To My Duke, Dearest| j. kirschtein

xii. Children Of Eldia

 With the Annual Polo Match coming in a matter of days, the weather was warmer. After the heavy cloud from yesterday, the clouds had finally burst and rained down overnight. Combustion of the clouds usually provided you with blissful sleep. There was just something about the weighty wash of rain against one's window pane that lulled everyone into the clutches of dreams. The palace had been completely silent, nothing but the rain, the rain, the rain. The solace it produced kept everything muted and gentle...everything except your troubled mind.

Like the new locomotive trains that were being administered in Marley, your mind had spiraled like those churning wheels, unable to free yourself from the awful words that fell from those pretty lips. You could not understand any of it. Was he warning you, perhaps threatening you? Was he more than aware of your little schemes? Were you not as intelligent as you thought you were?

As the surrounding chatter in the room increased, you forced your thoughts away, welcoming this distraction of noise. You were curled up on the plush chair of the women's lounge, one of the history books you and Mr. Arlert had collected from The Tower in your lap. Your attempt at reading it was halfhearted as the majority of it was in Eldian old-tongue, so you found yourself tracing your fingers over the illustrations like a reluctant school child.

It was only a matter of time before the side of your head began to throb with the extensive strain of trying to decrypt the foreign language. Mr. Arlert had maintained his rather modest and kind demeanour but you it was you who had withdrawn. Everything felt like a riddle inside a riddle, the paintings, the tapestry, the people.

You thought over to Eren who had pretended to Mr. Arlert as if it was the first time he had ever met you, yesterday. Why should he feel the need to hide that he had linked your arm and strolled you around the prince's private chambers and snuck you into the village like a bundled bride? If he was Mr. Arlert's supposedly favoured companion, why was he lying to him?

What was the purpose of befriending you, then accusing you, then acting as if he was unaware of your existence? It was enough to send ones head into a flurry of confusion. Exhausted, you slammed the pages of your book shut and gnawed at your lip as if you had not already eaten breakfast.

Galliard had his back rested against the wall, hand over the hilt of his sword and calmly took in the room, in true military fashion. Most of the other girls had been cautious of you bringing a man into the women's lounge and had their fair share of glances between to the two of you, but you were unbothered. Porco was so modest that he would most likely fall unconscious to sight of a woman's bare ankle.

You partially believed that the reason he had insisted on following you in here was because he was hoping to snatch a sliver of conversation with Lady Pieck, maybe even share a smile. As his eyes made their usual rounds over the perimeter of the room, they would linger on the raven haired girl who sat at the foot of the stretched sofa, fingers raking through the tumultuous waves of her hair.

Lady Sasha was sat on the said stretched sofa, with most of the other women at her side, an individual ray of sunlight that crooned for all the other sunflowers to see. There was nothing artificial about her, nothing that gave you the reason to hate her so much, but you could not bottle the bias you had against her and all the other Eldians.

They were the real vermin responsible for all the suffering you had endured, the reason why you were constantly lonely, constantly deprived of something to call a home or something to call a family.

The door of the women's lounge was pushed open, and you expected it to be Lady Annette, who had popped out to relieve herself after all the copious amounts of tea she drank at breakfast, but surprise swallowed you as Lady Mikasa entered the room, head hung low. Nobody had seen her in over a day, which was why every single head in the room simultaneously turned to her.