The coal black horse galloped through the hills of snow. His dark hair fluttered against the breeze. Levi stopped before some run down cabin with one faulty sign with faded letters that read 'The BlackSmith.'
His sapphire eyes read the title of the cabin and grinned. He had ridden from his kingdom of Eldians. His King, Erwin Smith, was bedridden from a great sickness. As his most loyal knight, it was his duty to bring him back medicine made by the great sorceress and blacksmith of the Ymir's Desert of Paths. Eldians would be overwhelmed by illusions and hallucinations when they crossed the Desert of Paths. It was once a land where sorceresses alone lived but many were killed by the Fire Giants after they had angered them for they had yielded the fire they were given to reign mortals as slaves. Fire had been taken away from all sorceresses but one who was a mortal woman who could not yield fire but was a great blacksmith and doctor. They left her immortality and their mystical fire with the condition that she stayed in the Dessert of White for eternity. The King told him that he would visit the woman when she was a mortal, often, as a prince in the kingdom of Eldia before she left. Hanji Zöe, was her name, she was the respected saviour of their kingdom, the one who befriended the giants. Levi shoved the broken door away and took a step into the dark interior and dust. "Sorceress Hanji Zöe-" His call was interrupted by the touch of artic metal on his neck. "Who are you?" Her voice was beautiful and endless. "...King Erwin has sent me here... you are our kingdom's greatest healer, I hear... My King is sick... he's an old man... on his death bed, in need of medicine." Levi's azure eyes figured the outline of her face, her nose was hooked, his eyes he couldn't see from the cloak. She turned her head toward him and he was met with a copper eye. "Don't look at me!" She roared, she sent a metal dart at him and he dodged the weapon. Her hold on her sword had loosened, he sensed. Levi kicked her down with one solid move. Too late. The sword pointed at his Adam's apple. He gulped. The strands from his bun were wept by the sweat his face left. "Erwin... I made him thousands of swords... I persuaded the Fire Giants and created good reputation for the Eldians. They will come again... I told him... that the use of mystical fire for weaponry was a sin and that the Fire Giants would send his kingdom plague... and that he would be the one to suffer from that plague. He didn't return those swords to me... all he wanted was power... Erwin deserved what he got-" Hanji spat out and Levi grabbed her by the collar and dragged her up the cabin wall. "You will save my King." Hanji feared the blaze of loyalty held in the knight's blue eyes. Sunlight shined into the cabin through the crack between the door and the wall. The hood of her cloak had fallen and Hanji's one right flame eye revealed itself, the other was covered in melted scarred skin. Levi let go of her and moved away. He pointed his sword at her. "Will you make it, you hag?" Levi threatened the sorceress. Her brown messy locks were cut short and she pushed away the sword with the back of her hand. "Get out." She spat. Levi narrowed his eyes at her. "What good is it... to obey giants... must we understand creatures who do not help progress our freedom?" Levi questioned her after he kicked her down to the ground once more. Hanji stared at Levi with no words. Levi felt his brain swirl and tighten. His skull felt great pain as if his brain were dissected. "What's this.?!" Levi barked as he held his head in agony and glanced at the woman. She stood up onto her feet and walked over to him and held his face with both of her hands. Her one eye burned in a red colour. It burned into his brain, pictures of the past. Levi screamed as his memories flashed before him. Was he going to die? Was this the end? He was thrusted backwards into the wall behind him. "You are tragic... afraid of calm... in need of freedom." Her shoeless feet took their steps. "In need of a mother's hold... poor man." Hanji embraced his drowsiness into her chest and ran one hand through his raven strands. "Mother?" Levi saw forgotten flashbacks of his mother, Kuchel, she smiled, washed him, fed him. His grip became tight on Hanji's cloak. "Go to sleep... now... my son." Her voice was endless as they drugged his absent mind. Levi wouldn't lose his hold on her to her surprise. She held his face by the jaw and looked into his narrow eyes. "Sorceress... save my... King... I beg of you." Levi held clawed her face with a gentle touch. Hanji's eye widened at his strength to maintain his conscious. "He is... our only... hope." Levi felt faint and lost his wake.
Levi saw a dream, it was of a woman with glasses... "Oi, shitty glasses..." He'd call her by that name, who was she? BANG! He woke up, in the snow, he was outside of the cabin, covered in a blanket. Hanji Zöe, had made a fire and over the pit of fire was a pot. She spoke in some kind of norse tongue. She held her breath after she realised he had awakened. "You are awake. Here, you must be hungry." Hanji shoved a bowl of stew into his hand. Levi eyed her as if to ask if she had poisoned it. "It's poisoned." She walked into her cabin. Levi scoffed and ate the stew. He was hungry. As he chewed at the pieces of meat in the stew, she focused on her chants and spells. "Expect a Great War to come... Knight..?" She didn't know his name. "Levi." His tone echoed. She kept her eye on him before she looked away and stirred the pot with a ladle and filled one large leather bag. "How did you lose the eye?" Levi ate his stew. "I lost it because I made those swords... because Erwin didn't return them." Hanji frowned. Levi gazed at the woman in the dark cloak and stared into the stew. "You have the hands of a woman... you would've made a great mother or wife somewhere far from this desert." Levi said. Hanji with her one eye in disbelief held her gaze on him with befuddlement. "You make fun of me..." Hanji watched the steam from the soup swim upward. Levi rose to his feet and sat closer to her on a log. He touched her scar with his thumb. "Does it anger you... that I am?" Levi smirked. Hanji couldn't believe the Knight before her and smacked his hand away. He held her leg through the cloak to stop her leave. "You... what did you do to me... those memories... you gave them to me." Levi stared up at her. His strong hand grasped her thigh and traveled their way up. "It must be sometime since you've seen a man." Levi took his hand away and got to his feet after she didn't resist. "You know what I am." Levi glared at the sorceress. "What are you, Levi?" Her voice whistled with the snow in the wind. His azure eyes took note of the pink of her lips. She was beautiful on second thought. Her eyes were like tigers, mighty and wise... her nose was hooked but the thickness of her lips gave her a motherly expression. Her dark locks kissed the sides of her face though in a mess. Levi felt his heart skip a few beats before he returned to the present moment. He gulped. "You are strange... you didn't lose your hold on me... after I had reminded you of your mother. You clung to me and begged me to save your King." Hanji eyed him. The silence was overtaken by the frost breeze. "Take these with you, at dawn." Hanji left him outside and walked inside with bits of firewood. "I clung onto you..." Levi whispered to himself into the gust.
"For my King?"
The gust made the cabin tremble and left the inside with the sound of crackle from the fireplace, floorboards and walls. Levi stared at the woman hidden by the black cloak. She sat in one corner with a staff in her hand. His blue eyes counted the splinters of flame in the fire. The warmth from the fireplace made them sweat. "Hold me." Levi confessed. "I cannot get my sleep... I need it. Remind me of my mother, again." Levi said. "Your mother is dead?" She asked him. "Yes. She was sick because of the job that led me to be a bastard." Levi admitted his mother was a prostitute. Hanji held no sense of surprise, it wasn't unexpected. "Come here." Levi's arms opened up to her. "Have the Paths started to play with your mind? You are a Ackerman, are you not?" Hanji narrowed her eyes. Levi rose up and made his way to her. "I can kill you." Hanji said to him. He ceased but his expression remained unafraid. "You won't." Levi took another step forward. "Your love for me will." Hanji's eye stabbed into him. "If I lose you." Levi kneeled before her and placed a hand on her cheek. "I won't-" He was interrupted when Hanji sliced his right eye and healed it to leave a scar. He barked in pain as he clutched onto his eye. "You Bitch-" Hanji interrupted once more and kissed him. They both made love. Dawn came, Levi could not find Hanji. His black horse was outside and so was the leather bag of medicine. He touched his right eye and the scar on it. He pivoted on his feet. The Fire Giants had awakened. Thousands of them were unearthed from underneath the desert. They were after the medicine. Levi from the distance could see Hanji hold up her staff, a verdant glow escaped from the top of it. "Run, Levi." He heard a voice whisper into his ear. It was her voice. A couple Fire Giants began to drop into the sand. He could hear her roars as he rode his horse away. "You have left me to shed from the eye... you couldn't." Levi cried as he returned to his Kingdom. Hanji perished into black ash...
