What else would I want from you, Petra?

I'm fond of you, Petra.

Lies. Utter fucking horseshit. What did he want from her? Everything. Fond of her? He was fond of tea, of his horse, of kicking back with Erwin late in the evening and talking about nothing in particular. He was on fire for her. Watching the hurt in her wide, amber eyes as he belittled her had made him want to punch himself in the face until he had her permission to stop. Calling her weak. Calling her a kid. Making her believe it was all about business.

Protecting her, because he could not stand the idea of another man's filthy hands on her.

Levi could barely admit it to himself, but when he'd found her on the balcony with that fucking asswipe Karl (maybe his brother, maybe, fuck it) he'd nearly gone after the man. Not because Karl might have it out for him; not because Karl might've wanted to hurt Petra; no, worst of all, Karl might've wanted to fuck Petra. Bright flashes of mayhem flickered in Levi's mind's eye. He had entertained the thought of taking his own teeth to the lord's throat, ripping through his jugular and tearing the beating pulse out of the guy's neck. Then, bloody and dripping with murder, he imagined hoisting Petra into his arms and running her through the ballroom—fuck even knew how he'd do this without being seen or stopped—and then throwing her down onto the ground, climbing on top of her, snarling that she was his, only his, ripping away those frothy layers of gown and having her with brutal force because what the fuck did he know about fucking?

She had to be a virgin. Had to be. What a first time for both of them.

If it took every ounce of his control and the last breath in his body, he would protect her from himself.

Why can't you tell us what's wrong? They'd all asked it in so many words.

I can't look in your eyes, Petra, when you learn my mother was a whore and I'm a bastard and my maybe half-brother is out to get to me through you guys. I don't want you to look at me and see a scum, thug piece of shit.

Erwin. Where the fuck was Erwin? Levi got a headache just thinking about how long it'd been since he'd seen the man. Just sitting with the Commander would make some of this pain go away. Erwin and Petra, the two people he needed most in this world, only Erwin gave him order and calm, and Petra riled up the fractured chaos that he most wanted to keep buried. With Erwin, everything was open. With Petra, all was secrets and evasion.

That's not love. That's insanity.

If she saw the real him, she would never want him again. And he'd rather live apart from her and still be able to see some misguided desire in her sweet eyes than lose that light forever by being honest. He was a gremlin, some underground monstrosity looking up out of the cavern to where she sat in the sunshine, the girl in the little stories she loved to share by the fireside. Levi was a capering, leering, degenerate, horny piece of filth, one that wanted to contaminate that sweet little angel with his cock and his fumbling hands. Filth. He was filthy. No matter how many times he washed, he could feel that dirt and decrepit fungus deep under his nails and in the lines of his skin. The abscess of his soul. Touch her with his body? A perversion.

A thudding, persistent pain had started at the base of his skull and behind his eyes. This evening was all a bit too much for him. He needed a place to collect his thoughts.

He'd been ambling down some hallway. Stopping before a door, he opened up…

Inside, the curtains were drawn and moonlight flooded the room to outline the people within. Thankfully, Levi didn't get too much detail, but he got enough. More than enough.

"Hiya, Levi!" Hange had removed her gown and shoes, and stood there in a pointy brassiere (why were her tits pointy? Did Levi want the answer to that?) and absolutely no underpants. Across from her, the man and woman Levi'd seen earlier were mostly naked as well. The guy was down to his tight boxers, the woman naked except for her own underwear and some knee-high stockings. Her tits were small and pert.

The woman sat on the man's shoulders, forming a creature about ten feet tall. The girl held out her arms in a menacing gesture, and snarled and gnashed her teeth. The almost naked man wobbled a bit to keep them both balanced.

"Levi, why don't you join us? It'll make it feel so real." Hange bounced and clapped her hands with girlish glee. "I'm going to have sex with a titan!"

Levi did not say a word. He merely shut the door, and walked on. He was pretty sure he would never sleep again. He wondered idly if life was one long waking nightmare.

Someone ran smack into Levi as he rounded the corner. Moblit. The poor man's hair was standing up on end. His jacket was gone, his sleeves rolled.

"The squad leader. I can't find her anywhere!"

Levi tried to remember how to talk. "Back. Back there." He gestured over his shoulder with a jerk of his thumb. Moblit gave a haphazard salute, and ran on. Levi blinked, trying to think straight. "Moblit. Wait. Save yourself," he croaked, but the poor man's terrified shrieking was the only answer. Must've opened the door.

Levi passed couples nestled in shadowy alcoves, furtively embracing. The rustle of silk, the moans, the smacking noises made by lips. Fuck. Disgusting. He winced whenever he thought of sex, of the exchange of fluids, the fishlike stink of it. The only time he'd ever been really turned on by the thought of touching a woman like that was with Petra. Back in the barracks, after a full day of treating her the same as the others and acting disinterested, he'd return to his room, spit in his hand, and stroke himself to a climax, teeth clenched, eyes closed as he imagined those creamy legs of hers opening for him, the white and rose of her breasts, the slick little sanctuary between her thighs. Him inside of her, claiming her, her wanting him so much she could barely think. Then he'd come, his seed splattering on a towel, his spine bending and her name at the back of his throat. He'd clean himself over and over, hating that he wanted her, that he needed her to want him.

"Oh. Oh." A woman's breathy and somewhat familiar voice shook Levi from his reverie. He halted and, before he could tell himself not to, looked to his right. There, in a sheltered nook, he found a man and woman in the throes of mostly clothed passion. The girl's shapely leg was wrapped around the man's waist, her skirt rucked up to reveal the top of her thigh. Their faces were pressed together, her hand clasping the back of his neck. He had his own hand between her legs, and was clearly working hard. "Oh, you're a genius. Don't stop. Oh. Oh," she breathed. The man gave a deep groan of pleasure. He was a giant, taller even than Erwin, the woman no midget herself. Her hair was blonde and short, and she sounded like Nanaba because she was Nanaba, which meant—

Fuck. Levi was peeping on Mike. He whipped his head around and tried to creep off just as he heard Nanaba give in to a breathy climax. More smackings, probably Mike kissing her deeply. Levi did not want all of this information on his comrades. He winced, wondering if he was gonna run into Erwin having an orgy around the next corner. He prayed that the servants gave this place a good disinfecting after the night was over. Had every single alcove and couch been defiled? He wouldn't touch anything here for the rest of the party.

"Hey. You." Mike's voice stopped Levi in his tracks. He looked over his shoulder. Both Nanaba and Mike were peering around their corner at him. It looked like a scene out of a stupid comedy. Levi hated theatre; he hated how ridiculous everything was on the stage. Apparently, life could be even worse than some garbage play.

"Uh. Sorry," Levi grunted.

"It's fine." Mike stared. Levi stared back. They were the two quietest guys in the Survey Corps. One time, just the two of them in a room, it'd been so silent for so long that Levi forgot Mike was there. Turned out Mike had forgotten about Levi as well. Real shock when they noticed each other.

He liked Mike.

"No need to apologize," Mike said.

"We weren't exactly looking for privacy." Nanaba shrugged, then whispered something to Mike and took off. Maybe looking to get cleaned up. The idea of it made Levi's skin crawl.

"Want a drink?" Mike pulled out a flask.

"Yeah. Yeah, I do." Sometimes Levi wished he could get fucking drunk. Mike unscrewed the tumbler, poured some amber liquid, and passed it off. Levi leaned against the wall, and sipped. It burned through him good. Grunting in appreciation, he passed the flask back. Mike drank. "So. Good party?" Levi muttered.

"Yep." Silence. The two men stared at the carpet. "Good party?"

"Nope."

"Rich bastards, eh?"

"Sort of." Levi wasn't gonna get into this with Mike. Now that he'd made his squad secure, his plan was to lay low until the end of the night, get on his horse, and ride out of the Morgensterns' lives for good. Clearly Karl knew about him, otherwise he wouldn't have gone after Petra. While it pained Levi to imagine a bastard like that in charge of a large swath of territory, and all the souls who lived on it, he couldn't see how he'd be in a position to make it all better. He'd go on being Humanity's Strongest, a nameless bastard from the underground. That was all he knew. All he wanted.

Well. Not all he wanted.

Unbidden, his thoughts returned to Mike with his hand down his subordinate's underwear. Something like hope—a deformed kind of hope—flared in Levi's breast.

"Ask you something?" he grunted.

"Yep."

"Nanaba." A pause. "So. How's that work?"

A really long pause.

"You mean like—"

"No. No." From Mike's tone, it was clear he meant sex. Levi would rather set himself on fire than get those particulars. "How's Erwin not split your squad up?"

Mike shrugged. "It's just sex." Just. Just sex. Levi tried to comprehend the juxtaposition of those two words. Impossible. "We keep it quiet. Don't talk about it."

"Erwin knows."

"Suspects. But we keep it quiet. There's knowing, and then there's being told."

Levi imagined fucking Petra in a broom closet, retying his cravat, then going to dinner in the mess hall. Sitting neutral with her, acting like he didn't know how she tasted, how her cunt felt around his cock. Impossible. Maybe he could keep that act up for a little while, but he was an all or nothing man. She'd either be his in every way, or not at all. Plus, there was not a secret in this world that Levi would keep from his Commander. Erwin would be told. He would instruct Levi in what to do after that. All or nothing. That was him.

"Why you curious?"

"Not curious. Just…interested."

"Why interested?"

"Why're you curious?"

This could go on for fucking hours. Mike snorted, drank, gave up.

"Nanaba's coming back soon." Mike screwed the cap on his flask. "So."

"Yeah, now she's gonna grab your dick." Silence. "Ha. That was a joke."

"Levi, you're fucking awkward."

Levi left Mike, walked around the corner. Maybe he should go back to the ballroom, but the idea of covertly watching Petra dance brought him no pleasure. She'd be miserable now, all because of him. She'd forgive him soon; that was her, always forgiving. Always seeing the best. Maybe he should go find Erwin, have a frank chat about what they were gonna do with the Morgensterns.

But the pain of what he'd done to Petra kept getting its teeth into him. He'd hurt her. Throwing her death in her face, calling it the only thing he wanted from her. Levi halted, winced, rubbed his forehead.

Had he gone too far? He'd gone too far, hadn't he?

"Captain. Hello." The storklike servant in black livery came to a stop before Levi, raising an eyebrow. "May I help you with something? Are you lost?"

If you only knew the half of it, pal.

"I'm not lost. Thanks." Levi stepped aside and let the guy get to wherever he was going. Maybe Levi should head for the ballroom and grab her, but…fuck it, he couldn't do this in front of the other guys. The thought made him sweat. Levi was bad with feelings, always had been. Petra's pain, his horniness, the guys' varying levels of annoyance and worship made up for a volatile cocktail of crazy. Levi turned, watched the servant walk away. Petra's face hovered before him, vivid whenever he closed his eyes.

He had to do it.

He had to apologize.

Erwin had always appreciated the solitude that libraries offered. As a boy, he would sit in his father's office and stare at the books on the shelves. Sometimes he would take a volume down and read, and sometimes he would merely turn the pages with a loving hand. The scent of old books was intoxicating, musk and the trappings of time.

His father's personal library had not been quite as extensive as this. Erwin stood in a room whose ceiling stretched twenty feet over his head. Several long, polished reading tables congregated in uniform order, spaced equally apart from one another. A ladder waited nearby to take him to the top shelves should he require it. Books rose around him, titanic in their grandeur. He walked to a shelf, trailed his fingers along the spines. Old histories, new novels, even a collection of Lord Morgenstern's writings. Erwin plucked one of those from the shelf, riffled through the pages. The scent of vellum and faded paper greeted him. He got as much of a sensual thrill out of it as, when a younger man, he'd first discovered the pleasure of a woman's body.

A woman.

Her soft footstep on the carpet. The ghost of her perfume.

"Erwin," Marie whispered.

Closing the book, Erwin turned to find Nile's wife standing a few feet away from him. The blue of her gown matched her wide, extraordinary eyes. Nearing forty now, two children into the marriage, he would have expected her to go to seed. Jowls, a dumpy waist, hair streaked with gray, lines at the corners of her eyes. And yes, Marie was no longer twenty-four, but she was still lovely. More delicate than before, more dignified. Her bosom a touch larger, her mouth lined faintly with laughter.

Nile had to go to bed in ecstasy every night.

"Hello, Marie." He laid the book on a table, and bowed at the waist. "What may I do for you?"

She shook her head, her porcelain brow furrowing. "Why are you so cruel?"

"What do you mean?"

She came to him, and Erwin could not help the way his scalp prickled to have her close that distance between them. Her upturned eyes, a plea written in her gaze.

"Have you forgotten everything?" she whispered.

"No. I could never do that." Their mouths were close, requiring only him to bend or her to lift off her heels.

Erwin had joined the training corps late. Embarrassingly late. His aunt and uncle had threatened and cajoled him until finally, on his nineteenth birthday, he had packed his case and left their house for the final time. His dreams would not be put off any longer, no matter their insistence that he could do so much more for humanity than die as a common soldier.

Nile Dok had been one of the few trainees as old as Erwin. They had sat together at every meal, trying to ignore the children that crowded the tables around them. Erwin had enlisted Nile into his dream of discovery; Nile, easily led and grateful for the friendship, soon adopted Erwin's passion with the conviction of a true follower.

In their final training year, the two had frequented an alehouse in town. They were men now, and had even less in common with the teenagers sprouting up around them. Heigel's Drafthouse was a scene for the intelligentsia, for artists and writers and layabouts with family money. Erwin had fit in better there than he'd wanted to admit. And then one evening, while sharing a pitcher of something too hoppy for Erwin's taste, the men had seen a girl in a blue dress sitting on her own. The girl had been blonde, exquisitely so, and sipping a framboise, a frothy little pink concoction so unmistakably feminine that it had roused something primal in Erwin.

"Come have a drink with us," Nile had squeaked. The girl had come over, and Erwin had noticed a splotch of yellow on her hand as she sat. A rolled up canvas lay beside her; she rested a reassuring hand upon it.

"Are you two gentlemen soldiers?" She'd smiled at them, a smile full of worldliness and faint interest. "Unusual clientele for this place."

That had been Erwin's introduction to Marie Bonner. Two years older than he, an artist, a bohemian in a world that did not even know what that word meant. Every night they could spare, Nile and Erwin would rush to the alehouse, and every night they would meet Marie there. Sometimes she'd go dancing with the two of them, laughing in their arms. My handsome fascists, she called them, and she would discuss novels and plays that Nile had never heard of and that Erwin had read and seen twice. Nile's ardor for Marie was evident from the first sip of their first drink; Erwin made sure that his interest never registered as more than intellectual.

Because he had a vision of his future, and that future must involve the Survey Corps. And despite the inherent seduction in Marie Bonner's lily skin and knowing smiles, no earthly woman was going to derail his dream. He would not take a wife, not ever. He had sacrificed that kind of happiness when he knew his goals. For one, no woman could compete with his dream, and besides that, life in the Survey Corps meant possible death every time they left the walls. No woman should have to bear that emotional burden.

Though he craved her. Before he had even thought to put up a barricade, Marie had overcome his defenses and overthrown his peace of mind. He would think of her during training, when his instructors praised his aptitude tests. When someone came to him and hemmed and hawed about the Military Police, and how he could rise to become Commander within a few easy years, he pictured Marie in their shared home, decorating the walls with her art and laughing in his arms.

For the first time in his entire life, Erwin Smith knew uncertainty.

And then, graduation neared and Nile came to Erwin looking flushed. Stammering, he told Erwin that plans had changed. He was in the top ten of the class—they both were—but Nile was taking his skills to the Military Police. He was going to propose to Marie. Was going to? Well. He had proposed.

And what did she say?

She laughed, and said she'd give her answer at graduation. She wanted to see what life her handsome fascists would choose.

Fascists. Plural. Erwin did not relish that moniker—he didn't think Nile knew what it meant—but the plural caught him off guard. What would they choose?

What would Erwin choose?

Two days before the ceremony, when the others were drinking and frolicking, Erwin had gone to town and found his way to Marie's studio apartment. He and Nile had been there before, to see her paintings. Nile had admired the curve of Marie's waist; Erwin had thought that, impressionistic splatters aside, the woman had a gift for color and texture. And he had eyed her bosom, as well.

The apartment occupied one half of the eave of a house. The roof slanted sharply down. The place smelled of turpentine and linseed oil. Erwin hung up his coat on a hook by the door. Buttery sunlight gleamed on the paint-splattered kitchen tabletop. A chipped earthenware mug held a spray of purple wildflowers gathered from a crack in the sidewalk. Marie loved natural flourishes trapped by the decay of urbanity. Her words.

An easel held up a new canvas, one that had been recently primed. A palette with squiggles of paint, brushes resting in a cup; Marie taking off her apron, saffron on her hands; a mortar and pestle dusted with scarlet red.

She was all color and art and life. She leaned against her kitchen table, and for once her smile was nowhere to be found.

"Nile proposed," he said evenly.

"He did."

"What are you waiting for?"

"You," she replied.

He kissed her until there was barely breath left in his body. Their fingers deftly unbuttoned one another, unhooked, undressed. Erwin had known women before, but never like this. Her mouth was supple; she tasted of sunlight and rosehip oil. Her breasts filled his hands. She moaned as her legs wrapped around his waist, as he positioned his cock at the entrance to her sex. She was perched on the edge of her kitchen table.

"You're a god," she whispered. For the first time, Marie Bonner looked undone. Her fingers trailed across the planes of his face, his lips, the hard contours of his training-firmed body. "How are you real?"

Erwin had answered by sliding into her. Though she'd been wet as could be, his girth had made her gasp, dig her fingernails into his shoulder. They'd fucked, and caught their breath, and then she'd straddled him when he sat in a chair and ridden him until he screamed her name. Her hair flowed around her as she threw her head back, her eyes squeezed shut when she reached her climax and cried out. Erwin found her clit, lavished attention upon it over and over until she'd detonated several times, grew limp and languid in his arms.

Erwin could not remember how many times they made love that afternoon and evening. They'd used every flat surface available, from the table to the floor to, finally, Marie's bed. They never got dressed, not once. Famished, they ate apples and bread and half a pomegranate she'd been saving to paint—a whole month's worth of wages, gone in the afterglow of sex. They ate with their fingers, kissed one another with juice-ripened mouths. Erwin lay amid her rumpled sheets, an arm nestled behind his head, his cock resting on his stomach. Marie grabbed thick paper and charcoal and sketched him, sitting up by the headboard and giggling.

"You were born to be an artist's model," she said. Her strokes on the paper were deft and sure and furious. "Do you really not understand how handsome you are?"

"I wouldn't mind being told a few more times." He quirked an eyebrow. "I'm only human."

"No. You're a god, and a demon. You are not human."

"How can I be both divine and demonic?"

"Believe me, Erwin Smith. You embody all kinds of contradictions. You have an artist's soul and an academic's mind and yet you want to become a soldier. Men like you don't join the military. It's a mindless, fascistic machine designed to swallow up all individuality. It's brutal and fueled by propaganda."

"I think you're the one who's talking propaganda now." He'd been terse. She'd paused in her sketching. "Why even consider marrying Nile, then? He'll join the MPs for you. The police, of all things. He'll keep you safe. A woman like you, choosing safety?"

"Art doesn't pay." She spoke softly, hair falling into her face. "And women grow older. Young, unmarried women artists have a good time; old, unmarried women artists sell paintings of cats and flowers on street corners and earn two pitying looks for every coin."

"And you call me brutally practical."

"I don't want to talk about this anymore. I want to finish my drawing, and then I want to fuck you."

"Then by all means. Continue."

She tasted earthy and ethereal all at once. He made love to her with his mouth, his hands, his cock, and she responded enthusiastically to every advance. Her medium was oil paint, but he envisioned himself a sculptor, stroking the curves of her body to create the perfect representation of flushed, orgasmic bliss. Once the sun had gone down and the moon had risen, once morning was not that far off they exhausted themselves and lay there in her bed. Moonlight silvered her hair, turned her cheek white.

"Erwin. I won't mind if you join the Survey Corps." Her breath stirred the hair at his temple. "I'll wait for you at home and pray to the goddesses to send you back to me."

"Marie." He shut his eyes. "You don't understand."

"I understand that I've loved you since the moment I saw you. If your vision of the Survey Corps has to take priority, it will. I'll be waiting for every moment you can spare."

That night was the worst of his life, as she slept in his arms. Erwin did not cry much, but for those few hours until dawn he wept and begged himself to relent. Just an inch. Just bend enough to put her in his life. He was half the Corps's, and half hers. A tilt in either direction and…

"Please," he begged with the fervor with which he'd beg something of a remote deity. "Please let me be human."

And the deity who wore Erwin's own face gazed down at him from the blackness of the ceiling. His eyes were cold.

When Marie awoke, it was dawn and Erwin was dressing. She looked up at him, bundling the blankets to cover her nakedness. He saw that she understood.

"Be safe," she whispered.

"Be happy," he replied, and left.

Erwin didn't attend Nile and Marie's wedding. He got drunk instead.

For fifteen years, he had not seen her. She was as tantalizing now as she had been then.

"Erwin. Please," she whispered, and their lips met. She slid into his arms with the ease of a practiced dance. Her moans were soft, her kisses light. He deepened the embrace, their tongues meeting, her body shivering against his.

Erwin reflected as he kissed this woman, the only woman he had ever loved.

On that night, their one night, he had been half hers. Though he had continued to yearn for her, as the years passed that half had halved in turn. He'd been twenty five percent hers; later, twelve and a half. Erwin could slice every ounce of love and desire into categorical slivers. His passion would never fully vanish—even if it got down to one one thousandth of a percent, it would exist and persist. Marie Bonner Dok would always be a part of him.

But she was no longer as important as his goals. His dreams. Not remotely. Though his body remained chaste, apart from the occasional dalliance or visit to an elite brothel, his soul was filled with a new kind of love. Mike, posting lookout by the window even when there was nothing to watch for; Hange, cackling and cavorting around with her science, wild ideas flourishing under her care; and Levi, always at his side, always blunt and surly and fierce in his convictions. These were his people. The only love he would allow himself, because they entwined perfectly with his dreams, enmeshed with his chosen reality.

Levi would grow disgusted if he heard these thoughts. To Levi, love was to be shunned because he did not think himself worthy of it. They'd never talked about it explicitly, but Erwin knew the man's fractured psychology enough to understand that. Whereas Erwin found that he did not require love to sustain him, Levi ran from his need for it.

Levi was truly, now and forever, the better man.

And Erwin would love him for it, and use that decency until one or both of them were dead.

Levi. His friend. His comrade. The only person Erwin would give his life for without hesitation.

Erwin pulled out of Marie's embrace. Keening, she clutched at his shoulders.

"What should we do?" she whispered. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips pink.

She was as desirable now as the day he had met her.

"I don't feel as I once did, Marie." He did not explain the fractioning of his love, because it was too cruel and also not cruel enough. He regarded her with half-lidded indifference. "Time has changed me. It's changed you." No, he couldn't be that awful. "You're still beautiful, Mrs. Dok. But it's not enough to tempt me. Please. Go back to your husband."

She pushed away from him, hand clutched to her chest. Her shoulders drew in. He'd shamed her, and he knew she was a proud woman. It was what he loved about her, one of the things.

A love that could be easily pushed aside when inconvenient.

"You're a demon," she muttered.

"You said it yourself long ago." He nodded in recognition. "A demon, yes. Though not divine, as it turns out."

"Erwin. I'll never see you again."

"That would be for the best." He paused then, and drank in the detail of her for the final time. The coil of her sleek blonde hair, the delicate lace at her cuffs, the rose of her lips. His, offered to him once more, and rejected.

"Goodbye, then."

"Goodbye, Marie."

He waited until she'd left the library, and returned to the shelves. His fingers again trailed along the spines of those books, caressed one, took it out.

Erwin studied the title. Diary of Lord Viktor Morgenstern, Jan-Jun 815

Odd. The cover felt warped, as if it had been wetted.

He opened the volume and began to scan the lines, his mind hopping point to point, drawing conclusions and checking his data.

If he were honest—cruelly, brutally honest—this was the reason he'd come to the library.

He'd forgotten he was supposed to meet Marie completely.

"So. Petra. How about the Marian?" Oruo had his shoulder against the wall, and was attempting to look suave. Petra merely drank, and resigned herself.

"Sure. That'd be nice. Thank you, Oruo."

His small eyes widened to their fullest. He seemed to glow. "O-Okay! Yeah! Be right back, I need another drink!" He scampered off, and Petra sighed and lovingly shook her head.

"Got a dance or two to go before the big one." Gunther held out his hand. "What say we show Eld and Katrina how it's done?"

Petra watched her friend and his girl on the dance floor. They seemed lost in their own world whenever they were together. Imagine that kind of bliss. Petra, meanwhile, had actively avoided looking for the captain. She gave Gunther her hand.

"Let's do it." She tried smiling as they sailed onto the floor. Gunther was a solid partner, solid in everything he did. Petra found she was always most comfortable in his company, of all the guys on the squad. They jigged together, and Gunther spoke.

"Listen. I want to just say it, before it gets awkward." He sighed. "I know, Petra."

"Know what?" Her heart thumped as they spun twice.

"I know about your feelings for the captain," he muttered.

"I. Gunther. What. I. Um." Her brain had ceased functioning.

"Relax, no one else knows. Least of all him." Gunther gave a slight smile. "Oruo and Eld don't notice these things, not like I do."

"How. That is. How do you…"

"I get it. Unrequited love." Petra had an irrational yearning to shout that no, the captain did feel the same way! At least, there was a chance! She clamped her lips shut. "Don't get huffy. All I mean is that I know how it feels to love someone you shouldn't."

She frowned. "Who?"

Gunther shrugged, twirled her, then whispered, "Eld."

"Oh. Oh."

By the walls themselves, it was damned obvious when she gave it a thought. Gunther was forever by Eld's side, always primed for duty whenever the second in command appeared. Petra had just assumed that he and Eld fit together, the way she and Oruo did; they were the cool-headed duo to counterbalance her and Oruo's squabbling.

"Gunther…"

"Relax. I know he'll never feel the same. I've resigned myself to it." Petra sensed now that Gunther might be turning in synchronicity with Eld and his girl. Maybe trying to catch a glimpse of the man's shoulders, his bun of yellow hair. "And I love Katrina. She makes him happy, and that's enough for me."

Why were her eyes filling with tears?

"I think…I think you deserve all that happiness, too," she said at last.

"And maybe I'll find it. Look, I can't stop my feelings for him. They'll last, but…" Gunther frowned. "The first step is understanding it's not going to happen. It's the one that hurts the most, but it's necessary."

"He…he could still feel that way." They both knew she didn't mean Eld.

"Maybe. Maybe. But it'd break up the squad, Petra. And besides, if he did." He sighed. "I'm sorry, but men don't hide their feelings for years. Women can be strong enough for that, but guys? He'd have made something obvious by now, and. Well."

"He hasn't." The captain was certainly a man, and he'd act like other men in regards to sex and desire. No doubt. The way Levi'd spoken to her in the parlor…

It was clear that he did not see her that way. He never had. He never would.

"Pet, I'm so sorry. Please don't cry." Gunther took the opportunity the dance presented to press his cheek to hers. "This was the wrong time to bring it up. I'm a jerk."

"No. No, you're right. I'm the one who's been silly." She sniffled, watched him with widening eyes. "Promise you'll never tell anyone?"

"Until my dying breath, it's our secret."

She kissed Gunther's cheek as the dance ended, and they applauded the musicians.

The first step to freeing myself is to accept he doesn't feel the same.

She would be all right. She would find love. Real love. Something that wasn't a fantasy nurtured in her mind.

Even if it killed her tonight, she'd be fine. One day.

They walked off the floor to find Oruo waiting with two glasses of sparkling wine. As Gunther left to get some air, she drank with Oruo. Petra felt sullen now, glaring at the blissful dancers before her. This was supposed to be a fairy tale of an evening. Instead, reality kept shoving its ugly face into hers at every turn.

"Hey." Oruo bumped her elbow. "Don't cry, Pet. It'll be okay."

"I know," she muttered, wiping her cheeks. Idiot. She cried too damn easily.

"Look, we all get a smack from the captain now and then. Your turn was up, that's all." Oruo sighed, and looked heavenward. He had a hero crush on Levi to rival her own. If the captain told him to pull down his pants and jam a radish up his anus, Oruo would proudly proclaim that it was the greatest experience of his life. "Besides, everyone knows you're his favorite."

"I am?" She barely mustered a smile. What was the point of gaining his favor if his heart didn't race when he saw her?

You joined the military to be a brave soldier in his eyes.

Yes. Yes, that was right. Petra lightened at the thought.

She could always be that to him, if nothing else.

"Whenever you do anything, it's always 'look at Petra do this' and 'see how nice Petra made that.' You're the only one of us who ever makes smile even a little bit." Oruo sighed. "You're lucky, Pet."

Yes. She smiled now, her heart still broken but the pieces mendable. She was a little dear to him, at least.

"I just wish you guys didn't have to take shifts protecting me."

"Soon, we're gonna take to the floor and all your troubles will wash away." Oruo sniffed. "I am the superior dancer in the whole Squad Levi."

"Careful, you dribbled some wine down your chin."

While Oruo fixed himself up, Petra turned to find a thin, pale man in black livery standing before her. A servant. He regarded her with a bored expression.

"Petra Ral?" he asked.

"Yes?"

"Captain Levi has requested to see you."

"Okay." Oruo fluffed his cravat. "I'll escort her."

"The captain requested to see you alone." The servant shrugged, as if this message were beneath him. "He was adamant about it."

"Well, the captain requested she not go anywhere alone tonight!" Oruo jutted his jaw.

"The captain isn't a dangerous predator," Petra said flatly.

"Oh. Well. Yeah. True."

Petra bit her lip. What if this was a test? One to see if she'd obey his orders? Petra shuddered at the thought of latrine duty. But…

What if he wanted to apologize? Was such a thing possible?

She suppressed the flutter of hope in her stomach; the captain wasn't about to pull her away and declare undying love. But he probably wanted to…

No, he couldn't apologize to someone like her.

Could he?

"Madame, if you're coming," the servant drawled.

"Yes. I am." She patted Oruo's arm. "Back in time for the Marian."

"Don't be late! Tell the captain I'm expecting you!" he called as Petra tracked the servant through the crowded ballroom. Her heart pummeled her chest as she followed the fellow up the stairs, took a left, and padded down a winding labyrinth of hallways.

"Why's the captain all the way up here?" she asked.

"In truth, madame, he's been drinking. I believe he's sulking." The servant sniffed.

Sulking. Could he feel sorry for what he'd done?

No. She wouldn't believe that. But when the servant stopped outside a pair of doors and gestured to them, her whole body buzzed with tension. Maybe. Maybe Gunther was wrong.

Oh, she'd give her soul to have him be wrong.

"Thank you," she breathed, and opened the doors. The servant made a dismissive noise, and walked on. Petra entered a darkened room. Across from her, windows displayed the falling snow outside. A large, officious looking desk waited directly before her. Turning her head to the left, Petra noticed a canopied bed.

A bed? The lights out? She clenched her jaw, trying to suppress the giddiness. Impossible. Impossible. No. He couldn't…

He couldn't want…

"Captain?" she breathed, hands over her chest, her heart fluttering under her fingertips. The door closed behind her. Petra turned on her heel.

"Hello, Miss Ral," Karl Morgenstern said.