The first time Armin saw the girl in the streets of Trost, Jean knocked her over with his pack.
"What the hell?" Jean exclaimed, looking down at the girl he'd sent sprawling onto her backside on the walkway.
Armin was quicker to respond. He let his own pack slide to the cobblestones and knelt to help.
"Sorry about my friend there. He's too busy thinking about our military exercise. Are you okay?"
"I'm not hurt." She tugged at the plain gray fabric of her skirt where it tangled at her knees. "So you're soldiers?"
Armin caught a glimpse of slim calves in white stockings before she righted the dress. He hoped he didn't flush like an idiotic schoolboy. "Yes, here for Commander Pixis' exhibition." He offered her a quick smile. She looked back down at the tangle of cloth and paper that had spilled from her basket. Sunlight caught in the smooth sweep of her red-gold hair as she pushed some of the loose curls behind her ears.
Jean finally recovered his manners and leaned down as well. "I'm very sorry, Miss -?"
"I'm Kate. Kate Johnson. And it's fine. I wasn't really watching where I was going." She hurriedly stacked some papers and something that looked suspiciously like an old book of maps.
Armin's fingers closed around it before she could tuck it in the basket. The leather cover was worn and split, the pages within crackled with age. Reverently, he opened the cover.
"Are these maps? From beyond the walls?"
Kate laughed. "Silly! How could such a thing exist?" She gently tugged at the slim volume when Armin seemed to have difficulty surrendering it. She hid the book away under some fabric and ribbon. "No, just someone's fantasy about what may lie beyond." She turned her head to watch one of the Garrison troops stroll by. "You know it's not anything anyone would know for certain."
Her level gaze almost dared him to contradict her. But then she smiled sweetly and accepted the hand Jean extended to help her to her feet. "Thank you both. Well, not for knocking me down, but for showing courtesy in helping me up."
Armin stood as well. Her smile lit her blue-green eyes and brought into prominence a dimple in her right cheek. She was seriously cute. On her feet, she was at a height with him while Jean towered over them both. She had a sprinkle of golden freckles across her nose to go with that flame-bright hair.
"And good luck with your military exhibition."
"Wait!" Armin called as she hurried away. "It was nice meeting you! And my name is Armin!"
Beside him, Jean snorted. "Smooth, Arlert."
"And you're such an expert?" Armin watched the red-haired girl disappear into the crowd. "What was it you said when you first saw Mikasa? Oh, I know – 'You have beautiful black hair.' Which she cut. Immediately."
"Hmmph." Jean scowled. He liked Armin too much to tell him to screw off. His unrequited adulation of Mikasa was a sore subject. "Kate is pretty cute. Glad to see you looking at someone besides Jaeger. I imagine she lives close by, eh? We're in town for a few days. Maybe you can track her down."
"Maybe," Armin said thoughtfully. "And I certainly don't look at Eren like, well, like that." Kate had played off his questions about the book quite well, but still. "She all but batted her eyes at me to distract me from that book. I wonder…."
Jean made a rude noise. "Leave it to you to be more impressed by a book than a pretty girl smiling at you. I'll let you daydream about it while I focus on our competition."
Once Conny and Sasha caught up to them, talk turned to their pending demonstration for Commander Pixis and of the wild boar terrorizing the surrounding countryside. But Armin's thoughts kept straying to strawberry-blonde hair and blue-green eyes.
Kate – her name really was Kate, just not Kate Johnson – allowed herself a grin as the young soldier called his name out to her as she pushed through the crowd. He had been totally adorable, from his blond sweep of hair to the toes of his high, polished boots. He didn't look like a soldier, not like his sharp-faced friend. His intelligent gaze had locked onto the book immediately as though he knew its true worth.
Casting a last look around, she gripped her basket closer and ducked into an alley. Tomorrow she would pass the book off to the shadows who had paid her to retrieve it in the first place. She just had to keep it safe that long. Hugging the basket to her body with her elbow, Kate skinnied up an iron gutter drain and hauled herself up on the roof with a groan. Climbing in a skirt was a bitch, but a girl wearing pants – a girl who wasn't in the military, anyway – drew too much attention.
Her slippers made little noise on the roof tiles, but the press of humanity below covered her steps well enough. She paused in the early dusk to look towards the wall. The sun was a drop of blazing gold above the deep shadow cast by Wall Rose. There were soldiers everywhere, but they were focused on readying the ODM course and exchanging gossip from the interior and the Garrison. Hopefully such activity would be a blessing rather than a hindrance…
A few roofs over, she shimmied down a decorative iron railing into the wide street. Here, the houses were large with opulent gardens and wide porches. Kate took a moment to smooth her skirts and her hair before straightening her back and joining the pedestrian traffic along the walk. She was late for dinner – again – but her uncle shouldn't be too angry. He might not even notice.
She slipped in the kitchen door. Cook was just lighting the sconces as Kate scurried through to the dining room.
"They've just sat down, ma'am, so hurry on."
"Thanks, Anika."
Her uncle and her cousin were so engrossed in their heated argument that they barely glanced at her entrance.
"It's not right!" Her cousin Jan was fair like her, so his pale complexion was suffused with the color his anger aroused. "The crown can't continue to pretend hardship doesn't exist beyond Wall Sina. Have you not seen what our people deal with?"
"Jan, we're a noble family. We're expected to fall in with the king and be rewarded for our loyalty." Uncle George calmly buttered a hard roll. He acknowledged Kate with an incline of his head. "Unless you'd rather move somewhere else and see for yourself. Talk like that will get you in trouble." He cast a glance at Kate. "Now enough. Let's enjoy the lovely meal Anika prepared and speak about more pleasant things."
Jan unwillingly turned his attention to his food, but he flashed Kate one mulish glance. He and his father were always at each other about what was fair within these walls. Jan contended for more rights, better food and all sorts of nonsense for the lower classes. He even thought the selection process for the Military Police was a waste of soldiers best suited for other branches of their military.
As she sipped her soup, Kate's mind wandered back to the soldier she had met that afternoon. Undoubtedly Armin's family was not noble nor would he earn an opportunity to enforce the king's rule as an MP. But his eyes had held such a depth of intelligence and perception that she had been alarmed that he had seen through her flirtatious effort to distract him from the maps.
Kate sighed. Her latest assignment had been far more difficult than she had anticipated. The merchant who had discovered the book had plans to turn it over to the Survey Corps – at a handsome price, of course. His estate, well- guarded due to his suspicious nature, had been challenging to access. Had she been discovered in the process, she would have been arrested. Or worse. But this was it – she was done after this, her debt paid in full. I am a loyal servant of our king, and I mean to prove it.