The mare's soft muzzle lightly tickled Levi's hand as she ate. The late harvest had been poor, so she had to make do with some oats. Levi would much rather have treated her to an apple for all her recent hard work; apples were her favourite. His too, if he had to pick.

With his free hand he petted her softly, and she nickered a little, her hot breath snorting into his hand as she hoovered up every last oat.

"That's your lot."

She whinnied defiantly.

"Nothing I can do. We're all out."

He sometimes came down to see her at night like this when he couldn't sleep. She was often awake herself, and seemed to appreciate the company; plus it was nice to get out of his sleepless room, even if it was cold in the stables.

The past week though, he'd been coming down to see her every single night. Any time the scouts returned from an expedition was a sombre affair, but this time the regiment's casualties were especially catastrophic: almost forty percent of all current serving scouts were gone, and the survivors felt it with every breath in, as though the recent losses were infused into the air itself. The compound was emptier than it had been in years. It was like a bad dream.

Levi's own squad, who, outside of drills were usually tiresomely chatty and constantly quipping at one another, instead sauntered quietly around the barracks. They hadn't even been eating together, the fire in the common room hearth was a pile of dry ash, and if Levi wasn't so diligent about cleanliness, the board games leaderboard would have been covered in several inches of dust.

…

Then there was Petra…

Levi's chest constricted and ached. Yes. Since they'd got back it'd been this way.

She'd been avoiding everyone outside of training, and they really only saw her when she came to fetch a cup of tea or a bread roll from the kitchenette. During drills she was diligent, focused and stronger than ever, but the gentleness and friendliness had vanished from her demeanour, in its place, silence. She'd made it clear to every one of them that she needed some space and time to grieve, but that didn't make it easy to be around, and Levi hated feeling helpless.

On the first evening after their return, concern had awashed the faces of the four men when Gunther informed them that he'd heard her weeping in her room as he passed it. Levi'd heard it too. When he heard it again on the second night, he'd knocked on her door and asked if he could come in, but she fell silent at his question, and after five minutes waiting in vain for a response, he walked away.

It worried him, and the winter nights were longer and darker without the squad's spark, but even sparks needed time to mourn.

He exhaled, stroking his horse's muzzle.

"Any ideas?" He asked her, but she only blinked her long black eyelashes in response.

"Oh that's right…you're a horse." He said wryly.

A thought struck him. The muscles in his arm tensed up with his idea, and in a heartbeat he was out of the stables and outside Petra's bedroom door rapping.

"Petra." He said lowly, and heard her snivel, and fall silent again.

He took a breath in, then with an instant twist of the doorknob he blew in from the hallway as she sat up messily from under her covers.

"Get up."

She stared emptily at him from her bed. She looked smaller than usual, her eyes puffy and red, her hair a mess.

"Get your coat. You're coming with me."

She swallowed, "Bu-"

"Hurry up." He crossed his arms, "Don't make me drag you out of here."

Baffled and tired, she nodded and extracted herself from the blankets. She'd taken to wearing his grey long-sleeve to bed over some basic pyjama bottoms, and he couldn't help but pick out the shape of her figure in it, then mentally chastised himself. Even now, even sleep deprived and pale from her melancholy, she was still the most breathtaking person he'd ever seen…but, in this exact moment, those kinds of thoughts were hardly appropriate.

Slowly she plucked her long military coat from where it hung on the wall, and wrapped the dark green wool around herself.

"Where are we going?" She asked in a small voice, pulling on her boots.

"You'll see."

The walk over was quiet, and though he didn't look at her, he could feel her round eyes intermittently glancing at him.

"The stables…?" Her question sounded quietly as they approached.

"Mm." He replied as they came to a stop at the entrance, "Saddle up. We're going for a night ride."

Levi absorbed her bewildered expression as she blinked, and wiped her still-wet eyes with her sleeve. He thought she might say something, but instead she simply wandered inside to fetch her horse's saddle. He continued to watch her small frame in the dim light as she prepared her horse. She spoke to the grey mare in soft tones, and he thought he saw some glitter return to her eyes. Immediately he felt lighter. It seemed to him that, no matter how despondent she became, she would never fully be able to conceal her warmth and brightness, because it was hardwired into her.

His grey eyes then grazed the dirt at his feet.

That her sadness had been on his mind constantly, that he would go out of his way to try and make her feel better…that the smallest hint that this trip to the stables had already begun to distract her from her burdens, made him feel almost weightless…

Everyone was on their own path, with their own shit to process. This was what being a scout entailed, they all knew it; they all had to deal with constant loss and grief. She wasn't special in that regard, except…

…standing here in the stables she was sad and bright and beautiful, and her fire, no matter how dim, lit him up inside. All he really wanted was to be close to her, and with each day he was being pulled ever further down this track, falling deeper-

"Levi? Are you coming too?"

He was grateful that her question snapped him out of his reverie. There were some things that, in spite of it all, he still didn't quite feel he was ready to admit to himself, at least with words. He wasn't sure he'd ever say such things out loud, and certainly not to her.

"Mm." He grunted in response to her, then busied himself with his own horse.

They lead their horses out into the night and mounted them, Petra shivering a little;

"So…where to Captain?" She inquired.

"Doesn't really matter." He replied, then set his horse galloping.

She followed on some feet behind as he raced through the dark fields under the vast night sky.

"Hey! Wait up!" He heard her shout then laugh as she feebly attempted to overtake him.

He smiled to himself, pleased to have heard her laugh again.

"You can't catch up that's on you." He fired back, grey eyes flickering in challenge, and saw that he'd stoked her fire in response, and she passed him with a grin as they leapt over a fence into the field of long grass beyond, hooves clattering against the cold ground.

Onwards they raced in playful contest, wind in their hair and fresh air in their lungs, with only one another for company, and the chandeliers of twinkling stars watching from above.