Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Little queen, he used to call her in his head. Watching the daughter of the Hizuran dynasty flit and titter through the hordes of men that raised her family's banner. When he met her for the first time, she was a girl barely flowered. She was a princess then, the daughter of a fierce but small kingdom, and to mint the sanctity of this new alliance, she, the Queen, and the Crown Prince had accompanied their military. At the time, Eren had been skeptical. "Princesses and their ilk aren’t meant to be part of negotiations,” he said and there was a moment where he wondered if he’d gone too far with the emperor, the man who’d promised him as a boy that he’d deliver him to the most fearsome battles men would ever fight in their lifetimes. Ensuring that even though he was the illegitimate son of a disgraced family whose glory days were behind them, his name would ring out through history as one of the greatest warriors Eldia had ever known.

“Not this princess,” Erwin replied and the deep, rumbling tone of his voice gave these words the quality of a declaration, even though it was just the two of them, drinking in Erwin’s private quarters. And normally, that would be enough for Eren to jettison such concerns from his mind, trusting in the man he’d pledged his absolute loyalty to when he was just a boy.

But now he was a man. Thirty years old with close to a thousand kills to his name. Enough that Erwin had given him the title of the Emperor’s lieutenant and placed him at the head of the most fearsome divisions of the Eldian army, leading hordes of screaming, blood-thirsty men into battle underneath the Emperor’s flag.

“You want to fuck her,” Eren said before he can stop himself.

Erwin appraised him for a moment. Long enough that Eren wondered if he’d gone too far. But then the stiff quiet was shattered by the emperor’s laugh. Commanding and thunderous like a god’s must be, making the hair on the back of Eren’s neck stand up even as he told himself that there was nothing to worry about.

“Perhaps. It depends on what kind of princess she ends up becoming,” the emperor said, his words well-oiled with consideration. Like there was another secret lingering just beneath the one Eren had so easily recovered. One that might explain this alliance, crafted between the towering Eldian Empire and the meager island kingdom of Hizuru, far more generous than the terms offered to any other country. It had confused Eren when he first heard it, and it confused him even more as he watched his emperor, his god, swirl wine around in his chalice with an inscrutable look on his face.

His expression haunted Eren even still the next morning when he took his place on the emperor’s dias to watch the Hizuran military and royal family make their way to the palace. The thousands of soldiers they’ve brought to the capital glinted ominously in the light, their armor fine and metaled, though thin enough to allow for easy movement. Their faces are as placid as the waters that surround their island home, which allowed them to cultivate this awesome power without the interference of competitors. When the King approached the Emperor at the steps of the Citadel to present him with the gift of a sword, the crowd fell silent in reverent wonder.

The King himself was known to be a fearsome warrior. An Eldian himself, he’d fallen in love with the princess of a sonless family and proved himself worthy of their crown. Despite his origins, he’d given himself over to the Hizuran people, wearing their garb and speaking their language as if it was the truth written in his bones.

His queen consort stood next to him, head bowed, in a decadent silken robe that was cinched tightly around her waist with a wide ribbon. She was wearing red, all of them were, and intricate embroidery trailed up her sleeves, letting everyone know that she was well-loved. The sort of wife that was used to being heeded. Eren could understand why; there was a divinity to her beauty that even he was affected by, despite the fact that he hadn’t taken a woman to his bed in years.

He told himself that he wouldn’t look at the girl. Whatever Erwin wanted, it became his the moment he uttered that it was to be so. And while he’d struggled to fall asleep, wondering what about this girl could have arranged a constellation of starry affection in the eyes of his leader, he took his desire to know her in his hands and crushed it into nothing. Or at least, that was what he’d thought he’d done before arriving on this stage where all of Eldia and the might of Hizuru were looking in his direction. He tried to refocus, looking at the Crown Prince of Hizuru instead, a dark-haired boy with delicate features who stood at haughty attention at his father’s side.

But there was no controlling his gaze once it caught on the princess for only a moment. Shorter than her mother but not by much, she stood at her side in a dresslike robe. And though it contrasted brilliantly with her pale complexion and the dark silk of her hair, that wasn’t what made him understand why Erwin might’ve taken a special interest in the Hizuran princess.

She was otherworldly. In appearance just as much as in demeanor, she stood with a solemn elegance that Eren knew to be beyond her years, the serene sternness of her being rivaling that of the most accomplished soldiers he’d ever known. But the truth of her hold on the emperor was in her eyes – steely and fierce like the Hizuran blade that Erwin was now turning over in his hands.

“With swords like this, the Kingdom of Hizuru and the Eldian Empire will bring the world to its knees!”

The emperor lifted the blade above his head and Eren could see the fires of war in his mentor’s eyes.. Like it was preordained, the crowd joined the Emperor in his war cry in perfect unison, until it drowned out whatever peace might exist in this world.

The princess didn’t join in. Her gaze was unflinching and sharp, cutting into Eren with precision when he did. Making him falter, if only for a moment And when she smiled, girlish and a little mean, his arousal was potent enough that it clouded his anger. Unwillingly, his eyes tracked over to the emperor who, no doubt, was looking in the same direction Eren was. It was only because a twin madness had erupted in him that he was able to recognize it in Erwin so easily, how utterly besotted the emperor was with who this girl was and could be.

The feeling this knowledge conjured in him was dark and twisting, intertwining itself with his insides, as if to ensure that the curse of his interest of her could not be torn out easily. And something like knowing flickered across her lovely face. Now, on the eve of their demise, he wonders if this moment was his downfall? Or maybe, it had occurred at some impossible past point he no longer recognizes, assuring that this is the end he’s always been destined for.

All for Mikasa.

But he didn’t know that yet, then. No, then he thought that whatever had passed between them was delusion, brought on by what Erwin had shared with him the night previous. Once the ceremony was complete, he broke away from the emperor’s retinue, saying he wanted to talk to his soldiers before they departed on a small campaign the following morning.

“I’m sure they’ll be happy to see you,” the emperor added, clapping Eren on the back. Relief shivered into his body; there were other reasons for his leader to look at him askance when he requested more time with his soldiers. It wasn’t a secret what he did with a chosen few of him in part because Erwin had done the same thing. Letting the young men of Eldia slake the desire that was stirred up by blood and violence.

He wasn’t a kind lover nor was he generous. But there must’ve been something in his touch that made men feel worthy because he never had trouble finding someone to share his tent, to allow him to pound into their ass until they had no choice but to lie on the ground, utterly spent. And the times that he wanted someone who could withstand more, there was always Reiner. They’d trained together in the camps created for boys from families without standing.

Because they were leaving the following morning and it had taken over a week for all the troops to arrive, the Eldian capital had allowed them to erect a camp on the grounds adjacent to the palace, no doubt to show the empire’s might to Hizuru as well. As Eren drew closer, the sounds of men laughing and drinking became more apparent. The closer he got, the less familiar the words became to him. He realized that some of the Hizurans must’ve joined the frivolity. Their officers had been allowed the privilege to the camp alongside the Eldian forces that they would be marching to war with Marley.

All around him, soldiers clunked heavy flagons of beer, laughed uproariously at dirty jokes and other lowborn forms of humor. Eren didn’t mean any of their questioning eyes nor did he slow down as he found himself drawn to the Hizuran camp for reasons that he was unwilling to admit to himself.

He wanted to see her again.

Arousal churned in his gut as he approached the grounds that housed their newfound allies. Their tents were different, as was the way they lit their camp, using lanterns instead of lit torches. Their language was foreign to his ears, having nothing in common with Eldian or the languages of any of the other peoples’ he’d conquered on Erwin’s behalf. Yet, he still drew closer, even though he knew that he wouldn’t find her there. Princesses didn’t spend their time in military camps, drinking with soldiers, waiting to be happened upon by the desperate and the damned.

The guards at the entrance to the camp were standing still wearing armor. Their swords were at the ready and even though Eren knew that it would take a great deal for them to be drawn on him, he still found that his blood shivered for a second at the sight.

“I an Eren, the emperor’s lieutenant. I an here to treat with your officers,” he said, doing his best to ignore the guards’ raised eyebrows. He wasn’t wearing anything resembling an official military uniform; in fact, he still donned the finery that the emperor had requested he’d wear to the ceremony. His long hair hung loose around his face and he had no weapon on his person, nor anything resembling a gift in his arms. Still, they let him through.

One of the few comforts available to him in his brutal life was that no matter where you went, soldiers were the same. And the Hizuran camp was in many ways identical to his own, albeit in different colors and materials. The lanterns that hung from metal pillars staked into the ground lent a warm glow to the path he walked as he snaked his way through the camp. Some of the foreign soldiers startled at the sight of him, their gazes made slow and sticky by drink.

He was used to being stared at. When Erwin first lifted him to the position he was now in, it had been an unpopular choice. “You can’t just give someone their own division of the military because they are talented at killing people,” he remembered Erwin’s advisor Nile saying. And it mostly didn’t bother him, as long as he knew that there were places that he could tread that bluebloods like Nile wouldn’t even dare to approach.

But in all of the places he’s been, he’d never come across a sight as striking as the one that greeted him once he found his way into the guts of the camp. He heard the clash of blades, the ringing of steel that only came with the pure Hizuran make. And such sounds – grunting and cursing, sand being kicked up as one soldier fell to the ground and the other stood over him in mock triumph – were all expected, unremarkable even. Yet, all of it was rendered extraordinary by the two who were sparring.

The first element he was able to define was the one that was the least strange to him – the Hizuran weaponmaster, watching the two sparring soldiers with an expression of cool detachment. Eren had met him once before, during the early negotiations between the two nations. Though he was small in stature, he was fearsome, a fact aided by the milky gray of his injured left eye, made even more striking by the slash that decorated his eye socket. He came from the family of the king, someone of Eldian descent who’d ended up on the Hizuran islands by chance..

The holder of the first sword wasn’t a surprise. Hizuru was known for their warriors, which meant that its crown prince was expected to play a role in the military. He looked comfortable in the sparring clothes he wore, a more muted gray compared to the finery he’d donned to the ceremony. The crown prince was small in the way of boys who hadn’t yet hit their growth spurt, despite his assured destiny of greatness.

Maybe that was why he was being trounced so thoroughly by an unlikely opponent: his sister. She was dressed similarly to her brother, and around the same height that he was. Eren remembered hearing that they were twins, a symbol of good luck in Hizuran culture. His hair was up while hers was down, shielding her face from sight like a black silk curtain, but it didn’t seem to interfere with her ability to dodge every single one of her brother’s blows. She moved with graceful precision, creating graceful, vicious shapes with her body.

“Makoto! Watch what your sister’s doing. She is making a fool of you in front of the Eldian military.”

Eren startled, having been so caught up in watching the Hizuran prince and princess cross swords that he hadn’t realized that he had been noticed. Levi was glaring at him pointedly, no doubt waiting for some kind of introduction or excuse for why Eren was here. But it was hard to think clearly when the princess was looking at him, her sword still in hand.

“Put that away, Mikasa. We are supposed to be friends with these people,” the weapons master scolded. The princess flushed for a moment, a delightful break in her composure that made her look like a fifteen year old girl instead of the warrior goddess she’d been only moments ago. But before he could commit her vulnerability to memory, it was scrubbed from her face entirely, and she regained her expression of regal disinterest as she sheathed her sword.

“Is there a reason we’ve been blessed with your presence, lieutenant?” Levi deadpanned, finally turning his scrutiny on the interloper in their midst. Eren didn’t know what to do with his attention nor the eyes of the progeny of the Hizuran royal family and their guards. Perhaps, the only thing that he had going for him was that he didn’t have any weapons on him.

He felt the princess looking at him. There was an intentionality in her gaze that told him it was more than looking. “It appears that the lieutenant is lost. I can help him find his way back,” she said, tilting her head to the side. As if sensing her weapon master’s disagreement, she added: “I will take a full retinue of guards to make sure we find the way safely.”

It was clear from the older man’s expression that he didn’t like this answer. However, it was also apparent that she had dominion over him, the kind that would be disrespectful to question in front of a high-ranking officer from a foreign military. “As you wish, princess,” he said through tightly held teeth. Then, he fixed Eren with a glare so potent and murderous that Eren felt it even once his back was turned to him.

Yet, it paled in comparison to the princess’s light. Radiant and demanding, it held even when she drew close enough for their differences in height to become apparent. He was more than a decade older than her, tall enough that she had to tilt her royal chin upward so she could look at him properly.

As if noticing this discrepancy, her retinue of guards maintained a tight circle around their princess and the wayward soldier she’d decided to escort to his camp. Unintentionally, they created a wall of sorts around the two of them, accidentally allowing for something like privacy as their faces were shielded from any who might want to gawk at what the daring Hizuran princess had gotten herself into.

“I have heard of you,” she said, wearing a mysterious smile. She wasn’t wearing any of the makeup or finery that she had been when he’d seen her on the dias earlier that day. But her beauty refused to be diminished, almost as if she was aware of the hold it had over him. “They say you’ve killed more men than anyone else in Eldia. Even the emperor. Where I come from, they call you the Devil of Paradis.”

“I thought princesses were usually shielded from the realities of war,” he said. His eyes lingered on her and all the ways she’d defied his expectations. He’d never met a woman who preferred to walk around with the ability to kill sheathed at her hip. She must’ve noticed him looking; her hand fell to the hilt like a reflex. She grasped it briefly, as if for comfort, before letting her hand fall to her side.

“Hizuru is not like your backwards empire,” she retorted, her grin turning sickly sweet as if to placate him. “Women of the Azumabito dynasty have always been expected to be fearsome warriors. Just as much as their men. Otherwise, how is she supposed to protect herself if her king is elsewhere?”

Another suggestion to her words, yet the meaning of this one felt even more diffuse. Making him wonder if there was another layer to Erwin’s plans that he wasn’t yet aware of. The emperor had yet to marry or sire an heir; since he took hold of power in a military-backed coup fifteen years ago, there hadn’t been time. But the emperor was in his thirties now, an age men like him rarely reached. It would make sense for him to finally secure his legacy through marrying the Hizuran princess. And it surprised him, the rash of emotions that filled his chest at the thought, forcing the question from his lips before he could stop it.

“And who is your king to be?”

Suddenly, her eyes flicked away from him. They came to a stop and Eren realized, belatedly, that they were already at the edge of the Hizuran camp. The guards parted, no doubt expecting him to take his leave. Still, he stayed, anxious for her answer.

“Have you not heard? Today, the Azumabito dynasty announced that they will be upholding their founding tradition. There’s a reason that twins are something to be celebrated. It’s said to honor our founders, who themselves were twins and married in order to preserve the peace of our small island kingdom. And so, I'm to marry my brother before the end of the year.”

He was preparing himself for Erwin’s name to fall from her lips. Something about the fledgling alliance and the need for it to be strengthened. But what she’d presented him with a far more complex issue instead: a marriage that she clearly didn’t want to a meager boy who couldn’t possibly be worthy of her. It made his blood hot to think of her not getting what she wanted. But before he could say anything about it, she disappeared into the circle of her guards and let them lead her into the night.

Eren only noticed that he’d dug his nails into his palms once they started bleeding.

“Open your mouth, Mikasa.”

After months of the Eldian emperor’s tutelage, her body had learned how to take such a command with ease. Something about the deep vibration of his voice touched a primal place in her. Dark and hot, it knew she had to do what he said. Once the Hizuran-Eldian invasion of Marley began just over a year ago, she’d be sent here for protection. It wouldn’t do for the future queen of Hizuru to be taken captive, the emperor had explained when he’d come to the shores of her island kingdom to take her.

She was sixteen then. Married for a handful of months, though it felt more accurate to say that she and her brother had been bound together in ways more sacrosanct than marriage since they came into this world together. Both the emperor and his lieutenant had haunted her thoughts with more frequency than was appropriate for a married princess. When she heard that her brother would be accompanied on the battlefield with the man she’d spoken to on a starry night in what felt like another life, she wanted to weep with jealousy. If only she’d been born a man, then she would’ve been able to soak up the Eldian hero’s attention, to learn how to be a killer at his side.

But unfortunately, she was a woman, and the closest thing she was allowed to a battlefield was whatever was left to the realm of politics and diplomacy. It was for these reasons that her family had allowed her to stay with the emperor. She was meant to learn something from him. However, Mikasa had come to realize that her parents and the emperor had different ideas about what that might mean.

Once, early on in her stay in the emperor’s palace, he’d asked her if she loved her brother and all she could do was laugh. To describe the way she felt about him, the eternal thorn in her side, took far more than one word. It was a sentiment that contained every feeling she’d ever had about another person, all forced into the body of a boy who looked just like her, just with shorter hair.

It was clear that the emperor of Eldia was intrigued by the customs of her family, as similar things had gone on in the early days of the Eldia he’d seized control of. Her family had fabricated a great romance to justify it, but deep down, she knew it was because the Azumabitos couldn’t stand the idea of their blood becoming any thinner. That, and any man with the standing to have her would expect a dowry so grandiose that it would almost bankrupt the small kingdom.

Still, everyone pretended that it was ordained by the gods or another power that couldn’t be questioned. Makoto had yet become a lover to her; or at least, who he was as her lover, her husband, was inextricable from who he’d been growing up: a resentful boy grasping for love.

He had been smaller than her at birth, sickly enough to cause the queen to spend sleepless nights cradleside. And in the absence of her mother , Mikasa had grown, sharper and more resilient, driven forward by a burning need to secure her future and survive. For the first decade of their lives, she was stronger and faster than him in every way and he was made even softer by the way their mother coddled him in his childish envy.

But as her brother became a man and learned that the solution to every one of his desires lived inside his sister, he’d become needy. Preening for her attention when they were training under Levi’s instruction, flicking notes in her direction while their instructor Hanji schooled them in the ways of the world.

“I’m lucky that you’re so pretty,” he once murmured in her ear at a family gathering when they were fourteen. “I don’t even have to pretend to like you.”

Even once they were married, their relationship hadn’t lost this teasing, prickly quality. If only to see what he might do, she refused to strip herself of her wedding garments on the night they were meant to consummate their marriage. Instead of taking her in hand – like she knew a man would – they devolved into petty squabbling and play fighting until he finally subdued her enough to get his cock inside her.

What she found in their lovemaking wasn’t pleasure exactly, but something familiar and not all-together unpleasant. As long as she made sure to never look at him and find her own face staring back at her: ripped open in a clumsy expression of male pleasure. When she found herself attracted to him, a slick wrongness always accompanied it, the vanity of it unbecoming. Together, it was like they created a blackhole of beauty, endless eating itself, never finding succor. While their pantomime of marriage – copied extensively from their parents – was enough to convince their family and kingdom, as soon as the emperor of Eldia set eyes on her, she was found out.

“I knew it as soon as I saw you,” Erwin said after the first time they found themselves like this: wrapped around each other in his most private quarters, the rigid strength of his body carving hers into something new. They hadn’t fallen into bed together immediately but it had been close. The foolish crush she’d nurtured for the foreign emperor who looked at her like she was already a queen had only been made more potent by their separation.

“That boy has no idea how to fuck you like you’re meant to be fucked,” he added and then he proved himself right by making her come on his cock so many times she started to cry and like a loving dog, he licked away her tears.

In his chambers, he told her to call him Erwin. He dismissed his guards, his servants. He let her into his bed and some nights, she even slept there. More often than not, he was naked, which made it easier than ever for her to find the shimmering heat of his pulse in his neck or his chest or his wrist or even his cock, when it was buried deep inside her, and how easy it would be for her to kill him. That this, in some way, seemed to be part of what made him so desperate for her, to the point where he wasn’t even upset when he found one of her daggers hidden underneath the pillow she usually slept on, saying that if she ever decided to kill him, he’d be sure that she’d have a good reason.

Today, she’d been in the garden, supervising the planting of a shipment of plants and other flora from Hizuru in order to furnish a garden meant to commemorate the alliance between their two countries. It was a project the emperor had given her but he appeared to be dead set on distracting her from it. She wasn’t at all surprised when he sought her out before she’d even finished giving the palace gardeners directions. At first, he used to come with extravagant excuses to prevent the servants from suspecting anything between them. But before long, whatever it was became undeniable, and everyone around them learned how to avert their eyes.

He was the emperor, after all.

Open your mouth.

It was easy to do what he asked when he said it in that booming voice of his, deep and commanding like proclamations from a god. She was still wearing her finest clothes – an ornately draped robe in the Eldian style that was secured to her body with criss-crossing ribbons that accented her waist. The sheer shawl that allowed her the hint of modesty had long ago been abandoned, revealing her shoulders. She could feel his gaze on her, intent as a physical touch as he pulled his cock free and presented it to her as her reward for doing what he said.

He reached for her, cupping her chin in the calloused expanse of his palm. “When you look at me like this, I want nothing more than to give you the world,” he said, pressing his thumb to her lower lip. Like a reflex, her jaw opened wider and she took him into her mouth and then her throat, breathing through her nose like he’d taught her.

It took effort to swallow him but it was worth it for the feeling of him petting the column of her throat. “Gods above,” he said, his eyes rolling back in his head in ecstasy. “You take me so well.” She had no choice but to rub her thighs together in order to relieve the ache his words stirred in her. He noticed with a dark chuckle, his hand rising to cup her chin again so she had no choice but to look at him. Letting him see her, teary eyed with her lips stretched around his cock.

“You’re wet, aren’t you? Let me see, darling girl.”

To the princess she had been before she came here, such a thing would be unthinkable. Allowing another to see her in such a shameful state, how needy and whorish she was. But over the time they’d spent together, the emperor had taken his time to break down all the barriers that used to stand between her and pleasure. “I knew it as soon as I saw you,” he said after the first time he’d made her scream from how viciously he thrust into her. “This is how you need to be taken. Your brother can never do this for you. Only me.”

She lifted her skirt with one hand and it was with sweet humiliation, sticky like honey, that she found that her cunt was dripping arousal onto the tie. The emperor groaned at the sight. That was her only warning before he pulled himself from her mouth and yanked her to her feet. The kiss he captured her mouth in was devouring, leaving her swooning on her feet even as he steadied her in his arms.

“Erwin, please,” she whined against his lips, still unused to the weight of his first name on her tongue, no matter how much he insisted on it. And he couldn’t get enough of the taste of it in her mouth, thrusting his tongue into her mouth like he wanted to savor every remnant of it. They found their way to his bed through muscle memory alone; it wasn’t the first time they’d made this journey already drunk on each other. When he finally pressed her into the mattress, her whole body responded in kind, positively vibrating with need.

“Please,” she whined again when their mouths broke apart and, finally, she must’ve sounded pitiful enough that the emperor is willing to take mercy on her.

His hand found its way between her thighs, soaked with her wetness the second he dragged his fingers through the wet seam of her, no doubt finding his answer.

“You know, it’s rare for a princess to be blessed with such a whorish cunt.” As if to keep her shock at his words at bay, he spread her folds and pinched the swollen pearl of her clit between his fingers, making it impossible for her to do anything but whimper.“I’ve barely touched you and you’re already gushing.”

The embarrassment she felt was so deeply buried underneath overwhelming physical need that she barely felt it. Too caught up in how he drew his fingers through her wetness, letting his callouses catch on sensitive skin. At the feeling it stirred in her, she clawed at his chest, desperate for an anchor. He didn’t wince, not even when she began to draw blood. If anything, it seemed to egg him on even more. His fingers found their way to where she wanted them so badly.

“Is this what you want?” he cooed, finally thrusting a finger inside her. She cried out, unable to keep herself from bucking eagerly against his touch. She could feel his smirk against her cheek as he gave her another finger, an even tighter fit than the first one. But even with the pain it brings, she still finds herself clawing at him once more. “Impatient today, are we? A little princess desperate for cock? Open your eyes. Show me what your hunger looks like.”

There was a time where she hesitated before doing what he said. When she was perhaps more skeptical about this emperor and what he might want with her. And she wasn’t a fool; she stored those feelings in a secret place where she could call upon them if she ever needed them. But he’d more than proven to her that her obedience was to be rewarded, that it wasn’t something that he took lightly.

So she opened her eyes for him, only to be overwhelmed by what she saw. The emperor of Eldia, stroking his hard cock with her wetness. His big hand wrapped tightly, just underneath the head of his cock, making him look even wider. Even though the sight of his naked body wasn’t unfamiliar to her, it still stunned her: the hard, worn muscles that made up his chest, drawing his shoulders wider than Makoto’s would ever be. He caught her chin in his hand so she wouldn’t be able to wince away, no matter how intent and piercing his gaze could be.

He wanted her to feel it, the power he held because the people of this nation had turned him into a god, and she did. He moved his hand from her chin to her neck, covering it completely with his palm. Her heartbeat hammered against it, like it needed him to know how much she wanted this. How much she wanted him. He kept it there, pinning her to the bed.

“Everything I’ve done…All the people I’ve killed…It’s all worth it to have you here, looking up at me like this.” And with the violent, claiming way he thrust into her, catching the bend of her knee in his hand as he did it so he could plunge even deeper inside her, she had no choice but to believe him. “My little princess,” he gritted out as he pulled his hips back, reminding her of how terrible it was to not be full of him. Past the point of speech, she whined, a flush climbing up her chest once she heard how pathetic she sounded.

He laughed darkly, moving his hand to her face and squeezing it as if that would force more sounds out of it. To make matters worse, his cock was no longer inside her, leaving her pussy to clench around nothing. “Erwin,” she whined, tears leaking from her eyes. “Please. No more teasing.”

“Oh, darling,” he said, wiping away her tears with the back of his hand. “How can I deny you anything?” he said before fucking back into her hard enough to make her scream, showing her once more why her brother would never be able to satisfy her again. Maybe that was why – once he’d rended so much pleasure from her that she became a limp doll, her only purpose receiving it – she tightened her legs around her hips once she felt his body jerking with the effort not to come.

His eyes flicked up to hers, filled with wondrous disbelief. “Mikasa,” he said, sounding more fucked out than she’d ever heard him. The question that followed her name didn’t need to be spoken; it had been hanging in the air between them ever since they fell into bed together the first time.

“Give me a son. An heir worthy of Eldia and Hizuru.”

And, true to his word, he did exactly as she asked. Only in the morning did it seem to dawn on him what this meant. “We should go to Marley. So you can see your brother and I can treat with my lieutenant,” he said, his hand finding its way to her flat stomach. She could feel certainty in his touch, and she believed it, the image of their child already taking shape in her mind’s eye.

He’d spent most of his life at war. First, at the emperor’s side when he was not yet an emperor, occupying a position similar to the one Eren did now. Then, he’d torn men asunder for the sake of Erwin’s throne and it was through the viciousness of the emperor’s lieutenant’s response that he was able to crush dissent so early into his reign. The wars he’d waged on behalf of the Eldian empire, and Erwin’s as well, had been his favorites, if only because with such a noble cause, it was easy to justify even horrific acts of cruelty that were necessary for victory.

Was this one of those moments? He stood at the edge of what looked to be hell, a battlefield saturated with the dead and dying, set ablaze. The fire had been his idea; they’d already beaten the Marleyans’ spirit and were gaining on their bodies. It had been a smaller company, ambushed because they were unaware that the forces of Eldia and Hizuru had made such progress into the guts of the Marleyan kingdom.

In the violence of the day, he attempted to find the crown prince of Hizuru. His charge, or at least that was how Erwin explained it. “I need you to be my eyes and ears. Guide Makoto. Show him how war is truly made,” he’d said when he first came to him.

But Eren couldn’t help but scoff, thinking of the boy he’d seen lose to his sister. “No, you need me to watch over a green boy playing soldier.”

To his credit, the emperor didn’t fight such a claim. Instead, he regarded Eren coolly, in his way that unsettled most mortal men. Something measuring and divine about his gaze and the time he took with it.

“You sound displeased, Eren. Is there somewhere else you’d rather be?”

Such words, the intention clinging to them, were twined together for one purpose only: to remind him of his place. He fell silent then, knowing that to go any further would bring him within spitting distance of treason. So he went to war like his emperor asked and the crown prince tagged along with him, feigning at authority until Eren taught him exactly where such posturing would get him: being forced to his knees so he had no choice but to swallow Eren’s cock.

Makoto had proven to be less useless than Eren feared. In the distance, he could see the boy prince using his sword to tear down any opposition that might still exist. Eren told him that such a thing wasn’t necessary, that the flames would take care of it. But Makoto insisted, a strange brightness about his eyes as he turned his blade over and over again in his hand.

It was a look Eren recognized: from the rivers he’d looked into before cleansing himself of the blood and carnage; his reflection in the eyes of young boys who weren’t meant to be soldiers before he brought his sword down on them. It was the look of a boy who learned a new, quicker way to become a man. All it required was a hunger that could only be sated by blood and someone to show him how to use it properly. That, and a natural predisposition to cruelty.

Eren approached him from behind. The sun had already dipped below the horizon, casting the world before him in a blood-soaked orange shade. The other soldiers were working their way through the carnage, most of it in the past so most of their work was stripping the dead of their weapons and clothes. The ground beneath his feet was soft and soggy with death; he knew now how to keep his eyes ahead, to prevent himself from seeing anything that might put him off of eating or drinking or fucking. It was necessary to do these things once blood had been spilled; he knew no other way to carry on with himself.

The sound of the prince’s blade slicing through flesh didn’t stop, not even when Eren drew closer to him. Whatever Makoto was doing, it fell under the realm of unnecessary brutality. “My prince,” he said, placing his hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “It’s time to leave this place and make camp.”

He did his best to hide his disgust at what the boy had done – wanton destruction of bodies that were on the edge of death or already there. It wasn’t something that Eren himself hadn’t done in moments of youthful frustration but it was something else entirely to come across it existing in another person – all of that fear and anger that had nowhere else to go. He watched as the crown prince hacked corpses into nothing, the blood spraying across the face that reminded Eren so much of someone who he’d rather have by his side.

Would she be this reckless? This foolish? This unwilling to see anyone other than her as a human being? It was hard to think otherwise when faced with the utter brutality of his actions. Limbs hacked from bodies, faces split open.

Makoto turned to him, his eyes still alit with a strange and terrible fire. “Just a little bit longer,” he said, like a child asking to play outside for a few minutes past sundown.

“Makoto! We’re leaving. Now!” Levi’s voice echoed over Eren’s shoulder, no doubt having less patience for his ruler’s bloodthirst. There were times when they looked at each other, these two men who had seen so much war, and Eren knew that what was passing between them was close to treason. But they never spoke it into being, so it didn’t really exist. Besides, the prince still yielded eventually, finally sheathing his sword once Levi’s voice reached him. His eyes flicked to Eren once he was done, the need in them overwhelming.

And it was hard not to be taken in by it. The prince was beautiful, even when he was splattered with blood. “Wash, then meet me in my tent,” Eren said, turning away before he could see the responding joy on the young boy’s face.

The princess was with Erwin. It was for her safety. Yet, not a day went by where he didn’t wonder if perhaps there was something more nefarious at work. He only caught a glimpse of her before he left and even that had done something to him, rekindling whatever insanity descended upon him the first time they met. He didn’t have to look at the emperor to know that he had a similar look in his eyes; it was hard to think of a man who wouldn’t, given what she was and how she carried herself.

But there was a difference between Erwin and other men. While a princess would know how to guard her virtue from a man without station, one who posed only a risk to her, whatever the emperor had become was another matter entirely. Even in the short time he spoke to the princess, the grasping in her was impossible to ignore. She wanted a different life. And he knew from experience where such wanting could led.

After Makoto departed, Eren finished his survey of the battlefield. They’d killed the majority of the regiment from the speed with which the fire was burning, it was unlikely that whoever escaped had done so without a scratch. They would be weak, easy to pick off by a handful of roving troops of guards. He called out to one of his captains, a recent addition named Floch, and gave his instructions to the eager, obedient soldier. Once he was done, his nose had gone numb to the smell of burning bodies. He made his way to the nearby creek to rinse himself before finally making it back to his tent.

The prince was there, waiting for him. Wearing just the pants he slept in, his hair loose around his shoulders as he spread his lanky body across Eren’s bed roll. Like a reflex, he looked for the boy’s sword, only to see it hanging from one of the poles that kept the tent upright. He was getting better at following directions.

“What’re you reading?” Eren asked, hanging up his own sword as well. He was wearing just a robe and the feeling of the air on his bare skin, as well as the sight of the prince’s back, once a delicate plane of porcelain, now flecked with scars. Sometimes, when he was fucking him from behind, he could pretend that he was his sister instead. For twins of different genders, the resemblance between them was uncanny.

Makoto turned, a wild look in his eye. Eren drew closer only to see that there was a scroll in the boy’s hand. “What’re you doing with that?” Eren snapped, before reaching for the rolled parchment. But whatever words it bore had put the prince into quite the mood. He yanked it out of Eren’s grasp then pulled it close to his chest.

For a second, he looked like a boy instead of whatever he was out there, amongst all that death, and Eren’s heart softened for a moment. “Give it here,” he said, giving the boy another chance.

“Stop telling me what to do,” Makoto said, clutching the parchment even tighter in his hands. “Technically, you should do what I say.”

Eren wasn’t able to control what his body did next: the way he immediately flew at the boy prince, unable to maintain anything remaining decorum or even the vaguest notion of self-preservation. Makoto was acting out, no doubt because his extended carnage had been interrupted. Eren recognized his bloodthirst from the soldiers who always dipped too far into their own darkness based on a misguided belief that whatever they did to others was vindicated by whatever inferiority they endured as children.

These were the sorts of boys that Eren typically delighted in breaking. Turning into something worse, even, as long as he was able to make use of it. Hadn’t Erwin fucked the same fury into him, somewhere in a life so distant it felt like it happened to someone else? It was strange to think that he was ever anything other than this: the weapon the emperor had molded him into.

Makoto was at least prepared for what he’d brought onto himself. There was a flash in his eyes – a fire so reckless it could only belong to a teenage boy – and it betrayed him before he could execute whatever move he had planned. Eren flipped him onto his back, settling his full weight against him so he had no chance of moving out from underneath him.

“Give it to me,” Eren said, trying his best to ignore the prince’s growing arousal, shifting against him. Not that his body wasn’t responding in kind; it was hard for it not to after a battle like that. But he didn’t like the look in the boy’s eyes, what it could mean. He grabbed at Makoto’s hands, trying to pry the parchment free.

Makoto, of course, knew what to do. Rolling his hips enough that Eren was momentarily distracted. This was far from the first or even twentieth time they’d fucked; whatever had found its way between them was the type of affection that men could only develop between each other when they were at war, thinking of someone else while a wet mouth or hole enveloped their cock. Given his age, the boy prince was a bit more open of who he was thinking of, almost as if he knew exactly how to torture Eren.

You know, my sister has the most perfect cunt in the entire world. It’s like heaven,” the boy prince was prone to saying when tipsy, making Eren’s blood get unbearably hot.

The boy prince was between Eren’s legs, panting and flushed, his long hair casting his face into beautiful shadow. “Make me,” Makoto said, his sneer so arrogant, it made Eren remember that this wasn’t his sister.

But in truth, he was too far gone to mind. Blood lust was a close cousin to the real thing, especially for him. Without warning, Eren forced two of his fingers into Makoto’s mouth. His cock grew even harder at the sensation of the younger man’s throat, clenching and pulsing around his fingers.

“You forget how much I am capable of making you do,” Eren said once Makoto remembered how to breathe through his nose. Only then did he relent, pulling his fingers free of the boy’s throat. He took halted, sucking breaths, momentarily silenced by the loss of air.

Before he could start talking again, Eren’s fingers found their way to the sash that kept Makoto’s robe closed. He pulled it free easily, letting the silk fall open to reveal the younger man’s hard, dripping cock. It was pretty enough, and decently sized, though he often found himself thinking that a princess like Mikasa deserved more than just “decent.”

“Prepare yourself for me,” he said, fixing the prince with a terrifying look he’d learned from his worst commanding officers, the ones who dared him to disobey just so they could beat him for it later. Then, he picked up the scroll that he’d been reading. It lay on the floor, rumpled from their wrestling.

He waited until the boy spread his legs, revealing the tight furl of his hole, and began to tease it with his spit-slicked fingers before he started to read the message in earnest. Of course, it was from Makoto’s sister. What else could’ve gotten him so wound up and wild?

Even her handwriting was enough to send shivers down his spine, elegant and girlish. It touched him to see that the siblings wrote to each other in Eldian; he wondered if it had been a secret language for them in the living catacombs of their family’s ancient dynasty.

Brother,

The emperor has told me of your recent successes on the battlefield. It seems that war has made a man of you yet. I’d like to see for myself.

I’ll be accompanying the emperor on his trip to the new stronghold in Karifa at the end of the month. Please tell the lieutenant that the emperor would like to meet him there as well.

– Mikasa.

A web of feelings tangled in his chest at her words. He didn’t know what to make of Erwin and the princess traveling together, nor Erwin allowing her so close to the battlefront. That, and the idea of having to meet Erwin on these uncertain grounds made him uneasy. Yet, he couldn’t deny the darker current beneath all of it, thrumming with the thought of seeing her again. Especially after hearing so much from Makoto about the wonders of his sister’s body.

“No wonder you were so desperate to keep this to yourself,” he said, finally looking up from the parchment. Makoto, no doubt more needy than usual after reading his sister’s message, already worked himself open enough that he was able to take one of his fingers, his chest flushed with how much he was panting. His eyes narrowed at Eren’s words but, still, they must’ve done something for him as well as he began to fit his second fingertip inside his hole.

Eren lifted the parchment to his nose. It might’ve been his imagination but the faintest whiff of jasmine still clung to it. “That’s her perfume, isn’t it?”

The beautiful boy’s face contorted into something like a snarl. “That isn’t yours,” he said, though the seriousness of his words was diminished by how breathily they left his mouth. His hard cock bobbed uselessly against the toned muscles of his lower stomach. The sight of it, leaking and desperate, as well of the parted pink flesh of his hole as his second finger worked its way inside of him, cut loose Eren’ last thread of self control.

Eren sprung forward, catching the bend of one of Makoto’s knees in his palm. He used his strength to push it upward.. The sight it revealed combined with the reminder of Mikasa made his cock pulse and he pulled it out of his pants, too impatient to take them off completely.

“That’s enough,” he said, and finally, the boy did what he said without complaint. Though, perhaps he would’ve done anything as long as it meant that there was an end to his suffering. He was quite a sight, spreading himself for his lieutenant shamelessly, his drippy cock bouncing against his lower stomach. But it wasn’t the sight Eren wanted. Not when he could still smell the remnants of the princess’s perfume in the air.

“Get on your stomach.”

The prince was far gone enough to answer Eren’s bidding without complaint. The older man placed a steadying hand on the freckled, scarred skin of his back. Letting his eyes fall closed for a moment so he didn’t have to think about whose hole he was lining his cock up with – just that it was hot and tight and slicked for his use.

They’d fucked enough times by now that Eren had long given up on gentleness. Makoto had proven himself ungrateful for it anyway; the second he could feel the brutal width of Eren’s cock against his hole, he arched his back. The older man had to grit his teeth with how tight Makoto’s ass hugged him with every thrust, made worse by the whiny noises the boy was making. He stuck his fingers into his mouth to shut him up but was distracted by how well the prince nibbled at his fingers.

It made him want to get even. “What would your sister think if she saw you like this, I wonder…” he drawled, digging his fingers into the meat of Makoto’s hips so he could fuck into him even deeper. Ensuring that the moment his cock grazed the prince’s prostate, he was thinking of her. How tight he got more than confirmed it, that and the corresponding yelp that came with it.

“Who do you think would take my cock better? You or her?”

Finally, the prince reached the limits of his tolerance. He turned his head, giving him a snarling glare over his shoulder. Still, it was rendered rather toothless by how flushed his face was and the sound of his hard, wet cock smacking against his ab muscles with every thrust. “It’s her, isn’t it? That’s why you’ve been practically humping my leg since you read her letter? Do you miss your sister’s cunt?” His eyes started to roll back in his head as Eren began to lose his patience.

His words affected him more than he expected. Making him think about what it would be like to be destined for greatness since birth, to the point that your family married you to your sister in order to ensure it. What a mind-fuck it would be to grow up alongside such a beautiful girl and know that she belonged to you.

He almost hated Makoto in that moment, enough that he pressed him into the ground so he could fuck him even deeper. All of it was made worse by the fact that the boy had lost it with how close he was to coming, babbling about how much he missed his sister and how perfect she was in every thinkable way. Tipping Eren into orgasm earlier than he expected, leaving the boy beneath him panting and unsatisfied.

“Finish yourself off,” Eren instructed once he’d extricated himself from the boy’s body. Too far gone to argue, Makoto did as he was told, eyes fluttering closed as he did so. No doubt caught up in thoughts of his sister, if the name he was mumbling to himself was anything to go by. When he came, it was with a pitiful whine, covering his own chest with his cum.

The prince didn’t stick around long after that. What had transpired between them was the sort of thing that made it hard to look one another in the eyes after. Though, Eren should’ve known that the tension would hang in the air between them well into the next day, when the princess and the emperor finally arrived in the late afternoon.

Karifa was their most well-established fort on Marleyan soil so far, including a large port where they’d been able to establish a fairly strong navy stronghold from which combined Hizran-Eldian forces had been able to go after some of the smaller island communities. It put a cleaner varnish on what had transpired in the year that they’d been at war than was truthful, but this, like everything else, was another form of war – convincing the powers that be that what Eren wanted was what they wanted as well. He didn’t like to lose control to effeminate men in perfumed robes for as long as he could help it; the killing felt less good then.

He and the prince waited at the docks. Both of them were wearing ceremonial versions of their typical warrior garb. Makoto had initially resisted, no doubt nursing some boyish hope that his sister seeing him in the guise of a battleworn soldier might convince her of something he’d yet to impress upon her yet about his manliness. But Levi was the one who insisted, using a cold, authoritative voice that made Makoto’s eyes go wide and doleful like a child’s.

Still, the boy couldn’t stop fidgeting. Once his sister stepped off of the gangplank onto the docks – wearing an elaborately draped gown in jade silk that must be the latest fashion in the capital, on the arm of the emperor who was no less finely dressed – the boy’s restlessness became impossible to ignore. Eren threw out his hand, gripping Makoto’s offending wrist hard enough to hurt.

“Steady,” he ordered.

He waited until the boy met his eye before he let his hand go. In the prince’s gaze, it was clear that he’d abandoned himself to desire, his mind solely focused on the prize that existed in front of him. Though, perhaps Eren was a hypocrite for thinking such admonishments when he became more overcome the nearer she drew.

All of it was made worse by Erwin and how utterly perfect they looked together. While Makoto and the princess were the same height, the golden-haired emperor towered over her. Her beauty was made even more enticing, partially obscured by his shadow. There was no denying that the emperor looked better for it as well. He was nearing his fourth decade of life; it made sense for him to finally be softened by a good woman.

But this woman wasn’t his, she belonged to the reckless prince standing beside Eren, who was so enamored with his sister that he didn’t notice the obvious signs that she’d fallen for someone else. There was no other way to describe the way she gazed up at Erwin, her hand falling to her stomach as she did it. The sight alit something primal in Eren and suddenly he knew: the emperor had given the princess a child right under her brother-husband’s nose.

Somehow, she’d become even more beautiful. Not in the way that belonged to girls but to those who were kissed by the gods. There was a new radiance to her and he could tell it stupefied her brother. Once the emperor deposited his wife in front of him, Makoto didn’t seem to know what to do.

“Let us give these newlyweds time to get reacquainted,” Erwin said, finally letting the princess free of his grasp. Only then did she let her eyes flit over to Eren. She barely let her gaze rest upon him. Still, he could see in her eyes the memory of the time they spoke before her wedding. That had to count for something, even if she had the emperor’s baby in her belly.

He did his best to hide his suspicions from his countenance once he accepted his old friend’s invitation. Thankfully, Erwin was quick to talk about war and the business of it. It was easy to fall into conversation with him when they were discussing such things, unconscious and rhythmic. Reporting on things that he’d mentioned before to the emperor, even as he watched the prince and princess abscond together out of the corner of his eye.

Once they were in the emperor’s private quarters, the door closing behind them and wine having already been poured, it was impossible for Eren to hold it back any longer. “She’s with child,” he said, wiping the wine from his lips once he was lit with liquor enough to say it. “Yours, no doubt.”

To his credit, Erwin didn’t even seem disturbed by the accusation. Instead, he took a long drink of wine for himself then looked at his lieutenant with purplish red still dripping from his lips like a glutton.

“That’s yet to be seen.”

It wasn’t a denial but he knew Erwin. If there was any honor in saying the child wasn’t his, he would’ve taken it. But instead, he simply drank more wine and asked the servants to bring a celebratory feast for him and his lieutenant’s enjoyment.

The food in and of itself was beyond anything he’d had in over a year: meat with fat and oil rendering thick off the bone, breads so heavenly they practically melted in his mouth, piles upon piles of all sorts of nourishment, as far as the eye could see, even though there were only two of them>.He was almost hungry enough to let it all slip by his notice; this finery, this excess. But when they raised their goblets to each other, the emperor said it was to honor his victories though the impudent lieutenant couldn’t keep himself from saying: “if this is such a celebration, why isn’t the crown prince here? All the victories are in his name.”

He’d never been able to read his mentor, no matter how much time they spent together. It was in the way Erwin held his face: stern and militant, as if even the slightest weakness would betray himself. Yet, at Eren’s words, his face split open, suddenly and violently.

“I think you know we have other things to celebrate,” he said before draining his glass and glaring at Eren until he did the same.

“Such as?”

“The promise of a new heir to Eldia,” Erwin announced in his booming voice that left his subordinate no choice but to drink.

The alcohol sang through him, making him reckless. “You’ve given her a bastard, as good as killed her and the child too. Either by one of your enemies or by her sick fuck of a brother. The fact that you think there is anything worth celebrating…” he trailed off, his rage finally overcoming him to the point that he knew if he spoke further, he’d probably end up dead.

“I hadn’t realized you cared for the princess. I cannot blame you. She is unlike any woman I’ve ever met. Beautiful, of course, but more than that. She’s queenly in ways that seem beyond her age. Smarter than any of my advisors and even more bloodthirsty. Cunning too, with a sharp tongue that leaves gaping wounds…” Erwin’s eyes went hazy for a moment and it was startling, the realization that it seemed that he’d come to care for her too in his way.

“Ultimately, then, we share the same interests. I am not a fool, Eren. I know the danger I have brought to her. I do not attend to let such threats fester. For a time, it will be advantageous for the child to be Makoto’s. This is why we came here.”

“He is a fool but he’s not stupid. He will figure it out eventually,” Eren said. However, in his words, his expression while talking about the boy prince, he must’ve revealed something to Erwin, in the same way that Erwin had betrayed his affection for the princess.

“You’re fucking him, aren’t you? And you dare to act righteous?”

Eren bristled. “That’s different.”

“Well, no matter, I know it’s beyond you to bear some sort of sentimentality for the men who find their way into your bed. If you’re so concerned about the princess, you should be happy to know that you’re the only person I trust with dispatching her brother.”

At first, he didn’t believe what he was hearing. It must’ve shown on his face because Erwin laughed, the mean sort of chuckle that was only for one’s self. “Come now, you can’t be surprised. You yourself just spoke about what a threat he’d be to her, the child. I agree with you. And what better way to ensure that he’s not a threat?”

He knew Erwin well enough to see the plan clearly from that point onward. How perhaps this had been the reason that he’d been stationed here all along, at the prince’s side.

“And then what?”

“The heir will grow up in Hizuru with his mother and his true identity will be kept a secret. Then, once he’s of age, we will reveal his true parentage and unite Hizuru and Eldia under one crown.”

The words sunk into him with the heavy certainty of fated things. Still, it didn’t sit right with him, not with everything else he knew, what he’d seen. Could he really kill a boy just because it would make the emperor’s life easier?

“I will give you some time to get used to the idea but know that when I order his death, I expect you to act quickly.” Erwin finished his glass, the wine staining his lips a darker red. Then, as if to ensure that he had the last word, the emperor dismissed his lieutenant from his presence with a request for Eren to get a good night’s sleep. As he made his way out of the emperor’s quarters and into the night’s humid dark, his head swam with everything he’d learned – a lifetime’s worth of chaos sewn in a matter of minutes

. Perhaps, that was why he didn’t see her until it was too late. His body collided with another on the stairs that led out of the courtyard and into the heart of Karifa, filled with the drunken singing of sailors and soldiers alike. He cursed, assuming that due to the person’s diminutive size and perfumed hair that it must be a prostitute, left to wander the streets with only her body for sale.

But when he bent his head down to admonish whoever was in front of him, he was shocked by the perfect moon of her face, so lovely that it could only belong to the woman whose fate occupied his thoughts with increasing regularity. It appeared she was just as shocked to find him here as he was to find her, her eyes so wide and shiny that he could see his reflection in her pupils.

“Princess, what’re you doing here?”

Reflexively, he took her shoulders in his hands, moving the both of them into the shadows so no one would see them. She was wearing a different dress, made of fine silk that billowed around her body like a shroud or something else sacred for keeping holy things hidden from sight. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, even longer than the last time he saw her, reaching her waist.

Now that she was a woman grown, her beauty had become excruciating to behold. She met his gaze with a stony determination, almost like she meant to torture him with it. “If you’re here, you must know.” There was a new steeliness to her eyes now. Unable to help himself, his gaze found its way to her stomach and the terrible, wonderful future that was lurking inside of it, confirming what she already suspected.

In Eldia, he had a wife waiting for him, and children too. Such things were expected of a man of his stature. They’d been married for at least a decade now, though he’d spent little of that time at her side, not that he thought she minded. Historia was her name, a noblewoman from an ancient house that had garnered the emperor’s favor. She was small and she was beautiful like a doll or some other precious thing that was meant to be kept on a shelf. Still, it wasn’t a chore to lay with her and she’d given him two children – a boy and a girl who were a couple of years apart.

Given the conditions that shaped their lives, he was never present for her pregnancies. He’d never seen the way bringing life into the world could change the form of a woman, making her almost divine. There was no other way to describe the radiance that emanated from the princess as she looked up at him, her eyes swimming with terror and awe.

“Princess…” he started, not knowing where he was going. All he knew was that the affection he felt toward her was a damning thing. He could think of hundreds of ways for his sentence to end but none of them would deliver her from the fate that she’d been doomed to.

“You judge me,” she said, wrapping her arms around herself as if to hide the object of his judgment from his sight. “I see it in your eyes. I’m a fallen woman to you now, am I not?”

"No, no, nothing like that,” he said and if he was surprised by how easily he reached for her, he was gobsmacked at how she relaxed into his grasp. His hands were on her shoulders again, her perfume enveloping him completely. “I worry for you. The emperor can be short-sighted, especially when it comes to matters of legacy.”

Only when he said the words did he realize the truth and treason in them. Morality had never been one of his strengths and for a time, it seemed that he and the emperor shared a twinned brutality, never exceeding the limits of what the other could tolerate in part because of how far said tolerance extended. But finally, Erwin was leading him down a path that he might not have the stomach to follow.

The princess appeared unsettled by his sincerity. When her gaze tipped toward him again, her eyes were glistening. “What would you have had me do instead? I was all alone and I…” She looked away from him for a moment, but when she turned back to him, all emotion was scrubbed from her face and with it, the last smudges of her girlhood. “I must do what is right for Hizuru. It is my duty.”

“How is jeopardizing your life the right path to take?” His grip on her shoulders tightened enough that she winced. Shame washed over him once he realized he was beginning to lose control; he let her go if only because he didn’t trust himself with her anymore.

The loss of his touch seemed to undo her, as if she’d come to depend on it. In the air, she swayed. He resisted the urge to reach out and steady her. It wasn’t right for him too; they barely knew each other in actuality. But somehow, either through osmosis or delusion, he’d been infected by Makoto’s love, his devotion. Or maybe it had just reminded him of the feelings that had stirred in his chest when he first saw the princess over a year ago..

“It is not me who matters. Not really, anyway. All that matters is who comes from my womb. What kind of world his existence might promise,” she said. And maybe that and the fiery look in her eyes were what unleashed him, knowing that her fate wasn’t something that she wanted to accept.

This time, she was the one who drew closer. He shivered with overwhelm once he could feel her body’s warmth. “Not to me,” he said. With how low and dark his voice was, it almost sounded like a threat.

All her decorum evaporated and, suddenly, she was a girl again, blushing and wide-eyed, looking up at him like he’d promised her the world. It was her belief, shimmering like tears in her eyes, that made him so desperate to give it to her. And he knew then that he would kill the prince and anyone else who might get in her way, as long as she’d look at him like this.