Chapter 35

The heat between my legs and the thirst inside my mouth have all but dissipated by the time the sun creeps in through the window. The world cracks a lidded eye in rosy yellow, shimmering the dawn in streaks against the opposite wall and illuminating the dust motes flitting through the air. My nocturnal respite has caused me to reorient, situating me to rest on my left side, top leg curled up out of the blanket and the lip of the sheet nestled under my armpit. An entire wall of warm muscle sits behind me, morning wood pressed against my ass and a hearty bicep scooping me to the clothed chest I ogled at the night previous. I crane my head to reassure myself of the body's identity; sure enough, Reiner Braun sleeps fast behind me.

I shouldn't, but because I can't truly help myself, I allow us a few moments to stay as we are. In sleep he's lost that permanent, grizzled, shadowed lurch to the space underneath his eyes and jaw. He's his age once again, just an overgrown boy dreaming of stars and silver skies. Or whatever it is that men dream about. He's breathing evenly out of his nose, eyes dancing underneath the lids, sequined figures frolicking beneath a heath of willow trees. The urge to pet his hair back from his forehead, to smooth his brows into shape with a single finger, swarms to life in my arm and forces me to stop glancing his way entirely in order to suppress it.

Even that motion, small as it was, seems to be enough to rouse him momentarily from his dreamscape. I feel him curl his arm around me more. Like a snake, churning its body in tighter and tighter circles, asphyxiating its prey with its gradual, pumping, slithering vices. I tap against the arm thrown over me. Whisper like a curtain, like dandelion fluff floating in a summer breeze. "Hey."

"Mmnn." The proffered mumble, groggy and thick with that atrociously delicious rumble associated with early morning exchanges, makes my ears tingle.

"You awake?"

Reiner squirms slightly behind me. His prison bar of an arm relaxes incrementally. I give him another minute to gather his bearings, to bid sleep adieu. "Mhm."

"Good. You should get back to your cabin before it gets too early."

Exhaled air, hot and humid, ghosts my neck. I shiver and feel the muscles in his upper body twitch reactively. Granting him more time to get untangled, I find myself counting slats in the floors until he and I are untangled, with me the sole resident of the little infirmary bed. I stare for a moment at Reiner as he stretches, rubbing his eyes. How we both managed to share a night on this mattress is beyond me.

That should be the end of our interaction, but it's not. Reiner's early voice turns back in my direction, louder as he comes to sit on my side of the bed, leaning down over me. His touch is careful, hesitantly sure of itself, fingertips not entirely callused but not exactly soft either. He brushes a few unruly strands of hair back from my face; I feel a quick tug at the corner of my mouth and hastily free the hair caught between my lips before he can notice its existence. "Aliva," he says, and my name sounds like fresh dew and marigolds. "Do not ask me to forget this ever happened."

I choke on my own words before I can even get them out. "What makes you think I would–"

"You would," he tells me, in a way that's humor and resolution. He's not wrong. I should laugh, or at least smile, but I can't. Despite how diaphanous his expression appears, I cannot help but think it has some depth I fail to understand. "My feelings from last night stand. If you are unable to side with me…then do not give me hope like this again."

I find sudden interest in studying my nails. "My answer is still undecided."

Reiner's hand falters and retreats. "Nothing has changed for you?"

"Has it for you?" My head snaps up faster than it ought. The pain from yesterday returns like a white-hot whip, dizzying me. "If I were to tell you now that I will live and die in Paradis, for Paradis, would you abandon your mission for me?"

It is cruel of me to lash out. He scrutinizes my face. Sighs. We draw our weapons and slit our own throats. "No."

"Then we are back where we started. Back at an impasse."

Silence falls. A bird begins to chirp outside, harkening the rapid onslaught of the spring. Our season, at its end. "When I leave this room, what will I be to you?"

"A lover," I tease, and regret it immediately. I wipe the curl of my cheeks off my face and straighten myself back out into the Reaper. "Tell me–who kept me company last night? The warrior, or the soldier?"

"...The soldier."

"And in the cave?"

"The warrior."

"In the tent?"

"Soldier."

"The obstacle course?"

"Warrior."

Ah. I shake my head, exhaling in a way that sounds almost like mirthless laughter. "I see. Then it is the trainee who lingers, who hesitates, who pleads. And the titan who draws back from me, who demands I offer my neck out first."

Once again, I watch a muscle in his jaw twitch. His profile turns rugged, sharp, coarse. "Yes."

"I've made up my mind." I stretch, bruised body yelping in protest as I do. I'll have to take it easy today. The last thing I want is to land myself right back into this room to face the memories I know it'll forever illicit. "As I am now–devoid of all recollection, save for the few notes crammed into my brain here and there–I am no more your ally than any of the other eastern division trainees are. But–and this is a very large, very unlikely demand–if I regain my memories, I'll reevaluate my standings then. I was more neutral then, wasn't I? More self-oriented?"

Reiner's eyebrows raise, their slight display of suspicion almost amusing to me then. "Are you not still self-motivated?"

"True," I concede. "Though my current self has decided the best course of action is to serve dutifully to the hundred and seventh division."

"Things change."

"Do they?"

"You're back, aren't you?" I have nothing to say to that. Taking advantage of that gap in our conversation, Reiner sets his hands against his legs and rises to stand. "I should go. If…"

"...You'll be the first to know," I assure him. The sudden twist in my gut is alarming and confusing. The sensation crawls up my throat, burning like bile, its stench eerily similar to guilt. I swallow it down impassively and watch Reiner nod, turn away, and head out.

"Take it easy," he tells me softly, and then he is gone.

Before me stands the endless stretch of sand, the shimmering blue sky, the flickering white light cast behind the frame of the woman I once made sandcastles with. This time, she looks to be somewhere between the child's form I first saw and the older version that accosted me when I collapsed in the obstacle course. The man from that time isn't here. We are, once again, alone.

"I thought you only showed up in dreams," I say, and my voice feels thick with dry, dense air. A fog, an entire wall of breath, separates me from her. "And only to say shit like, 'this is the extent of your abilities,' while I lay suffocating in some dusty alley."

The sand girl hardly seems fazed by my petulant use of air quotes to mock the words she once sent flying my way. Instead, she digs a sandaled foot into the ground beneath her. Her hair falls over her face, obscuring her eyes. "You are difficult to converse with."

There's an urge to roll my eyes almost immediately, but I suppress it rather easily once I catch a glimpse of her expression. With her face scrunched and downturned, eyes focused on the scuffing motions of her toes, it's almost like she's contemplating something rather important. And if she's speaking with me right now… "You need me for something," I realize.

The girl glances up. "Yes. No. I will make a deal with you."

"Right now?" I sit down in the sand. It's not like I really have anywhere to be. "I vaguely remember asking you to make a deal with me once."

She shakes her head, sending her hair sashaying this way and that. I really can't get a good read on her, that girl. "I can't make it with you."

I feel my eyebrows furrowing, either out of confusion or some intrinsic measure of self-defense. "What's that supposed to mean?"

The girl's foot stops moving. It's like this whole space stales, the air around us suddenly bearing down on me, a whole world's worth of weight collapsing onto my body, knocking all the oxygen out of my lungs. "You need to remember."

I gape, lips flapping soundlessly, hand crawling to my throat. "I–"

"You will remember. Soon. She will make sure of it." Tiny, birdlike footsteps. She approaches with the most peculiar gait I've ever seen, striding one second and limping the next. One moment her skin is peppered with arrows, her breathing ragged. The next, she's tall and adorned with that headband again, a hand cast over her swollen stomach. "When you are yourself again we will speak. We will bargain."

A flickering, thread-thick sliver of air passes by my nostrils, granting me just enough of a reprieve to sputter, "I don't understand–why appear now if I'm not–"

"To remind you," she says, voice echoing and hollow. "To warn you."

The air bears down, crushing me, snuffing me out entirely.

I do not see which form she settles on before I am thrust into darkness, into the infirmary, shivering with unease and slick with fevered sweat.

A/N: Short chapter, I know, but I wanted to get it uploaded and couldn't wait until I have time to write more! Hope you're all still enjoying the story. We are seriously SO close to some of the parts that I'm most excited about. It's been eons since I blocked out some of the plot twists...crazy to think that they're almost here. :)