nothing more than silk. Now where had he seen that before? And since when did they start using arrows? He does not have the chance to ruminate.

An outlaw is before him and his liege once more, axe raised to cleave one or the both of them in two. They are endless and everywhere, these outlaws, like fucking roaches. Distantly, Eren hears what sounds like the king bleat out, “Oh, gods be good,” as Eren shoves his royal person behind him to protect him, uselessly, with his body.

A foot of red-tipped steel bursts from the northman’s mouth like some grotesque tongue. His eyes widen and turn glassy in quick succession, and the axe tumbles from his hands. His pointed tongue retreats from his bloodied maw and his corpse falls to reveal Sir Levi Ackerman. The cycle of relief giving way to tension and back again is turning Eren’s head around, yet he is pleased to see his master all the same.

Sir Levi’s eyes flash from his face toward his injured arm and his mouth tightens. “Get the king to the temple, most of our men have taken sanctuary there. Me and the rest will throw the outlaws back. Go!”

For one mad moment, Eren wants to argue. He can still fight, still hold his own, yet the way his master’s eyes blaze up at him gives him pause. His arm is worse than useless now and better still he is half-blind, he will only get in the way. And he has the king to protect, a king who is in very real peril of being savaged if he insists on continuing the way he is now. His pigheadedness will spill royal blood in his hands, a much more dire consequence than a Lord Commander’s missing arm.

The king will not be harmed under his watch.

Eren swallows, bites his tongue, and nods jerkily. He stirs the petrified king onward, favoring his right arm, and lets the others put the outlaws to flight.

“Any luck with Halkin and Skaryn?”

His sire sighs, unendingly weary. “I hardly think this is the right time and place to speak of politics.”

But, Father, the weather and my happy domestic affairs hardly make for scintillating conversation. Zeke turns away from the dark world outside the wrought iron window to glance at Lord Grisha in his seat beside the canopied bed. “Well, since we’ve thoroughly exhausted the topic of our dear youngest here, we had as well talk about matters of import.”

Their dear youngest is lying upon his chartered bed, soused in poppy and utterly dead to the world. Yet he lives to see another day, thank the gods, Zeke thinks, watching his little brother sleep and recover his strength. His fever has broken at last, a very promising sign, assures Healer Dmitriy. The youngest Jaeger is well past danger now, and his wounds are healing cleanly.

There had been a scare of festering and the possible loss of a limb yet the Healers worked their craft and they moved beyond that. Fresh poulticed bandages bind Eren’s arm and cover the left side of his brow, the fall of dark hair over his face stark against the white linen. He looks younger, as innocent as he is like to get at this age, more the boy of six of Zeke’s youth and less the young man of sixteen he has quickly grown to be.

In the end, only the scars should remain. And his knighthood. Scars and near-death for that honor, that is how you come into it. Eren will be well-compensated for his leal service.

He is luckier than some, to be sure. Good men were lost that day. “Any word yet on the new Guardsmen?” Zeke persists when his father keeps his peace. Most times silence comes easy between them; sometimes, Zeke even preferrs it so, yet silence of late is an uncomfortable thing. He has somehow tied it to Eren’s state. If they keep quiet, then surely Eren will weaken and pass away into the Fields. His brother must hear their voices, if only so he can have an anchor to the living. Zeke does not know why he insists when Eren is finally out of the weeds. But it is true what they say about habits.

The quiet snaps and pops of the fire are the only things to be heard as Grisha stares at him a moment through his lenses. The light of the flickering hearthflames reflects off the fine Rhoseine glass, only to give way to the green pools beneath. Eren has inherited those eyes, the Jaeger eyes. Zeke is a Fritz through and through, blue and gold and fair. And yet they insist he is his father in gold.

“Some candidates have been chosen,” Lord Grisha says at length. “The squires of two fallen, Bertolt Hoover and Conrad Springer. They are set to replace their former masters. No word yet for the other two replacements but some names have been put forward.”

“Our younger Eren would have jumped at the chance.” Zeke gazes down fondly at his sleeping brother once more. “I’ve always wondered what made him change his mind.”

His father chuckles, a rare sound these days. “I was surprised he reconsidered at all, not that it was such a terrible thing. There are other ways to win honor for himself and his House. Left him open to the marriage market, at least.”

Speak of the marriage market… His little lady will want to know she can visit him at last. Zeke had caught the poor thing hovering around thereabouts near every day since they brought Eren in. It will enliven the lad to see his betrothed. They seem to be sweeter on each other at present, Zeke is pleased to see.

“As to Skaryn and Halkin…” Lord Grisha sighs and rubs his eyes beneath his spectacles. “I’ll continue to lobby for their families. If execution is in the fates of Valko Skaryn and Yuri Halkin, then so be it, but to extend that punishment to their whole lines?” He rubs at his temples, his horror at the thought well and truly palpable. “To their wives and children and brothers and cousins… it is too much. Too much. I cannot let that stand.”

His Majesty had been sore wroth when he had recovered from the terror of his ordeal. The lords Skaryn and Halkin were arrested, accused of treason and attempted regicide. Both have been attainted, stripped of all lands, titles, and incomes, and sentenced to death by beheading. But that is not to be enough for the king. In his wrath, Rod Reiss has declared, in no uncertain terms, his desire to see both men’s lines ended. Every man, woman, and child who bear the name of Skaryn and Halkin shall be expunged. Even those merely married to the name found no mercy. Rod Reiss wants them gone, gone.

Zheletov, too, felt the flames of royal fury. Hundreds of Zhelevic were arrested, those outlaws who did not manage to flee further North. All have been sentenced to hang. Rumor has it that the king means to hang their families as well, to teach the North a sharp lesson in slaughter. Robert of Feyhill, the head of the northern faction and the mind behind all, is to be hanged, drawn, and quartered - a fate reserved for the vilest of traitors. A charge he still vehemently denies even at the rack.

What should have been a moment of festive reconciliation became naught but dross. The court is silent, reeling in the enormity of it all.

“Eren saved his life, he should grant me a boon, at least,” Lord Grisha murmurs, more to himself than to his eldest, who stares at him then at his brother, who lays oblivious to his burgeoning role as leverage and potential savior of the lines of Skaryn and Halkin.

Zeke supposes it is only fitting for his knightly brother. What are knights for but for the saving of innocent lives?

“His fever broke last night, my lady, you can see him at last.”

You have never heard anything sweeter.

“Oh, thank the gods.” You smooth down your crimson dress, making sure all is in order. He has not laid eyes on you for four days, you had best be presentable. And pretty, you must be pretty, a girlish voice whispers, which you hastily tamp down. As if he’ll care overmuch about such matters, not after his ordeal. A silver shield burnished to a mirror sheen is hanging from the wall opposite you. Surreptitiously, you brush back a stray lock that has escaped from your braids. All in order, you think, pleased, as you stare at your somewhat distorted reflection. Some effort will not be amiss, surely.

Healer Dmitriy knocks upon the wooden door to announce himself before opening it and entering. Aly the Cat slips inside at once; distantly, you hear your betrothed utter a pleased exclamation of the creature’s name. You feel your heart thrum faster. Your fingers twine themselves around each other against your fluttering tummy. He sounds well. That is good.

“My lord, the Lady Rhyzkova is without and wishes to see you,” you hear the young priest say, his voice partly muffled by the half-closed door. The note of excitement in Eren’s voice as he bids the Healer to let you in makes you smile.

It is comfortably warm inside the chamber. A fire crackles merrily in the stone hearth before the canopied bed, inadvisable for a southron summer but perfectly acceptable for a northern one. Two bone-white velvet armchairs are arrayed before the fireplace. A table laden with what looks like the tools of the Healers’ trade - physic, rolls of bandages, and herbs of the medicinal sort - is sitting between the loungers. The brown linen curtains of the tall wrought iron windows are pulled back, illuminating the room with pale, watery sunshine and giving the place an airy countenance.

A green smell, the smell of herbs and plant life, pervades all. You find yourself breathing in deeply as you enter, your first few footsteps tapping lightly on the polished marble floor, yet all vanish as you lay eyes upon your wounded knight. The white hangings on his bed are tied back, revealing his form. He is sitting up, at least, with a wide grin on his bandaged face, his left eye swollen half-shut beneath the poultice. You would not have known he was ailing and lifeless for the better part of four days by his demeanor. Ginger Aly is curled up on his blanketed lap, eyes closed contently as Eren runs languid fingers over his short fur.

Your knight is awake, and smiling at you, and so wonderfully alive.

“How are you feeling?” you murmur as you sit on his bed by his legs. A flash of dark blue cloth sweeps by from the corner of your vision, but you do not pay it heed. Eren and his well-being come first.

He opens his mouth to answer but frowns almost at once. You mirror his expression and are about to ask what is wrong when he speaks. “Everything’s fine, Healer Dima, you may leave us.”

The straw-haired Healer in question freezes in the act of settling himself down upon one of the armchairs in front of the fireplace. Nerves and uncertainty play across his thin features for half a heartbeat before he reaches some sort of resolution and sits down determinedly. “Oh, no, please do not mind me. Someone must needs stay to keep an eye on… your health. Just because your fever has broken doesn’t mean you’re not susceptible to a relapse.”

“Oh, in that case, your presence is a much welcome one indeed, Healer,” you say rapidly, as Eren makes to say something, something undoubtedly rude to judge by the look on his face. He curls his lip at your interruption but subsides once you shake your head at him a little. Let him be.

Healer Dmitriy smiles, relieved. “Very good, my lady. See, you’ll hardly notice I’m here.” He reaches into one voluminous dark blue sleeve and pulls out a small book - a missal of The Light of the Creed, the new faith’s holiest text, you see, catching a glimpse of the twelve-rayed sun of the Creed on the book’s black leather cover. The priest opens the primer and promptly vanishes within its pages.

Of course a godly, dutiful man like him will insist on playing governess, you realize belatedly. It had not occurred to you until you saw him glance from you to Eren with an expression of abject worry. He can hardly leave a young maid alone with a half-naked young man in his chambers.

For the young man is very much half-naked. You feel your mouth go dry as the realization hits you hard. You cannot understand how that detail eluded you. “I see you’ve made a new friend,” you gesture at little Aly on Eren’s lap, a ditch effort to distract yourself, and fail miserably. That only brings further attention to his hard, incredibly ridged stomach. Oh, gods above.

Eren stares down fondly at the cat, oblivious to your ogling. “We only properly met this morning but we’re fast friends now,” he laughs as the ginger tom rises and stretches, then proceeds to rub up against his Healer’s charge, purring loudly. Never have you wanted to trade places with a cat so badly in your entire life.

Suddenly, looking your betrothed in the eye becomes an endeavor of utmost difficulty, not when you want to look elsewhere. You have seen your fair share of half-naked men. Comely men and homely ones, paragons as sculpted as statues and pigs shuffling along like sacks of suet, you have seen them all. You never lack for those in summery Vascalin, where the sight of them is so common as to be unremarkable. But a half-naked Eren is a veritable god to their mere mortal flesh.

You peer up at him from beneath your lashes as Aly occupies his attention for the nonce. He is beautifully well-made. You have always suspected it to be so; some of his tunics show off his shape well, and he oft wears his daily linens with the laces undone, allowing one to get a glimpse of an expansive, defined chest. To see all of that bared before you to prove the truth of your fancies is astounding.

His shoulders, broad and striking, lead down to strong, sinewy arms. The bandage wrapped around the right limb flaunts the roundness of the muscle and stands stark against his tanned skin. A tiny cluster of leech marks speckles the skin beneath his dressings yet they do nothing to diminish the smooth perfection of his limb. His chest is as wide and well-muscled; verily, his torso is a vision, each muscle as sharply etched as though he is cut from stone.

Some other girl is giggling madly deep down inside. You feel like a bitch in heat. The thought near makes the mad laughter bubble up your throat but you quell it quickly. And then you make the singular error of allowing your eyes to follow the sloping trail of chiseled muscle beneath the blankets and almost choke on air. The expected sight of the waist of his pants is nowhere in evidence.

Gods be good, is he naked under there?!

You squirm and press your legs together on your seat. You cannot have asked for better fodder for your fantasies. Suddenly, you can hear him, hear the deep, sultry cadence of his voice asking you if you will let him sate his lusts with you, feel the hard, chiseled torso press close against you as he leaned down to kiss you… Poxy Duty had robbed you of that kiss. More’s the pity. You wonder what it will feel like, to be trapped beneath that god-like body as freed of clothing as he is now, feel his heat and his skin bound you as you lay below him helpless but to take his lust and his amorous attentions…

Gods help you, lass, the lad is injured and just escaped death by the skin of his teeth. It does not do to entertain such unbecoming ideas. You’re worse than a dockside slut, you admonish yourself as heat courses through your whole body at the turn of your thoughts. There are better things to occupy yourself with than his magnificent body. His health is what matters most.

“Hey.”

You start at the sound of his voice and do not immediately meet his gaze. You hope to all the gods, both old and new, that your face is not a mirror of your desire. That is a discussion that can keep; your priestly governess will be shocked to his soul should he have the slightest inkling of what had flounced through your head these past few moments.

“Hey,” Eren says again, reaching out to lay a hand on your forearm. The touch comes lightly, so very lightly, yet the way it burns is anything but. You meet his eyes at last. “Are you all right? You look strange.” His concerned frown gives way to a reassuring smile. “I’m fine, see, healthy as a horse.” He wrinkles his nose at the idiom, making you giggle. “I’m well past danger now. The wound’s not going to fester, there’s no poison in my blood, I’m fine and whole. You don’t need to worry so much.”

“Thank the gods,” you breathe, instantly snatching at that sentiment. It is not as if you aren’t worried about him, but best have him construe your conflicted expression as concern instead of lust. This is not the time for lust. “Speak of the gods,” you smile down at Aly, who has padded over to you, seeking affection, “you are blessed indeed. Lady Alyrya has been with you this whole time.” Cats are sacred to the Gardener, but none more so than the ginger tabby.

“It’s a nice thought, that-”

“Oh!”

There is a great tug, and your hand flies to your chest as the laces of your bodice come undone. It will seem that Aly is feeling a little too neglected. Or desirous of yarn. You hold the tom fast as you unhook his claws from the crimson cords, your face smarting a little in mortification.

“Oh, dear.” Healer Dmitriy flaps over to the bed, the tips of his prominent ears pink. “A thousand pardons, my lady, it seems he’s in his excitable mood again. I’ll see him out.” He scoops his ginger attendant into his arms and bustles away, threatening the cat with a salmon-less dinner as he does so.

You sigh and tighten your laces once more. Aly had not pulled down far enough for your breasts to spill out from your bodice, thankfully, but that was a near thing. You are more comfortable baring skin than most women north of the Greatshield are, being from the sweltering South, yet you draw the line at exposure in front of two men. Well, perhaps one of them can get a pass. You bite the inside of your lip as you fumble briefly and have to redo the knot all over again.

“You know what they say about certain animals being able to channel people’s wills?” Eren lifts his gaze from your chest to your face. His eyes have darkened a little. Your fingers tighten on your cords. “Nobody can say for sure if that still holds true but it’s an interesting thought.” His legs shift beneath the blankets.

The return of the Healer saves you from having to form a reply. He gives you an apologetic smile and another apology before returning to his seat and his book once more.

“Your hair’s grown longer,” you remark arbitrarily, not quite knowing what to say to your betrothed’s earlier statement. Besides… Your face tingles a little. With the way he looked at you then, you cannot guarantee that your conversation won’t lead to… bawdier pastures. You had never truly touched upon the subject before but something about his demeanor then gives you pause. Best to nip that in the bud. Your governess will not stand for anything remotely suggestive. He will throw you out and forbid you from seeing Eren again for the rest of his confinement, and you cannot have that.

Eren tugs at the ends of his hair, looking at it thoughtfully. “Do you think I should cut it? I haven’t been up to calling on the barber lately…”

“It’s your hair, you’re free to do as you like.” You give him a small smile. “I like it, though. It makes you look-” comelier, “-older, more mature.”

He settles back into his pillows, appearing gratified. “Well, then, I suppose I’ll keep it as it is for the time being.” He gazes at you for a good long while, before his concern reduces his smile into something softer. “You look tired.”

The chuckle that escapes you echoes the sentiment, as though his bringing attention to the fact has drawn four days’ worth of weariness out. You rub a finger at the skin beneath your eye. “Between you and Father and this whole affair, I have been getting no lick of sleep.” You cannot count the hours you had spent in Merrydell’s sanctum, praying and praying and praying for him and your lord father, beseeching the old gods to bless and keep them. You had even visited the nearest temple of the Gardener to offer incense, a candle, and yet more prayers for your betrothed. He belongs to the Creed, perhaps his Lady will be better inclined to protect him should the old gods dismiss your pleas.

Lady Alyrya heard them, at any rate, her and the old gods. Father’s fever was only the chills brought on by the rains and not from a corrupted wound; he had taken a glancing blow from an outlaw’s knife but managed to come out of that debacle otherwise unscathed. He was right as rain after a day or so.

Eren had given you more grief. What time you had outside of prayer was spent hovering anxiously outside these very chambers, hoping you could visit him or at least learn of his condition. Still, you will visit the sanctum and the temple tonight, to give thanks to the gods for granting him further life.

“Ask Healer Dima to give you essence of valerian, it helps a lot,” Eren urges, fretful. He can be a rather fretful character, you have come to find. It only makes him sweeter in your eyes.

“I will at that. Although I’ll be sleeping more soundly tonight regardless.” Because you’re awake and all right and alive. A bowl of apples is sitting upon his bedside dresser. His mother’s key lays beside it, nestled amidst the coils of its leather cord. “Are you hungry?” you ask, gesturing at the fruit.

“Will you feed me if I am? I can barely lift my arm for the pain.” Eren blinks at you all innocent-like. The teasing tilt to his lips ruins the effect, however. From the distance comes the tiniest of coughs.

Your own mouth twitches up in amusement. “If you wish it.”

“I do wish it,” he says firmly, sitting up straight again. “I’m hungry, so hungry, famished, starving-”

“All right, your hunger has been well and truly noted.” You reach for an apple and the paring knife and proceed to cut the fruit. Needlessly, you know. He is not so injured that he cannot feed himself (despite his claims to the contrary). In this, you indulge him. The patient must have his way until he recovers.

A cough resounds from the distance once more, louder this time, as you reach forward to put a slice of apple in your betrothed’s waiting mouth. You both freeze and glance over at the Healer, who is staring at you beadily from above his holy missal. A prick of annoyance simmers within you, but you flash him a placating smile as you move to put more distance between you and Eren. You slip the piece of fruit into your betrothed’s mouth, careful not to let your fingers brush against his lips, those luscious, alluring, enticing lips…

You bite back a giggle as he chews the morsel, looking distinctly bad-tempered. Your fingertips still tingle from the warmth of his breath. “I see you still haven’t put on your mother’s key,” you observe, eyeing the forenamed pendant on the bedside table. His betrothal necklace looks rather lonely without its staunch companion around his neck.

His bad-tempered expression deepens. “He’s a priest, he’s as superstitious as they come. His precious sensibilities won’t stand for blasphemy.” Scorn drips from his voice as he says the word, further amusing you. “You’ll make a better Healer,” he adds, his expression softening as he gleams at you. “You don’t nag as much.”

That is an interesting thought, that. The past few days certainly lent further fodder to your long-held fancies of being a Healer. It is a flimsy whim, a glib thought born from a night of girlish diversion when asked that absurdly preposterous question: what would you be had you not been born into nobility? Your fledgling pastime in the gardens led you to answer as you had.

But perhaps that fledgling can grow into something more. Seeing people you care for hurt and ailing woke something in you, the desire to ease their pain if only but a little. You hope Healer Darya is willing to take on a new apprentice this autumn.

“Does it hurt so much?”

Eren chews on his apple, looking artless and very much innocent in truth. He does not stay so for long, though (not that you expect him to, the cheeky sod). “I already told you, didn’t I? I wouldn’t ask you to feed me if it didn’t hurt like blazes.” Something in your expression sobers him, and the smile he flashes you is gentle, tender. “I’m a little sore, but nothing you need concern yourself about too much.” He reaches out to take your free hand in his, lightly caressing your skin with his thumb. “And you have been, haven’t you? So concerned that you lost sleep over me, of all people.” He seems to move farther away, going somewhere beyond this room and beyond you.

You pull away from his hold to cup his face in your hand, as though in doing so you can keep him bound to yourself. You touch him as softly as you can yet still he flinches as your palm presses against the injured side of his face. That spasm of pain makes you pull back but he reaches up quickly to keep your hand on him, smiling up at you reassuringly as he does so. The green sparkling at you beneath his poulticed eyebrow is as vibrant as its twin, swollen and puffy though the skin around it is. He is still so beautiful, your battered knight. So beautiful, and warm, and alive.

The loud clearing of a holy throat reminds you of decency and decorum, and you make to pull away from your betrothed once more. He is not having it, though. His grip on your hand tightens, and his face darkens like thunder. “Bloody prissy priests… As if a simple touch to the face equates to… what exactly? A hot little romp?” His laugh comes out exuding derision and mockery. “I didn’t throw you down on the bed and have my way with you, did I? With the way he’s looking at us, you’d think he caught us fucking,” he grouses, in a voice pitched low so only you would hear him.

A lump rises inside your throat that almost chokes you. You cough to rid yourself of it. How he can say such things so baldly confounds you. “That’s… probably what he's thinking. I suppose he’s here to try and preserve my honor. For all he knows, you could be some sort of perverted lech,” you say, in what you hope is an offhand way.

That puts a thoughtful look on Eren’s face. Suddenly, the darkness in his eyes holds a very different sort of sentiment. He glances at you from beneath his lashes before looking down at his lap. Your fingers twitch a little against his face as he continues to keep your hand captive. Heat once again simmers beneath your skin to match the heat you had caught in his gaze before he averted his eyes. In a quiet voice, he murmurs something that sounds suspiciously like, “He’s not far off, then.”

Your heart almost stops at that. “Pardon?”

He lifts his eyes back to yours and blinks slowly. “Have I not been preserving your honor for the better part of a year already? He has nothing to worry about.” One corner of his mouth kinks up roguishly. “Unless my lady does not care for such things. I’d gladly play the perverted lech if you’d let me.”

Gods save me.

Eren’s smile widens as though he has heard you and he releases your hand, allowing you to pick up the paring knife from where it is sitting on your lap. You take a brief recess to settle yourself and cut another wedge off the rapidly browning apple in your grip. Your hand does not shake, to your credit.

“Good apple, that,” Eren notes conversationally, as though he had not been speaking of perversion and fornication mere moments ago.

“The Skaryns brought in a good harvest.” The discomposure leaves you at once as the name of that doomed family leaves your lips. You stare down at the halved fruit in your hand. A good harvest. And their last. Everything seems to dim then, as though a pall has settled upon the world. The Skaryn pall. It is a cruel edict. Your knight had saved the author of that cruel edict. And that is why you can now call him that. Your knight. “You will be a Sir in truth now.”

“I will be, huh…” Eren looks pleased, excited at the thought. As well he might. It is all he ever wanted and lived for, the culmination of years of training and service.

“What’s his name, your squire?” you query as you feed him another slice. The next slice you eat yourself. It is as good as he claims, browned though it is now; the juice is sweet, refreshing on your tongue.

His eyes widen as he munches his own mouthful, as though he has forgotten that knights need squires to squire for them. “Falco Grice.” He swallows. “I have a squire.” The wonder in his face and voice makes you smile. “How do I go about being a master, though?” He screws up his face in thought, then puffs out his chest. “Falco, muck out the stables. I want to be able to eat off the ground once you’re done,” he says in his best approximation of Sir Levi’s flat tone.

There is a pause as the both of you stare at each other silently before descending into fits of giggles. For a while, you cannot stop. He is strong and thriving, and he is to be a knight at long last. Everything seems good in the world again, and the fate of doomed families fades into the ether. But as the light of day gives way to the gloom of night, his cheer slowly gives way to something more staid, dour, even mournful. Eren looks down at his hands, pensive. “Do I even deserve that honor, though? After…”

Sir Erwin’s lost arm hangs heavy between you. Half a year gone and still it haunts him. His gloom seeps into you like some illness, only to feed your determination to see him rise above his guilt and shame.

“You do,” you state firmly. You will not brook arguments on this matter. “You saved His Majesty, the king’s life, that’s not a small thing. And you learned, didn’t you? You didn’t get those injuries by running pell-mell into danger, did you?” As he shakes his head no, you go on, “Then let it go. Onward and upward and no looking back. It does you no good to dwell on such things. It’ll only eat you up inside.”

“Did I even learn, though? Because I thought about it. Running pell-mell into danger.” He picks at the skin on his forefinger, hunched over and reeking of shame.

Your heart goes out to him, your earnest betrothed. He is a young man, near grown, and yet in many ways he is a boy still. “The only thing that matters is that you didn’t act on it.” You brandish a slice of apple at him. “Sweet to banish the bitter.”

A weight seems to lift off his shoulders as he accepts your proffered piece into his mouth. “You always know what to say.” He gazes at you, soft, contemplative, considering. “And you have to know what to say. In that there is no choice, not for you, my Lady of Rhyzkov.”

You cut yourself a wedge and help yourself to your own sweet. There is nothing to add to the truth that you have always known.

“I grew up wanting to be a Royal Guardsman.”

As most boys do, noble or common.

“But then I served one of them.” Wryness taints Eren’s tone as he continues, “I saw him- them dog every step of this one man every day of their lives and realized that… wasn’t for me. Knights are for serving, yes, but I want the freedom to choose my own liege. If I am to spend a lifetime in thrall to one, I want it to be by my own will and not because tradition says I must.”

And to be a Royal Guardsman is to serve the blood royal for life. “But you didn’t choose me.” As either liege or bride.

Eren looks at you then and subjects you to a long and intense stare. “No, I didn’t.” This intensity is different, something you cannot quite place.

He is such a forceful personality, you reflect as you hold his deep green gaze. Deep enough to drown in. And you are and will continue to do so, you know now, for the rest of your life. But there is joy in trying to keep up with him, something exhilarating about navigating his tides. He is quite unlike anyone you have ever met, and it intrigues you.

“That doesn’t mean I won’t serve you gladly, willingly, and with everything I have.”

Embers of green fire begin to flare up at you and you avert your eyes lest you be burned. His tides you can navigate. You cannot say the same for his flames. “I look forward to your investiture.” You cut the last bit of apple in half.

The reminder of his investiture banks his flames near instantly. “It seems… inappropriate to have it after the executions.”

So his father has told him all. A certain chill appears to cloak you in its folds. It is almost enough for you to wish for his fires back. “The court needs something to celebrate after such unpleasantness.”

“Unpleasantness…” Eren frowns down at the white linen sheets draped over his lap. “The northmen deserve their sentence for that treachery, but to eradicate whole bloodlines strikes me as being too much. Little Yakob Halkin could hardly conspire against the king. Six-year-olds care more for toys than treason.”

You have never thought to see the end of a line, much less two, in your lifetime. But that is the way of the lords. You yourself are descended from the Shrike, Queen Yelena Rhyzkova, the fourth to bear that name and title, who had rid the world of the Moldovans thousands and thousands of years ago. If your royal forebear had any compunctions about killing the children of her enemies in her bid for power, no one will know now. She had taken her sensibilities with her to the grave.

“The commons will go the way of their masters, if the talk is true.” You hand Eren his last morsel and bite into your own.

Eren eats his apple and reclines back on his pillows. “It’s only talk. He will get his blood price and be paid twice over with highborn blood. He’ll leave the innocent commons alone. They’re not worth that much, at the end of the day.”

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

---

A/N:

Horny YN is horny. But, really, who can blame her? Have you seen the guy?

Knight!Eren is here at last, hurrah for him. But the Northern Matter has turned into... another matter entirely.

This’ll be the last update for this year, so it’s my Christmas posting for you, my readers, who I am very thankful to have! I’m glad to be able to share my brainchild to the world and I thank you so much for reading! Always, always <3

This may be my last TSL update but not my last post for the year... at least it depends on how fast I can get around to it. But I’m planning on dabbling in the modern AU and posting a smutty one-shot that will just not leave my brain and so I have no choice but to write it. Hopefully I can get it done before the year ends, if not... I can hail the New Year with good sexy smutty goodness.

Tagging: @princess-okkotsu @lukepattersin @aki-and-saltfish

#eren jaeger x reader #eren yeager x reader #eren x reader #snk x reader #aot x reader #eren jeager x reader #Eren Jaeger #eren yeager #shingeki no kyojin #attack on titan

42 notes · View notes