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It was not pleasantry or an act of politeness that brought Armin to Levi’s castle. In fact, with a friend turned into a horse and the threat of him ending up like that forever, it was anything but. It was a necessity, and if it weren’t for Jean, Armin would have never risked entering the witch’s domain. There were too many stories about Levi for anyone to feel comfortable entering his lands without expressive permission and Armin wasn’t too certain that this visit wouldn’t end with something worse than being stuck as an animal for all of eternity.
“Master Levi will see you now,” a soft voice told him, a short haired girl that barely came to Armin’s shoulder ushering him and the horse at his side towards the large double doors down the hallway. They hadn't been waiting long to be seen--in fact, the blonde thought that it was a bit too soon to go in for his tastes.
“I suppose there’s no choice now,” Armin mumbled, taking the rope around Jean’s neck in hand once more. Jean had refused to wear it at first, pinning his ears and backing away. However, people were much less suspicious and much less likely to try to steal if he seemed to be owned; not to mention the fact that with every passing day his humanity seemed to fade more and more.
Jean nickered gently from his side, nudging his head into Armin’s hand before beginning to walk.
“Does he seem angry?” The blonde asked nervously, following the small girl back down the hall. The click clack of Jean’s hooves against the shiny black tile was loud in the silence, the brush of the girl’s robes the only other sound.
“Levi is always irritated,” the girl murmured, not once looking back at the two of them. “but seldom angry.”
Was that supposed to be comforting? Armin wondered, sharing a glance with Jean. However, before he could think about turning back they were at the doors. Large and imposing with what looked like metal studs lining the outside, Armin stepped forward to help open them--only to be stopped when the girl did so with barely a nudge.
“Good luck,” she called, head bowed as they walked past and into the great room beyond.
The click of the door behind them sounded a lot like a casket closing to him.
For a moment, Armin was surrounded by darkness, his eyes going wide and straining against the sudden onslaught of black.
“Jean?” he whispered hesitantly, hands outstretched as he began to feel around for either his friend or a wall; a worried whinney was his answer. It should have helped to lead him in the right direction, except the noise seemed to echo back at him from all sides.
“Jean, I can’t--” He stumbled mid sentence, tripping over something large and heavy. Falling to the floor with a crack, Armin cried out in pain, warmth beginning to bleed out from one of his knees.
“Really now,” a bored voice called, in that same haunting echo that seemed to surround him. “I suppose this answers the question of whether you can use magic or not.”
“If I could do magic I wouldn’t be here,” Armin gasped, reaching back towards the thing he’d tripped over. It was hard and rigid, as if made of many small rocks and strangely warm to the touch. He shuddered to think of what it actually was.
“Fair enough,” the voice murmured, low and rumbling. Distantly, Armin thought that it was the type to hold power, to make you quake in your boots and shiver right down to your bones. “I’m tiring of this darkness anyways. Svjetlo!”
Another cry tore itself from Armin’s lips as light began to grow somewhat in front of him, starting at the size of a pea to expand into something larger than a man’s head. Squinting against the glare, the blonde couldn’t help but watch as the light split into five pieces, shooting out into different corners of the room to light the torches lining the walls and dangling above his head. In no time the room was lit with a comfortable glow, allowing Armin to finally see just what it was that he had tripped over. It took a few moments for it to register, for his eyes to follow the barbed tip closest to him to the growing slope of a tail that was easily three times the length of Armin’s body. From the tail came a large mass clothed in gleaming bronze scales, the ridges gleaming and polished under the light. It curled around the floor, taking up a great part of the room with its size--in fact, Armin realized dazedly, it seemed to take over the entirety of the back wall, its large back rising up like a mountain behind the throne-like chair in front of it. On the throne sat a man clothed in black and crimson, a robe of starlight and blood dripping from the chair to the floor in a puddle near the creature’s head.
It was a dragon, the blonde realized, staring at the seemingly sleeping drake. A statue of a sleeping dragon, seemingly bowing down to the witch before him even in sleep.
“Are you going to stare at me all day?” the man spoke, crossing a leg in a way that just screamed power and royalty. He could definitely pass as a king. “I thought your friend needed help.”
“Jean!” Armin gasped, eyes widening as he shoved up, off of the floor, head turning wildly.
A relieved nicker answered him, the sound of hooves striking tile filling the room as the golden horse jumped over the dragon’s tail to stand by Armin’s side. His pinned ears said that he was afraid, but he did not flinch when meeting the witch’s eyes.
“A curse,” Levi murmured, leaning forward slightly with interest. Armin nearly choked when he realized that the man had slit pupils, like a serpent's, the black widening out to eat up the gunmetal gray of his iris’. “When was it cast?”
“A week and three days ago,” Armin answered, placing a hand on Jean’s shoulder. “I was told that if I didn’t find someone to break it soon, he would be stuck like this.”
“And become less and less human every day,” Levi dipped his head. “You must have pissed off someone high up to get stuck with that sort of curse, kid.”
Jean snorted, stomping a hoof in answer. Armin didn’t need a translator to know that that wasn’t something polite. “Jean!”
“Ah,” Levi smirked, eyes flashing as he sat back. “I see it now.”
“I’m really sorry,” Armin apologized, elbowing Jean’s side lightly. “He’s not usually so…”
“Impertinent?” The witch offered.
He grimaced, bowing his head. “Yes.”
“I’m used to rude people,” Levi flicked a hand in dismissal. “It doesn’t bother me so much anymore, it’s better than lies anyways.”
“That’s... “ Armin blinked. “a surprisingly good way to put it.” At the witch’s raised eyebrow he flushed, hurrying to amend his mistake. “That’s not to say that I don’t think you’re intelligent! I just--that’s a good way to word something that other people may find hard to understand--”
“Relax,” Levi sighed, rolling his eyes. “We haven’t even discussed payment.”
“Payment?” Armin echoed.
"Yes, payment." A slow smile stole across the witch’s face then, dangerous and slick like the predator he surely was. “Nothing is for free, after all. Isn’t that right, Eren?”
Armin shared a confused glance with Jean, wondering just who this ‘Eren’ was.
They didn’t have to wait long.
When the last echoes of Levi’s voice faded away, a large exhale much like a gust of wind swept through the room, ruffling Armin’s clothing and batting Jean’s mane about. It was warm, akin to the summer humidity that weighed down the air when it was hot, and it made Armin’s skin go clammy the same way it made the hairs at the back of his neck rise.
That noise sounded alive. That noise sounded like something big and monstrous and--
It wasn’t until Levi reached over one of the arm rests to stroke a hand down the dragon’s nose that Armin realized with a start that the dragon-that-was-a-statue was in fact, not a statue after all. The touch was slow, deliberate, and if the tail beginning to flick to life behind them didn’t tell them what they’d first missed, then the bronze eyelid closest to him peeling back in a slow blink certainly did.
“Oh my god,” Armin whispered, frozen in place. At the sound of his voice the dragon’s head lifted, turning to place its full gaze on the blonde. It’s eyes were as big as Armin’s head, if not bigger, with startling green iris’ shot through with brilliant starbursts of gold. If he wasn’t so terrified he might have been awestruck.
“This is Eren,” Levi started, standing to scratch gently at the scales behind the dragon’s jaw. “he’s--”
Jean cut him off with a high pitched squeal, ears pinned to his head as he skittered sideways, the sudden turn of events seemingly too much.
“Jean!” Armin tried, reaching for the horse only to be met with empty air as the other male bolted. He nearly made it to the doors only to be stopped by Eren’s tail, the large appendage hitting the floor in front of the horse with a loud clatter of scales. Jean reared in answer, pawing at the air and turning away. When he ran past Armin once more it wasn’t hard to see that the whites of his eyes were showing--just as it wasn’t hard to see that there was no where for him to go. Quicker than Jean could run, Eren’s body wrapped around them all in a large circle, boxing them in and leaving the horse to run in terrified circles.
“Stop it!” The blonde cried, when the dragon prevented Jean from jumping over his tail with a flick that sent him to the ground. “You’ll hurt him!”
Eren ignored him, tail flicking like a cat’s as he watched the horse. It seemed like he could have done it forever, until Levi tisked, slapping his nose lightly. “Eren,” he started lowly, holding a glowing hand up. “you’re going to break the floor.”
Jean screamed again--this time in pain. Even still, the glowing red of Levi’s magic began to spread over his body, leaving him frozen in place. It climbed up his hooves, circling around his legs and encasing his upper body until he fell to his knees, buckling under the force.
“What are you doing?” Armin demanded, darting over to his friend frantically. “You’re hurting him!”
“You said you wanted him turned back,” Levi answered, turning away from the dragon to watch as the magic enveloped the horse completely. “U muškarca!”
A flash of red enveloped the room at the term, before with a startled cry that was neither Armin’s, nor a horse’s, the light receded back into Jean’s body--his human body.
“Jean!” He breathed, falling to his knees beside the other male in relief. He tugged him up, leaning his head against his chest as he checked to make sure the blonde was breathing. When he was certain, Armin looked up at the witch in confusion. “But… I haven’t given you anything?”
“We’ll figure something out,” Levi dismissed. “he was getting rather annoying anyways.”
“Well fu--”
Armin smiled nervously, hand now over Jean’s mouth. It seemed he was coherent again.
The dragon snorted, nudging Levi’s shoulder. The witch blinked. “Right. As I was saying…” He gestured towards the dragon, uttering a string of words that Armin couldn’t hear. With another flash of light the dragon disappeared, its huge mass seeming to vanish from thin air. In the place of its head now stood a tall man with tanned skin akin to the bronze of scales and with eyes as luminous as the serpent’s. “This is Eren.”
This time Armin couldn’t stop Jean.
“Holy shit.”
“Your shrieking hurt my ears,” Eren informed them, scratching at said ears with a wince. They were pointed, Armin found out, when he turned his head. Pointed and inhuman like the claws at the tips of his fingers, the fangs peeking out of his mouth, the slits of his pupils, the tail flicking behind his back, and the scales climbing his jaw. “Especially the horse’s.”
“What did you just say--?!” Jean started. Eren grinned. Wide and threatening and in a way that showed off his razor sharp teeth all too well, he was no less imposing as his dragon form. “I said that you’re a horse. Which is exactly what you were.”
Jean sneered. “Whatever you say, snake breath.”
Levi smiled slowly, watching the two from his spot near the throne. “Yes,” he murmured lowly, to the point that Armin was sure he was the only one who could hear it. “I think we can work something out.”
Eren’s head turned. “Don’t you dare,” he warned, eyes narrowed in on the witch. “I’ll tear up your tile and burn your wardrobe.”
Armin really didn’t think being threatened by a man that could turn into a giant fire-breathing dragon warranted laughter but then again, what did he know? He was just thankful he was even still alive.