Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Alois Trancy understood love. He understood need. He had long since figured out that the two were the same.

Luka taught him this lesson first. Alois had loved him: a companion, a playmate, a partner in scrap-begging. Family. Alois had offered up that affection, and felt, nigh-physical, the returned grip of Luka’s love, infinitely stronger, on him. To Luka, Alois was protection, provision. Central and parental. Alois needed Luka like food, but Luka needed him like air.

Luka needed him, like a demon needs a soul.

The wake of his death starved Alois, but didn't suffocate him. Pain pangs heavy in his stomach, but he'd had time; he could go days, even a week, without eating a bite, until he bargained and stole his way to another meal. So Alois left. Fled the town, learned his merits, relied on himself, and needed nothing of any dead thing.

For what could it offer, to those still alive?

The old man loved him, next. It was an easier love, that of the rich, not a gnawing hunger but a yearning for luxury. It was easy to be like fine wine and flaking pastries and soft velvet couches; to men like Trancy, anything beautiful was necessary, and god, was Alois beautiful. For every cheap touch and stomach-sick word he doled out, he was paid back in love and wealth and fine silk to drape over the dips in his waist, accentuating every bone-visible detail. And it was all Alois’s doing. His beauty, his charm, and his willingness, all that had won him these riches, they were all traits of his own. He didn’t need this old man, he could make any pedophile give him the same. Alois took his money and his name and mourned nothing when the Earl Trancy died.

So it should have been, with Claude.

When they’d forged their contract, Alois was sure Claude would love him. Claude wanted his soul, sure, but what man wouldn’t claim the same? The contents of his inner self were his alone; it was his vessel on offer, and it would be enough. It had always been enough.

But rather than the need and hunger he’d come to expect, Claude only gave him apathy. Those cold, yellow eyes offered him nothing.

But it would come in time. It would. Trancy had wanted a cold, indomitable beauty; others had wanted a blushing virgin or a cowering victim. So Alois had been. He was a beast of legend, a shifting form. Claude’s powers could not rival his.

He learned Claude's quirk of lips, the turn of eyebrow. Noted, when he was found interesting. When Claude spared him half a glance. Took all these sum parts and added them up to a being he could imitate so flawlessly there was nothing left behind the mask. Alois turned to demon, as much as he could; he hurt and hurt and took and followed after the Phantomhive boy relentlessly. It should have worked.

But the world had never been twisted towards his favor. All the failed dance invitations, all the flirtation, all the sadism and punishment, it didn’t matter. His desperation was evident, and unimpressive. The dependence, the need, was his alone. But he tried, he tried.

Claude would never love him. But Alois — pitiful, wretched thing he was — had fallen so far in love it became all he was. Was this what Luka had felt? To love someone like air? No, no, this had to be more. Luka was a human, something with lungs that needed breath. Alois was a fire, suffocating to ash.

And Claude? All he needed, all he loved—

Was the fucking Phantomhive.

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair. Claude was supposed to his. Alois owned him. Claude was supposed to give Ciel Phantomhive to Alois, Alois was supposed to destroy Ciel, destroying the Phantomhive butler the same. And, in return, Claude would get his life, and his entirety.

But he couldn’t make Claude need him. Couldn’t even make Claude want him. Alois had failed in the application of every horrid lesson he’d ever learned, and in whatever vacant hollow a demon might confuse for a heart, there was no room for Alois.

Just hours before the house caught flame, he started to wonder if it was worth it to even try.

Behind him, the Trancy mansion burned.

Alois had escaped heat and smoke and cast-out silverware and the sword that had claimed the lives of his servants. He’d collapsed, sharp rocks scraping through his stockings and stabbing into knee-joint. The fall skinned his fair, uncalloused palms and drew his blood, red and glinting in the firelight.

He’d seen the corpses of Hannah and the triplets, the beautiful mansion marred by their mangled, demonic, dead forms. He stood by and witnessed as the only home he’d ever known went up in dancing flames. And, most heartbreaking, he’d watched that dreadful Phantomhive butler stab Claude through the chest.

His Claude.

The only man whom Alois had ever loved. The man who didn’t love him but might’ve, maybe, one day. The man who dressed and bathed and fed him, his parent and his savior and his beloved. His. The only thing that had ever been his.

And he was gone. Stolen from the world at the command of the boy he chose over Alois.

It wasn’t fucking fair.

A long shadow covered Alois. Silhouetted by the still-roaring flames were two beings-as-one: the butler, and Ciel, carried as a child. Whatever rage boiled in Alois’s chest mellowed quick at the realization that, like Luka, like Claude, like the life he’d meticulously crafted for himself, he too would be killed by this awful boy and his awful demon.

But, still, death was welcome enough. What were the alternatives? Finding another rich pervert to pay his dues? Playing the victim and convincing the bank to let him keep whatever was left of the Trancy fortune? Living stranger-to-stranger, never needing, and never having anything of his own?

He might as well just go.

He closed his eyes and straightened his back, wanting to be killed with the dignity he’d never been allowed to live with as an orphan, slave, and whore. But the latter list was how he’d be remembered, if he was remembered at all. He had never been allowed honor. He would take it, in the moment of death.

But the finishing blow never came.

Alois forced his eyes up, making contact with Ciel’s— both the bright blue one and that which was marked and purple. He was pretty enough, Alois supposed, but not as pretty as Alois himself. Ciel was always straight-faced or frowning, dull as unpolished metal. Why were these demons — both Ciel’s own and the one who was once-Alois’s — so infatuated with him? What did he have that Alois didn’t?

What did Ciel do to deserve their love?

Certainly not show mercy on pathetic blonde boys in ridiculous outfits when the kill would be far more beneficial. That wasn’t how a demon thought. And, hard as Alois had tried, Ciel was simply better at playing a devil.

So why was Alois still breathing?

Ciel finally spoke. “Sebastian.”

“Yes, young master?”

“Bring Alois Trancy back to the Phantomhive Estate.”

Had Alois been through less that day, had he been able to feel anything enough to be curious, had he been just a bit more foolish, he might’ve asked why. But he wasn’t, so he just leaned forward till his forehead pressed to earth.

And he laughed.

Two weeks staying in the foreboding halls of the Phantomhive estate did little to illuminate what the hell he was doing there.

The mourning fit had passed quickly. Claude was dead and would stay that way regardless, and he’d never loved Alois, and now Alois was taking residence with Claude’s killers, and none of it made sense, and mourning was depressing, so what was the point. As he got over the grief, so he got over the death wish. This left him with nothing but a pervading sense of ennui and the lingering fear that he was going to wake up with a fork through his skull.

And, god, was it boring.

No one spoke to him, aside from brief informationals with the staff where he was told, repeatedly, that he was not to leave the manor on his own. Unlike the late triplets and Hannah, said staff proved themselves to be completely useless for every task besides enforcing that rule. Because Alois never wanted to tag along on the Phantomhive’s inane quests for the queen or his shoe shopping or whatever else he did out there, inside he was stuck.

That almost made the death wish return.

What had he done for fun, at the Trancy house? Sadism, he remembered, and seduction. But those were trickier, here. He no longer had the luxury of servants belonging to him; no little dolls to take the painful punishment for nothing done wrong. This house had no forgiveness for Alois. The butler who killed with silverware, the gardener stronger than Alois could believe, the maid who hid rifles under her skirts, the chef who stored more explosives than food. Alois didn’t understand these people more than the basic knowledge that hurting them would be suicide. And, by this point, he was fairly sure he didn’t want to die.

So, seduction.

Sebastian was an easy first target. Handsome, and tall, and uninterested in a way that tempted Alois to dig his nails into conjured skin till he got a reaction. But, no. No.

Silly as it was, it seemed unfair to Claude.

With that option struck out, he turned his focus on the staff. No to the maid — she seemed to be still trying her luck with the butler, and power to her; he didn’t particularly care for women, anyway. The gardener, too, was no good. He was two or three years Alois’s senior, but still blatantly naive. He — Finny, if Alois caught the name right — had all the wiles of an unkissed virgin, and Alois had no interest in playing teacher. Hell, he probably wouldn’t even know what Alois was doing.

Finny was sweet, though, if a bit clueless, and Alois almost liked him.

Almost.

He wouldn’t allow himself to truly be fond of anyone keeping him trapped here.

The chef… a better option. He was attractive, in a more rough, masculine way than anyone else in the house, and in the age range of Alois’s usual men. But he quickly proved to be just as useless as the gardener and, while not mean, far less sweet and — worst of all — American. Like the impression Alois had often got from the Americans he’d met, he had a tendency to blow up everything he touched, so Alois wasn’t keen on being something he touched.

Fine. Blondes weren’t Alois’s type, anyway.

So, every person in Alois’s well-decorated prison cell was deemed unsuitable.

Well, actually; there was one more option, but that was an immediate, definite no. The estate’s beloved young master was not on the list of people Alois would consider getting on with. If the very idea didn’t make him question the basic tenets of good taste, the threat of a fork-through-skull surely quashed the idea.

Well, he did want one thing from Phantomhive, at least:

His world brought to ash at Alois’s feet.

But, but, loathe as he was to admit it, Ciel had helped him. For all his sins, his long list of indiscriminate murder, Ciel had spared Alois. He had taken him in, given him food, lent out clothes (tragically bland, but something about beggars and choosers). And Alois had no idea why.

Maybe he would kill Ciel one day. Hopefully, that day would come soon.

But not before Alois got his answers.

Chapter Text

Alois wasn’t hiding.

He wasn’t hiding, because that would be childish. It was a… tactical moment to plan, that was the term for it, and if that just happened a moment spent tucked in the corner of the kitchen cabinet, as far away from that goddamn butler as he could manage, well, planning is best done uninterrupted, anyway.

He wasn’t hiding.

It was the damn Phatomhive's fault, anyway. Alois had asked one bloody question, couched in several threats, albeit, and the boy was calling for butler. Coward. In any case, Alois would have to plan for a better information grab next time.

He’d been in the cabinet for somewhere between five and fifty minutes, at that point — he was dreadful at time, consequence of being relatively new to the concept of clocks — but he felt with some certainty that if the butler really was going to do anything to him, it would already be done. He’d’ve been killed, or thrown out — if not a knife through skull, at least a light prodding.

Regardless, it had been some-odd minutes. That was a good deal of time for anyone to hide — fuck, not that he was hiding — so there was no reason he shouldn’t open the door and walk out that moment. There was no more risk.

Just as he’d reached to push the door, it was wrenched from beneath his fingertips.

“Well,” the cook said, silhouetted by enough light that Alois had to squint and flinch back. “You’re not a sack of flour.”

“No, I don’t think so,” Alois snapped, stepping out of the cabinet and away from the towering man. He hoped that the heat rising to his face gave him more of a rosy glow than a look of complete embarrassment. “Was it much trouble for you, telling the difference?”

The cook laughed. Like everything he did, it was too sudden, too loud. “Eh, a bit. Wanna tell me why you were hiding out in there?”

“I wasn’t hiding.”

“So just posing as a bag of flour to mess with me, then? If the young master was the type for it, it’d be a fun prank for the two of you to pull.” Did he think Phantomhive was his friend? He was stupid, Alois knew that, but that pushed it. “Nah, but really, you feeling alright? Cabinet hideouts ain’t the most comfortable.”

There was a stitch in Alois’s neck from bending over underneath the low ceiling of the cupboard, but he just raised his head higher as if that would make the ache invisible. “I said it wasn’t a hideout, and I’m feeling fine, thank you.”

Alois was making a noble effort to step around the various benches and pots and ingredients that had found themselves somewhat miraculously strewn across the floor in the time Alois had been tucked away, but even with his concentration and his back to the chef, he still heard the sigh. “Hey, uh…” Fair confusion. What was he supposed to call Alois? Alois wasn’t his master, wasn’t even an Earl, anymore. Not that he’d ever been. He wasn’t a fellow servant, nor a guest in the house. What do you call a person like that? “Kid.” Well, that was something for it. “I’m supposed to be starting a broth for dinner, and I'm gonna, but Fin and Mey are coming down to play some cards in a minute or two. You ever play?”

Alois snorted. “Do I look like I play cards?” He and Luka had played games, but they could scarcely afford food on a good day, let alone a deck. They’d played with sticks and rocks as counters, inventing rules as they went along. Then, well, with everything that followed, he wasn’t in any place to play cards until the late Earl Trancy was gone, and Claude never played with him.

“Always time to learn.” In Alois’s moment of hesitation, the chef continued, “C’mon, kid. You’ve been living here almost a month now, and you’re a total mystery. Let me get to know ya.”

Oh.

Oh, that made sense, this wasn't kindness — this was interest. A good excuse, to get Alois comfortable in the space with him. It wasn’t terribly surprising, he supposed, and he never was angry for attention, but he’d already set a hard no on getting himself mixed up with the staff.

Only… It had been a while, since he’d been loved. And, and it could perhaps give him a foothold in this chaotic house, just long enough to figure out…

“Alois!”

Something to consider, at a later time.

“Are you here to play cards with us?” The gardener practically slid to a halt before Alois and, in his close proximity, began bouncing on his toes. How he was older than Alois, God only knew. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you for-ever, did Baldo talk you into it? You always have such nice clothes, I knew you’d be fun to play with!” He tilted his head and smiled the most big-toothed thing Alois had ever witnessed. Scratch how he was older than Alois, better question: how did he survive this long?

“I…” The gardener — Finny? maybe? — had his hands clasped in front of him, eyes expectant, and the maid behind him was smiling kindly, and the chef might just be interested in getting him alone—

He’d wasted his time in worse ways.

“There isn’t anything better for me to do in this house.”

Finny laughed, bright and loud, and clapped Alois on the shoulder, so suddenly that he flinched, sharp, away.

He could feel the eyes of the elder two servants on him, immediately. He straightened posture and lifted chin, an implicit dare to call him on a motion they knew nothing of. Pity was a valuable thing, but not here. Here, his tactic was mystery. Pretty and alluring and cold, the promise of secrets revealed if they shared in turn. An empty promise, of course.

And flinching at a half-there touch was hardly part of that plan.

The chef glanced at the maid — never mind how he could see through the glare and fog on her glasses — and then nodded. “Maybe we start with something simple? I’ve been teaching Finny how to play poker, but that might be a bit much for now. You guys down for blackjack?”

Like he'd said, there wasn't anything better to do.

If Finny knocked his shoulder against Alois’ one more time—

Well, there wouldn’t be anything he could do, really, since he’d seen the boy had lifted up an entire wardrobe with a single hand the other day, but he might just throw the cards down in a fit.

As it was, they’d played blackjack for ten minutes before Alois got supremely bored and suggested they play a more engaging game, or else he would find something better to do. The maid had laughed at that, a surprise as she hadn’t spoken the entirety of the game, as focused as she was. But with another look Alois was displeased to find he couldn’t decipher, the chef proposed teaching Alois to play poker.

He couldn’t say he understood it, but it was definitely as fun as chess, if not more.

“Fold?” Alois asked-no-said, trying to imbue more confidence into a word he knew was likely nonsensical in context. He was unused to guesswork.

The chef snorted. “Sorry, kid, not how it works. Come on, no one ever teach you how to play cards?” It was a joke, Alois wasn't so dull as to miss that, but it made something in him bristle, anyway.

“The Earl Trancy wasn’t too interested in games.”

The smile on the chef’s face faltered, and he scratched at the back of his neck with one hand. “Oh shit, kid. I’m sorry. I forgot — your father passed around a year ago, right?”

“The Earl Trancy wasn’t my father,” the words fell from his mouth more easily. He knew, if he were acting in good taste, that this shouldn’t be made obvious, that the unseemly truth of him was unspoken for a reason. But surely they knew. They must know, he had never been granted the dignity of a subtle reputation, and, besides, there was an excitement in it too. That bemused shock he’d missed seeing as he flirted with men four times his age. Being a spectacle, an object of interest. “He was an old pervert.” The words were aged honey in his mouth, so sweet that they grew sick, as he donned a half smile and laid down a card. “And I was his favorite.”

The table fell silent, and Alois delighted in it.

For a moment.

Where he was expecting surprise, the kind that exists in the moment before one decides to laugh, the kind he should expect, because it was shocking, it was funny— the faces around him were stiff. Finny’s expression was raised-brow with confusion, eyes darting over the two others, the maid with a pressed-flat line for mouth and the chef with eyebrows so furrowed that it cast his eyes in shadow.

Alois felt, for the first time in ages, that he had done something very, very wrong.

It was the chef that broke the quiet: "Jesus." And a heavy sigh through gritted teeth. And then, horrifically earnest: “He’s dead, right?”

Alois nodded.

This time, it was the maid, glasses perched on her forehead, looking no less than ready to kill. Her lips parted and from them, simply, “Good.”

Alois could feel the cold on his exposed skin.

“I, uh,” the chef started, running a hand through his hair and looking halfway between awkward and morally outraged. Which there was no reason for him to be, Trancy was dead, what did it matter, besides, Alois was fine, he was fine, and he doesn’t even know these people they don’t have any reason to care— “I think we should pause the game here, yeah?”

Nods and shrugs from the other two, both glancing halfway at Alois rather than looking at him straight, like it was his fault the game was ending. He didn’t do anything. He just said something that was true and that didn’t matter because it had already happened and he wasn’t to blame that they thought themselves so above him as to be uncomfortable knowing about it.

Alois was standing, he found, hands still shaking at his sides. Before he could halt the trembling motion, he found his fingers wrapped up in another set.

The gardener was smiling again, but this time a little calmer, more suited to the uneasy air still lingering. He moved his hands to Alois’s thin biceps and then, without giving Alois a chance to step away, wrapped his arms around Alois’s shoulders, pressing their bodies flush.

Alois was… being hugged.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been hugged.

“Thank you for playing with us, Alois!” Finny said, bright and genuine and entirely dismissive of the fact that Alois was just standing stiffly in his arms. “I’ve spent these past couple of weeks looking and wondering how you got here. But now I think it doesn’t matter! As long as you’re here, that’s what’s important.” With a final tight squeeze, Finny let him go, but not before placing his hands on Alois’ cheeks, just for a moment.

The kitchen felt suddenly all too warm, and Alois needed to be out of it, but the maid was blocking the door.

“Alois.” It wasn’t the voice he recognized of hers, high pitched and a bit scattered. Rather, it was lower, softer and perfectly matched her narrowed, downcast eyes. He was so caught up in the way she looked at him that he nearly missed her placing a hand on the side of his face, thumb running over his cheek.

This time, he nearly did pull away, tell her he wasn’t a pity case or a child, that he could manage his history on his own, that he didn’t need—

He was leaning into the touch. He could feel himself do it.

“I’m glad you made it here.” she said. Her hand fell from his face and for a horrible, childish moment, he ached to have the touch back.

But he didn’t need it. He didn’t.

So he watched, arms folded over his chest, as Finny grabbed at the maid’s hands, pulling her out of the kitchen.

And then it was just him and the chef. Alone. Alone. Which was good, Alois thought, this was what he’d wanted, attention and the touch of hands on his skin and the feeling of being needed and the foothold it would give him.

(He wondered when the stew would be done. His stomach felt hollow, just then.)

“Hey kid,” the chef said, lighting a cigarette. He was going to offer one, Alois thought. The men did on occasion, and, on occasion, Alois took it, though he didn’t really like the taste. He was halfway to holding out a hand when the chef put the box back in his pocket. “How are you doing?”

“I’m fine,” he said, sinking back into his seat. He lifted his chin. “The maid and gardener didn’t need to— I was fine.”

“Of course, kid.” He didn’t believe him. “You don’t have to call them the maid and gardener, they’re not like, our titles.” But Alois didn’t know these people. He didn’t know them, they weren’t his waitstaff, nor was he one of them. Besides, Alois didn’t even— “You... do know our names, right?”

Alois paused. “The gardener’s name is Finny.”

The chef let out a laugh and, with it, a heavy cloud of smoke. “Yeah, that makes sense. He’s a notable one.” He was smiling fondly, and this was by far the oddest prelude to sex Alois had ever been a part of. But maybe, looking again at the affection clear in the chef’s expression, maybe he and the gardener were fucking, and this was just Alois’ invitation in. “In case you want to call us by our actual names, mine’s Baldroy, and ‘the maid’ is Mey-rin.”

Alois wondered how fast he’d forget those. Maybe not for a while, if the chef gave him reason to repeat it. The thought felt clinical as it passed through his head. “So, Baldroy,” the name was decidedly non-erotic, and Alois’ voice was too dry to drop low and seductive, and he had to ball his hands at his sides to keep them from shaking, but greater men had wanted him at lower points. “What am I still doing here?” Awkward, awkward. He didn’t need words, though. He how to speak, soundless. He could lean closer to where the chef was sitting on the table. He could let his eyes go heavy-lidded and part his lips, undo a few buttons from his own shirt.

He didn’t move.

“I wanted to apologize,” What? “About Sebastian. He’s— look, he’s my boss, as much as the young master is, so I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but he can be a complete prick. I don’t know where he gets off, making you feel unwelcome and unsafe here, and I’m gonna talk to him about it. But, all that being said, I really don’t think he’d hurt you. I’m not quite sure why you’re staying here, but if you’ve been here this long— he’s not gonna hurt you.

“But if he does.” He met Alois’ eyes with his own, blue-turned-black in shadow. For the first time, Alois thought that maybe he actually knew how to use all those explosives he kept tucked away. “Or if any man, anyone, hurts you, touches you, anything. I’ll take care of them. Or Mey-rin will, or Finny. You’re staying in our house, which means you’re under our protection.”

The shaking had moved from his hands to his shoulders, and his breath was so fast and short that his lungs could barely keep up. Still, his chin was high, voice haughty, “I don’t need your protection.”

“Then how about somebody to talk to?” His expression softened, turning that same gentle smile on Alois. “Doesn’t have to be me. I get it— I completely understand if I’m not the person you’d want to talk to. But talk to Mey-rin and Finny. Maybe—” He laughed around the cigarette perched in his mouth. “—If you’re looking for actual advice, Mey is prolly your best bet. I love Finny — hell, he’s my kid — but things can get lost on him sometimes. Still, you should talk to him. I think he’d understand a little more than you think.”

“I don’t—” His mouth was so dry. “I’m not—”

Baldroy had called Finny his kid, but looked at Alois with that same fondness. He hadn’t looked over Alois’ body once, hadn’t made any move to shut the door or lean in towards him. He didn’t—

He didn’t want him.

And Alois didn’t understand.

Because he didn’t— He still wanted this man’s attention, his touch, the foothold it would give him. More, even, than he had at the start of this. But, but, when he realized— realized that this wasn’t why they were alone— the air that had been trapped in his lungs was freed, the knot in his stomach loosened, his hands, finally, stopped shaking. And he didn’t understand why, why all that added up to make him feel—

He wasn’t wanted, and all he could feel was relief.

He slammed the palms of his hands against the desk, as he stood. The sound had the chef jolting backwards nearly into his soup. “I’m—” What, ‘sorry’? He wasn’t. “I— Goodbye.”

“Hey, wait, kid—”

But whatever he was going to say was lost on Alois as he stormed out of the kitchen, the fastest pace he'd managed since fleeing the Trancy manor fire. He thought he heard the sound of the cook following— his footsteps echoed louder in the tired halls than Alois’ light, quick step. Regardless, it wasn’t long before Alois slammed the door to his small room behind him. He caught his reflection in the mirror, and couldn’t miss the bloodshot of his eyes and the wet streaks down his cheeks. He swore and wiped his face on the inside of his wrist.

He fell backwards on his bed, fingers curled over his face. He could still feel the warmth of Finny’s arms, his breath on Alois’ neck. Still imagine the soft press of Mey-rin’s hand, the fond curve of Baldroy’s smile. It was stupid. He was acting like a bloody idiot and he knew it. He didn’t even know these people; what kind of child was he to want so badly to be held by strangers? And what kind of fool, to be relieved when he wasn’t wanted?

He shut his eyes, and placed himself back in that warm kitchen, wrapped in someone’s arms without the desire for anything more, as if there could be anything more than that.

Stupid.

So stupid.

Hannah had told him, sometime between when they met and when he plunged a thumb into her eye socket, that a ringing in the ears means someone is talking about you. He’d called her full of shit and waved her off to get his lunch, and she hadn’t said anything else.

His ears were ringing.

He knew it was just a superstition, what Hannah had said, even if she was a demon. But aside from cards and annoying, tedious self-reflection, he hadn’t done anything that day — or that week, for that matter — and he.

Well. He never liked being bored.

He crept out of the small room he’d been granted, still half-dressed in dayclothes and ungartered stockings that muffled his steps on the old wood. The sun had long since set, and the halls were draped in shadows so thick that it took a minute or two for Alois’ eyes to adjust to a point where he had any idea which way was forward. Once he did, he worked around the negative space and with his limited remembrance of the floor’s layout to find the stairs.

Halfway down, his ears caught the muffled start of a conversation, and at the point where he could just see onto the first floor, he could hear exactly what was being said.

“—and, look, I don’t wanna tell you how to do your job—” Baldroy scurried in front of Sebastian, who was dutifully extinguishing the lit sconces on the walls. But he hadn’t finished yet, so he and the chef were still half-bathed in orange light.

“Ah. Well, then don’t.” Sebastian interrupted, turning back to the wall.

“Except, here’s the thing, I found him hiding in my kitchen this morning.” They were talking about him, then. He might have to rethink some superstitions. “He wasn’t hiding from me, not from Mey or Finny. And I don’t think it was the young master, do you?”

Sebastian sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, a motion oddly familiar. “Even if it were anything you were supposed to concern yourself with, no, I did not chase down the Trancy child.” Oh, that was far worse than ‘kid’. Alois bristled. “The young master called me to his room this morning, and by the time I arrived, Trancy was gone. I only know he was there at all because the young master informed me he had run away.”

The chef huffed and extinguished one of the candles between his fingers, turning half his face to shadow. That would be it, then. Alois was surprised he’d said anything at all, despite his promise. It brought back that embarrassing ache in his chest he thought he’d left behind half a day ago.

Before Alois could retreat upstairs, Baldroy spoke again, “He’s a kid, Sebastian. Fourteen, if that, and he’s survived more shit than anybody ever should, a lot of it inflicted by guys who don’t look too different than you or I. He has every reason to be scared of us; there’s no reason to make it worse for him.”

Sebastian shook his head, chin bowed, and passed a hand through his hair. The low light glinted sharply off his eyes, as if he was wearing glasses, and oh. He looks like Claude. “You aren’t paid to soothe his fears.”

“I’m paid to keep this house and the people in it safe.” He jabbed an accusative finger in Sebastian’s direction and, if he’d been a step closer, it would’ve pressed into his chest. “No one will tell me why he’s here, but as long as he is, I’m damn sure I’m protecting him. That includes making sure he’s not terrified to just exist.”

Sebastian blew out the flame of the final candle. The only remaining light was the lantern hanging at his hip, just bright enough to see him turn back to Baldroy. “I will continue not harassing Trancy. I will try to, I suppose, be ‘less threatening’ with my general appearance. In return, you will get back to doing your job. Is that amenable?”

“Fine, I get it.” Between the negative space of the shadows, the cook’s raised hands were visible. “Just, keep in mind. He’s a kid, and so is the young master. I was thinking, the two of them could probably be good for each other, yeah? When’s the last time the young master spoke to someone his own age, besides his cousin? Just— both of them got a lot of shit handed to them way too young. Most we can do is not add to it, and push them in the direction of feeling better.”

“Beautifully said, Mr. Baldroy.” Sebastian’s thin arms were crossed over his thin chest, long, thin finger tapping at the opposite forearm. He wasn’t physically intimidating in the slightest. Honestly, Alois should have no reason to be afraid of him. But he could remember knives and a sword and demon blood and corpses—

It wasn’t something he could afford to forget.

“Now,” Sebastian continued. “Would you care to start on breakfast, or should I do that, as well?”

Baldroy laughed, though nothing Sebastian has said was funny. “Yeah, yeah I got it. I’ll start on that right away.”

He saluted the butler and walked off, hands in apron pockets. Sebastian watched him for a moment, two. Then, his head tilted sharply up. He was just beginning to turn his face when Alois jolted away, ducking out back-to-wall, so he was out of view.

Eyes still focused on the visible sliver of downstairs, he breathed a quiet sigh of relief. He shook his head. Ridiculous, to be scared at all. He lifted his gaze to the first floor landing, and had to cover his mouth to muffle the embarrassing yelp that nearly escaped his mouth.

Ciel Phantomhive was standing on the step above him.

Nightgown down to his knees, arms folded over his chest, head tilted and eye covered by a simple tan patch. Just watching Alois. He wondered how long he’d stood there. Why he hadn’t said anything.

From downstairs, “Mr. Trancy?”

Phantomhive was still looking at him, the furrowed eyebrows just barely visible through the dark. Alois kept his hand over his mouth, breathing slow, but lifted his chin and narrowed his eyes, daring the boy to say a word.

In the end, it was Phantomhive who looked away first. Then, voice wholly steady, “I’m just getting water, Sebastian. Go about your work.”

A pause, in which Alois was sure Sebastian was going to push it. But instead. “Of course, young master.” Followed by the sound of well-kept shoes on well-kept floors, walking away and away.

Leaving just the two of them.

“What are you doing?” Phantomhive asked. Then, with no pretense or ceremony, he sat down across from Alois, tucking his nightgown over his knees, so that his only visible skin was his feet, hands, and face. Alois looked him over, any shame from being caught muffled by feeling suddenly older than this child wrapped up in a nightgown. It felt silly, to even refer to him by surname.

Alois relaxed his shoulders back into the wall behind him and crossed his arms over his chest. “That’s none of your business.” Then, hating his curiosity, “Why are you?”

Ciel was quiet for a moment, considering. “I said, getting water.”

“Yeah, and we both know that’s shit. What are you doing, lying to help me?”

Ciel wrapped his arms around his knees, a soft contrast to the cool look he shot Alois. “I didn’t lie. I told him the truth, and ordered him to go about his business.”

Alois scoffed. “Is it really that difficult to give a straight fucking answer? Or would you rather just follow me around and stare at me like I’m some bloody trainwreck?” Ciel just looked at him more intently, not showing a hint of responding. “Why am I here, Ciel? Can you think of an answer for that one?”

“That line of questioning didn’t do you very well this morning.”

He was so— so obstinate. And nonsensical. Alois wished someone would just explain that Ciel had been dropped on his head some months back, which would explain why nothing he did or said made sense. But, he thought, allowing his anger to cool, it didn’t matter what Ciel did or didn’t say. He wanted to know, obviously, but if Ciel wasn’t going to tell him now, sobeit. He couldn’t risk another threat, and any life outside this home would be hardly better than life this morning.

And, so, he shot one more scathing look at the boy resting his head in the crook of his arms, and stood up to walk away. Halted, before he’d taken a step, by a voice—

“I could call Sebastian right now,” Ciel said, words blurring together as if he didn’t intend to say them at all. “I could have him kill you, or I could do it myself. There’s nothing making me keep you here.”

Alois froze on the stairs. Nothing Ciel had said was at all noteable, nothing that Alois didn’t already know, nothing worth turning for, and yet. “Nothing to keep you from killing me?” Alois looked over his shoulder at the boy, now standing, one hand balled in a fist. “Then why don’t you just do it?”

They met eyes for a moment, two, three. Then, without a word, Ciel turned, and walked down the stairs. Alois followed his descent with his eyes, down and down until he disappeared into the darkness.

Alois walked up through the dark to his bedroom.

Some things, it seemed, would take a while to learn.

Chapter Text

Alois hadn’t seen the staff all day.

It was near noon, and he’d been standing just outside the kitchen for at least ten minutes at that point, long enough that he’d taken to picking at his cuticles. Usually by this time of day, Finny or Mey-rin or Baldroy— if he wasn’t already in the kitchen— would pass by, ask him about his day, and invite him inside the kitchen for a game of cards or a baked good or the latest theories on what the young master and his butler were up to. Alois would always decline, act as if he hadn’t been standing there for that very purpose, and then agree the second time he was asked. It was habit, at that point.

But ten minutes was far too long a wait. He wasn’t about to walk into the kitchen and announce himself— that would be as good as saying he enjoyed the time he spent there, and he couldn’t have anyone thinking that. Even if it might, maybe, for some inane reason, happen to have been just a bit true.

So, instead, he made his rounds through the manor.

Things were uncharacteristically clean; Alois ran a finger over a mantle and found it entirely dust-free in a way that, as long as he’d been in residence there, it had never been. He could see his reflection in the marble flooring. Not a speck of dirt or blood to be seen.

Unnerving.

He made his way out of the manor, into the expansive gardens surrounding it. The lawn was bright green and shorn respectably short, the hedges were trimmed, and rows of bright pink flowers lined the sides of the main path, an area that Alois was sure had been barren not three days ago. He ventured on.

About a quarter way around the building, his ears caught the familiar voice of the gardener. He was singing, some horrific rendition of a folk song that did nothing for Alois’ mood, except assuage the vague worry that everyone in the manor, himself excluded, had been vanished overnight.

Well, actually, that wouldn’t be all so bad. He’d hope the staff would be fine, he supposed, but if it got Ciel and that butler out of his way—

He let the idea mull into nothingness and approached at an angle, so he’d be seen as passing-by more than walking-to him. Finny was perched on an unnervingly thin branch towards the top of one of the poplar trees, trimming its blossoms, still singing. Alois fought the impulse to cover his ears.

He kept walking, until he’d passed the tree by completely, and Finny hadn’t said a word. He looped around some hedges, starting closer to the tree, and tried again. Nothing. Again. Nothing. He found himself, in a minute, standing right under the gardener's branch, as he probably should have just started.

“Morning,” he announced himself, leaning against a neighboring tree in an attempt at casualness he hoped might counteract just how loud he had to yell over the singing. To add to the illusion, he pretended to pick at his cuticles, which were near-gone from his earlier boredom. Dammit, he really needed a manicure.

This, finally, got the gardener’s attention. He started backwards and his little standing branch nearly snapped off. Before Alois could do more than lurch, worriedly, forward, Finny laughed and jumped the— must be— twenty meters to the ground. He straightened up and shook off the leaves that had gotten in his hair, already smiling.

Alois knew there was something not-right with the staff but, Jesus.

“Alois!” Finny called, running over as if he didn’t just survive a drop that should’ve crushed every bone in his thin body to dust. Said thin-body crashed into him, a moment later, and near-suffocated him with a hug.

Alois had come to expect these— the hugs— and while he hadn’t quite gotten to relaxing into them, he wasn’t quite as stiff-spined now. And he never pushed away.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t play today,” Finny leaned out of the embrace, but kept his hands, calloused and warm, on the bare skin of Alois’ forearms. “But I’m glad you came to say hi!”

Alois shook off one— just one— of the hands. “’m just wondering why I haven’t seen anyone today. Thought I might’ve gotten lucky and been rid of you all.”

Finny’s eyebrows furrowed for a moment, before he returned with a bright laugh. There was really no insulting him. “No, we’ve been really busy setting up the house.”

Now that was promising. “Oh! What’s the occasion?” A ball, or maybe a smaller party, or some interesting company. Something to alleviate the unending tedium.

“Lady Elizabeth is coming!”

That was a familiar name. Alois couldn’t place it. “Who is?”

Finny clapped his hands together before him, with seemingly little force, but it echoed in the open space nonetheless. “She’s the young master’s fiance! And she’s so nice— and always dresses so pretty, I think you’ll really like her.”

“I bet I would.” At the very least, he would enjoy bothering Ciel in front of her. “Where should I go, to meet her?”

Finny tilted his head to the side for a moment, two, before grinning. “Hm… Wherever the young master is! You know, right? You and him have been getting along so well lately.”

Alois laughed, sharp and unpreventable. Not like Finny could piece together why, if he was so dull as to make that mistake.

No, he wouldn’t say they’d been ‘getting along’, well or otherwise. Since running into him that night, Ciel hadn’t been any more forthcoming with information, but he’d sometimes make eye contact with Alois in the halls. One time he’d asked what Alois was doing in the servant’s domain, to which Alois had answered, ‘Oh, please, Lord Phantomhive, would you be so kind as to tell me how that’s any of your Lordship's business?’. Now that he was thinking about it, Finny had been there that day. Was that what he thought indicative of a blooming friendship?

Regardless, an odd-timed laugh wasn’t a rarity for him, and it was easy enough to follow up with: “When is she to arrive?” Alois asked.

As if on cue, the sound of hooves on cobblestone broke out over the grounds. Several horses, if Alois wasn’t mistaken.

“Oh, that’s her!” Finny clapped his hands before him. “I have to trim a couple more trees, but good luck, ‘Lois!” Before Alois could protest the nickname, Finny was wrapping him up in another hug. He let go just as quickly, fixing Alois with another wave before running and jumping up into a tree.

Christ.

Alois took a moment to straighten the fabric of his vest and stockings and fix any hair that had fallen out of place, before setting back towards the manor. By the time he reached the grand stairway, there were a series of carriages already moving towards the stables. Rich folks, and their needs. Sure, when he’d been wealthy he’d had the clothes and the fine decor, and he enjoyed a good party, but, Christ. This made Ciel’s penchant for ugly little trinkets look tame.

Rather than be trampled four times over, he looped around to the servant’s entrance, from which he could hear some light conversation a floor above. He made his way up from the lower levels, navigating the now near-familiar halls until reaching the main parlor. On the opposite end stood Ciel and, her back to Alois, a young woman with hair set in large, golden curls.

“Lady Elizabeth, I presume?” he said, leaning long and languid against the doorway. Casual and pretty. Not that he had any interest in attracting Elizabeth, except maybe to earn Ciel’s ire but— Ah. That wouldn’t be necessary. Ciel was scowling and Alois hadn’t done more than show up.

Elizabeth turned towards Alois, and there was something vaguely familiar about her. He’d had her at his party, he thought, some remembrance of a truly ugly costume nothing like the lovely set she was wearing here. He continued, “Lovely to finally meet you.”

Elizabeth smiled, as instantly delighted as Ciel was miserable. “Oh, Ciel, who’s this?”

Ciel sighed, so quiet Alois only knew it by the expression, not the sound. “This is Earl Alois Trancy.” Huh. He hadn’t expected the title. “He’s… staying with us. His manor burned down. We are offering him shelter.”

She shot Ciel a wide smile. “Oh, Ciel!” Not a second after speaking, she hurried over to Alois, pink skirts fluttering around her. “Oh! Earl Trancy, we’ve met before, apologies! It’s good to see you.”

“And you, Lady Elizabeth. You look even better out of costume.” He took one of her pink-gloved hands and pressed his lips to the back of it. He glanced up and— oh, fantastic. Ciel was pissed.

Elizabeth giggled. It was a discordant sound, an unnatural high-pitch with well-practiced length and smooth cut off. It was a rehearsed thing, this laugh. Alois had done similar many times. “You can call me Lizzie.”

“Then you are welcome to call me Alois.”

“You have such cute clothes, Alois!” She commented, looking him over. His outfit was nearly as bright as hers, more in the purples and mauves than her soft pink, but brilliant nonetheless. Baldroy had done a shopping run the other day, and had asked Alois if he needed anything and, well.

The desire to wear anything but more of Ciel’s boring, reject outfits was something Alois had qualified definitively as a need.

Alois took the praise with a lifted chin. “Nothing compared to yours.” He hovered a hand near her skirts, waiting until she nodded to take the fabric between his fingers. It was silky and reflected the light, certainly better quality than the easy-bought outfit Baldroy had procured for him. “Oh, this is marvelous. Where did you get it? I’m not as familiar with this city’s boutiques as I’d like to be.”

Lizzie clapped her hands before her, instantly delighted. “Oh! Well, this one was made for me, by my tailor, but there are some geniuses in the world of fashion with shops not too far. Could I take you? I would love someone to shop with!”

Alois didn’t even care that Ciel had gone from irritated pout to full scowl, because the desire to annoy him paled before this prospect. He could leave the manor. He could leave the manor and get beautiful clothes and see something that wasn’t these fucking hallways and the surrounding garden, and he wouldn’t be tailed by Ciel or his butler or the staff. Oh, oh.

He focused any excitement into a small quirk of the lip. “I would be delighted to.”

Lizzie brightened even further with a small gasp and a tilt of her head. “Oh, you would? That’s—” She leaned in closer to him. “Ciel never goes shopping with me. And the one time he did, he wouldn’t try on any of the clothes I picked out for him. I’m beginning to fear it might be a lost cause,” she bemoaned. But there was a slight curve to her lips, a cleverness in the narrow of her eyes, that made it seem more rebellious joke than true complaint.

Alois was fully smiling now. “Angels will weep the day Ciel Phantomhive learns the difference between a cravat and a tie.”

It startled a laugh out of her, open-mouthed and too-loud and just a bit nasal— unpracticed, every part of it.

Alois thought, he wanted to know her.

“Are you two quite finished?” Ciel asked. Lizzie laughed again, halfway between real and fake, and trotted over to her fiance. She was wearing flats, Alois noticed, that put her just barely taller than Ciel in his heeled shoes.

She leaned towards Ciel, not too close as for touching — something about the propriety, Alois supposed — and smiled. She did so with her eyes wide but her gaze cast downward, flat shoes pigeon-toed, and neck long. It was a bit eerie— with her blonde hair, blue eyes, and bright clothes, she could have been Alois’s reflection, in the moments he found innocent subservience to be the best finishing touch to an outfit.

“Sorry, Ciel,” she granted, her bowed head making her finally shorter than her fiance. “Can we tour the gardens? Those pink flowers, they’re new, right?”

“Finny’s trimming the poplar trees,” Alois provided, before Ciel could answer. They both looked at him as if they hadn’t expected him to speak again. One was decidedly more happy about it than the other. “They’re looking quite nice, I think.”

“We will go look,” Ciel said, looking over at Alois as if still unsure why he’d chosen to speak. “Is that alright, Elizabeth?”

“Lovely!” She took the arm Ciel had offered to her, then turned back to Alois. “Are you coming, Alois?”

It would be a risk. A risk that, reasonably, he shouldn’t take. He had tested his luck enough today, and he figured Ciel would have the power to cancel his outing if Alois acted out too much. But Alois— he was bored and he was curious. He’d never seen Ciel interact with anyone who wasn’t his staff or someone he wanted dead, and maybe seeing the two of them together would provide even the slightest amount of insight.

Besides, it seemed Lizzie wanted him to. And the prospect of a friend who would tolerate, and perhaps even join in on, his joking about Ciel— Well, it wasn’t an opportunity he wanted to pass up.

“I told Finny I would find him in the gardens,” Alois supplied, as reasoning. It didn’t seem to make Ciel any happier, but Alois didn’t really give a damn about Ciel’s happiness, in truth. “Might as well tag along.”

And so he did, milling about a few feet behind Ciel and Lizzie, who were arm-in-arm as they made their way out of the manor’s foyer onto the paths outside. They chatted on, idle more than anything, and Alois quickly tuned them out in favor of thinking about what he was going to do, once he was outside.

He’d been honest when he’d said he didn’t know the shops in the area. He didn’t really know shops at all. The only time he’d had both the money and freedom to choose what he would wear had been short months, in which most of his clothing had been specially tailored. Even then, Claude had insisted he spend more time scheming or planning or whatever it was he was supposed to be doing, in favor of procuring outfits. So, the prospect excited him. He would like to see all the clothes in rows. Maybe they really had little tables with free water and cakes like he’d read about in a magazine story, once. The city would smell of populace and sound like life— big and bustling and far more interesting than a looming manor with too-few residents.

He’d immersed himself so fully in the idea of it all that he nearly ran into the back of Ciel, stopped beside Lizzie to study the trees. He righted himself, and caught the tail-end of what Ciel was saying: “— and how is Auntie?” The word nearly went over Alois’ head, but instead, it caught, and, what?

“She’s well! She and Father are going to Edward’s—”

“Are you two cousins?” Alois asked, sparing hardly a moment to feel bad for the interruption. He’d say it was worth it, as Ciel went instantly red in the face and Lizzie shuffled, just a bit, away from him.

After a few failures to speak, Ciel tilted his head up so that he was almost looking down at Alois. “Yes, and what about it?”

Oh, oh, this was perfect. This was— Alois was making a valiant effort not to laugh, lips pursed as he nodded. “Nothing about it,” he promised, voice high and tight. “No, no, just— curious. Huh.” It came out more like ‘Hah.’ If he started losing it in laughter in front of the two of them he would certainly not be invited to the shops. “I— think I should head back.”

Lizzie tilted her head, eyebrows furrowed. “We haven’t run into the gardener yet?”

Alois was already backing away. “Oh, I forgot, he said— he said to meet him in the kitchen. Where I’m going. Now.” He turned away, and then back. “It was really was lovely to meet you, Lizzie. Next week, for the shops?”

She brightened instantly. “Perfect! Goodbye, Alois!”

He turned, and near-sprinted away in an attempt to keep himself from bursting out in undignified giggles while still in earshot. He didn’t even make it to the manor, stopping behind some tree far enough away that they certainly couldn’t hear him.

And then he doubled over laughing.

“Christ,” he said, barely managing to breathe. “Fucking nobles.” Then, further amused by himself, “Cousin-fucking nobles, to be exact.” He sank down the side of the tree, still laughing behind clenched teeth.

Say what you will about poor folk, he thought, but there’s none of that ‘keeping it in the family business’. Ciel was engaged to his cousin. God. Lizzie really did deserve better, but Alois would not complain for the easy comedy. Dammit, that was funny.

Fucking nobles.

Chapter Text

Alois woke up in a cage. His back was pressed against metal, his head was splitting itself with ache, and the light was dim enough that he couldn’t make out very much of his surroundings. Except, of course, the upright-sitting form of Ciel Phantomhive, still in dayclothes, directly across from him.

Well, this was bound to happen eventually.

“Good morning,” Alois greeted, pushing up a little ways to lean back comfortably against the bars. Ciel jerked his head to look over at him. “Funny waking up next to you.”

“Keep your voice down,” Ciel hissed. With the proximity granted by Ciel’s lean-in, Alois noted the frantic wideness of his eyes— plural. The eyepatch was nowhere to be seen. “I think there are guards outside the door.”

“Oh no!” Alois scoffed. “Come off it. What’re they gonna do? Put us in a smaller cage?” He demonstrated his lack of concern by extending his leg until it was rested on one of the horizontal bars on the opposite wall. “When’s your serving dog getting here?”

“Why should I even tell you?”

“Because you’re enamoured with me? I thought, after all the help you’d offered…” Alois’s tried and true pout was not pulling its weight, so he traded it for the rolled-eye. “We’re not gonna just sit here in bored silence. You’re a prat, and you don’t like me any better, but I don’t see anyone else to talk to.”

Ciel had cocked his head and narrowed his eyes while Alois talked. “You sound different.” Alois raised an eyebrow, incredulous. “When you talk to the staff, and Elizabeth, you’re more polite, your sentences are more well-put-together. Not so… crass.”

Alois pretended to consider this, then shrugged. “Yeah, suppose so.”

“Why?”

“I’m not telling you shit, if you won’t even answer my question.”

Alois hadn’t managed to live in the Phantomhive manor for— what, two months now? three? — a long time, in any case, without picking up on its master’s affinity for chess. His interest in strategy. Alois found it ridiculous — chess was a game for the ennui-inflicted rich who thought themselves better than cards — but he could see that calculation in the shift in Ciel’s expression. Weighing his opponent. And making a move. “Question for question, then?”

A foolish misplay.

Alois grinned. “It’s something to pass the time.” Before Ciel could open his mouth, “I’ll go first. Why didn’t you kill me, that night?”

“That wasn’t the question you asked before.”

“Tell me where you said it had to be.”

Ciel met his gaze for a moment, scowl-for-smirk, before glancing away. “Pass.”

Alois scoffed. “Bullshit!”

“It’s an irrelevant question, and I’m allowed a pass.”

Alois considered. It was the question he most wanted answered, but what was the rush? He could afford the wear-down approach. “Alright. When’s your bitch coming to save us?”

Ciel grimaced. “I don’t know when Sebastian will arrive. I haven’t been awake much longer than you, but the light through the window there—” he pointed to a sliver of light visible through the cell bars. “—Indicates the sun is setting. I was taken when walking the gardens this morning. So we’re far, but Sebastian has had time to look. I don’t imagine much more than an hour.”

“Wow.” Alois drawled. “Shit answer, I could’ve guessed any of that.”

“It was the question you asked. Now I get to ask mine.” Alois rolled his eyes and made a gesture with his hand, a ‘go ahead’. “Why do you speak differently in front of me?”

“According to your cousin,” because hell if he was going to let that one go, “I’m an earl. According to the staff, I used to be. I’d like if they kept that idea of me. But you—” He looked him up and down, and laughed. “I don’t give a damn what you think.”

Ciel lifted his chin, which only served to make him hit his head on the cage ceiling. It would be funnier if the claustrophobia wasn’t beginning to set in, but still, Alois got a victorious smile out of it.

“You should,” Ciel insisted. “I’m the reason you’re still alive.”

“And why is that, exactly?”

“Pass, again,” Ciel answered, instead.

“Fine.” There’d been a half-pause before ‘pass’, this time. Which Alois would point to as progress. “What’d you sell your soul for? What’s the butler doing, for you?”

“Avenging my parents’ murder.”

Oh, of all the things— “That’s trite!” Alois liked to think himself beyond this petty jealousy, but how on earth did this kid, with the most boring, overdone backstory and motive one could have, interest so many demons? ‘Avenging his parents’ — boring! How was that any better than Alois’?

Ciel ignored the comment. “If you so disrespect me and what I’ve given you, why do you stay?”

Alois huffed, tracing the reflection of light on the cell bar to his left. The sun really was setting, and the line had been creeping ever downwards. “You know, I thought it over, and living in your manor is a step up from being a street whore, so I’m staying.” Ciel winced, and Alois snorted. Made sense, that he’d be a prude. “How old are you, anyway?”

“Thirteen,” he answered, easily. “Fourteen in December. And you?”

Alois thought for a second. “Eh, probably fourteen. Maybe fifteen now.” He honestly figured it was still the former, but he had no way of knowing, and he’d take the superiority where he could get it.

Ciel furrowed his eyebrows. “You don’t know?”

“Ah! That’s another question.”

“It’s a clarification.”

Alois was tempted to push it, but, honestly, he didn’t have all that much to ask of the kid. Besides the obvious inquiry Ciel kept avoiding, he really didn’t find him all that interesting. Rich kid’s parents die, he makes a deal with a demon to avenge them, and everyone fawns over him forever. Boring. And not good material for questioning. The point of this wasn’t gaining arbitrary information, but stretching Ciel’s patience thin enough it snapped. “What, you think I have it written down somewhere? Not all of us got people sticking around to tell us when we were born.”

“What’s—”

“My turn!” Alois interrupted. “What makes you so attractive to demons?”

“Pardon?”

“You’re painfully uninteresting, your backstory’s shit, you’re a pain in the arse at best and a bloody child on average, and yet not only your own demon but mine go fucking crazy for whatever’s in your soul.”

Ciel didn’t seem to register the insults. “I didn’t want your demon.”

“Doesn’t answer the question.”

“Why would I know? They are demons. Whatever they see in me isn’t something I can see in myself.” Out of the corner of his eye, Alois could see Ciel curl, just slightly, into himself. The next words he spoke were just a bit too quick, rushing into each other. “What happened to your contract seal, when we killed your demon?”

Alois rolled his eyes and stuck out his, nearly blank, tongue. Once he figured Ciel had seen, “Wasn’t like your eye. It only showed up when I was calling for him. But it left the trace of the shape when he died.” Ciel nodded, taking the answer as it was. There was still a tenseness in his posture, in the too-tight clench of his fingers around the fabric of his clothes. “How do you feel about your butler?”

“What?”

“I never ask you to clarify your questions.” He sighed, as if this was some great pain. “Do you trust him?”

Ciel immediately bristled. “He works for me, there isn’t a matter of trust. I don’t go around befriending my staff.”

“I don’t know why, I’d say some of them are far less obstinate and boring than the earl of the house.”

“If you find me so boring, you can stop asking me questions.”

“Oh, Ciel, I thought we were having fun! No need to be like that. So, really.” He nudged Ciel with a foot. “You’re scared of him, then?”

“He— He is contractually bound to me,” Ciel answered, as if his shoulders hadn’t gone completely stiff. “I am the one in charge.”

“Mhm.”

Alois had settled back against the barred wall as best he could, stretching out to make the cramped space feel a bit wider. He really didn’t like cages all that much. Based on Ciel’s curled-up, cornered stance, he’d guess the feeling was mutual, but Alois would be glad for the extra space it granted him.

He was, at this point, expecting little from Ciel’s questions. Which meant he was sent shock-straight when the boy asked, “Are you a queer?”

He didn’t let it keep him off-guard for long. He relaxed back, donned an easy grin that felt sorely at odds with the turn of his stomach, and answered, “Obviously. Didn’t think you were dense enough to miss that.” And then, because, oh this would just kill him, “Are you?”

Even in the low light, Alois could see how spectacularly pink Ciel went. “No.” Ciel squeaked out, and Alois had no will or desire to keep from laughing till his stomach ached, so he did, drowning out Ciel’s spluttering with the sound.

“Oh,” Alois sighed, after a moment. “God, that was funny. Gotta say, you make a damn bad case for yourself, acting so defensive.”

“I’m not.” Alois spared a thought to whether he meant not queer or not defensive. “I’d thought you were, but I wasn’t sure.”

“What part gave it away? The outfits, or my reputation for letting men fuck me?” Alois had, in truth, never expected this conversation. Everyone knew he was a whore; no one brought it up unless they were looking to see that for themself, and he doubted that was Ciel’s intention. All that ‘polite company’ bullshit, that made people side-eye and scorn him, never naming why they did it. No one just outright asked.

Any fade of Ciel’s blush was lost in the full-force resurgence it saw in response to the question. “Both, honestly.” He fidgeted with his rings. “You asked two questions in a row, so I get two.”

Dammit, he had, hadn’t he? “Fair’s fair.”

“Were you— that is— did you actually… enjoy it?”

Another question no one had ever asked. Most assumed he did, the insults proved that much, but the staff had thought the exact opposite. He laughed off the stiffness of his shoulders. “Oh, not so much a prude, then? Would you like explicit details or just a sense of atmosphere?”

“I did not ask to hear about it. That is not what I—”

“Oh, quiet.” Alois interrupted, already bored of Ciel’s shallow defenses. Then, realizing an answer was expected, he offered an easy grin that was, in practice, quite difficult. “Of course I did. They loved me, wanted me, and gave me things, too. Attention, money, power. Got much of a title as you with no fancy lineage, no boring meetings, no responsibility. Easy. Just—” He realized, suddenly, that he’d said far more than was required, without ever really answering the actual question. Ciel was staring at him. Like the staff had. His own shoulders were raised, nails digging into the skin of his palms, and his stomach ached. “What are you looking at?” he snapped.

“What’s there even to look at here, besides the only— Wait, that isn’t my question.” Smart, to catch it.

“Ask away,” Alois prompted, trying in vain to uncurl his own fists.

“Did you love any of them?”

Dammit, couldn’t he ask about anything else? Maybe something that didn’t make Alois feel sick? “I didn’t love them. I didn’t need them, not the way they needed me. I used them to get what I wanted and that’s it.” And now it was his turn. “Why are you so fucking interested?”

Ciel took a moment to consider it. Then, his shoulders slumped. “I’m not. I’m bored, and this is more interesting than silence.” And because he allowed Alois no rest, “What about your butler?”

Alois scrubbed a hand over his face, but didn’t bother with an unnecessary clarification. “I thought I did. Maybe I actually did. But now he’s fucking dead, and unable to do a damn thing for me, so what need do I have of him?” Ciel hummed, half-interested, and how had Alois forgotten how much he hated him? “Is this why you didn’t kill me? Easy entertainment?”

“No,” Ciel answered, easily, and Alois wanted to wring his fucking neck. He could, no one would stop him. “What’s your real name?”

“It’s Alois,” he parried back, leaning towards Ciel. “What’s to stop me from killing you right here, bare hands? Or at least pulling that eye out of your skull?”

“Nothing. Now, don’t be difficult, what name were you born with?”

“Jim Macken. James, if you really want to be a cock. Do you think I won’t do it?”

“No, I don’t think you will. If you’re a queer, what do you get out of flirting with Elizabeth?”

“Easing boredom. Keeping company. If you dislike me so much, what do you get out of this questions game?”

“Easing boredom. Keeping company,” Ciel parroted. “I notice my eye is still in my skull.”

Alois scoffed, angry, and settled back against the wall. “My ranking places death below street whore below living in your manor, and I don’t think your bitch would take kindly to a meal with one less eye. Besides, I still want answers.”

“Haven’t you gotten plenty?”

“All I’ve gotten out of you is that you’re a thirteen-year-old not-queer with dead parents and no respect for me. And that you’re no more interesting than I’d guessed.” Ciel looked at him for a moment, the last rays of light catching the symbol imprinted on his right eye. Did it mean anything, Alois wondered, that Ciel’s contract was so permanent and visible that he had to actively hide it, while Alois’ had been fleeting and inconsistent, leaving him with the only the faintest reminder when it was broken?

Nah. He was just bored.

They were both quiet for a minute or so, looking away from each other. The sun sunk below the ledge of the strange, thin window, shrouding them almost entirely in shadow. It was spring, but the chill was beginning to set in as night fell. “Do you know who it is that took us here?” Alois asked, quiet in the cool air.

“Cult group, probably,” Ciel answered, just as subdued. “They’re usually the ones to opt for cages. Suppose they’re waiting for the full moon to come out. They did seem to be looking for me, specifically, though, so maybe not purely cult. Part revenge, I’d guess.” He hooked his chin over his knee so he was looking at Alois. “Why did they take you?”

Alois thought about it for a moment. “I was walking in the gardens, looking for Finny, when they took me, like you were, right?” He nodded. “Guess they thought I might’ve been you. Didn’t want to risk getting the wrong boy.”

“Fools,” Ciel said, and the sincerity of it made Alois snort. “What?”

“Nothing.”

The silence dragged. Ciel curled further into himself, maybe for warmth, or just comfort. He seemed accustomed to this type of capture, and Alois wondered how many times he’d gone through this alone.

“What do you do with the staff?” Ciel asked. “You’re always with them.”

Alois shrugged. “Play cards, mostly. Talk. They’re all there in the kitchen most mornings, so it's somewhere to go.” He paused and, when Ciel didn’t respond, “Your manor is fucking huge and fucking lonely, I wasn’t going to sit around in my room by myself for three months, and it wasn’t like I’m allowed to go out.”

Ciel hummed and traced his fingers over his knee. Alois had a moment of hollow victory, realizing that he probably had more friends than Ciel did, and every one of them had known Ciel far longer. He didn’t give a shit about this kid, he really didn’t, but the thought sat wrong with him. He shouldn’t care, and he didn’t, but, Christ.

Ciel must be so fucking lonely.

“Do you miss your parents?” Alois asked.

Ciel ran his fingertips over the length of his own arm, like a reminiscent gesture of comfort. “Of course. Do you miss yours?”

“Don’t remember them.” He didn’t need to say any more, the question was answered, but: “I had a brother. Luka.” The name felt stiff and unwieldy on his tongue, too long since he’d had any reason to use it. “He— he was younger. I took care of him, best I could, until he made a deal with a demon, and died. I thought it was Sebastian, for a while. Now I think it was my maid. But, I suppose, it’s moot. He’s been dead for eight years, doesn’t really matter who did it.”

Ciel pursed his lips. “Is that why you were after me? You thought Sebastian killed your brother?”

“Guess so.” Beat. “Also… Claude. You know, that incredible soul of yours, he wanted it. So I wanted to get it for him.” He made a gesture half-like a shrug, suddenly feeling very exposed in his sprawled-out position, a perfect contrast to the huddled-up form of Ciel. He didn’t like thinking about Claude. Or any of the men. But he was playing this game fair, and that meant honesty.

Ciel hummed, and looked straight forward. “Have you ever killed anyone?”

“Isn’t it my turn?”

“Yes. And that was it.”

“Prick.” He’d used up most of his malice in their back-and-forth, and couldn’t even force the word to sound mean. “No, in answer. At least, I don’t think. I told my brother I wanted the townspeople dead, and he had his demon kill them… but I haven’t actively caused anybody’s death.” He let out a half-formed laugh. “Or maybe I’m just forgetting.” Ciel was looking at him, something intense in the furrow of his brow. “Not gonna ask the same. I know you have.”

Ciel let out a breath that was the closest thing to a laugh Alois had ever heard from him, and shook his head. “You didn’t kill my parents,” he said, entirely matter-of-fact, as if it was something he was informing Alois.

“Obviously not? What?” Then, in a moment of realization, “You thought I did?”

“It was a possibility,” Ciel answered. Alois noticed that he was scratching at the skin around his right eye. “That’s your answer. Why I’ve kept you around, to assess that possibility.”

“Oh.” Well, that was… underwhelming. All that intrigue, just for Ciel’s misinformed hypothesis. Boring. Boring, boring and…

And it didn’t make sense.

“No,” Alois said, forceful. “No, that’s shit!”

“What?”

“You wouldn’t have let me live,” Alois said, confident in his surety. “If you thought I’d killed your fucking parents, even a chance, you would’ve killed me. If you were right, that’s your whole mission complete. If wrong, you wouldn’t give a shit that you’d ended my life. I’ve been honest through all this whole dumb game, you could be decent enough to return the favor.”

“I…” He looked taken aback, waver in his quick-to-fault voice. Then, he set the thin of his mouth into a line. “Fine. I didn’t want to.”

“What?”

“My turn.”

“Fuck you.”

“I heard that there was a pedophilia ring in the Trancy house, and that the new Earl Trancy freed the captives when the old one died.” Alois flinched. He’d thought that had been more under-wraps. “You consider yourself cruel, don’t you? Cruel and clever and remorseless.”

He’d gouged his maid’s eye out with his fingers. He’d enacted violence on his staff whenever it suited him, and laughed. He’d seduced old perverts just to turn them over to the police. He delighted in causing discomfort. He didn’t know a word for that, other than cruel. And yet, something about labeling himself in such a way… it felt wrong. But, hesitantly, “Sure.”

“You freed those children. For no personal gain. Because they were innocent, and you had no reason not to.”

“If this is your answer, you should take the idea of ‘kinship’ into account.”

Ciel ignored him. “You freed them, but that doesn’t make you a good person. It doesn’t erase your cruelty,” Ciel said. “If I don’t want to take every opportunity presented to do the worst thing I could, that does not erase who I am. I didn’t want to kill you, so I didn’t. That’s all you need to know.”

Looking at him in the near-all-encompassing darkness, Alois was reminded of that realization, found in the stairwell nearly a month ago, now. Ciel, knees to his chest, big eyes set in a facsimile of sober calculation… The only difference was that the nightgown had been replaced with dayclothes, but even those so clearly marked him as a child that there was nothing to be said for it. Ciel was a kid. He was a thirteen-year-old kid, trying to articulate his reasons for not committing cold-blooded murder while maintaining that he was still a killer who had every reason to be feared.

Maybe he wasn’t all that interesting, but he was fucking funny, wasn’t he?

“What are you doing?” Ciel asked, as Alois curled into himself, body shaking and arm over his face. He saw the shadows shift as Ciel moved closer to him, just before Alois threw his head back in laughter. Ciel flinched harshly away. But Alois didn’t give a damn, he was just laughing.

“Oh my god,” Alois whined out, barely in control of his breath. “God, you’re a fucking kid!”

Ciel stiffened and sneered. “I am not a—”

“Shut up, shut up, you are. And so am I! And we’re asking each other who we’ve fucking killed! Do you not— this is fucking ridiculous!” He was still laughing, ribs beginning to ache, and eyes tearing up. He at least hoped that last one could be blamed on the laughter.

Ciel scoffed. “You’re insane.”

“Oh, that’s bloody rich coming from you.” He took a few breaths, letting his lungs refill. “You’re a thirteen-year-old who has deluded himself into thinking he has the right or the knowledge to control life and death!”

The calm, pensive Ciel who’d confessed to missing his parents a few minutes ago had vanished, leaving in his wake an angry creature. Through the tears clouding Alois’ vision, he could see the rise of the boy’s shoulders. “But you have the right to summon demons and hunt me down and rip your maid’s eye out?”

“No! But neither of us should! We can’t sign a land contract, how the fuck were we allowed to make deals with demons? We’re too fucking young to decide about death! God, I— I was ready to kill you so my butler would want to fuck me!” That laugh came out half-sob, and Alois just hoped he’d look insane more than pathetic, as Ciel winced away. “And you’re even younger than I am! We’re children, what the fuck are we doing?”

“Maybe you are, but I—”

“Couldn’t stomach killing a kid your age on his knees, as his home burned behind him? I thought, this whole time I thought it was some grand plot but, no, it was pity and guilt and loneliness! You’re not a demon. You’re as fucked in the head as me, but you—” He giggled, reaching the tail end of his laughing fit. “You didn’t want to kill me cause you didn’t want to kill someone in cold blood. Like a person.”

Ciel said nothing as Alois’ laughter turned to silent tremors turned to nothing. Then, “I assume you’re very pleased with yourself.”

Alois’s head was still reeling, trying to remember everything he’d spilled in his rant. But he had just enough energy to look up from where he was slumped against the metal bars and smirk. “Just had the best laugh since I learned you’re marrying your cousin; I’d say so.”

“You didn’t figure me out,” Ciel insisted. Alois felt a twang of disappointment that he didn’t seem to react to the cousin jab. “All you did was laugh like a madman and make a half-dozen unfounded claims. And make me consider leaving you here when Sebastian comes.”

Alois scoffed. “You won’t.”

“I am— I am the Earl Ciel Phantomhive, the Queen’s Watchdog—”

“Why?” Alois interrupted.

“The— what?” Ciel looked back at him.

“My turn for a question.” He brought one knee to his chest, for something to rest his chin on. “And you’d better hurry with that answer, cause I think the moon will reach its height soon.” He jerked his head towards the window, which let in the barest hints of moonlight. “Why are you all these things? Earl, Watchbitch, Judge of Life and Death?”

“They were my father’s titles, his responsibilities. They are my birthright.”

“’Lright,” Alois granted. “Birthright they are. I inherited shit too, and no one really questioned what I did, Claude made sure of that, but it still wasn’t really mine. Sure, I could take money out of accounts if I wanted, and people made under the table deals with me, but no one expected me to actually serve as an Earl. Cause I was a child.”

“Or because you were…” Ciel halted mid-sentence, and Alois grinned.

“Is ‘a whore’ the phrase you’re looking for?” It wouldn’t be wrong. People did tend to underestimate him for that, in conjunction with his age. He was a dumb, pretty thing, nobles tended to write him off, and many had made the mistake of stopping their investigation there.

“I was going for ‘mentally unstable’.” Alois doubted that, but let it slide. “And your points are irrelevant. You could have done your work, fulfilled the expectation of your title, but you made the choice not to.”

“And you’re missing the point. ‘s not about what I could have done, or even should. I was never supposed to get these titles, and you weren’t meant to get yours until you were an adult. Until you had the time and preparation to make the kind of decisions you’re not mature enough to make. But you’re choosing to make them, and to convince yourself that these roles mean you can’t flinch away from death, which has killed people, and nearly killed me.”

“So what’s your point?”

“Not sure,” Alois answered, honest as he’d been the whole damn game. “Guess just pointing out, you don’t have to live this way. Don’t have to rush to your revenge and, you know, your soul being eaten at the end of it. I got out of it without my revenge and with my life and I,” he spread his arms out as wide as he could in the cage, and they nearly hit Ciel. “Feel fucking great.”

Ciel stared at him for a second and Alois thought, with something that felt uncomfortably like hope, that maybe he was being listened to. Maybe, Ciel Phantomhive wasn’t the unchangeable, childish prick of a killer he’d expected.

Ciel looked away, scoffed, and said, “Forgive me if I don’t take advice from an insane, ridiculous boy who I could kill at a moment’s notice.”

“Already used that threat. It’s empty, now,” Alois reminded. “And suit yourself. That’s none of my— oh shit.”

There were, suddenly, men in the room. Several. Not in typical cult robes, but all in identical black, linen fabrics draped over their tall bodies. Alois’ attention was drawn from them by a flash of unnatural purple, Ciel in the periphery of his vision, wincing.

“Ciel,” he hissed, leaning towards him. “Shut your eye.”

He looked up at Alois. “What?”

“The purple fucking eye, dumbarse, shut it.”

“That’s not what I—”

“Earl Phantomhive,” one of the men addressed, and Alois turned to look at him as soon as he saw that the eye was shut. “Please step forward.”

“That’s my name,” Alois said before Ciel could get a word out. He stood as best he could in the slow ceiling, which had him hunched over to look properly attractive, but at least he was pretty. “What’s yours, handsome?” The man wasn’t — handsome, that was — but that had never been a prerequisite for using the term before. But, for whatever reason, it felt rough and leaden in his mouth, and he nearly winced getting it out. Dammit. He’d been off when flirting with that chef, but had figured that that was a one-time stilt, nothing serious.

Dammit.

“Unlock the cage,” the man said to his peer, not deigning Alois’ question with a response. The lackey did, and Alois stepped through the opened doorway, dodging out of the way of the man’s hand. “Where’s your contract seal?”

Alois grinned, and stuck out his tongue. The same silent lackey, a skinny man with too-big eyes, grabbed the end of his tongue and yanked it. Alois felt himself freeze up, heart beating far faster than it had a moment before. He was being ridiculous, he reminded himself. This was barely a touch, and it didn’t even hurt.

“Different than I’d heard about,” the taller man commented, close enough that Alois could smell his breath. “But it’s definitely a demonic contract.” He nodded towards Ciel, then signaled for the guard to let go of his tongue. “Who’s your friend?”

“Orphan we took in.” Servant wouldn’t track, what with that outfit. “We let him roam the grounds, I suppose you couldn’t tell us apart?”

“Didn’t want the risk,” the man said, defensive, and Alois nodded, as to say ‘completely understandable’. “Come with—” he was cut off by the sound of a scream, and a large object hitting the floor. Body, Alois would guess. “What in the Father’s name—?”

“Hmm.” Alois walked forward until he was next to the man, looking in the same direction. “Seems like a bit of chaos! Bound to happen while the moon is high, which, does it look like it’s beginning to fall to you?”

“Brother Isaac,” one of the other men said. “I don’t think—”

“Quiet!” The man— Isaac, seemingly — was looking at the thin window. “The child is right. We are short on time.”

“Oh! Well, then we’d better hurry.” Alois smiled at the men, and walked ahead of them into the next room, ignoring the sounds of two more screams— these halted far more quickly. He stopped in a room with an opening in the ceiling, shining moonlight onto a stone slab with several sharp tools. He took a seat on the stone, figuring this was where he was to end up, and reveled in the space, far greater than that of his cage. “Lovely place you have here.”

“John, hold him down,” Isaac commanded, and a younger man came around to grip onto Alois’ shoulders, tight with pressure. God, was his breath getting short, too? “Hands,” he commanded. In his were a sharp scalpel, and what seemed like an empty vial. Alois grimaced. This was to prove a point— he hadn’t intended on actually spilling blood.

Another sound of a body collapsing. Then— the sound of a cage door torn from its hinges. If Alois could just buy a moment of time—

“You really don’t need to hold me down,” Alois promised, not turning his palm. “I’m very good at sitting still through what’s done to me.” It wasn’t a good line, and Isaac didn’t even looked fazed, and now Alois’ stomach was even tighter, so there was no fucking point.

“Your hands, Phantomhive.”

Where were they? Alois was sure he would—

“Fuck!” Alois yelped as Isaac grabbed roughly at his wrist, turned it over, and sliced open his palm. The cut was deep and, fuck, Alois had never done well with blood — his own, at least — and John’s hands were only digging deeper into his shoulders, and he felt sick he felt fucking sick—

The pressure on his shoulders vanished instantaneously. Then, the force holding onto his wrist let go as well. His head was still swimming, eyes locked on the fucking stream of blood coming from his hand, breath heavy enough to make a wheezing sound.

“Lord Trancy.” He forced his eyes up, and in the haze of his vision, he saw that goddamn butler and, in his arms, Ciel. Just looking at him. Sebastian awaiting Ciel’s instructions. The burning of Trancy manor, all over again.

Take him or leave him.

“Take him, Sebastian,” Ciel ordered, just like Alois knew he would.

He didn’t laugh his time, just let himself get picked up by the butler. Alois shuffled off the shoulder of his lightweight jacket, pooling enough fabric for him to press his hand into, in a shallow attempt to slow the bleeding. It was hand cut, not a wrist one, and he was fairly sure he wouldn’t bleed out from it, but he hoped they would get home before he passed out. Sure enough, Sebastian began sprinting, and Alois had just enough humor left in him to be amused by the fact that the demon was going to run them home.

It didn’t take that long— for however many hours it had taken the butler to realize his master was gone, find him, and get there, it took minutes to get back. Or maybe just felt like it.

The blood loss did seem to be getting to Alois’ head.

The butler carried them up the stairs, depositing them both at Ciel’s door, and not offering Alois a thing to help with his still-bleeding hand. It was fine— Alois was fully prepared to turn away, walk off and bandage it himself, with a torn shirt, in his room.

But before he could, Ciel grabbed him by the wrist. It wasn’t the same that Isaac had clasped as he sliced through his skin, but the shock of it still froze Alois in his tracks.

But Alois wasn’t a child— at least not in this sense. He wasn’t afraid of something simple as touch. He exhaled, turned towards Ciel, and forced himself to delight in the narrowed-eye confused being cast his way. “Yes, my Lord?”

“Why did you do that?” The boy hissed, as if that would keep Sebastian from hearing.

Alois grinned, however uneasy, and leaned in close enough to whisper, “To prove that I was right.”

He stepped away, winked — his right eye, a joke he doubted Ciel would catch — and set out towards his room.

And ended, on his own terms, the question game.

“How’s your hand, Alois?” Mey-rin asked. Same as she’d asked the day prior, and the one before that, and so on, for the past week. Since Finny had come to check on him that night, and seen him bleeding all over his bedspread in an attempt to wrap the wound in shirt fabric.

The gardener had started sobbing, instantly.

While doing so, he’d run off to get the maid and the chef and, between the two of them, they managed to give Alois proper stitches. The gash was, apparently, worse than he’d thought, and he’d consented to the treatment. Alois still hadn’t pieced together their individual histories, but he was pretty sure Baldroy had been a soldier, which would explain how easily he seemed to handle the needle. As for Mey-rin— he supposed those guns she kept hidden caused enough harm that it was useful to know how to sew someone up.

She was smiling lightly at him now, over her hand of cards. “You oughta let me bandage it again. I don’t want you getting infected.”

“It doesn’t really hurt, now,” he answered. It was true, but he still worried over it more than he wanted to admit. “But, yeah, maybe some new bandages.”

“Oh, do you have a scar yet?” Finny asked, leaning over the table as if closer proximity would allow him to see through the gauze. “Can I see it?”

“Nah, Fin.” Baldroy answered. He was standing poised between a cutting board and the playing table. More than once he’d nearly chopped a playing card in half, and at one point, had played a julienned carrot instead of an ace. “Cut that deep has barely had time to scab, let alone scar.”

Finny pouted. “But it will scar, right?”

Alois unwrapped the bandages and winced at the still-healing sight. Badroy was right; the stitches were still fighting to hold skin together. A dark red scab formed a line starting from right above his wrist, and reaching, almost, the bottom of his index finger. “Looks like it,” he answered.

“Oh!” Finny held out a hand, and Alois set his wrist in it. He felt silly thinking about it, but Finny was one of the few people — maybe the only — whose touch he trusted. “Oh, ‘Lois, this still looks really painful.” His eyes were wide and Alois worried for a moment that he might start crying again. But then he met Alois’ eyes and fixed him with an excited smile. “You’re gonna look so cool when it scars!”

Mey-rin nodded her agreement, with a certain amount of wariness. Baldroy didn’t say anything.

Alois figured they had too many scars to find them ‘cool’.

“Scars don’t fit my general aesthetic,” Alois commented. “But I suppose I could—”

He was cut off when Baldroy abruptly dropped his knife and froze in place across from him, Finny doing the same thing a moment after. Alois frowned, about to ask, when Baldroy said, “Young master!”

Ah. That was it.

Mey-rin beside him immediately pushed her glasses down onto her face and turned around to look at the boy. Alois, who hadn’t spoken to him since that night a week prior, turned more slowly, and just enough to catch Ciel in his periphery.

A vision of discomfort.

“What’re you, uh,” Baldroy started, a clear indicator that Ciel visiting the kitchen was not any sort of regular event. “I’m getting lunch ready, if there’s anything you wanted to try, but—”

“No,” Ciel said, so out-of-place even in his curtness. “I was just.” His gaze was on the table, before fixing on Alois for a moment, and darting away. Alois wondered why, then— oh. His hand was still on the table. Palm-up. “What are the rest of you doing here? I only remember hiring one chef.”

“We’re— ah, playing cards, young master,” Mey-rin answered, when no one else volunteered the information. “So Baldroy won’t be so lonely.”

“Yeah!” Finny added. “Mey finished the cleaning last night, and Sebastian told me I’ve already pruned way more of the hedges than I should’ve, and that I should just take a break while I let them regrow, so we were just—”

“Easing boredom,” Alois offered. “Keeping company.” Ciel narrowed his eyes, enough that Alois thought he might just remember the phrase. If that would even matter.

No one said anything for a moment. An invitation lay heavy in the air, with three unsure if they should utter it, one unable to presume it, and the final fully ambivalent to whether it was accepted or not. (Because, really, as funny as it would be to beat Ciel at cards — he knew he could beat him — there was something… nice about his time with the staff, that Alois wasn’t sure he wanted changed.)

But maybe it wouldn’t even matter. Maybe no one would—

“Hey, young master,” Baldroy started, knife still in his hands. “If you ever wanted to play cards with us, there’s always a seat open, you know. If you ever find yourself wandering down here again.”

Ciel flushed. “I don’t— I. I thank you for the invitation but I do not have an interest in…” In the middle of the sentence, he caught Alois’ eye. And held it. Looking for something.

And Alois, despite his better judgement, despite the fact that he’d won their last back-and-forth and had no desire to bring that victory into question, made a decision. He rolled his eyes, and nodded Ciel towards the seat next to him. He curled his cut-open hand into a fist, hiding the wound, and giving Ciel the room to choose.

“I…” Ciel tried again, the same discomfort as before, and Alois wondered if he had — quite literally — shown his hand for nothing, with that invitation. “I suppose a round couldn’t hurt. I’m not busy at the moment, anyway.” Alois couldn’t quite remember what he’d said the first time he’d accepted the invitation to cards, but it was probably a damn lot like that. God, if Alois had to accept one more similarity between them, he might as well throw away any remaining self-respect, and become a moody, vaguely-murderous child with an eyepatch.

The crowd of faces around them, as Ciel awkwardly perched himself on the chair at the head of the table, was a mix of confusion and vague delight. Although, most of the latter came from only one of the staff. “Oh, young master, I’m so glad you’re gonna play with us!” Finny said. “We had three players for so long, and now with ‘Lois it’s a lot better, and with five it’ll be—”

“We’re very happy you’re here, young master,” Mey-rin cut in, and Baldroy nodded.

Ciel hummed, looking down at the cards Alois had dealt him, face still fully red. “I, thank you.” He picked up the hand, looking over the values, and bleeding enough that Alois could see every card without even having to try. “I…” Ciel started, and somehow looked even more sheepish. “I don’t know how to play.”

Alois burst out laughing.

He made no effort to hide that laughter, and the staff all stared at him as if he was next in line for the executioner’s block. But he didn’t really give a damn. Ciel wasn’t going to kill him, Ciel was going to play a goddamn card game with him.

Alois had hated Ciel, then envied him, then become completely apathetic about the situation, and now… He didn’t expect to become Ciel’s friend, nor even think he really wanted to, but the thing about the two of them that Alois had realized in his laughing, epiphanic fit was this: guilt and loneliness could do a hell of a lot. Could keep someone alive, or make a closed-in earl open himself to a game of cards. And he and Ciel, for all he wanted to muffle any possible similarities, were both wracked with guilt and very, very lonely.

And maybe there was hope for them.

Chapter Text

July 20^th

“You know,” Baldroy said, hand lingering the doorframe as he ushered everyone out of the kitchen. Alois was the last to go, which apparently made him easy prey for that tone Baldroy got when he wanted to Talk, with all the importance a capital T would imply. “I think it’s really good that you and the young master are getting to be friends.”

Alois scoffed, less taken aback than he had expected himself to be. Just because he enjoyed the chef’s company didn’t mean he thought him any less dimwitted than when they’d met. Figures he’d make that error. “Oh, thank you, but we aren’t.”

Baldroy did a little roll of his eyes that Alois assumed he wasn’t meant to see. “Sure, kid.”

“We aren’t.”

“Sure, I said sure.” He raised his hands over his head, faux-conceding, but it just made the door slip out of his grasp, and he had to catch it with his foot. “Ah, shi— hm. Yeah, ‘was just thinking. Seems like he really likes you.”

This scoff was taken back. “Excuse me?”

“Look, I get he’s my boss, but he’s the age of some of my siblings, back home.” This was getting… unnervingly honest. And no closer to clarifying the baffling statement the chef had just made. “So of course I get a bit protective, you know? And I’m good with kids, and I know when people your age are lonely, and the way they get defensive about it.”

“That better not be a pointed comment.”

Baldroy snorted. “‘Course not, kid. But, no, you know he wouldn’t have played cards with us last week if you didn’t nod him over. And he kept leaning closer to you than us when we played today, and looking to you for social cues. You’re, what, a year older than him? Think he, ya know, looks up to you.”

That was it, Baldroy had finally inhaled enough gunpowder to lose it completely. Alois shook his head, incredulous. “I don’t think Ciel looks up to anyone. Besides literally, I suppose.”

“Hey,” the chef said, faux-stern and clearly forcing down a laugh. “Guess you’re too close to see it, but he definitely wants to be your friend. Probably won’t say it though. Too proud for his own good, if you ask me, but I’m not his da, so.” He shrugged. Alois wondered, then, if Baldroy wanted to be. He’d already — apparently — near-adopted Finny. Was Alois next? (That was ridiculous. A joke to himself. If there was a sudden warmth in his chest, it could kindly fuck off.) “But really, I think it’d be good for him. I think he and Lady Elizabeth used to be close, not that I knew him then, but since they’re getting married one day… Eh, I just think he deserves a friend.”

Baldroy looked him over, and smiled, a smaller thing, closed-mouth and kind. Like he had that first day, playing cards. He moved his hand to just over Alois’ shoulder, but didn’t touch him. Aside from giving him the stitches on his (only even beginning to scar now) hand, he’d never actually touched him. Like he was afraid Alois would scare. Or that he couldn’t handle it.

Alois, as casual as he could manage, shifted his shoulder so it met the warm plane of Baldroy’s hand. The chef’s smile deepened.

“For the record, Alois.” He leaned in, no more than half an inch, conspiratorial but not uncomfortable. “I think you deserve a friend, too.” Then, with a half-second squeeze of Alois’s shoulder, he let go, and gestured out the door. “See you tomorrow, kid.”

“Good day,” Alois offered back, unable to say anything else. There was the lingering warmth of his shoulder, that he didn’t want to address, and the more pressing issue, of Ciel’s apparent infatuation with him.

With the door shut behind him, he shook his head and laughed. The chef didn’t know what on earth he was talking about. Friends. Ciel barely spoke to him, and Alois wasn’t inclined to do anything more.

Friends.

Well, it was funny, though.

August 7^th

Alois didn’t give a damn about societal convention, at all, and never had. If there was a situation he wanted no part of, he walked away. Not a problem in the slightest. A dozen times at least in the — god, was it almost four? — months he’d lived there, he’d turned a corner to see Ciel and immediately reversed and fled in the direction from whence he’d come.

When he saw Ciel leaned against the wall of the kitchen corridor, scuffing his shoe on hardwood, he was so very ready to turn tail and flee. But—

But he wanted to play cards. He had been planning on it. And Baldroy wasn’t going to come get him when he opened the kitchen. Which meant he had to wait.

With Ciel.

Well, at the very least, he could be an annoying bitch about it, in hopes Ciel would save him the trouble and fuck right off. He flounced over in his loudest way, collapsing back dramatically against the opposite wall, faux-grin full force. Ciel fixed him with a scowl and a full-on stare, and Alois waved, a floaty, four-finger wiggle.

Ciel shuffled to the side, look askance.

Journey out of his fucking space starts with a shuffle, Alois supposed.

“How’s your hand?” Ciel asked, after a moment, and, ugh, smalltalk, but, well. More opportunities to get him to fuck off, was the upside.

“Why do you wanna know?” Alois asked. “What are you hoping I’ll use it for?” He reached towards Ciel’s belt — lazy, with no desire to actually undo anything — and got his wrist swatted for his effort. The wrist-swat was, sadly, unaccompanied by a storm-off, so Alois just shrugged. “I get it. I'm not pretty enough now that I'm scarred for you.”

“Hm.” No apology, then. What had Alois expected? “Lady Elizabeth requested your company on her shopping trip in two weeks time.”

“Oh, actually?” The high-pitch of his excitement wasn't too discordant with the rest of his tone that conversation. Luckily, the Earl seemed too emotion-deaf to tell which was real.

“Yes.” Then, after a long inhale-through-teeth. "I don't have to be worried about you, with her, I presume?"

“Oh, darling, of course not.” Alois reached out to pinch his chin between two fingers. “You know I’m yours.”

Ciel turned his face away, harsh, and grimaced. “Let me amend that. You can go to the shops if you behave yourself.”

Having received shove-back rather than storm-away twice now, Alois was feeling less confident in his ability to shake Ciel off. No point acting saccharine, then. “Oh, piss off, don't condescend. You don't dictate where Lizzie chooses to take me."

"No. But I have say in what Lady Elizabeth thinks about you."

"Eugh." Alois waved in the air in front of him. "What's all this 'Lady Elizabeth', 'Lady Elizabeth'? Her name is Lizzie, you prat.”

“Lady Elizabeth is her title."

"And Lizzie is what she asks to be called. Or are you so self-important you think you get to decide that for her, just cause she's your little wife-to-be?"

"I call her by her title because it's the civil way," Ciel answered, all prim and proper with only the face-flush to show he was agitated. "I'm sure it wasn't practiced where you hail from, but my family places value on respect.”

"Which family is that? The avuncular in-laws, or the dead parents?" Alois was quite proud of himself for pulling that word from his vocabulary and using it so stellar in an insult. So proud, he didn't even thing to get ready to the inevitable fight. A thing like that, said where he 'hails from', would've gotten him shoved to the ground so hard he tasted dirt in every once-daily meal, for a week.

Ciel gave him nothing.

Not even the view of him leaving.

This, he remembered, was why Ciel was a worthless thing to have around. He wasn’t frightened off by the flirting nor was he willing to engage in the bout of verbal abuse. If there was a sword on hand, Alois would consider escalating, but hell knows if that would yield a true reaction. It was no fun, when Alois got nothing in return. 

The strange, wide-eyed boy just watched Alois, as he slumped, arms-folded, against the wall. Odd and condescending and fucking boring. Maybe Alois should elope with Lizzie, just to save her from that. She deserved better, and it would serve him right.

“You are too.” Ciel said. Alois cast a slow glance over at Ciel's un-meeting gaze. Whatever was he on about now? “You’re also a prat.”

“Wow, Ciel,” Alois drawled. “Be honest, did I teach you that word, just now?”

“You’re not better than me," Ciel bowled on. Tone twine-thin. "You are condescending and rude and self-important. We’re...” He cut himself off, and it only took a moment for Alois to realize why.

“I’m sorry, Ciel, were you about to say that we’re the same?” He put stress on the last word, just to see Ciel flush, slightly, and look away. “I thought you’d never come around.”

“All I said was that you aren’t any better than me—”

“And not any worse,” Alois interrupted. “Birds of a feather, us, you think?”

Ciel scowl, face wrinkling up like an old alleycat denied a dead mouse. Alois laughed right in it. The earl looked a moment away from an insult more tepid than scathing, but before Alois could hear it, the kitchen door opened. “You guys— ah, shit, am I interrupting a conversation?” Baldroy asked.

Alois grinned, eyes lowered, and began to walk towards the kitchen entryway. “Oh, nothing important. Just Ciel recounting all the myriad ways he and I are cut from the same cloth. I’d always thought, given my fashionable disposition, I’d be sewn from something finer, but he was unable to be swayed.” Baldroy raised an eyebrow as Alois passed him, and he could vaguely hear Ciel’s spluttering from behind, but he minded neither as he took his seat at the card table, idly grabbing one of the less gunpowder-covered snacks the chef had laid out. “Are the two of you coming, or not?”

“I didn’t say that,” Ciel muttered, but walked through the door, regardless.

And, regardless, he sat next to Alois.

Funny.

August 20^th

“I think it’s lovely that you and Ciel are getting along,” Lizzie said, apropos of nothing, while holding a ruff up to Alois’ next to check the look.

It didn’t catch him so off guard enough as to let slip an undignified, ‘why does everyone fucking think that?’, but it was a near thing. He offered, instead: “Honestly, Lizzie, he’s fine, but given the choice, I’d much rather be friends with you.”

She smiled, not showing teeth, but not so restrained. “I may be slightly more sociable.”

“And a good deal more clever. And you know how to match your stockings with your outfit without even the help of a butler.” He wasn’t sure to what extent he could get away with bad-mouthing Lizzie’s fiance, but in the service of — entirely true — compliments, it couldn’t hurt.

“I do think he should take my advice on fashion more. Everything he wears is so plain. Look—” she turned behind her to grab something from a pile of garments one of her staff was dutifully carrying. She turned around with an armful of bright clothes. “Wouldn’t this just be so cute on him? I even have the dress to match.”

Alois looked over the outfit— purple, and gaudy to be sure, but Alois had favored gaudy in ways that far surpassed a violet suit. Besides, he could tell it was chosen with care. It was a cooler purple, that would pair well with his eye color and the raven-blue shade of his hair, but with enough warm, pink tones to stand out. Alois wasn’t much of an artist himself, but he understood the basics enough to know that this was a coordinated choice.

“This would suit him very well.” He met her gaze. “Do you paint? You have an eye for color.”

This grin did show teeth, and she immediately flushed and looked away. “On occasion. Mother says— well, there are more important things for me to study. But I like it.”

“You should teach me.” She gave a small shake of her head, downplaying. “No, I’d appreciate it. Would give me something to do, when locked away in your fiance’s home for months at a time,” he bemoaned, leaning dramatically back against a shelf of cravats. A store clerk shot him a dirty look. He just nodded to Lizzie, as if to say, look who I’m with. The man looked away.

He had missed that kind of power.

“If you don’t mind me asking, Alois,” she started, ignoring his comment entirely as she tested a silk blue neckpiece against his skin tone. “Why are you staying with Ciel? I know you lost your home, but how did you end up here?”

He was half tempted to tell her the truth, just to screw over Ciel. If she’d even believe him. But she was already handing the cravat to the servant carrying the things she wanted to buy for him, and he didn’t want to ruin this with her.

(Purely for the material gain, he thought, watching the servant shuffle around the massive pile of outfits he was holding. Nothing else.)

“He and I worked together on a case, last year,” he lied, the words coming easy. “It’s why I had you all over. I helped him out, then, and he owes me. And I honestly have nowhere else to go — I’m truly a tragic case, you have to understand.”

“I was sorry to hear about your father,” Lizzie offered, sincere in her words, but not exaggerated. She had not known the late Earl Trancy, and barely knew Alois, and it showed, but she was kind, firstly. It did wonders to soothe Alois’ suddenly quite-tight stomach.

“I… Thank you. But we were not close.” Too close, rather, some bitter voice inside him countered, but he told it to shut up. After the staff’s reaction, he wouldn’t be so candid with Elizabeth on the details of that relationship.

“Still. I am lucky, in that regard, but…” She trailed off, a sad look cast at a pair of block-heeled, pointed-toe shoes. “I don’t think Ciel has ever recovered, even a bit, from losing his parents. They were close but I cannot imagine it is easy for anyone.”

Alois didn’t remember his parents. As far as he was concerned, he never had any. Just him and Luka and the occasional passing kindness of strangers. Which, of course he’d had them. Someone to give birth to him. No one who meant more than that, though.

But, honestly, he never had recovered from not having them, had he?

Seeing Alois lost in thought, Lizzie continued, gentle in tone but clearly wanting Alois to return to form, “I do wish you’d met him — both of us! — before. He was such a kind child. Funny too! And he loved stories, and playing games, and would even dress up with me. I can tell you aren’t very fond of him—” He opened her mouth to refute that absolutely correct assumption, but she interrupted. “— no, I know you aren’t, don’t lie. He can be abrasive, so I appreciate the effort you put into getting along. I think he would be a good friend for you, if you give him the chance.”

“I don’t know what life there is for me, outside his manor,” Alois said, unnervingly honest. The sentence has passed through his lips before he gave his brain the chance to check it. “So I figure I have nothing but time to learn to tolerate him.”

Lizzie smiled at him, not full, not entirely honest, but not fake, either. “I think you will,” she offered, and turned back to the display rows.

September 19^th

“She was going to kill me.”

Alois looked up from the book in his lap to see the figure of Ciel Phantomhive, standing in his Alois’ doorway, wringing his hands. Making vague, dramatic statements. At midnight.

Alois lazily raised an eyebrow, having just enough curiosity to decide to humor this. “And who would that be?”

Ciel darted his gaze back and forth, across Alois’ room, before stepping in, and finding himself seated across from Alois. On his bed. “Just— a circus performer. No one of note, really. Her family— her troupe were… kidnapping children. Who were then brainwashed and killed. We were supposed to stop them.”

“Ever the hero,” Alois drawled, tapping his fingers over the pages. “And?”

“They attacked our house.” His hands were crossed over his chest, fingers digging to his forearms. Apparently, he’d misconstrued Alois’ ‘And?’ to mean ‘what?’, when he thought it couldn’t be a clearer ‘why are you telling me this?’

Ciel continued, “Not— her. Not her. But the rest. Looking for me, I would suppose. So the staff— killed them. As is their job.” Alois felt his eyebrows furrow, for just a moment. He’d— well, of course he’d known, that that was their job. Protecting the house. No reason they would be as… destructively talented, if not. But hearing it stated so outrightly—

Ciel wasn’t the only one sitting with stiff shoulders.

“She found out that they were dead,” he continued. His tone was careful, almost rehearsed. Alois wondered if it had been. “She figured out it was me— my people, and she was mad, and she had a knife, and she came at Sebastian and I—” He was gripping his forearms so tight his knuckles turned white. “What else was I supposed to do?”

“Was she your friend?” Alois asked. Ciel was, as always, something slightly incomprehensible to Alois, but he could make fair guesses at why this death, as opposed to all the others the boy had caused, would rattle him so much, even presumably months later. “Or a child? Both?”

“I—” Ciel flushed, just a bit, and it seemed Alois had hit on something. “She was older than I was.”

“By much?”

He looked away, eyes cast down at his hands, gripping onto the quilt so tight they knuckles paled. “I don’t think so.” He huffed and looked back up at Alois. “And we weren’t friends. I don’t have— We weren’t friends.” Alois didn’t respond. He had begun to get a sense of when Ciel had more to say, and he did: “She was… kind to me. We roomed together. I liked—” He tightened his fist around the fabric, then let go. “It was all a ruse. Probably. She was— a bad person. I was doing the right thing.”

“You seem convinced.” Ciel’s already pink face went red, and he turned his head away. The low light favored his left side and, with the movement, his entire face was cast in shadow. But Ciel wasn’t particularly good at hiding anything, Alois had found, with or with facial expression. “Not that I don’t appreciate being audience to the run down of your morally just murders—” Ciel’s shoulders stiffened. “— Or maybe being the priest at your confessional? Regardless, you don’t often stop by, and I’m wondering why you found this to be the time for it.”

Ciel turned just far enough that his furrowed brow and the curve of his sneer caught the light. “I’m trying to answer your question.”

Oh. He was halfway through the puzzle Ciel had laid before him, but — despite the slight chest-tight feeling Alois was not keen on admitting — he wasn’t kind. He would not relieve Ciel of this confession. “Which question would that be? You’ve not been very forthcoming on any, historically.”

Ciel pressed his lips into a flat line, and Alois wondered if he might give this up entirely. Alois supposed, it wouldn’t matter much, he’d already pieced it together, more or less.

But the confirmation…

“I was going to kill you,” Ciel said, back to poised, back to rehearsed. “Have Sebastian kill you, technically. But looking at you, I kept… thinking about her. I felt sick. I couldn’t— I didn’t want to do it. So I didn’t.” He made eye contact, sharp and fast, with Alois, single eye wide and dark. “It wasn’t about you. Killing you wasn’t worth my discomfort. It costs me nothing to let you live.”

Well.

It made sense.

Of course, everything Ciel said was buried behind twenty layers of self-deception and guilty-conscience lies. But Alois had been right. That was all there was to it: a kid with a God complex and a refusal to take responsibility for the hurt he’d caused. Alois was just lucky to be far enough down the line of Ciel’s victims that some twinge of guilt had finally kicked in.

Hell, that poor girl.

“Don’t talk like it’s better to not feel guilt about it,” Alois said, unwilling to thank him for the information. He kept a bit of mocking to the tone, but there was something softer in it, too, that he couldn’t force out.

Goddammit, if was feeling sympathy—

“You should feel guilty about it,” Alois continued, not dwelling on the tight-in-his-chest. “You killed someone who was not a match for you, who did nothing but treat you kindly and try to avenge the family you killed—” He thought, briefly, of Hannah and Claude and the triplets. What might have become of him, if he’d had more love for them than he had cowardice. “—but you already know that, all your vague bullshit aside. That’s why you didn’t kill me.

“I’m not going to rehash our months old conversation, though none of it seemed to sink in. I’ll just say, again, you aren’t weak cause you’re unwilling to kill a kid who’s no match for you, even if they’ve done you some wrong. Christains would say some shit about the value of forgiveness, but that’s nothing to me. However you spin it, killing a helpless kid is always bad. Choosing not to do it again? That’s a good thing.”

Ciel narrowed his eyes, fingers still digging into his arms. “Because it let you live?”

“Because it let a person live.”

Ciel didn’t say anything, in turn. Just curled his knees up to his chest, wrapped his arms around his legs, and looked down. Alois had half expected to leave, or fight back, or anything. But he didn’t.

He really looked pathetic.

Bur Alois was not going to pity him. He simply wasn’t. The kid was a prick, who would’ve willingly killed him if it wasn’t for a scrap of a conscience still holding tight. Sure, he was constantly under the influence of a fucking demon, the summoning of whom wasn’t really his fault, and most of his actions are the result of filling what would be a morally-questionable role for an adult, let alone a child — but that didn’t matter. He killed a kid! A friend! He was a reputable bastard, who didn’t deserve redemption!

Like Alois.

And, like Alois, he was also alone.

“Thank you, I suppose,” Alois offered, every rational thought in his head screaming at him to not indulge Ciel. To value his bitter convictions above a moment of empathy. “For telling me.”

Ciel sat up a little straighter. “Just to stop you asking.” (Alois, honestly, had not asked in months.) “...You’re welcome.”

It was quiet again. Alois was hoping Ciel would just stand and leave, as he had just enough tact to not immediately kick him out, after all that. There wasn’t anywhere for them to go from there, as far as Alois was concerned, but apparently, Ciel was concerned otherwise.

“What are you reading?” Ciel asked, simple as anything, simple as if he hadn’t just admitted to taking demonic aim at a child and pulling the trigger. Again, incomprehensible.

After a moment of deliberating, Alois held up the book so its cover faced Ciel, and tersely answered, “In a Glass Darkly.” When there was no outward reaction, he rolled his eyes and clarified, “Gothic horror short stories.”

Ciel’s brow furrowed, just slightly. “I didn’t know you read.”

“Of course I read. There isn’t anything else to do here.” Then, shrugging, “Besides, it’s good. Do you read? Anything besides your, bloody, case reports, or whatever it is for your Watchbitch assignments.”

Ciel lifted his chin. “I don’t often have time, but sure.” A beat. “I’ll read that when your done with it.”

Alois raised his eyebrows. “Will you?”

“It’s my book. I’m assuming you didn’t go buy it yourself, you must have got it from here.”

Alois scoffed. “Well, I hope you know I’m taking my time.” Something about Ciel, still all curled-up into himself, asking Alois about his bloody reading habits, made him pause, offer, “Frankenstein is on my shelf, if you want something until then. That is, if horror isn’t beyond you.”

Ciel frowned, but stood, finally, stomping over to the other side of the room to pick up the novel. And then, instead of departing with Alois’ get out of my room present, he returned to the bed, sat back in his place, and opened the book.

Alois watched him for a long moment, but Ciel didn’t look up from the pages. Didn’t say a word. Just settled into the mattress, with no sign of intention to leave.

If this was just how it was—

Alois allowed himself a slight roll of the eyes, then shifted In a Glass Darkly into his lap, drawing his finger down the page until he found where he left off. And he read.

Some things were just incomprehensible.

September 30^th

“Here,” Alois called, standing in the foyer of Ciel’s room, just before tossing the book onto the boy’s bed. “I’ve finished.”

Ciel looked up from his own book at Alois, then at the novel a foot to his left, then back at Alois. “Well, I haven’t. With The Modern Prometheus.”

“It’s Frankenstein, prick. You call Twelfth Night, ‘What You Will’?”

Ciel wrinkled his nose. “I’m not much for Shakespeare.”

Alois leaned on the doorframe, since it seemed this was, somewhat, of a conversation. “It’s better performed, and I’ve never seen you near a theatre.”

“I’m busy.”

“Be less busy,” Alois offered. Something about this back-and-forth, though not in any measure kind, didn’t seem to carry the same malice as most of their previous. They hadn’t talked much, since Ciel inexplicably spent a solid hour in Alois’ room, silent except for the flip of pages. But it wasn’t a hateful lack of conversation. Just… Nothing. “I’ll ask Lizzie. Perhaps she’ll invite me to a live show.”

“She does like performances,” Ciel offered, seeming unconcerned with the topic of his fiance-cousin, for once. Which was fine with Alois. “I do, too. Not Shakespeare.”

“I would’ve figured it would well-suit your dramatic tendencies.” Ciel shot him a glare but, if Alois wasn’t losing it entirely, there was something almost like an upward quirk of the lips in his expression.

This was getting far too friendly.

“Do you have Dracula?” Alois hurried out, the question he’d come here to ask, in the first place.

Ciel tilted his head to the side, slightly. “What?”

“A book about vampires? You’ll read ‘Carmilla’ in In a Glass Darkly. Apparently, Dracula is a new depiction of that sort of creature; similar, though.” Ciel’s gaze flitted down to In a Glass Darkly, as if he would absorb “Carmilla” with a glance. “It was released last year, so you’d likely know if you had it.”

“Have one of the staff pick it up when they head into town,” Ciel offered.

Alois groaned. “That could take days, what am I supposed to do until then?” he asked, like that was something Ciel cared about. Like he was a friend who would fix that. What the fuck was wrong with him?

“I was thinking about that.” Oh God. If both of them were going to be doing this— “You should start attending lessons.”

Alois scoffed. “Why?”

“Unless you want to spend your entire life in a spare room of my manor, you should probably have an education beyond age fourteen.”

“I didn’t start to have an education until at least age twelve,” Alois countered. Despite that he, honestly, wasn’t unhappy with the idea. He’d learned how to read and scraped together a few bits of knowledge from his time at the Trancy manor and with Claude, but he wouldn’t call himself in any way educated. He just might like to be.

“But,” he continued, “to your point, I don’t want to spend my time on useless things like your violin lessons or whatever makes that weekly screeching sound.”

Ciel, the child, threw a goddamn pillow at him. This might be a bigger offense, Alois thought, if it weren’t the smallest of a near dozen of cushions strewn across the bed. “I wouldn’t buy you a violin, let alone listen to you play it. Just, learn arithmetic. Economics. Basic things.”

“Sounds indescribably boring.” He thought back to what he’d said to Lizzie, the no-plans he had for his life. He didn’t want to live in a stasis forever. He wanted to know things. He sighed, as if relenting to a large chore. “Fine. I’ll go. Have your bitch fetch me when it’s time.”

Alois half-turned away, but still caught Ciel rolling his eyes. Small, and petty, and far more in-line with Alois’ mannerisms than his own. Like he’d picked them up from him.

Dammit.

“Read the book,” Alois said, in order to not say ‘goodnight’.

October 27^th

“Alois.”

“What.” Alois didn’t look up from the pages of his book, resolutely ignoring Ciel’s gaze, boring into the side of his face. These constant fucking distractions were putting Alois behind on his reading; he was barely two chapters into Dorian Gray, and Ciel was nearly done with the Poe collection.

“I’ve finished.” Well, scratch the ‘nearly’ from that earlier statement. Alois sighed, defeated, and looked over to where Ciel was lying propped against the headboard, book in his lap, with an expression Alois would maybe describe as smug, if Ciel ever deigned to have emotions.

“Congratulations,” Alois deadpanned. He’d been trying to stay at least a book ahead of Ciel, but waiting for Dracula had set him back a few days and, not to mention, only one of them had known how to read for longer than three years, and it wasn’t Alois. Honestly, he knew he would’ve fallen behind even faster, were it not for the hours he and Ciel had taken to sitting in the same room, just reading, quiet besides with the occasional interjected back-and-forths about the text.

It was weird. They didn’t talk about it, outside of it.

Ciel was still looking at him, not carrying the conversation, so Alois just rolled his eyes. “I’m not finished with Dorian Gray, and I’m not giving it to you until I am, so find something else.”

Ciel pursed his lips. “You’ve only just started.”

“Observant.”

“Just let me read it with you.” Alois raised an eyebrow. Ciel sat up and shifted over until he was next to Alois, hand on the book, their knees brushing in the middle. “You won’t have to revisit much, if we go from the beginning. I’ll read along with you.”

“Isn’t that too much cooperation for you?” It was for Alois, when it was with Ciel. The past few months, with their reading together, sharing Ciel’s lessons, playing cards, were a far cry from the hostile environment he first encountered here, but this — knees brushing, hands close on the page, co-reading a goddamn book — was, inarguably, friendship.

Alois thought Ciel was an annoying prick. Did, still, in the present. He didn’t like Ciel, and Ciel didn’t like him. They weren’t supposed to be friends.

Dammit. Dammit.

“Hush. It’ll be fine.” Ciel pushed Alois’ hand away to rifle through and flip back to the beginning pages, without asking Alois’ permission, on the book he was supposed to be reading. And Ciel tilted his chin to the side, to look Alois in the face. “It is fine, right?”

God. Dammit.

Alois scoffed, and looked away.

“Fine.”

November 17^th

“Mr. Trancy.”

Alois didn’t look up from the bowl of popcorn in his lap, legs kicked up to rest on the desk. “Mr. Michaelis.” If that was his surname. He’d heard it in passing— he had no way, and no desire, to be sure.

Eventually, Alois lazily glanced upwards. The demon was staring him down, thin arms crossed over his chest and gaze precise through those fucking glasses. (He was a demon, why would he need glasses?) (He looked like Claude, wearing them.) (Alois’ stomach was tight.)

“Must you eat during lessons?” Sebastian asked, looking no more happy to be talking to Alois than Alois was, talking to him.

“Yeah, actually,” Alois answered, throwing a piece of popcorn and catching it between his teeth. No point dwelling on tight-stomachs. “Medical necessity. My doctor gave it to me.” The demon didn't even blink an acknowledgement. “Baldroy. You know, the person who patched me up when I was near bleeding to death and no one cared to drop me off at an actual professional?” Alois waved the hand on which there was, finally, nothing more than a thin white line of a scar. “Besides, half the class isn’t here yet. Can’t have a lesson without the one fucking person who’s actually a student.”

Sebastian tapped his finger on his arm, idly. Narrowed eyes. Goddamn spectacles. “On the topic.” Alois gestured, lazily, for Sebastian to go on. “I think Ciel is suffering under your influence.”

Alois’ eyebrows raised, and he just gawked at Sebastian for a moment. Because… fucking what? “Alright?” He said, hands raised. “Look, I don’t give a damn about your approval, and honestly I don’t know why you give a damn about my ‘influence’. What does it matter to you, who your food is friends with?” It was a good jab, Alois thought, but something about it, the finality of Ciel’s fate struck a chord in him. But that was a good ways off. He could deal with it later.

Sebastian blinked. The vaguely-disappointed expression stayed. Alois wondered if his facial muscles were even fit to make any other look. “I was referring to the swearing I am worried he might pick up. Along with your other… affectations.” Which answered none of what Alois had actually asked.

Alois tossed a piece of popcorn into the air and tilted his head back to catch it in his mouth. “Don’t worry, he’s still perfectly goddamn civil in speech, even with me, and I call him a prick every other word.” Then, shifting gears, he set the bowl to the side. He kicked his feet off the table and leaned forward to rest his tilted-head on his clasped hands, looking up at Sebastian through long eyelashes. Small smile on his lips. (Stomach ever tighter.) “As for the affectations,” he reached up, before Sebastian could move away, and twirled his finger around the dangling glasses-chain the demon was wearing. Made his voice low and feminine and honey-sweet. “Not a clue what you’re talking about.”

Just as Sebastian seemed to realize Alois’ play and start backwards, Alois yanked on the chain, hard. Between the two of them, there was enough force to snap one of the links, the fucking glasses falling away into Alois’ hand. Victory. Alois managed just a moment of pride before Sebastian grabbed Alois’ wrist in a hold so tight he thought his bones might just shatter in grasp. “Don’t—” he started, voice controlled but lower, more from his throat, and Alois didn’t want to hear any more of it.

“Do I threaten you?” Alois asked, voice bolder than his mind was and quite a bit more foolish. “Are you a demon scared of a teenage whore?” Alois laughed. “I’m not intimidated by you.” It wasn’t true, not fully — because there was no antidote to watching someone kill everyone who had cared for you, as fake as that care all was, not to mention fucking resemblance — but it was far more true now than it had been. Because, quite simply — “Unlike everyone else, I both know what you are, and I live not in service to Ciel. And I threaten you. Cause I have influence over him, because I’m his fucking friend. You? You’re his dog.”

Sebastian’s expression did not change, he outwardly did not react in the slightest, but his grip on Alois’ wrist tightened. Alois’ hand went white. “I would choose your words very carefully, Mr. Trancy.”

Alois laughed again, this time a bit more manic, more frantic. “Or what? You can’t kill me. Not once he’s told you not to.” He was smiling, eyes wide, the glasses-chain held so tight in his hand it would leave imprints in the skin. “You’re so fucking inconsequential to me. You won’t help me and you can’t hurt me, so do not tell me what to do, do not fucking threaten me with shit you cannot follow through on. You’re at the beck and call of a bloody child. A child, who happens to like me.” Sebastian’s lip was just slightly curled, a deviation in expression miniscule in the long run, but Alois thought he might just try to kill him anyway. But Alois wasn’t done. He wrenched his hand out of Sebastian’s grip, and held up the chain. “Go fetch, bitch,” he hissed, and threw the glasses across the room.

And someone laughed.

Sebastian looked up, away from Alois, who immediately turned his head to look behind him, towards the sound. To see, book under his arm and hand over his mouth, Ciel goddamn Phantomhive.

Who had just laughed.

He looked somewhere between terrified and mortified, as his hand fell from his mouth and he walked, head down, to sit in the chair next to Alois’. Alois quickly flitted his gaze to Sebastian, to see the man regaining his posture and breathing slowly out. Not fetching his glasses because, as was fucking obvious, he didn’t actually need them, and just wore them to be a prick.

Fuck him. Alois had a far more interesting topic to explore.

“Did I just make you laugh?” Alois asked, low hushed tone and head leaned towards Ciel.

Ciel scoffed and looked away. “Absolutely not.”

“No, I think I did actually.” He put the bowl of popcorn up on the table, pushing it close to Ciel in offering. And because, again, fuck Sebastian. “I don’t know if I’ve ever heard you laugh before.”

“You still haven’t,” Ciel insisted, but without a drop of malice behind it. Then, leaning towards Alois, “Sebastian is going to kill you.”

“Nah. You won’t let him.”

Ciel shot him a glare — this was the old back-and-forth — but didn’t negate it. “I don’t know if I even could.”

“He’s a bitch. I’m not scared of him.”

“I’ve heard.” Then, without meeting Alois’ eyes, “So, ‘friend’?”

Alois huffed out a breath, but couldn’t hide the warmth in his face. He’d been banking on Ciel’s arrival having occurred after that particular admission. “Don’t flatter yourself.” But Ciel merely took some popcorn from the bowl, looked Alois in the eye, and, just barely, smiled.

Goddammit.

Chapter Text

“Ciel,” Alois hissed, knuckles rapping on the wood panel. “Lord bloody Phantomhive, open your door this instance.”

Alois was fully prepared to invade the boy’s privacy entirely and walk straight in — something Ciel seldom had qualms doing to him — but before he could grab the doorknob, he heard the soft plod of socks-on-woodpanel. A moment later, the door opened, revealing a nightgowned, sleepy-eyed, and definitively grumpy Ciel.

“What is it?” he asked, hands crossed over his chest and making an expression not-unlike a pout.

Alois looked at him, eyebrows raised, for a moment. Then grinned. “Happy birthday, your Lordship.”

Ciel was doing his damndest to look unimpressed, but even in the low light Alois could see the slight upturn of his mouth and the pink of his face. “Did you wake me at midnight for that?”

Alois returned Ciel’s earlier pout with twice the gravitas. “Is that any way to treat someone who comes bearing gifts?”

“You got me something?” His uncovered eye was so damn wide. Newly fourteen, and still such a kid.

“Of course.” Alois lifted the bag he’d been hiding behind the doorframe. Ciel reached for it, but Alois, lavishing in his height, held it above where he could reach. “Ah! Not here. Can’t celebrate in your doorway.”

“If you want to celebrate, Lady E— er, Lizzie, is coming over in the afternoon. It’ll certainly be something then.”

Alois scrunched up his face in distaste. “Well, obviously. I’m quite looking forward to it. But until then? You have to celebrate at midnight. Come on.” He started out into the hall, but Ciel didn’t follow. “What?”

“I’m in my bedclothes,” Ciel protested.

Alois rolled his eyes. “I’m not taking you for a night out on the town, the bitch would have a fit. To the roof, no one will see, come on.” Ciel still hesitated. “Do you want your gifts, or not?”

After a moment of Ciel all wrinkled-face and silent, he shrugged, and followed Alois out into the hall. “What do you mean ‘the roof’?” he questioned, walking along Alois’s side and doing a poor job acting like he wasn’t trying to peek inside the gift bag.

“I mean the roof, what else?” Alois traded the bag from one hand to the other, to the clear displeasure of Ciel. “Before it got so damned cold, Mey-rin showed me the stairway up. It’s her writing place.”

“Won’t it be 'so damned cold' now?”

Alois grabbed the sleeve of Ciel’s nightgown and pulled him off to the side, to an innocuous door at the end of the hall. He opened it, and grabbed two coats from where they were hanging on hooks just inside, shoes laid out beneath. “You question me far too much.”

Ciel shoved his arms through the sleeves of the coat, the hurried, unpracticed motions of someone still unaccustomed to dressing himself. Alois was already lacing his boots when Ciel found the ability to speak. “You’ve been planning this?” His voice was half-lost in the fabric of the coat’s high neck.

Alois shrugged. “A bit, yeah.” He caught a barely-there smile in his periphery. “Oh, god, don’t let this go to your head. I just don’t think the party today will be much to your liking, but it will be much to mine, and it won’t be fair for me to be the only one having fun on your birthday.” He pushed the roof door open with his shoulder. “Come on, now. You’re lucky it hasn’t snowed yet.”

The air bit at his face immediately as he opened the door. It was still early enough in the season that it was more wind-chill than actual freezing temperature, but Alois still worried for the longevity of this plan. He’d be fine, sure — he’d survived harsher winters, even if the last few had him accustomed to heat and hearth — but for Ciel’s delicate sensibilities…

“Here, then?” he asked, gesturing to a flat piece of roof that overlooked the gardens, just barely lit by lantern-lined pathways. The sky above was a marbled pattern of star-void and clouds, the moon half-full and bright. Alois wasn’t keen on admitting it, and damn if he’d ever go in for studying it, but he did like the stars. Some things are just pretty.

Ciel shrugged, but sat down next to him regardless. “You have me on a roof in the cold, can I have my things now?”

“Gifts, Ciel. You’re welcome.” Alois rifled through the bag to his left. “First, this is more a gift for both of us, but—” He pulled out a few glass bottles and handed one to Ciel. “Celebration, yeah?”

Ciel held the bottle daintily, like it was a foreign thing he’d hoped to study for some case. “Is this alcohol?” He wrinkled his nose. “Where’d you get this?”

“Baldroy,” Alois answered, easily. “Rules stand: no stepping off the property, no drinking alone, no tattling to the bitch. He promised he’d know, if we broke any, and I have reason to believe it.”

Ciel seemed doubtful. “Do you drink?”

Alois shrugged. “I have.” Wine and parties, champagne bubbles that moved fast and frenzied on his tongue like fingers under his shirt, the heavy scent of vodka on some rich dignitary’s breath— but that was not this. This was he and Ciel. No drinking alone, was the rule, but the other was no drinking with strangers. “It can be fun.” But his was not the only hesitation. “You don’t have to drink it if you don’t want to.”

“I suppose I’ll try.” He raised a hand to the bottlecap, then paused, then curled his fingers back into a fist. Alois raised an eyebrow. “Can you open this?”

“I… can’t.”

They stared at each other for a moment.

“We should get—”

“Let’s ask Baldroy to—”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah.”

Ten minutes, two bottle-opener tutorials, one very bleary-eyed chef, and a single, nearly-ignored “happy birthday, kid,” later, Alois figured he and Ciel had a pretty good handle on everything. In thanks, he didn’t even complain when Baldroy patted him lightly on the shoulder and insisted, “seriously, if y’all step an inch off this property, I’ll know, and they’ll be no more of this, got it?”

They got it.

Laying back on the rooftop, his breath white swirls in the air, Alois raised his open bottle to Ciel’s. “Cheers.” Ciel rolled his eye, but still clinked glass to glass. Alois watched as he took a sip, small by the look of it, and immediately winced away from the flavor. Alois laughed.

Then, he tried his own.

And immediately recoiled.

Goddamn, no wonder rich people didn’t drink this.

Ciel shifted so he was lying on his back, looking up at the sky. White curl breath. He scratched at the skin around his eye, just under the patch.

“You don’t have to keep that on, you know.”

“Hm?”

“The eyepatch. I know you have a demon eye, and I don’t give a damn.” He laughed, and took another sip. “Unless it’s keeping your eyesocket warm.”

Ciel frowned. “What if Baldroy comes back?”

“The man was dead on his feet, you think he’s going to wander out into the cold? Besides, they know. It’s been years, right?, they have to know.”

Ciel scoffed. “You might be overestimating them.”

“Don’t be a prick, I’m trying to enjoy your company.” Fucked up, though, the fact that he actually was. Enjoying the company. “All of them, even Finny, have seen enough of the world to know it’s bizarre and unreal, and they’re going to believe you’re exempt from that?” He nudged Ciel’s shoulder with his. “Don’t take it off if you don’t want, but, not for their sake.”

Ciel took another sip, bigger now, and winced again. And nothing, for a moment. Then, he pushed up onto an elbow and untied the strap holding the tan eyepatch in place. The purple eye still had a pale glow to it, in the night-dark. Pretty, for a killswitch. Of course Ciel would end up with the aesthetically perfect contract seal.

Alois’s had been on his tongue.

There was a tap on his shoulder. Alois turned his face Ciel’s way. “Yes?”

“You said ‘gifts’, plural?” The eye really was glowing. Maybe a sparkle.

Alois shook his head. “Slow down, Lord Phantomhive. We’ll get there.” He took a sip, feeling Ciel’s expectant gaze on him. “Fine.” He sat up and went for the bag.

“Alright, here’s a joint gift,” he continued, rifling through. “Lizzie and her family have an actual gift for you, I’m told, but she said you wouldn’t take this from her, so I had to try. We picked it out. Don’t be a bitch about the color.” Alois handed him a small package wrapped in parchment. He and Lizzie had come to the sad conclusion that getting Ciel in a purple suit was doomed to be a fruitless endeavor, but they managed to find something a little more simple.

The parchment crackled beneath Ciel’s hands as he didn’t so much tear it open, but work just slow enough to retain the dignity he would’ve lost if he did. The folding of the paper unveiled of a thin strip of fabric - to be used as a necktie - and matching gloves in the same understated purple.

“You know Lizzie paints?” Ciel didn’t look up from the gift, but nodded. “She’s really good at all that color shit, there’s something in there about matching your eye and the blue undertones of your hair… Far as I’m concerned I’d just like you to look a touch less fucking boring.”

Ciel shook his head, but Alois caught a glimpse of a smile. “Thank you. And her too.”

“You should wear them today. It will delight her.”

“I think Sebastian’s already picked something out.”

“Oh, fuck Sebastian.” Alois kicked Ciel’s foot, and the kid scoffed. “You’re his boss. You could make him wear purple, or bright green, or whatever, and he’d have to, and it would honestly be an improvement. He should be grateful you don’t.”

Ciel shook his head, half-smile. “I suppose.” He put the accoutrement down next to him. “I’ll wear it, if it’ll make you happy.”

Alois immediately caught the wording and smiled as shit-eating as he could manage. “Oh gosh, Ciel Phantomhive cares what makes me happy?”

“Collective you, Alois.”

“No, stop, I’m already swooning.” He pressed the back of a hand to his forehead and leaned far enough that he collapsed back onto the roof. He heard the tight-breathing indication of Ciel trying not to laugh.

It died down, soon, and then it was just them, lying flat on a roof. Ciel’s fingers tapped unevenly on the cold ground. Anxious. Alois let him stew in it for a moment, before: “Oh, and there is one last thing.”

Ciel sat up instantly.

“This is just from me, don’t be... weird.” He emptied the bag, for one more rectangular, less finely-wrapped parcel, and handed it over without looking him directly in the eye. It wasn’t the most inconspicuous shape, so surely he knew already. Ciel unwrapped it slowly.

“I haven’t read it,” Alois offered, as some means of explanation, as Ciel uncovered the title. “It’s new, apparently all the rage in the Gothic circles. I asked the lady at the bookshop. I thought you’d—”

“Thank you.” Oh god, Ciel was actually smiling, flipping through the beginning pages. When had they gotten to this point? “We can read it together.”

“I— Yes, I suppose we could.” Why the fuck did anyone keep around friends, when it was on occasion this embarrassing?

Probably for the reading together, his stupid, sentimental brain immediately answered.

Bullshit.

Desperate to turn from this odd corner of sentiment they had found themselves in, Alois sat up and nudged Ciel with a shoulder. “I’ve heard it’s a bit of romance, too. In, you know, the gothic way. If you can handle that.”

Ciel glared, flush high in his cheeks. “I think I’ll manage.”

“Wouldn’t want your virtue getting marred.”

“I don’t see what all the big deal is about, honestly.”

“Not like you’d know.” Alois paused. “Or, would you? Have you? Not, like, fucked anyone. But kissed even? Your cousin, or some other affair…”

“Like I said, I don’t see the big deal.” The flush hadn’t dropped in the slightest. “No, I haven’t.”

“Yeah, I figured—” Halfway into a quip, Alois’s brain caught up to his mouth, with a consideration he’s never broached. Huh. “I… I haven’t, either. Kissed anyone, that is.”

Ciel raised his brow, unbelieving.

“I haven’t.” Ciel still looked unconvinced, and Alois felt his face heat up. Stupid. “They had better uses for my mouth, alright?” he snapped, aiming for flippant, and could immediately tell how far by which he’d missed that mark. Ciel’s raised eyebrows went furrowed. Alois scoffed. “Whatever.”

Ciel looked at him for another long moment, then away. If he was good for anything, it was his willingness to drop things Alois didn’t want to talk about. “It’s been almost a year,” he commented, after what must have been a full minute. “That you’ve been here.”

“No, definitely not.” He’d never known what month it was, the first ten or so years of his life. It wasn’t a habit he’d picked up, really, but it was certainly not December when he first arrived here. “It’s gotta be another month or two.”

“That’s almost a year.” Ciel turned his head to look directly at Alois. “Have you… gone out, to find any men, since then?”

Alois blinked. “No.” Ciel didn’t say anything. “I could if I liked. It’s just too much trouble getting off this goddamn estate.” Beat. “Baldroy would notice. And Mey-rin. They’d be…” Disappointed. Angry, but not with him. Empathetic with a pain he didn’t fucking have, he didn’t. “It would be a whole ordeal.”

“Alright,” Ciel answered, plainly.

“Alright.”

…

Enough of that.

Alois pushed up off the ground. “God, don’t get all mopey on me when I’m trying to throw you a party. Drink another beer and stand up.” Ciel undid the lid to a second bottle with the opener, taking far less time this go around, and downed another sip before righting himself next to Alois.

“Standing,” he observed, a bit snippish. “What for?”

“‘What for’—” Alois answered, snatching the bottle from Ciel’s grasp and taking a long, heavy sip. There was something about Ciel’s gaze, Alois thought, without the eyepatch. It seemed a lot more like he was looking at him. “For the fact that nobody has a fucking party lying on the roof. Come on, have we read a single novel where anybody’s grand day was celebrated by moping about, talking about Gothic Romance?”

Ciel took his beer back and, in some act of penance, perhaps, he opened a second bottle for Alois. “No, that’s more for the casual conversation of friends, over a painting, before one kills the other…”

“Friends?” Alois scoffed, took the bottle offered to him. “Lovers, more like.” Ciel didn’t look nearly as surprised as Alois had expected, or hoped, but he was relishing in the being right. “Or did you think Oscar Wilde was that kind of friendly?”

“Wilde’s a queer?” Ciel asked. But there was no nose-wrinkle or harsh tone, nor any genuine sort of curiosity. Just the same dull, apathetic tone as when he’s asked the same exact thing about Alois.

“Yes, a real one, too.”

He took another heavy drink from out of the bottle. Then, like the bitch he was, grabbed Alois’ drink and had a sip of that as well. “What makes one queer any more real than the next?”

Alois took his bottle back. “The men who fucked me weren’t queer. A queer likes men. Those men didn’t want me because I was a man, they wanted me because I was a child.”

Ciel blinked. “Oh.” Shrugged. “Well, it seems they’re the issue, then. Not the queers.”

Alois scoffed. “Thanks, Lord Phantomhive.”

“I really don’t mind,” he said, and seemed true with it, carefully watching the swirl of drink in his bottle. “That you’re… like that.”

“Well, I’m so relieved,” Alois drawled. He tried to find it in him to be annoyed, but, for better or far fucking worse, he sort of got Ciel now. And it really was fine. “I was about to change up the basis of myself, for you, but since you don’t mind.”

Ciel eyed him, but Alois caught the quick upturned corner to his mouth, and figured it was more comfortable than the whole smile, anyway. “Would that have been another birthday gift?”

“Oh, piss off.”

“Probably for the best,” Ciel mused. “At least you’re not trying to run away with Elizabeth this way.”

“Do not feel so secure in that. I don’t have to fancy girls to see what a catch she is, and she and I will be eloping any day now.”

“And leave the manor?”

“Don’t sound so excited.”

“It was more a comment on your stubborn desire to stick around, that I doubt she’ll challenge.”

“With the fabulous wealth she offers? I don’t know, Ciel. You’ll have to do far greater work to woo me if you’d like to keep me around.” Hand over his heart,he leaned into Ciel’s space, bottle nearly clinking against his. Alois kept the eye contact for a moment before it was broken, Ciel leaning out and away with a snort and a roll of the eyes. And a slight flush to his face. “But really, I have to ask, the cousin thing — it doesn’t, like,” he made a face, “eek you out at all?”

Ciel shrugged. “It’s really just how we do things. It isn’t like—” He ran his finger around the rim of the bottle, not looking at Alois. “I’m not in love with her. I don’t necessarily plan to be. But I like her well enough, and we got on well when we were kids, and she’s already family, so why not make one with her?”

Alois blinked. “Ciel, you know ‘making a family’ involves—”

“I know!” Ciel interrupted, the flush rising again. He downed what looked like the rest of his bottle, perhaps in an effort to hide it. “I don’t need to think about that now. Don’t want to. Or talk about it.”

“I don’t want to talk about it either!” He could hear his voice, a bit too loud in his ears, and thought maybe some of the beer might be kicking in, and wondered if it might be advisable to stop Ciel from opening this third to start. “I have no interest in any of that business, about you or Lizzie, and certainly not together.”

“No, but you have plenty of interest in things that make me uncomfortable!”

“Well, Ciel, that isn’t exactly a short list.” He finished the bottle he was drinking and turned down the bottle Ciel (still) offered him, with a wave of a hand. He waited until Ciel meandered back to his side. Alois eyed him for a moment. “Sorry. I don’t mean to actually, you know, make you uncomfortable. Only a bit. When you deserve it.”

Ciel made a noble attempt at a raised brow. “Are you going to get nice when you’re drunk?”

“No. Beer does not a miracle make.” For due diligence, he clinked his empty bottle against Ciel’s new one. “I’m incurably malicious, it seems.”

“You are.” Ciel looked halfway to a grin, wide eyes catching moonlight and staring straight at him. “Bitch.”

“Fop.”

Ciel looked at him, unimpressed, and managed to hold the expression for a solid second or two before turning away with a laugh, which Alois caught all too quick. Pressing a hand to his forehead, he stumbled backwards, nearly toppling from that section of sloped roof to the one just below. Ciel caught him, though, hand on his waist, grip firm through the thick coat. To his credit, he was a bit more contained, giggles stored in scant space between them, leaning into Alois as he pulled him up. Alois shut his tearing-up eyes. “Alois.”

He tried to catch his breath. “Yeah?”

“Alois.”

He opened his eyes, “Yeah, Ci—”

He didn’t have clear vision for a second before his line of sight was filled with dark hair and pale skin, far closer than before, and didn’t have a moment to talk before the sound was lost by the very real and strange feeling of lips on his— and hand on his wrist and fingers ‘round his waist, breath and alcohol and the cold outdoors and and and—

His body threw itself back on instinct. Looking up, there was nothing but sky. No one towering over him. In his body, no sense of pain, no sharp unwanted contact. Just memory of mouth-on-mouth, which was new. Some ground untouched. Nothing rising up from some place of his head he’d rather just not exist at all to remember him into a corner. Just Ciel. His friend.

Ciel, who — when he looked down — was looking curiously at him. Blinked. “Sorry,” he offered, genuine but casual, as if he didn’t watch Alois move back feet in a matter of milliseconds. As if he didn’t just kiss Alois.

“Fine,” Alois answered. His hands were shaking, just a bit. He curled them to fists. “Sorry.”

“Fine.” Ciel offered a glance back at Alois. “Because neither of us had before. Why I— So we could both say he had. Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Alois answered. He hadn’t even gotten to questioning why, in all honesty, caught up in trying to see it as it was, working through something as bullshit as gratefulness, that no one had ever kissed him before, that Ciel wouldn't be ruined for him by some sharp remembrance, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.

The awkward quiet left the air thick and heavy, like the feeling in Alois’ throat and behind his eyes, for a moment. For a moment, before he brushed it off. (He was very fucking good at that.) Then, half a laugh and trying to get Ciel to look at him. “So when you said you didn’t mind my being a queer—”

That worked. And turned his face properly crimson. “Because we hadn’t, Alois, don’t—”

“I know, I know.” He reached over and ruffled Ciel’s hair. “The traditional man, I'm sure.” If there was a tightness to the set of Ciel’s mouth, Alois was fine to ignore it. “And one year closer to the man part of that descriptor. Congrats, yeah?”

“Yeah.” Ciel offered him one half-there, still-stiff smile, and clinked their bottles together.

It was fine.

This was fine.

They don’t talk about it.

For all the time he spends, tracing the line of his lips, wondering if Ciel is doing the same, he can never bring himself to air the words. For — he knows full well, now — a kiss is seldom more than a kiss.

The world doesn’t slow down and stop for such petty things.

He left the manor at one in the morning.

He hadn’t had anything to drink — as much as he’d appreciate the warm buzz in the late-December air — so Baldroy couldn’t have shit to say about it. Still, he snuck out, window-trespassing, avoiding the servant’s door. He borrowed a horse. He didn’t know how to ride, not really, but his steed was the sweet mare he’d fed a couple times a week for the past few months, and she liked him enough not to buck him, and that would serve.

He arrived in town.

It went like this:

Streetcorner in the dark.

Breath white in the cold.

A man.

(Lots of men. He didn’t address the tall, thin one with glasses, or the white-haired elder with big hands. He called to one in the middle. Fifteen years older than him, maybe. Brown hair. Scruff. Familiar, in the way all men of that look were familiar.)

It went like this:

Alleyway away from streetlight.

Hands and mouth and sharp, biting fingernails.

Stomach tight and turned.

A kiss.

(A shove. Not harsh. A “look, kid, I don’t fucking kiss.” Alois didn’t like this man calling him ‘kid’.)

It went like this:

A shove. (His own, this time. Harsh.)

A voice calling him “bitch”. (Kid and bitch and all these things that were not his to call Alois.)

Wet eyes and nose and mouth. (He was grateful for the dark).

The mare. The ride home.

The servant’s quarters he didn’t think not to enter through.

The panic. The panic. The tears and tight-chest and fuck fuck he felt home but not safe and what is wrong with him why does he keep doing this and fuck that man and fuck Alois and fuck Ciel and he is so, so—

“Alois?”

Mey-rin stood in front of him. He realized, she’d probably been standing in front of him for a while, if the concern on her face was any metric he felt fit to judge. He realized, she probably already knew. He realized, he was sobbing.

He ran.

It was a half-miracle he made it back to his room without tripping over his feet. His breath felt too large for his lungs; it was trying to get out only to get back in and if she saw him she would know and she would be disappointed and she would tell them and they’d all be so fucking disappointed and sympathetic and think him pathetic and he couldn’t and he can’t and can’t and—

“Alois, can I please come in?” The knocking on the door was gentle, her voice low and warm and quiet and, and, and fuck it, she already knew, and he nodded, even though she couldn’t see, but he didn’t have voice to speak or energy to stand and she always knew and when she came in, it wasn’t a surprise.

She sat at the edge of the bed. She didn’t ask him. She didn’t touch him. She didn’t look him straight on as he continued to sob.

He hugged her.

It was probably too tight. Then again, she could probably handle it. She hugged him back, hand in his hair, some sort of stilted shushing sound as if she, too, was unused to comforting. But it was alright. The air outside had been cold and cold and cold and she was warm.

“I— It’s my fault,” he choked out, the consonants hard on his throat, because it wasn’t fair for him to get this stilted comfort, this attempt at affection, if she didn’t know it was his own doing. “I found— I found the man, not— I wanted to, but then—” he felt her arms tighten around him, and he didn’t want to act like a victim; he wasn’t, he— “Nothing even— nothing even happened, but I didn’t— want it anymore, I didn’t— I don’t—”

“Do you want me to take care of him?” she murmured, hand still in his hair as he curled in his legs so he was all fit her lap. “I can get rid of him.”

There were times he’d missed Claude, Hannah, the triplets, for no reason other than missing the power of having people to do his bidding. People who would kill for him. Mey-rin was willing to kill for him. All he had to do was ask.

And didn’t the man deserve it? Sure, Alois solicited him. But nothing about Alois’ manner or dress could have hid that he was a child. And if this man was willing with Alois, how much would he take from other children? Would Alois not be doing the world a service?

Alois didn’t want to be the boy he was a year ago. He didn’t want to arm his rage with powerful weapons, let it attack unfairly. He didn’t want to be the kind of child so desperate for an ounce of love that he would approach men on the street, willing to sell his comfort away for the feeling of touch— but that one he already was.

Was having this man killed selfish or righteous? Was it a step forward or a step back? Did any of it even matter; would Alois always be this way?

He gripped on tighter to her, felt pathetic as his tears wet her apron, even more so as he choked out an “I don’t know,” — because why was it his decision? Why wasn’t there someone else who could keep men who will go with children off the street? And why the fuck was Alois someone who asked them to go?

“That’s alright,” she promised. “You’re safe here.”

But he wasn’t, really. No one forced him to go out, no one forced him to catch that man’s eye— he was the reason he was curled up and crying.

“I’m never doing that again,” he vowed. “I don’t want— I don’t want it anymore.”

“You don’t have to, anymore.” She pressed a hand to his cheek, like she did, nearly a year ago now, in that bright, loud kitchen. She was like Hannah but she wasn’t— she would not take a thumb in the eye socket, because she was not there due to hunger. She didn’t hold him because she needed to. She did not need to. And yet, she was there because— “We love you, Alois. You’re our family here, do you understand that?”

He cried and shook his head, unsure what he was attempting to negate. Unsure if he wanted this— he hadn’t had a family since Luka, didn’t know why to do with one. Didn’t know what to do with arms that held him of their own volition, with people who vowed to protect him, with card games and in-jokes and family.

“You‘re here,” she repeated, holding him tighter. He cried, and cried, and did not say a word.

“We've got you, Alois. I've got you.”

Chapter Text

“Is that Lady Elizabeth Midford here to see me?”

“Is that Earl Alois Trancy here to meet me?”

Alois heard Ciel huff from behind him. He couldn’t see him, buried as he was in Lizzie’s hug. “I suppose no one’s happy I’m here?”

“It’s the sad life of the cuckold,” Alois shot back, pulling just far out of Lizzie’s embrace to give Ciel a condescending pat on the cheek. “Nothing against you, Ciel, I’m just excited to spend the day with my lover.”

Still leaning into Alois’ side, Lizzie took Ciel’s hand and squeezed it. “Are you sure you have to work, Ciel? We have enough paint for you too.”

“I think his artistic stylings might be more fitting to that horror of a violin,” Alois mock-whispered, just to see Ciel’s eye-roll. And to hear Lizzie’s laugh. “But no, it seems the Queen has another mission that simply couldn’t be handled by, you know, an adult.”

Ciel rolled his eye. He was smiling a bit, too. “Alois—”

“He is going to be fifteen in two months,” Lizzie cut in, all saccharine-soaked sarcasm. “He is practically grown.” She didn’t quite fight down the way the upturn of her last word was halfway to a laugh. She turned into Alois’ arm to hide the expression. “But really, Ciel, couldn’t the bitch, er, the butler take care of it?” Now Alois had to fight down a laugh. For the good of the bit. It would be unprofessional to break early.

“He is not the Queen’s—” Alois raised his eyebrows, and Ciel caught himself, cutting off the words with a huff. “He is not the one in charge.” Then, with a touch of softness around the lines of his mouth: “Enjoy your afternoon. I know Alois has been looking forward to it.”

“As have I,” Lizzie answered. Then, looking to Alois, “I’ve looked at some ideal elopement spots and I can’t wait to hear your thoughts.”

“I’m hoping for an island.”

“I’m hoping you two might ever let up on this joke,” Ciel countered.

“‘Joke’?” Lizzie questioned. Head turned to the side, eyes wide, innocent as anything. Goddammit, Alois did kind of love her.

Ciel narrowed his eyes for a moment. Then, with a scoff, “You two are terrors.”

“We know,” Alois and Lizzie said, in unison.

There was a call from further down the corridor, low enough that Alois had no hope of making it out, but Ciel perked up the way he did, sometimes, at the same moment his eye would spark. Covered now, that eye was, but Alois knew him well enough.

“Go, attend to your watchbitch duties,” Alois shooed him away. “I promise no marriage will occur in your absence.”

Ciel relaxed just to shoot Alois a glare and a sarcastic, “Thanks.”

“Of course!” Lizzie chimed in. “You’re our witness, how could we have the ceremony without?”

Ciel shook his head. “Goodbye, terrors.”

“Bye, Ciel!!”

“Ta, Phantomhive.”

They both watched his Earlship walk out down the hall, till he disappeared around a corner. Then, they both dissolved into giggles, leaning into each other. “Oh, god, Lady Elizabeth. Have you considered going into comedy?”

She tapped her chin. “Oh, only at turns.” Then, turning to the door. “Gardens?”

“Gardens.”

They wandered out of the doors, arms linked while their free hands held onto paints and easels and canvas. The staff had offered help, but Alois would admit to being a bit territorial about his time with her Ladyship. How could he not be? She was a rare commodity, and an adored one.

Immediately upon entering the gardens, Lizzie traded flats and stockings for a more barefoot-in-the-grass approach. Alois laughed. He wouldn’t follow suit — he didn’t share Lizzie’s proclivity for dirt and worms and rocks — but he gladly helped carry the shoes she handed him. It wasn’t long for the carry, either; Lizzie soon dropped the easels unceremoniously in one of the grassy little courtyards, crowded by tall evergreens that nearly blocked out the farther-off trees, in all their red and yellow splendor.

“Here, then?” he questioned, starting to set down his share of the supplies.

“Yes, but no painting yet.” He lifted an eyebrow, and she reached out and grabbed him by both hands, pulling him forward. He went. “I want to walk more. Those just weigh us down.”

Alois huffed, but with no real annoyance. “But I’m still a helpless case with a brush, and my teacher so rarely comes by…”

“And whose fault is that? Not mine, my actions are perfectly proper,” Lizzie questioned, turned from Alois as she watched her footing, dodging around decorative rocks. “You know, my brother despises you.”

“Oh, god, what’d I do?”

“He thinks you’re trying to ruin the family name, that you have ‘foul intentions’ with me,” Lizzie snorted and shook her head. “My brother, he’s kind of cock.”

Alois gasped, faux-shocked and full-delighted. “Elizabeth!”

“Aw, did I offend your delicacy? Oh!” She grabbed Alois by the arm. “Garden snake!” While Alois recoiled, Lizzie ran forward and grabbed the horrible creature in her hands. She turned back to Alois with a grin and a serpent coiled round her arm.

Alois winced. “I thought we damned those things in Eden.”

“No, he’s sweet!” With a bare fingertip and a horrific dearth of fear, she stroked the head of the thing, leaning in to look it in the eyes. “Aren’t you, darling? Don’t listen to Alois, he’s also a cock.”

“Hey!”

“I think I’m going to call you ‘Ciel’,” she told the serpent. It (Alois was not going to call it a ‘he’, even if it shared the name of his friend) had lifted its neck to bump noses with her, and she giggled.

“The real Ciel is going to hate that.”

“Well, this Ciel will be my favorite, and I simply won’t worry about that one!” She trotted back over to Alois and linked his arm through her snake-free elbow. He wasn’t quite keen on being so close to the thing, but he wasn’t given all too much of a choice. “Now, as I was saying, my brother—”

“Are we taking it with us?”

“Of course! Wouldn’t you rather one Ciel than none?”

“I’ve never suggested that in any capacity.”

“Like I was saying,” she pressed on, shoulder nudge and slight smile. “I think my brother just can’t stand that I have friends besides him. And that you might just be better company.” Alois couldn’t help that particular bout of self-satisfaction. “Sure, he makes a whole deal about my ‘virtue’, but that couldn’t be less of an issue.”

This. This froze Alois up a bit.

As it was, he knew he was obvious. He never particularly tried to hide this thing about him; flirting with friends’ ladies was an obvious joke, so he didn’t even have that as a counter, if he even wanted to counter it — he didn’t, because he was fine with people knowing. People had always known. But with Lizzie—

The point was, his shoulders were stiff. “Oh?”

“Well, yeah, I mean—” She paused. “You’re more interested in men, right?”

Alois blinked. Smiled. Didn’t really try to hide anything when he asked, “What would make you say that?” (Because it would be fine. Her knowing. Would be fine.)

She looked him up and down, then met his eyes, incredulous. Ciel the Snake seemed to have a similar lack of belief.

“Appearance isn't everything, Liz.” He gave her a conspiratorial lean. “I have it on good authority that your vehemently not-queer cousin wore a full dress and drag at a ball once.”

"No."

"Yes! Bright pink, frills, the works, makes your gown today look like a slip. He still has it, I could sneak you into see it sometime."

She was laughing, a loud, somewhat-nasal sound that echoed around the garden. It was a far cry from the polite giggle she’d had when they first met. “Oh, god,” she said, wiping at her eyes. “Why does he never tell me any of the good stories?”

“Protecting your virtue?” Alois offered in answer, and she hit in the arm. He groaned, then laughed. “But, in answer. Yeah. Obviously.” It would be fine, it would be. (Stomach-tight). “That fine?”

She looked away from the snake and frowned. “Of course.” Like she couldn’t imagine why it wouldn’t be. Then, with a snort, “My brother, of course, will be overjoyed.”

“I presume because he has a love note with my name on it?”

“Oh, it wouldn’t be a terrible surprise.” She continued on, raising her arms at her side as she neared a small stream. Then, bare-tip-toeing, she stepped over the rocks bridging the twin shores. “I only ask…”

“Yes?” There was hesitance in her voice and, like so much in her mannerisms and styles and humors, Alois recognized himself in it. So he helped her along.

“Because. I think I might be, ah… Much the same way.”

Alois blinked. Once, then twice. “Oh.” And glad it wasn’t a ‘what?’, because, theoretically, he understood that there were men who were queer so, why not women as well, but he’d never really thought… And if queer men like him were girlish, effeminate, shouldn’t a queer lady be something other than Lizzie’s frilly, pretty, feminine self? Something masculine, or tough edged, or of that like?

“That fine?” Her words were a clear echo of his, half-teasing, but nervous, too. Nervous as he had been. The ever-reflecting mirror of him and her.

“Of course. Sorry, I was just— surprised. Sorry.” Then, “Did you just realize?”

She hummed. The snake hissed. It seemed to have taken to mimicking Lizzie. “I think I’ve always had a sense, I’ve liked time with girls more than boys — present earls excluded,” she lifted up Snake Ciel with the comment, and Alois wondered idly how Ciel the boy would feel about it. “But, I always had Ciel — not you, darling — and I really do love him, and I knew he was who I needed to marry, so what did it matter if I wasn’t attracted to him, or any other men? Surely, I was just normal.” She paused. Then, face heated pink and unable to hide a smile, “But now there’s this girl.”

Now, Alois was never one to reject gossip, ever, but something soured his expression, just a bit. Some tight-in-the-chest. Like, oh, god, was he jealous? Must put a stop to that. “Is there, now?”

She laughed, lightly, such that it was almost lost in the width of stream separating them. Alois took a cautious step onto one of the more dry rocks. He really didn’t want to fall in. “Her name is Meriel.”

“Tell me about her.” A small bit of water splashed up and bit the heel of his sock. He grimaced. Uncomfortable as it was, he shook it off, and did a better job ignoring the cool shock than he was the bitter jealousy. That was harder to place — he sure as hell wasn’t attracted to Lizzie, or this hypothetical other girl, but whether he was jealous of Lizzie having someone, or someone else having a greater hold on his friend than him… It was silly, either way. And he was happy for her, too, genuinely.

Focus on that.

“She rides at my stables,” Lizzie said, voice light and dreamy. Alois had never had his voice go like that over anyone. “She wears pants.”

“Nice arse?”

Lizzie’s cackle was high and sharp and wholly unrestrained, like her voice when she answered, “Yes!” She fell back onto the open bed of grass and covered her face with her hands, leaving only her full grin visible. “Oh god, Alois, she’s stunning. She always has her hair tied back, and she told me she wants to cut it short… She would look wonderful.”

Alois, fully over the treacherous stream, took the place next to her in the grass. “She know you fancy her?”

“Oh, I don’t know…” She drew her hands from her face and settled them over her chest, using one to idly pet Ciel (the Queen’s Watchsnake, Alois thought to himself. He’d have to use that one). “We spend a lot of time together. One time we rode around all afternoon, into evening, and I showed her my favorite place by the pond, and we just talked, for hours, and when we stopped to rest, she touched my hand, but—” She huffed. “I was scared. I didn’t know what to do. I think I’m a terrible queer.”

“Oh, you just need practice.”

“Thanks.” She looked over at Alois and smiled. Albeit, rather dejected. “But really. I think she is — queer, that is — but she, she fits all of it. I’m all— frills and pinks and the like, and what if isn’t the kind of woman she wants? She’s so smart, Alois. I don’t know if—”

“Don’t even start.” He swatted at her arm. “You’re the cleverest person I’ve ever met. And if she can’t see that below your massively charming frill, she’s far less astute than you’re making her out to be.” Lizzie shook her head, slightly, but her face was warmed and pink. “Take her for a picnic. Read her some Sappho. Compliment her arse. Three step plan.”

“Oh, fuck off,” she said, lightly. “But. You know. Maybe I will.”

“You should.” He folded his hands behind his head. His outfit would get grass stains, he realized. Nothing to be done about it. “But Ciel — the notably less serpentine — will be crushed.”

She scoffed. “Oh, like he has any right!”

“What, you wouldn’t crushed to find out your cousin was fucking someone else?”

“Don’t do that, you know he’s sensitive about the cousin thing.” She flicked his arm. “Besides, I’ve been dealing with it for months.”

Alois raised an eyebrow. “I think you may be overestimating how many torrid affairs to which your mother’s nephew is invited. That he’s told me, at least.”

“I…” Lizzie furrowed her brow and tilted her head. “Are you not—” She halted, mid-sentence, before pressing her mouth into a tight line and shaking her head. “Sorry, I was under the impression… Nevermind.”

“What?”

“No, no, I was—”

“Lizzie.”

“I thought he and you,” — what — “had a sort of…” She made a hand gesture Alois had no desire to decipher. “You know?”

Alois blinked faster than he perhaps had, ever. He didn’t want to guess what expression his face was making. “I don’t know, actually. What?”

“Well, I’m sorry.” It was far too petulant to be an actual apology. “I just thought— he and you are close.”

“Not in the biblical sense! Jesus.” Then, connecting some more dots. “Did you— did you think I’ve been fucking your cousin for months, all the while not telling you? What kind of friend do you take me for?”

“I didn’t figure you’d gotten to the ‘fucking’ yet, to be fair.” He shot her a look. “He’s the secretive type. I assumed he wouldn’t want you to tell me.”

“He wouldn’t want me to tell you because it isn’t true.” Alois shook his head. Here he was, being all jealous over never loving anyone, when he apparently read like he currently did. “Vehemently not queer, that one.”

She scoffed. “Oh, of course.”

“What, you think Ciel Phantomhive is a queer?”

“That, at least, is obvious.”

“You’re out of your mind, Lizzie.”

She hummed, pseudo-serious. “It’s probably the hysteria.”

“Funny.”

She did laugh a little at that, and Alois hoped that might mean they’d crossed this particular river of conversation. He felt… odd, about it. He didn’t fancy Ciel (honestly, he’d given it some thought, after the whole birthday debacle, and all those thoughts pointed to no, and that was near a year ago, and wholly irrelevant, anyway) and hence had no good reason for the disquiet. But there it was.

So it was entirely unfair for Lizzie to continue, “You don’t see the way he looks at you?”

God, dammit. “What, with toleration? And how long it took to work up to even that?”

“You’re a smart boy, Alois. Surely he’s done something you’ve noticed.”

Alois weighed the scales in his mind. He really was too much of a gossip for secrets. “Oh, fine. So, he did, technically, kiss me once—”

She squawked something that made the neighboring birds mad with jealousy. “And you called me crazy—”

“— but only because neither of us had kissed anyone before. No follow up, or anything. It was just. Being mates.”

“‘Mates’ is a word for it, sure.” After a shake of her head, she reached out to pat his cheek in the same condescending way he’d done to Ciel. “I think there’s not an ounce of hope for you, Trancy.”

“I think you’re too creative for your own good, Midford.”

“And really, you don’t fancy him?”

Alois pouted and tilted his head. “Don’t think my taste that horrendous.”

She snorted. “Apologies.”

“Oh,” he sighed, and rested a hand on his chest. “I’ll find it in my heart to forgive you.”

“You’re getting replaced, you know.”

“I have noticed you trying, actually,” Ciel responded, absentmindedly, not looking up from the pages of his book. “How’s the elopement coming?”

“Wonderfully. We’ve decided on purple for the groomsmen colors, if we can get you in for a suit fitting soon. Plenty of frills need to be coordinated.”

Ciel rolled his eye, lazily. “Elopements don’t have planned wardrobes.”

“Ours will. Lizzie and I never do a thing halfway.” Alois added another blue brushstroke to the piece, working from memory of the garden scene he’d been unable to finish before Lizzie had been shuffled off. “And I wasn’t talking about that, anyway. She found a garden snake. Named it Ciel, and has proclaimed it as her favorite being with the name.”

This got him to look up. “What? Why?”

“You're the one who's known her since birth, how would I know her reasonings?” This earned him a quirk of a grin. “She was heartbroken, leaving the poor serpent behind. It was too. I am sure they’ll find each other again next time she comes over.”

“I thought you two were meant to be painting, not chasing after creatures in the gardens.”

“Phantomhive, do me a favor, and look at my shoes.”

With a long-suffering sigh and a moment to finish the sentence he was reading, Ciel looked where he was told. Then, up to meet Alois’ eye. “They’re shoes. What about it.”

“Do you think these shoes have ever once chased?”

Ciel snorted. Alois counted it as a success. “You are impossible.”

“Like every grand mystery of our world.”

Cue eye-roll. “What are you painting, anyway?”

Alois shifted over as Ciel came to glance over the easel. “I’m not great at the human form, but painting our Lady Midford and the Queen’s Watchsnake —” this got a chuckle out of Ciel, and Alois preened a bit. Someone besides him had to appreciate it. “— was more interesting than plain foliage.”

Ciel hummed and nodded some vague approval. “Well, it’s not terrible.”

“Oh, stop, I’m swooning.”

Ciel shoved him in the shoulder. Alois returned the push. Ciel leaned back, further into Alois’s space, sitting close enough that their outer thighs were pressed flush. “So, you’ll paint snake Ciel and not me?”

Alois, clever as he was, picked up the brush and ran a line of blue over Ciel’s brow and down his nose. “There, painted.” While Ciel sputtered, indignant, Alois wet and wiped off his brush. “Oh, don’t fret. Matches your eye.”

He tried to wipe the paint, and only managed to spread it all around. “I can’t tell if she’s a worse influence on you than you are on her.”

“It’s a horrendous cycle.”

“Terrors,” Ciel muttered. Then, shaking his head, “I need to wash myself up. Not going to vandalize my book like this.”

“Oh, but darling, it looks so lovely on you.”

Ciel scoffed, and turned halfway to the door. His hair caught the window light, the late-day curl of his hair lit up in bright glints. The blue really did match his eye, and the scoff left the corners of his mouth still up-turned, and, honestly, he did, sort of. Look lovely.

…

Oh, fuck no.

Chapter Text

“What are you doing?”

“What,” Alois started, moving nothing but his mouth in order to not unsteady his hand, “does it look like?”

Ciel stopped lingering at the doorway and stepped, cautiously, forward. “It looks like you’re putting makeup on my gardener, but my question was more on the why.”

“We’re going out.” He put down the lip stain and picked up a small cloth to wipe away some errant rouge. He was no artiste, when it came to this particular art form, but, as it turned out, no one else was any better. Baldroy had reportedly done makeup for his sister’s kids, once, but those skills were lacking in practice, and Alois, at least, had some experience painting. “Obviously.”

Baldroy poked his head in from the next room. He was, Alois was fairly certain, aiding Mey-rin with getting dressed. “Don’t worry, kid— uh, young master—”

“Great catch,” Alois cut in, sing-song.

“—We’ve talked to Sebastian already.”

“Does he know where you’re all heading off to?” Ciel questioned, coming around Alois’ back to take a look at Finny, who was now being adorned with some red pigment on the cheeks. “Because I’m supposing it’s nowhere on the books.”

“Nope,” Alois responded, popping the ‘p’ sound. His own makeup wasn’t yet done up, so he didn’t have to worry about smudging. “You going to rat us out?”

“Obviously not.” He sat next to Alois on the bench. Alois thought he should, at this point, be used to how close Ciel tended to sit to him, but, nevertheless, it still set his shoulders straight. “Who’s going?”

“Everyone. Fin, dear, blink.” The gardener obliged. Alois continued on with the mascara application. Finny’d been talking a lot less, and Alois appreciated the dedication to protecting Alois’ work. “It’s Mey-rin’s scene, but me and Finny are tagging along. Baldroy is afraid we’ll get in trouble or that Mey will be too smashed to take us home, so he’s tagging along, like someone with no faith in us,” he raised his voice.

“Alois is right,” Mey-rin corroborated, coming out of the room in a full suit and hair tied back. She cast a half-nervous look at Ciel, before setting her shoulders straight. “I can take care of them.”

“Hey,” Baldroy followed her and bumped her shoulder with his. “You wanna have fun. Not be taking care of some kids. Who, hey, are looking great! You really are good at this makeup thing!”

Alois flushed a bit. He wouldn’t need any added color to his cheeks, at least. “Oh, I’m fine.”

Mey-rin settled a hand on his shoulder. “No, you are very good. I wish I could be more help, I do, but—”

He reached up and squeezed her hand in his. “I don’t mind it. Took barely a moment. See, Finny’s already done. Take a look.”

Finny took the mirror and gasped. Nearly covered his mouth with hands, before catching himself, and tightening his hands to fists. That forethought, however, didn’t stop him from throwing himself recklessly into Alois’ arms once the mirror was set down.

“Thank you Lois!! It looks amazing!”

“You’re very welcome, Finnian, but don’t you dare smudge a bit of it on my shirt or I will be forced to end you.”

Finny laughed. Mostly because he knew well as Alois that there was no way in hell Alois would have a chance. “Sorry! I’ll go put on my dress.”

“Don’t smudge it on that either!”

“I know!”

Finny darted up the stairs, and Alois took a moment to watch him, chuckle, and shake his head. In the moment of turn-chin, he caught Ciel’s eye, and watched him mouth ‘dress?’. Alois rolled his eyes.

“Don’t be such a prude, darling,” he grabbed Ciel’s chin and shook it a bit. Ciel had long since stopped pulling away when Alois did such things; instead, he glared, sans-malice, until Alois got bored and let go. “I’ll be wearing one, too, if you’ll be needing a fainting couch and a warning before I come out.”

“Piss off,” Ciel responded, lacking any bite.

“Hey! Alois, you better not be teaching the young master to swear,” Baldroy offered, passing by on his way to the stairs.

“Why the fuck are you blaming me?” Alois threw back, only for Baldroy to laugh in that deep-chested way of his and ruffle his hair. He was lucky Alois hadn’t done it up yet, or they would have had a problem. “Are you getting the carriage or not?”

“Who’s the driver, here? I’ll take care of it.”

Mey-rin finished the knot in her tie and met Alois’ eye in the mirror. “Are you sure you don’t want any help with your makeup, Alois? It must be difficult, doing it on your own—”

“Thank you, Mey. But I’m alright. Besides, I have Lord Phantomhive himself here to keep me in his charming company.” Ciel was being even more stony faced than characteristic, and it caught Alois off-guard. So much so that he leaned over to stage-whisper, “Ciel, please be a little more charming. Else I’ll look a fool.”

“What carriage are you taking?” Ciel asked.

“Not particularly charming, but ta for the effort.”

Baldroy poked his head back in the room. “Our normal one. Why?”

“That seats four, right? Plus the driver?”

Alois would blame the amount of mental attention he was putting into not smudging his own mascara for how long it took the words to parse and dots to connect. When they did, he laughed. “Are you— sorry, are you trying to come along?”

It wasn’t until he saw Ciel go properly crimson, eye wide then askance-looking, that he realized he’d fallen into a particularly high-pitched and bitchy version of his laugh. “Nevermind,” Ciel muttered, arms crossed tight around his chest.

Baldroy and Mey-rin shot him twin glares. He was reminded, momentarily, of a story Lizzie told him, when she had used a swear she didn’t know the meaning of in conversation at age eight, and the disappointed reprimanding in her parents’ sudden look was forever in her memory.

He wasn’t their kid, Baldroy or Mey-rin’s, but, yeah. He felt reprimanded.

“I just meant— aren’t you scared of this sort of illicit thing?” Between Mey-rin’s rapid shake of the head and Ciel continuing his facial imitation of a tomato, he figured he hadn’t quite hit the apologetic tone.

“I’m not— not scared,” Ciel sputtered. “What do I have to be scared of? I’m—”

“I didn’t mean scared scared, but you’re still, you know, sort of stuck-up about—”

“I think what Alois means to say,” Baldroy cut in, and thank fuck. Alois was not handling that well himself. “Is that we didn’t want to insult you or nothing by offering, but if you wanna come, we’d love to have you. There’s room in the carriage.”

“Please do come, if you’d like,” Mey-rin chimed in.

“You’d have fun,” Alois promised. “If you let yourself.”

Ciel’s eyes darted between the three of them. Then, shrugging like it didn’t particularly matter, he answered, “I suppose I’ll tag along.”

Baldroy grinned, something bright and wide and tangible and Alois was still teaching himself that smiles weren’t threats, that some people just liked to be happy with nothing behind it. “That’s great, kid.” He didn’t correct himself that time. “Aw, I’ll tell Fin. He’ll be so happy.”

He took Mey by the shoulder and they both rushed out. Alois huffed a laugh and returned to painting over his lips with a darker red than he’d put on Finny. It wouldn’t match his dress, exactly, but as he looked up in the mirror, he liked the way he looked. A lot. He had long been aware of how attractive he was, but he’d always accentuated that with widened-eyes and spit-wet lips, pale and pink and childish. But here— the way he’d lined his eyes made them look smaller, not larger, the lack of blush made him look less flustered and young, and the dark lip—

He didn’t look the way people who had wanted him would want him to.

And, for that exactly. He looked good.

It made him want to cry.

He could feel it, the way it did sometimes, like a tap turned harshly on, water flooding into his chest, rising up to the buzz-static of his brain and it was— he was— he was so fucking sad, and then there were tears pricking the corners of his eyes and, shit, he was going to fuck up his eye makeup and—

He laughed. (He must look so fucking manic.) Fuck it, sure, maybe he wanted to fuck up his makeup. He wanted to take it all off and blow off their plans to wallow inside, he wanted to go out and fuck some stranger, he wanted to feel as loved as he’d convinced himself he had been, thirteen and stupid and desperately believing that being abused was something more beautiful than it was, he wanted to pour Baldroy’s gunpowder in one ear and light it and see how literally he could blow his brains out, he wanted to not be this fucking sad for no reason, he wanted to be less goddamn stupid, who turns on a dime like—

“If you’re that sullen about me coming, I won’t,” Ciel said. Ciel, talking, like he had any right to be there, like anything in the world had anything to do with him. It didn’t. He mattered so fucking little in the grand scheme of things. And in the small scheme. In Alois’ life. What was even his point? He didn’t make Alois any less miserable, he didn’t even try, he didn’t love Alois, which was fine, because Ciel, again, had no point, and Alois sure as fuck didn’t need him, and didn’t love him, so what was—

“Not everything’s about you, Phantomhive.” His throat was tight and voice harsh. It sounded like he was speaking through gritted teeth, but he didn’t have any sense of his body, and couldn’t be sure if it was that or if the sound was barely scraping through his windpipe.

Through the red-haze of the too-small room, he could see Ciel, furrowed brow and relaxed shoulders, uncon-fucking-cerned. “Why are you pissed off all of a sudden?”

I can’t breathe, everything is so loud, I feel like I’m dying, I wish I was, I don’t know why this happens to me and I can never fucking stop it, he thought. It came out, instead, “Goddammit, can you shut up?”

“What?”

“Go fuck yourself, Ciel.” Before giving him a chance to ask other stupid, inane questions, he stood up and stormed off. “I’m getting dressed!”

“Alright?” Fucking prick, sounding so calm. “I’ll be here.” Fuck him, acting like this was just Alois’s normal. It was. It sort of was. Just.

He slammed the door behind him, fell on his arse, and tilted his head slightly back, eyes wide, so the fucking crying he was apparently doing, now, wouldn’t smudge the eyeliner too much. He was still going out. This would be over in five minutes, ten at most, and there was no point in doing anything about it. He sniffled, then laughed. Laughed louder. Jesus fuck, he was supposed to be better, now. He would be seventeen in a few months — he’d decided his birthday was in November, to give him a month where he could claim to be two years Ciel’s senior — and had no reason to be this fucking silly and turned over as the child he’d been over two years ago.

Fuck.

Sure to his prediction, after a bit sitting around crying and laughing and making a fool of himself, he felt the flood cease, the water rush out of him as easily as it had come, and he no longer felt like choking on his own breath. He stood, brushed himself off, and grabbed his dress from Mey’s closet. Remiss was he to find he couldn’t do up the clasps on the back by himself but, even then, even with the dress hanging loose around him...

He, tentatively, testing each word in his brain like checking for one to break beneath the weight of the collective sentence, thought out, ‘I look good.’ And he did. And the foundation didn’t crumble, the house didn’t bend beneath his weight and trigger a ten-minute session of mourning for god-knows-what. He just.

He looked good.

He stepped out of Mey’s room to find his Lordship sitting, as promised, before him. He didn’t look up from his book as Alois stepped out. “What were you laughing at in there?”

“I thought of your stupid face and it was a proper riot.”

“Funny.” He turned a page, a poor show of being unconcerned. “You’re done being pissed, then?”

Alois shrugged. “Got boring. I’m sure you know, you never bore yourself with a moment of feeling.”

Ciel snorted, and finally looked up. And froze a bit. Face flushed.

Alois wouldn’t deny a surge of pride at that.

“Yes, I am stunning, did you have a further remark?” Alois teased. Ciel scoffed and looked away and Alois thought, lightly, to himself, that of course a full dress and makeup would be the only way to get Ciel to look at him that way. “Alright, if that’s a no…”

“Shut up.”

“Come on, make yourself useful, Phantomhive. Fasten.”

“What?”

Alois rolled his eyes. “You can look up, arsehole. You’re not seeing anything scandalous.” Ciel did as told, but Alois noticed how pointedly he kept his gaze on Alois’ face, not straying to the legs or collarbone or anything interesting. “Come on. Can’t fasten myself, give a queer a hand.”

Alois turned his back to him, but registered the hesitation in the moment lapse before Ciel stepped forward. And, then, the rapid way he worked up the fastens on the back of the dress, flinching away whenever his fingertips brushed skin. It didn’t particularly matter, though. He did up all the fastens right.

When Alois turned, Ciel’s face was red, blush high into his cheeks and pink in his ears and gaze notably avoiding Alois’. Alois snorted. This caught Ciel’s attention at least, long enough for Alois to offer a quick wink. Which only made him blush again. Cute.

God really was cruel, neglecting to make that one queer.

Alois wouldn’t dwell on it. Barely had, in the past months. He was more than used to not getting what he wanted, and sure as hell wouldn’t start complaining now, in his otherwise good life. It was a good life, after all. Happy enough, barring horrid pits of sadness and wanting someone who didn’t want him and not having nearly enough fancy clothes. But, well. He did have this one.

“Looks like a butterfly,” Ciel observed, taking exactly two moments to look over Alois’s dress before that gaze returned, pointedly, to his face.

“Observant.” The dress was designed as such, Ciel was right, with shimmering fabric akin to a gossamer wing and black streaks like the lines across a monarch. All the places the dress constricted against his waist caught the light and twisted it, small scintillating patterns like a kaleidoscope of butterflies taking wing. “It was meant to.”

“It fits you, too. Who— how did you get this?”

“I borrowed Lizzie’s tailor.” Alois had gotten fairly good at reading Ciel’s expressions, now, and his quick raise of both eyebrows could be translated to mean, ‘there is someone out there who knows you’re wearing this.’ Alois rolled his eyes. “Don’t fuss. I can clock a queer at fifty paces, and I told him it was for my twin sister, in case. He won’t say a word.” Alois shot him a raised-brow look. “What, would you like one as well?”

Look returned, with emphasis. “I’ll be fine.”

“No returning to your drag days?”

“It was for a case.”

“I know, dear.”

Baldroy stuck his head in the door. “Looking great, kid! Y’all ready to go?”

Alois looked to Ciel. Ciel shrugged. Alois offered him an arm to hook his through, and, reluctant as his expression implied, Ciel did take it.

Huh.

“And we go?”

“We go.”

“Don’t leave the building without telling us, don’t talk to anyone older than Finny, don’t leave each other’s sight—”

“The bartenders are nice, do not talk them into giving you drinks—”

“If anyone gives you any shit, you call us. I’ll be milling ‘round, just like, whistle really loud, got it? Me or Mey will come and—“

“Kill them.”

“Yeah! Yeah, or, like, something to deescalate with a bit less— murder.” Baldroy exhaled, heavy, and tilted his head back and forth like counting to make sure he got all the rules. “Seriously. Don’t talk to strange adults.”

Alois had repressed a groan throughout the entire lecture, as embarrassing as it was to be talked-more-like-yelled down to in the middle of the goddamn club. He held it together a moment longer, but couldn’t help point out— “Finny’s talking to everyone he likes.”

“Finny is a good judge of character,” Baldroy answered. Alois was about to argue, but, “And, not to mention, Finny could lift this building right out of the ground if he wanted; if people mess with him they’re gonna be sorry long before me or Mey get to them.” He put one hand on Alois’ shoulder and the other on Ciel’s. Alois took it as a sign of growth on both their parts, that neither he nor Ciel flinched in the slightest. “Take care of yourselves, kids. I’ll check in.”

“Thanks, da.”

Alois had said it mocking, but he didn’t miss the way Baldroy flushed a bit and fought against his smile. “I— ‘Course. Have fun, you two. Love you.”

Now Alois flushed. Was this what having a da was like? Wildly embarrassing, but also warm? “Oh my god, go. Mey’s already mingling.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it, I’m in your way.”

Alois shook his head and turned to Ciel. He was smiling a bit, too. Alois nudged his shoulder. “But, really, is he our da?”

Ciel scoffed. “I don’t think we should take fatherly advice from a man who can’t tell apart ground pepper and gunpowder.” Beat. “Yeah, he is. Well, yours at least.”

Alois laughed. “Yeah. Hey, how long do you think it would take me to break all of those rules?”

“Alois—”

“Joking! Mostly. I look too fucking good in this dress to be pulled home early. But—” he searched the room, looking for attractive late teen/twenty-somethings with deep pockets. “I do want someone to buy us drinks.”

“You’re going to be flirting?”

“Jealous?”

“Worried.”

Alois wrinkled his nose. “God, Ciel, that’s worse. That’s more emotion, actually, what?”

“Worried about you breaking the rules, Trancy.” Beat. “And… and worried about you with these men. A bit.” Alois raised a brow. “I have reason to be.”

“I can take care of myself,” Alois responded, coolly. Like he was going to try to fuck a grown man. Like he’d even want to, after last time. He hadn’t learned much, but he wasn’t so stupidly desperate, anymore.

“Sure. But Baldroy said we were supposed to take care of each other.”

It was sweet. Why the fuck was he being sweet? “What page of the storybook did you steal that line from?”

“Don’t be a bitch.” His hand was on Alois’s arm. There was a layer of dark fabric between them, but, still. Ciel didn’t touch him often, not so deliberate, not so hand-on-body. “You had a bloody panicked episode an hour ago. And you were a mess, the last time you went out and found some—”

Alois felt the pit of his stomach turn coarse and cold. “You knew about that?”

“Alois. Of course I knew.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

No, no, why the fuck did he know about that? Did Mey-rin tell him? Did someone tail him? Was he just that obvious? And what was that, a week after Ciel kissed him? God, he probably made some stupid connection there that didn’t exist. Fuck, fuck. “We weren’t friends! It wasn’t any of your goddamn business. Don’t pry into somewhere you aren’t wanted.”

His hand tightened on Alois’ arm. Uncomfortable. Bad.

He wasn’t here to feel that way.

“You know what, Phantomhive? Thanks for your concern. Please feel free to shove it.”

Ciel scoffed, looked at him incredulously, and shook his head. “Alright, Alois. Go, then.”

“I will!”

True to his fucking word, Alois stormed off into the sea of people, looking anywhere but Ciel. Well, that was one rule broken, at least. But Baldroy was nowhere in sight, so at least he wouldn’t get so quickly exiled.

He did spot Finny, making a group of gaudily and wonderfully dressed people laugh uproariously. Naturally. Mey-rin, too, the warm, dark brown of her suit matching the red hair and coat of the woman with whom she was sat, heads bent close to one another, talking about God-knows-what. And everyone else – crossdressers and performers, women who were denied the title in society, and men in the same situation, and people who darted from gender to gender as a mouse might run over a grain field. All very interesting to talk to. Unlike some not-queer prick poking his nose into places he didn’t fucking belong.

“Fight with your man?”

Alois turned halfway to meet eyes with a young man leaning against a column. He was a year Alois’ senior, at most, and looking properly stunning in the low light. Square jaw and brown skin and irises the kind of black that looks infinite. Charming smile. Not someone Alois would mind talking to, in the slightest.

“Not my man,” Alois answered. “You know, you’d think he was – I’m forced to live in his house and by his rules, and he finds it his job to properly bury himself in my business, despite no one ever asking him to. And yet, he won’t even kiss me.”

Alois’ new friend laughed. “I’m assuming that’s what the fight was about? It isn’t any actual trouble you’re in, right?”

Alois waved the concern away. “No, no. He’s harmless. Just a prick, sometimes.” Then, trying to parse the beginning of his phrase, “The fight wasn’t about the not kissing, that’s—fine.”

“Sounds fine.”

“It was about the being in my business.” Alois wrinkled his nose. Then sighed. Set his shoulders. There were more pleasant things right before him. “Now, speaking of business, I would love to poke in yours.” He leaned a little closer. This young man was dressed nicely – masculine, surely, but makeup, too, and heeled shoes, and filigree-pattern on the edges of his suit jacket. Not bad off, money-wise, Alois would guess. “Who are you?”

“Elliot. Charmed,” he said, and charmed in-fucking-deed, as he proceeded to take Alois’ hand and press a kiss to the back of it. “If I’m not being too forward, you are breathtaking, Miss…”

“Jamie,” Alois offered. He had considered something more over-the-top, a sort of Aphrodite or Carmilla of a name, but he’d come across Jamie and, well, it felt right. “And, Elliot, in the state I’m in, forward is no fucking problem.”

Elliot smiled. It felt real. It didn’t turn Alois’ stomach. It made him feel wanted, with none of the round-his-throat strings usually attached. “Would you dance with me?” Sparing a glance over Alois’ shoulder, he added, “If not-your-man will allow it.”

Alois turned, to see Ciel staring at the two of them, look properly fucking murderous. Well, that answered the jealous question. Too fucking bad, Ciel. Wallow in it. Like the proper bitch he was, Alois grinned, faux-kind, and waved. Ciel flushed full-red and turned away instantly.

“He is cute,” Elliot mused, head tilted to the side. “If you wanted to see if he’d be more interested in a ménage à trois...”

“You are welcome to try, Elliot.” Alois, who was pointedly not looking back to Ciel, slowly drew his hand up Elliot’s arms. And pulled him onto the floor. “Vehemently not interested in men, that one. And no one is at a greater loss for that than I.”

Elliot raised a pair of dark and expertly sculpted eyebrows. “Is he aware of the type of establishment he’s visited?”

“I warned him. And dressed like this.” Elliot laughed and shook his head. His dark, thick hair caught the light and kept it trapped in the curls. He was, maybe, the most gorgeous person who’d ever wanted Alois, and maybe the first that Alois might genuinely want back. Some great losses, sure, but some successes too. Especially as Elliot set his hands on Alois’ waist. “He’s just a terribly supportive friend.”

“The way he was looking at us seemed very friendly.”

Alois hummed, and then pressed a finger over Elliot’s mouth. “Darling, you are far too fucking gorgeous to argue with me when we should be dancing.”

And so they did.

Elliot was tall. Not in an intimidating, overbearing way, not like Alois would be crushed beneath the power of him, but nicely tall. Even with Alois’ own stature, plus a heel that could easily be described as dangerous, Elliot had an inch or two on him. He wasn’t skinny – not that Alois, with the weight he’d put on living someplace opulent with no expectation of that childishness smallness, was really one to talk anymore – but his weight was soft, all hands that didn’t press and shoulders a kind resting place for Alois’ wrists. They danced close. The fabric of Alois’ dress was thin and light enough that he could feel the gentle pressure of Elliot’s fingertips, on his waist and hips and reaching down to skirt across his outer thigh.

It felt good. Really good.

The room was darkened, not fully, but enough that every glance of Elliot felt new, somehow, breathable like cold winter air into too-warm lungs, and he wanted to kiss him. He did. He really did. It was sudden and sharp, unlike the background, white-noise static of wanting Ciel, or the desperate searching for anyone, anyone who would have him that cold, snuck-out night, or the sad and lonely way he’d convinced himself he’d loved a grown man who never gave a damn about him. It wasn’t like that. It was present and real and all the more so for how tangible the outcome could be.

And, so, Alois kissed him.

Elliot kissed back, instantly, one hand snaking up to grip Alois’ hair while the other dipped down to the curve of his back. He tugged on the strands, a moment of pressure forcing a low, keening sound from Alois’ throat, parted his lips enough that Elliot could really kiss him, and Alois pressed inwards, arm tight around Elliot’s shoulder, close and close and close.

Elliot kissed along his jaw, by his ear, down his neck. Fuck, was this what it was like? Kissing someone, touching someone, being touched, when you wanted it? When you didn’t have a tight coil of worry in your stomach? Alois understood why people liked this so goddamn much.

Hand still gripping tight to the back of Elliot’s shirt, Alois opened his eyes. And there, over Elliot’s shoulder, centered as so often in his vision, was Ciel. Staring, again, at them. But, this time, when their eyes met, he didn’t look away.

Oh.

Slowly, without breaking eye contact, Alois guided Elliot’s hand from its place on his back, through the slit in his skirts, to curve against his bare thigh. And Ciel watched, face flushed.

Without breaking eye contact, Alois tilted Elliot’s head up and away from his neck, and kissed him, full on the mouth. And Ciel watched, lips parted.

Without breaking eye contact, Alois felt Elliot’s hand trail up the side of his leg.

Without breaking eye contact, Alois felt Elliot grab his arse.

Without breaking eye contact, Alois gasped.

And Ciel looked away.

“Jamie, Jamie,” Elliot said. Alois hadn’t heard any name of his said like that, like a prayer, in a while. He wasn’t quite sure he liked it. But he did like Elliot. “I think you’re the most gorgeous person I’ve ever seen.” That, that was better. Alois liked that he said ‘person’; he was sick of being called a beautiful thing.

“With what this dress cost, I’d better be.”

He laughed, then bit Alois’ earlobe. Close enough to whisper, “If you want my opinion, you’re way too fucking pretty for him. Especially if he always looks like he wants to kill something.”

“Hmm, maybe.” Alois took his turn, kissing along that un-fucking-speakable jawline. “But you’re pretty enough?”

“Look at me, darling,” he said, and that wasn’t a request Alois would refuse. Yes, still gorgeous. “Do I look like someone who doesn’t know how stunning he is?” Alois laughed. Elliot put his hands on Alois’ either forearm, and looked him in the eye. “Jamie, can I please take you home?”

Huh.

He considered it. He did like this. He did like Elliot. He did like the warm dip of attraction and arousal without any cold discomfort to drown it over. He wondered what it would be like, giving himself over to someone he liked, someone who would treat him as a person, not a rented-whore or plaything or child, bring him out of his mind for a minute. It would be wonderful.

It would be, it would be, so why the fuck did his shoulders stiffen, his breath catch in his chest, when he was asked?

It wasn’t fair. He wanted to want this. He should. He understood why kissing that strange man in the cold had made him sick and panicked, he understood why, in that kitchen years ago, flirting with Baldroy had left him shaking and uncomfortable, hell, he could even come up with a justification for why he could barely stick a hand down his own pants without making himself sick, but it shouldn’t happen now. This was a good thing with a person he liked, who liked him—

How was he still this broken?

He shook his head, shook himself out of this state. Tried not to let his voice shake when he answered, “Sorry, darling. What would it do to the reputation of a good girl like me?”

Elliot chuckled, clearly disappointed, but not putting up any sort of fight. Goddammit, were some people just good? “I understand.” Then, leaning into whisper, “You holding out for the one who's watching us like he’s trying to find the exact right way to carve out my innards?”

“Oh god, is he still looking?”

“I think he’s in love with you, darling. No one looks that murderous over a fleeting attraction.”

Alois rolled his eyes. “No, just territorial about his friends, or friend; I’m his only one. Barring his cousin. Who is also his fiancé.”

Elliot laughed. Glad someone understood what a fucking riot that was. “Oh, god. He rich or something?”

“Horrifically, yes.” He leaned in. “She’s a total queer, too, the fiancé. No one’s broken the news to him yet.”

“Fascinating. You’re in quite the predicament, Jamie.”

“Trust me, I’m well aware.”

“I should let you go,” Elliot said. His stepping-back was the slow, drawn-out withdraw of something mildly painful. Alois understood. “Before he really does attempt to kill me.”

“He wouldn’t.”

“Maybe.” He picked up Alois’ hand again, but this time to do nothing more than press a kiss to his knuckles. “I will see you again. If not in life, then in my dreams.”

“Well, I’ll hold out hope for seeing you again, in life.” Alois placed a hand on either side of his face. “And Elliot, please, for me, go find someone to take home tonight. I need to know someone out there gets to fuck you, even if it can’t be me. I’ll be unconsolable otherwise.”

“For you then, my Jamie.” He put a hand over his heart. “I swear, I will get some ass tonight.”

Alois laughed. “You’re a good man.” Alois leaned in and kissed him, once more, for posterity. “I will think of you.”

“And I of you, darling.”

When Alois left the floor, he didn’t see Ciel anywhere at first. He’d sort of assumed he’d be hovering and staring and wanting Alois in only the most not-queer way he could fathom for himself. It took a moment, but, there. Amongst the bar crowd, nursing a drink in hand.

Alois sidled up next to him. “So you did find your way to a drink?”

Ciel didn’t look up. Oh, god, was he sulking? Alois had been well-kissed and was wholly over the ordeal of their spat. “You’re not the only one who knows how to flirt.”

“Don’t be touchy. Someone bought that for you? You made sure they didn’t slip anything in it, right?”

Ciel snorted, bitter. “‘I can take care of myself.’ And I will. Aren’t you—busy?”

“Do you see anyone here keeping me busy?”

Ciel didn’t deign to answer. Nor did he move, when Alois grabbed him by the hand and moved to face him. “Darling—”

“Don’t call me that.”

“—Come dance.”

Ciel did look up, then. “I’m not very good at it.”

“Neither am I. It doesn’t matter. Come on, me and Elliot barely moved, did that look hard?”

Ciel swallowed tightly. “I didn’t—who’s Elliot?”

Oh, that sounded like a marvelous path to nowhere, fast. “Never mind.” He beckoned with his hand. “Come on. I’m not letting you leave until you dance with me.”

Ciel gave one last dejected look at his drink, before setting it back on the bar. And taking Alois’ hand. “Okay.”

Alois smiled. It was, in no way, feigned. “Good.”

Everything about Ciel, Alois found, was smaller than Elliot had been. Alois had well over a half foot on him, in those heels, and the hands rested on his shoulders had less of a grasp (and, not quite relevant, but were less calloused and far more sweaty, when they brushed Alois’ skin). His waist, where Alois held to him, was thinner than he would’ve expected, and Alois made a note to check that the bitch hadn’t put him on any strange diet.

But, the one thing that wasn’t small, was the massive fucking space Ciel put between them.

“You don’t look like you’re having much fun,” Alois sing-songed, trying to get that sullen face to look up at him. It worked. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Ciel Phantomhive.”

“Why are you—” He cut himself off. “Nevermind.” Ciel’s voice was set straight in the way that only happened when someone had to force it to be so. “I shouldn't be here.”

“Darling.” Feeling just a bit brave, he leaned down to press their foreheads together. “I am glad you’re here. Honest to that God of yours.”

Ciel chuckled. “I doubt God wants anything to do with me.” But he wasn’t the first to pull away. “But yeah, okay.”

The dancing got better after that. They still weren’t pressed chest-to-chest or anything – and probably for the best – but Ciel would follow his lead. Would take his hand when Alois reached for it. Would laugh when Alois whispered his theories about the other patrons in his ear. Ciel was just—there. And so was Alois. And it was good.

“Alois?”

“Yeah?”

“Can anybody see us?”

“Ciel, we can’t dance half a minute without someone bumping into us, of course they can—”

“No, I—” He took a deep breath, like this was difficult. “Our people. Are they looking?”

Alois scanned the room. Mey, now dancing with her red-haired friend, moving more wildly than he and Ciel, but definitively distracted. Finny, entertaining a new table, shoes in hand, and Baldroy next to him, adding in for emphasis. “Tragically, I don’t think our dancing has proved enough spectacle for them. No, no one’s looking.”

“Okay,” Ciel said, in a whisper. When Alois turned his head back Ciel’s way, his face was far closer than it had been a second ago. His hand pressing to Alois’ cheek the moment their eyes met.

Alois’ heart, tight in his chest.

Tight, but also.

Also warm.

“Okay,” he repeated. Then, head tilted up and shoulders raised and more nervous, maybe, than Alois had ever seen him. “Alois Trancy, can I kiss you?”

“Yes.”

As if there would have been any other answer. As if Alois wasn’t leaning in halfway through the question. As if Alois wasn’t helpless to do anything but smile and meet him halfway, mouth on mouth in a dim-lit, bright-colored, strange and wonderful place.

As if.

Chapter Text

Alois Trancy was the kind of person lucky enough to have a fairly developed understanding of self.

Alois Trancy was an absolute riot, a looker, and a great person to have at parties. He was a painter and a poker shark and a better friend than some might guess. He knew a lot about spiders, about butterflies, about any number of small, glistening creatures to be found in the garden. Liked them too. Things he knew a fair bit about, but did not care for included snakes and strange older men. He was a queer (not because of the trauma, thank you) and a bit manic (also not because of the trauma, if he remembered his disposition in youth correctly, but the trauma sure didn’t help).

He was quite a few things.

He was, at the moment, in full drag in a queer bar, kissing Ciel Phantomhive on the mouth, the taste of sweat-salt and some unfamiliar liquor in the corner of his friend’s lips.

This. This was less easily understood.

It was his second kiss in a matter of twenty minutes, and was, he would have to say, the remarkably worse of the two. His experience was deeply limited, but kissing Elliot had felt easy, simple, meshing together lazily like water onto a riverbed. Kissing Ciel was markedly not. Ciel’s inexperience merely highlighted his own, and hell, were they a mess. Alois had to bend his neck to meet Ciel, whose hands were hot and sweat-damp on Alois’s forearms, both of them mouths open and all inexperience, no timidity. Everything, hot and out of place and unexplained.

And damned to hell if he didn’t like it all the better, still.

Instead of moving away when Ciel released his rough-nailed hell grip on Alois’ arm, he hummed, leaned in, kissed Ciel again once, twice, three times, light and easy. The fourth was more pressure, still closed-mouth, but dammit, Alois had no idea how much of this he would be allowed to take, so judge him, if you must, for wanting to have his fill while the kitchen was open.

Ciel pulled back, an inch or two. His eye was even wider than usual, and fuck if he didn’t look perfect like that, the tight-air humidity setting his hair in uneven, frizzy waves. Face flushed. Looking straight at Alois.

And, saying, “Alright.”

Alois bent over in a laugh. “‘Alright’?”

That lovely pink flush went full red. “What? It’s— it was— I’m—”

“You know,” Alois mused, running his thumbs over Ciel’s waist, where his hands were settled. “When I snogged Elliot like that, he told me I was the most beautiful person he’d ever seen and offered to take me home with him.” Alois caught Ciel’s brow-furrow and glance around, like trying to find poor Elliot in the crowd. Likely with murderous intent. “Gotta step up your game, darling.”

Ciel didn’t meet Alois’ eye. “I don’t know who that is.”

“Yes you do, you fucking voyeur.” Alois tightened grasp on Ciel’s waist and dared to ask, “Did you picture yourself in his place? Kissing me like that?” Ciel surprised him with a very tight nod. Alois responded with a kiss to his jaw. “Anything he did,” Alois moved Ciel’s hand onto the bare plane of his thigh. “You can.”

Ciel curved his hand. Ran his fingertips in small circles over the skin, still too shy to move to any of the interesting bits, but there was, of course, a time and a place. “You…” he said, lightly, leaning back to look him in the eye. Probably with some emotionally-stunted comment or deflection of jealousy, or telling Alois that he had his fun, his brief queer foray, and was done now, back to closed off and cold and— “You are the most beautiful person alive.”

Oh.

Oh no.

That wasn’t—

He didn’t even stutter or, or hesitate. He just. He said that.

Alois was probably as red in the face as Ciel now. God, maybe more. He’d never live this down.

Alois opened and shut his mouth a few times, before managing: “I meant—” It was a desperate attempt to keep his voice from cracking. He barely noticed Ciel’s two hands curling around his left. “I meant you could do, not—”

He cut himself off with an embarrassing little inhale of breath (not a gasp, thank you) as Ciel pressed a warm, firm kiss to his palm, right over the still-there scar.

Ciel didn’t pull away, either, or let go. His hands were still pressing Alois’ palm to his face, breath hot on Alois’ skin, every slight movement another kiss on the scar. He was looking down at the hand like it was something holy, like he could memorize the curves of Alois’ fingers, the birthmark on his thumb, on and on.

Alois was unsure, about worship. Didn’t like its uncomfortable reminisce.

He would love to be holy in Ciel’s eyes.

Alois pressed his thumb to the soft part of Ciel’s mouth, feeling the give his lips had found, minutes ago. Ciel did meet his gaze, then, only to take the end of his thumb into his mouth, teeth just scraping against the painted nail. Which. Was.

“Christ, Ciel,” Alois swore. “That’s— Goddamn, that’s fucking hot.”

Ciel grinned. Self satisfied. Put his arms around Alois’s shoulders and leaned up to press a long, firm kiss to his mouth. “Elliot is welcome to take you to his home if he likes. But you know who your home is.”

“You are such a possessive bitch,” Alois said, between the short kisses Ciel kept pressing to his mouth. “And to think you insist you’re not jealous.”

“Because I’m not,” Ciel repeated — insolent prick — as if his hand wasn’t firm on Alois’ face, holding it in position to not look away from him. “It’s true. I don’t keep you there but you don’t seem inclined to go elsewhere.”

“Leaving you for Lizzie any day now.”

“You would never.” Ciel traced the lines of Alois’ face with his thumb. “You said I needed to woo you to keep you here. How am I doing?”

“Oh, darling, this is not wooing.” He flicked the side of Ciel’s face. “Kissing me in a darkened bar? This is nothing. I want flowers. Cakes. Love notes sealed with that fancy wax crest of yours.”

“Needy.”

“Oh, like you can’t afford it.”

“Well, I don’t see how I could buy you a thing, here,” Ciel said, before shooting a look to the exit. “Perhaps we go?”

Alois froze up, waiting for the tight in his throat that had come with the same question from Elliot’s mouth. Waited. But it didn’t come.

Well, Ciel was right about that part at least. Knowing who his home was.

His hand hot in Ciel’s, he was pulled towards the exit. On the way, he caught Elliot’s eye. The man was sat between a wonderfully-wigged drag queen and a woman tall and dark, with a shaved-close head. Alois gave him a quick thumbs up. Elliot smiled at him, before raising a questioning brow to the previously-murderous Ciel leading him along. Alois flipped him off. Elliot returned the gesture.

“I’d prefer if you’d stop flirting,” Ciel bit out, “while I am trying to take you home.”

“Never, darling.”

On the carriage ride home, in the dark and lull of Mey-rin and Finny’s hushed conversation, Alois felt a tentative hand curl around his fingers. Out of sight.

Looking straight forward, Alois turned his hand in the grip.

And held tight to Ciel.

The halls seemed shorter, the walls closer, with Ciel’s fingers laced in his. They hadn’t spoken, just leaned, almost imperceptibly, into each other, catching each other’s eye every so often and smiling like stupid children. It would be embarrassing, Alois thought, but didn’t know what the ‘if’ that should follow that would be. It would be embarrassing. It didn’t really feel like it was.

Coming from the servant’s quarters, the room they happened on first was Ciel’s. It wasn’t uncommon to find himself falling into sleep at his friend’s room, or the other way around, once lingering at the door to finish one conversation, then another, and so on, became such that they might as well just sleep pressed spine-to-spine in beds that were always too-big, anyway. But there was a different feel to it, now. Hand in hand. Like breaching some sort of barrier.

Ciel opened the door.

Went though.

Alois followed.

The room was dark and night-chilled, but Ciel was fast to light the lanterns, while Alois was fidgeting and figuring out where he fit in this left-shifted reality. He wasn’t so foolish as to think Ciel’s wanting of him was something that would stretch on — as if there was anywhere for it to go — once Alois was no longer drag-prettied. But did it last to now? Was Ciel going to follow on that promise of taking him home, or was the short-lived them something that existed solely in the bar? Could he—

His thoughts cut off as his back hit the wall, the force of Ciel kissing him. Hard. Clumsy. Sweet.

Alois lifted shaking hands to cup Ciel’s face, opening his mouth beneath his friend’s. He could feel Ciel’s smile against his lips, and he returned it.

Well. That was the answer to that question, anyway.

He spun them around such that he was the one with the honor of pinning Ciel to the wall. Ciel gasped. Alois laughed. The two of them were like that, tangled up and the same and different and Alois had had nothing to drink but still felt odd and tipsy and turned around by the feeling of the two of them.

Backing up from the wall, he pulled Ciel by the hands down and away. Towards the bed. It was a nervous sort of walk, and he nearly tripped over his feet, only to feel Ciel catch him round the waist. It was reminiscent, Alois thought, of a roof in the dead of winter, faces close enough to kiss.

It wasn’t a fully comfortable reminiscence.

But Alois would not be getting cold feet. It was just… the proximity to a bed, setting him off. Nerves. Needless nerves — sure, it had been long as anything since Alois had done this, but it wasn’t like Ciel would have a thing to compare to. And as for Alois and comparing, he simply wouldn’t fucking do it. There was no point. If he wasn’t comfortable — who gave a shit. This was the only time he was going to get to have this, and he needed Ciel’s memory of the night to be Alois stunning and sexy and above all obliging, because how else would he ever be worthy of another kiss?

(Pathetic, Jesus.)

Alois knew how to take control of these situations. He knew the game. (He wished it didn’t feel like a game.) He could win.

He let himself fall gracefully back onto the mattress, spread his legs so one thigh showed, long and lovely, out the slit of the dress. He leaned back, chest pressed forward, head tilted and chin up. He must look like a fucking pin-up. Screw his tied-up stomach, this was what he was good at. And if no one else had deserved it, Ciel did. Alois owed him this much.

“How do you want me, Lord Phantomhive?” he said, voice pitched-high and saccharine, dramatic enough to be teasing, but Alois was at attention, ready to note if it worked for Ciel. He could play that way, if needed. He’d played it before, in some form, submissive and sexy servant of a man far beyond his station.

Ciel snorted and rolled his eye, but the hand he set on Alois’ bare knee might be inclined to wander, so Alois thought he didn’t need to take that concept off the table. “Alois—”

“Shh,” Alois pressed the pad of his thumb to Ciel’s mouth. “Don’t call me that.” Alois knew Ciel didn’t want him as he was. (He hadn’t called Alois by his name since they kissed.) Alois wasn’t ready to be put back in that box.

(Box of: friend, unrequited lover, whore, parasite on the house only good for the pieces of himself he could sever off and offer up.)

Ciel, to his credit, looked genuinely confused. “What… else?”

Jamie, James, Jim, Alois would be fine, if you’d want the person that comes with it. “‘Darling’, how about?” Alois pulled Ciel in, leaned forward close enough to press closed-mouth kisses to his ear, jaw, neck. “Dearest, angel, precious, sweetheart, lover?”

Ciel hummed. Alois could feel the vibration against his mouth. “I don’t think ‘sweet’ or ‘angel’ could describe a thing you’re doing now.” Alois laughed right back. Eyes shut, he didn’t notice when Ciel leaned in, and was met with a giggly, open-mouthed kiss he wasn’t expecting. (Still wasn’t quite comfortable with not expecting things, but it was fine, fine, he was good, he wasn’t too much of a bitch to enjoy a kiss from the only person to ever want him while still giving a damn about him as a person.)

Not that he really could enjoy the kiss, at all. Given how much else his mind had to focus on — kissing well while ensuring his makeup didn’t smudge, making the right noises, parting his legs at the perfect degree of open, and, speaking of legs, noticing that Ciel had, huh, barely moved his hand from Alois’ knee, despite the significant amount of foreplay going on, which was. Fine.

It was just, just. Alois used to be good at this. He had never been at a loss for how to make men want him. He used to be able to clock what would make a man tick in the time it took him to hear half a sentence and get one good look. That was his job. And he was good at it, he was good at it, it was the only fucking thing he was good at in the world, and if he’d managed to lose the skill before the one time it might actually make him half-happy to use it, well, he’d probably just get around to finally offing himself, because what was the point in living on uselessly, unable to make the one person in his life go crazy over him?

A bit impatient, he snaked his fingers over Ciel’s wrist and down to cover his hand. Then, intentionally as he could, he dragged Ciel’s hand up against his inner thigh. Ciel’s skin was cold. It wasn’t quite doing it for Alois (hadn’t it just? no more than an hour ago?) but no one had ever given a damn how he was feeling during any of this sort of thing.

“Al—” Ciel cut himself off when Alois gripped him a bit too tight at the sound of the name — involuntary, he’d swear. “Are you sure—” He wasn’t even going to try the pet names, then. It was fine. Alois leaned in and bit at the skin of Ciel’s neck. “Fuck, I—”

“I’m rather trying to ‘fuck’, dearest,” Alois grit out. He could feel the tenseness in Ciel’s hand, and let him go. “You are the one being reticent.”

Ciel removed his hand from Alois’ leg entirely. Dammit, dammit, what was he doing wrong? “I… What are you aiming for?”

“For you to get a move on.” He spread his legs a little wider. “I’m not one of those girls that needs all this foreplay, you can just get to it.” If he could just get to it, Alois could lie back, drift off like he always did when this happened, it would be fine, his body would still respond, he’d still be a good little thing, but he could stop thinking and just be. Gone. For a minute. With his head like this he needed it.

“Get to what?”

“Christ, Phantomhive, did you hit your head on the way home? Get to fucking me! Put me onto my back, or my knees or front or, or whatever will make you feel the least queer during all of this!” Oh, fuck, was he tearing up? At this rate, at least, it looked like Ciel had too much to think about to notice.

“Alois.” Oh, god, he’d fucked up. “I don’t know if this is—”

“I mean, if you’d prefer I fuck you, that can be arranged, I just think it may be a little harder for you to continue pretending I’m a girl that way.”

“Pretend?— Alois I am not pretending you’re a girl.”

Alois bit out a bitter laugh. “Yeah, sure.”

“God,” Ciel breathed out, before stepping away (shit shit shit) and pressing his hands to his face. “Dammit, I knew this was a bad idea.”

Like that didn’t sink like rocks to the pit of Alois’ stomach.

“Don’t.” Alois said, reaching out to hold Ciel’s wrist in his grip. He could turn this around. He could fix this. “Don’t act like you didn’t just want me. You can still want me.”

“I’m not— That clearly isn’t the problem.”

“I think this is exactly the problem.” Lashing out — something inside Alois reminded him — was about the least submissive, sexy thing he could be doing. “That you are so insistent that you aren’t a queer.”

“Slightly more relevant, but you know that isn’t the issue of the business.”

“What is?”

“That—” Ciel’s face was red, brow furrowed, flustered in anger in a way Alois had never seen him. Then he exhaled, heavy, collecting himself. “Alois. Do you actually want to have sex with me, or do you just want me to want to have sex with you?”

Alois made some horrifically embarrassing strangled sound. “What’s the difference?”

“Hell.” He breathed out. “We can’t do this.”

“I…” Alois swallowed. “What?”

“This was a bad idea.”

No, no fuck no no. “Ciel, darling,” he tried, minding the crack in his voice and the way he was surely already tearing up. He could— he could make Ciel want him again. He could. Whatever the fuck it took— He pressed his hand to Ciel’s face. “Please, love, whatever you want, I can—”

Ciel turned away from Alois’ touch.

Wouldn’t even look at him.

He was that repulsive.

And Alois knew, he knew, he understood. It worked in the bar, with Ciel a drink deep and unable to see him clear in the lights, where Alois could just be a sexy whoever, a drag-colored fantasy. It was different, here, in the light of his room, where Alois had forgotten how to just hold his tongue, be quiet and servile and pretty and not open his mouth, not remind Ciel that he was nothing more than a pathetic, unstable, stupid child who had leeched off of some rich friend long enough he had convinced himself he was worth more than however quick he could drop to his knees for whomever might want him.

“Alois?”

Of course Ciel wouldn’t want him, as he was. He’d already somehow managed to trick Ciel into liking him as a friend, and he should’ve stopped there, because God knows that was probably long gone now. Stupid fucking idiot whore.

“Alois!”

He wondered how easily accessible Mey-rin’s guns were. That would probably be the easiest way to go out.

Maybe Ciel would even miss him.

“Alois Trancy!”

Oh. Ciel was talking to him.

Ciel was holding his hands which was — nice, it was nice, it was too fucking hot in this room and the cool of his skin was pleasant. Ciel was holding his hands, which were shaking, as were his shoulders and the whole of his body which had something to do, he’d guess, with the fact that he was sobbing hysterically.

God, that was embarrassing.

“I…” he managed, the words getting caught up in his tight throat. It was enough to make Ciel realize he was lucid, it seemed, as relief washed over Ciel’s expression, which Alois couldn’t— he couldn’t look at him, at Ciel watching him fall apart over something so stupid. Ciel being forced to remember, again, how far Alois was from anything worthy of want. He looked down at his hands — their hands, interlocked — instead, to find his palms bloody from his own nails digging in far too tight.

He was a mess. He was a mess. Of course Ciel wouldn’t want him wouldn’t need him wouldn’t love him. But God, did it hurt.

“Alois,” Ciel asked, softly, “are you—”

“Why don’t you want me?” Alois choked out. He was still crying, the words half lost in the teariness of his voice. “I could— whatever you want, I can do it, please just, please, darling, I…”

“Alois.”

“I can do, I can be anything you’d like, I can, please let me, please, I—”

He was cut off by arms tight around his chest. Fingers gripping the fabric of his dress. Ciel’s breath against his ear. “Alois, darling. Stop it.” It was a slightly awkward angle, Ciel still half-standing while Alois was sat legs-spread and hunched into himself, nevermind Alois crying into Ciel’s shoulder, but Ciel was running his hands up and down Alois’ back, stilted yet soothing.

It still wasn’t right, Ciel still didn’t want him, but at least he wasn’t chased off entirely. At least he was here. Holding tighter than Alois deserved, shushing and soothing and Alois sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.

After a minute, or several thousand of them, how would Alois know, he managed a sardonic, “Are we hugging? Since when do we hug?”

Ciel’s hand stilled on Alois’s back until Alois hugged him tighter, and he continued on. “I’m not— I’m not very good at this.”

“Indeed you’re fucking not.” Ciel snorted. Alois took the moment to swallow his pride. “I’m sorry, Ciel. That was— Let’s just forget the whole business, alright? I was being—”

“I do want you. I think.” Alois would admit a strange little choked-gasp sound at that. “I don’t know what I want, honestly. But that isn’t about you.” It was quiet for a moment. “You’d laugh if I said I still don’t think I’m a queer.”

Alois, who was still, in fact, crying, attempted a deadpan, “You have me in hysterics.”

“But I honestly don’t think so. I never have been before. I’ve never— wanted any of that.” He moved back a bit, arms still around Alois, but with the space to look at him. “But I did— I do want you.”

“You have a funny way of showing it, Phantomhive.” Cautiously, he started, “But if you do, then—” He reached out to sit his hand on the soft curve of Ciel’s jaw. Ciel, in turn, reached out, pulled the hand down and away and shook his head. But interlocked their fingers still.

“No, Alois, I meant it. I barely know what I want, and you are in no place to be sleeping with anyone.”

Alois scoffed, indignant, and pulled his hand away. “You have no fucking right to tell me what I am in the place for. You aren’t my keeper.”

Ciel gave him a properly incredulous look. “You said it yourself, you don’t even want to have sex with me. Tell me honestly. Would you even enjoy it if we had sex right now?”

“No, I probably wouldn’t, but the point isn’t about me enjoying anything, it’s about you wanting me!”

“You have to understand how fucking terrible that sounds for everyone involved!”

“Like you’d know!”

“I don’t! I don’t, but you don’t any better.” Alois bit his tongue. What else could he even say? “Can we… Could we just go to sleep?”

Oh. Oh. That’s it. Okay.

He could take the rejection.

Alois stood, having to force Ciel off him a little bit in the process. “Alright. Be seeing you, then.”

“Alois?”

“Goodnight, Phantomhive.”

“No, I didn’t mean— Stay.” Alois paused, just before the door. “Stay. You have clothes to sleep in, here, we can talk more in the morning. Stay.” Then, like it physically pained him to ask, “Please?”

Alois swallowed. Wiped away the last dregs of tears. Turned back.

Alois grinned, still shaky. “Well, if you’re going to beg.”

Ciel snorted.

Alois walked back to him.

Alois woke in cool but familiar sheets, a state of vague discomfort, and — thank god — in a full set of pajamas. In the time it took him to realize the discomfort was from an emotional, rather than alcohol-induced, hangover, he also was able to place where he was and gain enough perspective to be truly, entirely, horrifically embarrassed.

He had enough sense to immediately get up and flee, but a particularly pointed cough stopped him in his tracks. “Good morning, Trancy.” Well, shit. Ciel was, somehow, fully dressed (Alois prayed the bitch hadn’t been in yet that morning), perched on the chaise opposite the bed, cup of tea in hand.

After a momentary debate, Alois sighed and sat back down on the mattress. “Sleep well, Phantomhive?”

“Not my worst night.”

Alois couldn’t help it. “Any interesting dreams involving any particularly stunning drag queens?”

Ciel set his tea back down in the saucer. “We should talk about it.”

“Oh, pass.”

Ciel scoffed. “We’re not playing the game, you can’t pass.”

“And that is crazy, because I do seem to be passing.”

“Alois.”

Alois groaned and threw an arm out. “What do you want me to say, Ciel? That you were right about my panicked episodes? Because there, you were. Oh, and I’m not going to apologize, you have me living with you, and this is what you get,” he sing-songed the last bit.

“Alois, you were panicked and sobbing in my arms. I don’t want an apology, I want you to not be so—” broken, needy, childish, all words Ciel was kind enough not to say. “I’m worried about you.”

Alois wrinkled his nose with an ugh. He refused pity. “God, please don’t be. Look, I’ll give you this: I, perhaps, have a slightly unhealthy relationship with sex and how people view me in that sense. I will deal with that in my own time, but I try not to burden you with it in the interim. Fair?”

Ciel pursed his lips. “I’m assuming I won’t get anything more out of you about this, then?”

The selfish, wants-too-much part of Alois wished vaguely, that Ciel would press the matter, would smother him in reassurances about how Alois meant more to him than sex and prettiness, quiet all those insecurities. But that wasn’t Ciel’s job, nor was it in his nature. God knows if it was even true.

Ciel shifted so the majority of his face was hidden in sunlight’s shadow. “I also wanted to talk about. Me. My part in it.”

“‘Your part’? You initiated it.” Ciel flushed, visible enough against his pallor that the shadow didn’t do a thing to hide it. “But it isn’t as if I’m holding you to it. You were drunk. I was dressed as a woman — stunningly, I may add. It doesn’t have to be anything more.”

“Except I was thinking—”

“And besides,” Alois barrelled on. “You were in a new place, you were out of sorts, there’s no reason to—”

“I’m going to kiss you,” Ciel interrupted, in one fast breath. Then, collecting himself. “Unless you’d like me not to.”

That. That succeeded in shutting him up. “Uh.” Oh, very eloquent, Trancy. “Alright?”

“Alright.” Back to this. The chaise wasn’t far from the bed, and it took barely a moment for Ciel to cross over and kiss Alois — soft, slow, and unbearably sweet — on the mouth. He pulled back after a second, but left his hands on the sides of Alois’ face. “I meant it, last night, that I really don’t know what I want. I’m not going to promise you anything and I don’t think you’d want me to. I don’t even know if I’m a queer and frankly I don’t have time to figure out it out right now. But I like this. With you.”

Well.

Well, had it been anyone but Ciel, Alois would laugh him out of the room for the painful dissonance of genuinely still believing he didn't like men, but if anyone was to so thoroughly defy logic by enjoying kissing his friend while being fully not-queer, it would be Ciel, wouldn’t it?

As it was, he could handle this. He’d been loved for far worse things than his convenience before, by people who would treat his heart far less kindly than he trusted Ciel to do. He could be something Ciel wanted. He could have Ciel, in this way, and it was far preferable to not at all.

“Hm,” he offered, far more casual than he felt. Ciel, on his part, looked like a hearty ball of nerves trying desperately to keep a straight face. Alois might as well take him out of his misery. “Alright, I’ll bite. We’d be friends and you’d kiss me when you please and I never tell a soul of your queerer inclinations?”

“You’d be free to kiss me when you please, as well.”

Alois tsked, having some fun with this now. “Very presumptuous, Lord Phantomhive. All of this has been at your behest, let’s not forget. I’m merely along for the — for now it seems, proverbial — ride.”

Ciel took this incredulously, but seemed like he wasn’t up to arguing it. “So, what is it? Yes or no.”

Alois hummed, leaning back with a hand on his chin. Just to torture Ciel a bit. Then, with a shrug. “Oh, fuck it. Sure. I don’t have anything better to do.”

This surely would end up hurting him. He knew that. He needed Ciel more than Ciel needed him, he saw that, and love chases need, as it always does. But he would take whatever scraps of Ciel’s want, need, love, for as long as Ciel would have him.

He leant up, kissed his friend. Just for a second. And it did feel good, to initiate something sweet and right and sick in his gut for reasons different than usual.

He would take what he could get.

Chapter Text

“I don’t think this is working.”

Alois groaned and leaned back as far as he could, with Ciel perched in his lap. “Darling, you say this every time.” Sure, it had brought his heart to his throat the first three or so occasions upon which Ciel had dropped that into conversation, but eventually it lost the punch. Especially given Ciel didn’t actually move out of Alois’ lap. As it was, Alois just finished with a sing-song, “If you were going to break my heart, I think you would’ve gotten to it by now.”

Ciel leaned his elbows on Alois’ shoulders. “I wasn’t implying we stop.” And that was always the follow up. If Alois had a penny for how often Ciel bitched about their relationship with no intention of ending it, he’d have enough money to buy his own oversized mansion and make Ciel come to him for once.

“Because why would anyone ever figure that that was the meaning of ‘I don’t think this is working,’” he put on a rather nasal and high-pitched voice for mocking Ciel. The boy didn’t seem to appreciate, but Alois didn’t seem to care.

“Can you stop being a bitch for half a second?”

“No.”

“I just think,” Ciel started, before pausing to chew the inside of his cheek. Alois flicked him. It was a bad habit, and he was attempting to train Ciel out of it. “I just think we should set up a few rules.”

Alois groaned. It was far too early in the morning for this, but Ciel had all but insisted Alois move into his room, so he was subject to this at any ungodly hour of the day. “Phantomhive, this is kissing, not chess. The last thing it needs is rules.”

“There are clearly things, we both have discomfort with, that may be well addressed.” Ciel was refusing to make eye contact. Alois, in turn, was refusing to have Ciel’s lithe frame dropped squarely in his lap. He shooed Ciel away, and with a huff, Ciel moved to sit next to him on the bed instead. “For example, I don’t like getting touched on… that mark. On my shoulder. I don’t like it.”

Alois nodded. He wasn’t going to be a dick about something like that. “Fair. Apologies if I ever did, and I will not do so going forward.”

“Thank you,” Ciel offered, stiff. Not that Alois had been in a business meeting in the past three years, but this was about how he imagined one. “And I don’t want you to leave any visible marks on me. Ideally, anywhere. Sebastian still dresses me on occasion and trying to hide those from him is too much trouble.”

“Sure, sure.” Alois’ back hurt, a bit. Trying to share a bed most nights was not treating his spine kindly. He laid back. “Are you sure he doesn’t know, though? Can’t he, like, read your thoughts?”

Ciel laid down beside him. “Given you’re still alive, I’m assuming he doesn’t.” He frowned. “Given I’m alive, too.”

“If you say so.” Pause. Ciel looking at him rather meaningfully. “Agreed on all that then. Following the rules.” Ciel moved his head to the side, like trying to gesture something. Use your fucking words, Phantomhive. “...Anything else?”

“Not from me.”

“So…” He leaned over to kiss Ciel, only to be stopped with a hand on his chest. “Oh, goddammit, what is it?”

“What are your rules?”

“I don’t have any! It’s a lawless wasteland in the kissing of Alois Trancy, one I would love to get back to, thanks.” He leaned in again. Ciel leaned away again. “What?”

“Alois, you have panicked episodes—”

“Not in the past month! Not real ones, anyway.” Ciel and him had been. Taking things slow. No sex of any kind, as much as Alois had offered, and Ciel liked to do this odd thing where he asked Alois what he wanted, which always felt like a trick question because he never knew the answer that would make Ciel happy — damn the straight-faced fop — so. Ugh. But he got to pretend Ciel loved him, that he could be worthy of love, for a bit each day, and, well. He would take it. And he hadn’t even cried once since it started! — in front of Ciel, at least.

Ciel took a squint-eyed moment before attempting an authoritative little chin lift. “James Macken—”

“Oh, fuck no,” Alois interrupted. No one had called him that name in — God, he didn’t remember. Maybe ever. He was always Jim to Luka and he doubted his parents would have ever used the full surname, for the fuckall he remembered them. If that were to ever be a thing — if — it would not be in a conversation like this. “How did you even know about that? I know you and the bitch stalked me, but.”

Ciel frowned. “You told me.”

“No, I did not.”

“You did!” It was a bit impassioned, a bit I’m right and there is no way around that in the way Ciel tended to get. “During the whole — question thing. With the cult.”

Oh, well, that would be the answer. Alois dredged through his memory of the particular night and between blood-loss and stress and manic episodes and everything else he learned that hour or so, telling Ciel his birth name must have slipped from the precious trappings of memory. But he doubted Ciel would lie about this.

Alois tisked, dismissive. “And you remember it, what, two years later? You can’t possibly be that taken with me.” Ciel flushed, a bit, and broke eye contact. Endearing. Annoying. “And, anyway, it would be Jim. I'm hardly a James now and I certainly wasn't then.”

“Is that a rule?” Ciel said, in a tone nearly loose enough to call ‘musing.’ “Jim only, not James?”

“Alois only. I have a name and I happen to like it.” He huffed. He could feel Ciel’s gaze on him. “I mean.” Making a fool of himself. “If you ever wanted to call me Jim, if you’re ever that desperate to switch around your terms of referral, I suppose you could go ahead.”

There was a tug on the corner of Ciel’s lips. “Alright, Jim.”

Oh. Oh. Well, then. Alois swallowed, ignoring any tightness in his throat. “Don’t overuse it. And not in front of anyone else, I don’t want to deal with the questions.” James Macken. Ciel’s dumb, posh lilt. Alright, Jim. Alois choked out a laugh. “God, but it is an ugly name.”

He didn't know why he expected Ciel to counter. But, “Yes, it is.”

“Oi, what the fuck?”

“What? You said so!” Breaking from his indignation in a moment, Ciel made a soft, cooing sound, like trying to soothe a bratty kid. Which Alois was not. “Not like it would be ugly on you. You know that. There isn't a name on this earth you couldn't make lovely.”

Alois scoffed. “Oh, god, Ciel. Do not go soft on me this young, it will be terribly uncomfortable in the bedroom.” Ciel gave him a very pointed look. “But I doubt my charm extends that far, honestly, darling. It just isn’t a sexy name. No, really, imagine it.” For effect, he arched his back, threw his head back, and moaned out in falsetto, “Oh, Jim, I'm about to finish!”

Ciel cracked up in laughter beside him. “You,” he said, still between giggles, “are the most incorrigible man.”

“Nothing to be corrected about a man you want to kiss so bad you make rules for it.” Alois shot back. “Alright, how about this for a rule: if you catch me being off during the whole kissing bit, make the horrific sacrifice and stop kissing me. And when I bitch at you for babying me and tell you that I’m fine, don’t hate me. Fair?”

Ciel hummed. “I’d love something more specific, but I’ll take it.” Ciel put an unsteady hand on Alois’ shoulder. “And you can stop me when you feel off, too. I’ll try but I’m not always going to be able to tell, you know.”

“I’m not expecting you to. I’m a wonderful actress, Ciel darling.” Alois turned so he was looking up at the grand canopy above his friend’s bed. That was the thing about making rules for his comfort. Luxury had always been something he’d had to fight for, had to win, using manipulation and wiles and playing whomever was easily played. Who was he, to get the luxury of this life, without even sacrificing his own comfort? What was he giving up for it? Nothing?

That wasn’t how the world worked.

But Ciel’s hand had followed his shoulder as he turned, a soft, cool touch asking for little except how to make Alois more comfortable.

Strange things.

Alois Trancy did not swim in dirty, murk-filled ponds.

“It isn’t dirty, Alois,” Lizzie denied, floating on her back without a care in the world, like there wasn’t a very visible piece of seaweed caught in her blonde hair. “We’ve been swimming here since before we could walk, it won’t do you any harm.”

Alois scrunched up his face, keeping his legs tucked to his chest, as far from the water as he could be on a dock. “All you rich lot may believe in bloodletting, but I will not be putting myself in the path of a leech.”

Ciel scoffed. “You cannot call me a priss and then act like this. It’s just water, Trancy. Stop complaining.” He splashed some pondmurk in Alois’ direction, and Alois yelped and moved back. Ciel snorted. Something nearly like a smile on his face.

Lizzie was still trying poorly to force down a laugh. “Come on, Lou, we got you that nice suit and everything!! You wouldn’t waste my hard work, would you?” She gave the kind of pout that could win awards, and Alois groaned. He couldn’t hold out against her.

“God, fine.” Lizzie did a delightful little squeal. Ciel managed half a grin. “But if anything slimy even brushes my skin I will drown you both.”

“You’ll do what you must,” Lizzie assured, sagely.

Alois eased himself into the cool water. Admittedly, it did feel sort of nice, against the horrid heat outside. Sort of. Not that he would admit to any point of enjoyment. By the edge of the pond, he could stand with his whole torso out of water, and didn’t intend to go in any further.

“Not that bad, right?” Ciel said, wading over to Alois. “No need to be all in arms, huh.”

“It’s passable, I suppose. Stayed at this depth.”

Ciel grinned, self-satisfied. A droplet of water fell over the curve of his chin and sloped down the line of his neck. Gross as the water was, God was Alois tempted to lick it off.

Being properly distracted, Alois didn’t notice Ciel reaching forward to grab him by the shoulder until Alois was already half-pulled, kicking-and-screaming, into the water.

Under the surface, cold and soaked and submerged, Alois kept his eyes screwed shut, even when he felt hands on either side of his face. Even when he felt the press of a mouth against his in the slightest underwater kiss, just a small parting of lips, a brief stealing of breath.

Alois was pulled to surface by a grinning Ciel, looking all too proud of himself. No longer kiss-numb, Alois remembered to be pissed, shoving Ciel hard. “You traitorous cunt!” Then, adding a shiver for effect. “Fuck knows what this will do to my hair!”

Ciel, the bitch, just laughed. In all too fair recompense, Alois splashed water directly at him.

Lizzie gasped. “Water fight?”

And before anyone could get a word out, it morphed instantly into a warzone. Which lasted, and lasted, till—

Ciel straightened up suddenly, causing him to entirely fail to dodge the nigh-tsunami Lizzie sent his way. He didn’t seem to note it at all.

Alois frowned and glanced at Lizzie, before turning attention back to Ciel. “Alright on all fronts, Phantomhive?”

At lack of response, Alois set a hesitant arm on Ciel’s shoulder, who jolted suddenly. Blinked. “Sorry.”

“’s all good.”

“Sebastian needs—” Then, remembering Lizzie. “I, um, forgot. That I have business today. I should. Head off.” He gave a long glance over the near-still pond that looked almost mournful. “Hate to leave early.”

“It’s okay! There are infinite lake days, Ciel!” Lizzie promised. The boy didn’t look all too convinced, as he headed off.

With him out, Lizzie called for being too cold, but insisted Alois stay in-pond. He didn’t argue — he was just accustoming to the cool, and spent a good amount of time with the whole lower half of his face underwater.

After a minute, Lizzie leaned back into a patch of sun, her hair falling in limp curls around her face. “So.”

Alois stayed face half-submerged for another second, before surfacinging to respond, “So?”

“You said once,” Lizzie tilted her head to the side, as if recalling, “that it would make you a horrible friend to not tell me, were you to, hypothetically, be fucking my cousin.”

Well, shit.

“To be fair—” Alois was well aware the game had been made, and felt no need to argue over something that was clearly already evident. “The 'fucking' has yet to occur.”

“He kissed you, though,” Lizzie reminded. That was on Ciel, for failing at any subtly. “And underwater. I presume it wasn’t the first time?”

“It’s happened a time or two, yeah.” Alois shrugged. “Not underwater, obviously.”

Lizzie held composure for one brilliant moment before bursting out in a glass-cracking squeal and throwing herself into Alois’ arms — and back into the water. “I’m so happy for you, Alois!! And for Ciel too — though I do wish you’d told me, and I am owed one told you so — the fact you thought he wasn’t queer—”

“Oh, jury’s still out on that, actually.”

“—you’re idiots, both of you, but I’m so glad you two figured it out, and you’re together, and happy—” She was getting… quite emotional about the whole bit, and Alois figured it was his duty to at least let her know the basics of the situation.

“Liz, darling, I think you should know—” She didn’t back away from the tight-crushing hug. “We’re not, like— well, I suppose you couldn’t call it much of a courtship, even if it was, you know, romantic, seeing as we’d never get married, but—” Lizzie did pull back, there, but was still looking at him with those eyes that would make a doe feel shame, and shit, he didn’t want to disappoint her. “We’re just friends.”

She tilted her head. “What?”

“We just— kiss. It doesn’t mean anything. He’s still working on some things, for himself, and I don’t mind snogging him as he does. So. Kissing. Nothing serious.”

“Hm.” She narrowed her eyes, looking over his features like putting together a puzzle. The speed at which that woman could go from doe to detective was horrifying. “Nothing serious?”

“Not a jot.”

“Which is why the first thing you brought up in your rebuttal was a discussion of whether or not you’d ever marry him?”

Alois flushed. He hadn’t meant it like— “I— it was relevant. We couldn’t ever — so I didn’t want—” Lizzie, damn her, could actually raise one eyebrow. Which she did. Incredulous. “I don’t think about marrying him.” He huffed. “It’s a bullshit institution, anyway, marriage. Only good for queers to hide by marrying their cousins.”

“So he is queer now?”

“I was talking about you, Lady Elizabeth.” She laughed a little, grin quirked to the side. “He’s not — so far as he’ll admit anyway, and it doesn’t really matter. He doesn’t... Ah, he doesn’t love me. And he won’t. And I’m fine with that.” He applauded himself for how remarkably casual he'd offered that. Brilliant work.

That was, till Lizzie cooed out, “Oh, Lou,” and threw herself into his arms.

He huffed and fell back with the force of it, the water rippling around the two of them. “Lizzie—”

“I’m really sorry, Alois. I know how much that hurts.” Alois, tentatively, raised hand to settle on her shoulder, returning the hug.

“I thought things were going smashingly with your well-arsed horsewoman?”

Lizzie chuckled, and Alois could feel the vibration of it on his skin. “They are.” She pulled back a bit. “But before that. The wondering. The feeling you could never quite be enough.” She rested lake-damp hands on either side of his biceps. “And you won’t believe me when I say he probably is gone on you. But know you are enough.” She leaned up to press a light kiss to his forehead. “And any cousin of mine who doesn’t love you like hell is a fool.”

Alois let his eyes flutter close as he buried face in Lizzie’s shoulder. “It really isn’t that big of a deal, Liz, I swear.” He felt her scoff better than he heard it. “But thank you.”

“Of course, Lou.”

Alois was lying on his back, in Ciel’s bed, reading some penny-novel of the gothic romance sort — absolutely sordid, filthy even, and fuck if he didn’t want to kiss Ciel’s chest like the love interest was doing to leading woman’s tits — when Ciel stormed in. Proper storm too. Ciel was a permanent light rain, but when he stormed, it was a take-cover sort of situation.

“Well,” Alois drawled, aiming for lighthearted. “How was your day?”

Ciel’s gaze turned fast to him like he hadn’t realized Alois was in the room. “What? Fine. What do you need?”

“Darling, I think we’ve long since been reliant on ‘need’ for why one of us might find himself in the other's bedchamber.” Ciel only coiled more into himself, still feet from the bed. Alois sat up and gave it another attempt. “It’s nothing so pressing in the downstairs region as to call it a need, but I have been reading this,” he waved the book, lurid cover and all, “and it isn’t without fine ideas, if you wanted to—”

“No. Thank you.” Ciel’s nails were bound to make proper acquaintance with his lower skin layer. “You can go.”

“Doesn’t seem much like I can, actually.” Alois stood up. “What has you all tied up?”

“Nothing.” Ciel turned full away from him. “Go, Trancy.”

“Oh, we are not doing last names again, I will not be demoted.” Alois curled his fingers ‘round Ciel’s shoulder. “Tell me.”

Ciel shrugged off his hand, but not before Alois could feel the shaking of his shoulder. Christ, he was about to sob, wasn’t he? “I am fine, Alois, and you have no— no fucking allowance to be in my rooms unannounced, so leave me be before I have someone escort you out.” His words were wet and cracking at the seams.

“Your threats are empty, your Lordship, I know—”

“We aren’t friends.” Ciel cried out, turning towards Alois, face the reddest it'd ever been. No shed tears, that he could see, but dangerously close to it. “You do not know me nor will I allow you to act like you have any power over me. You are my houseguest, and that is it, and I am the one in charge, I am, and you aren’t allowed to—”

“Ciel.”

“I have it in control, alright? I am— I’m in charge of a house, and a legacy, and a demon, I—”

“Ciel Phantomhive.”

“You will leave me be, I—”

“Darling.” Alois was tired of this. Tired, and he thought he’d cracked it. “What happened with Sebastian?”

“I…” Eye galaxies wide. His hands, between himself and Alois, were shaking. “How— Nothing, nothing happened, I,” he swallowed tightly, not looking at Alois. “I’m— I have it—”

There was half a moment of swaying, which gave just enough warning for Alois to lunge forward and, just barely, catch Ciel, before he fell to floor. Alois wrapped his arms around the boy, who was shaking and choking back cries, and shushed him, gentle, and rubbed a hand over his back. And then, and then—

Ciel sobbed.

Alois, with a bit of navigation and without more than a bit of bitching, managed to navigate the two of them over to the edge of the bed, where he could hold Ciel a little easier. He didn’t quite know how to do this, but he remembered Mey-rin’s arms around him, the gentle cadence of her shushing, and what he didn’t know, he could imitate.

“Phantomhive, you’re going to soak through your bloody eyepatch,” Alois chided, curving his hand around Ciel’s face, pushing the eyepatch out of place to reveal whites-turned-red around the purple iris. Still murky with the tears. “And more importantly, my shirt. Take care.”

“Sod off,” Ciel sniffled, not quite making eye contact.

“With your dead weight on top of me? Unlikely.” Hesitantly — he couldn’t remember if this was in the comfort guide — he set his hand in Ciel’s hair and combed it through the strands. “Would you want to tell me what’s the matter?”

“I—”

“And don’t think for a second I’ll take ‘nothing’ as an—”

“He’s going to kill me.” There was nothing of cracking to the phrase, empty and deep like a well with no bottom.

“Darling...”

“And I know that, obviously.” There it was: a harsh sniffle, the rustling sound of Ciel wiping his nose on his shirt-sleeve fabric. It was nice, to find in him moments of childishness. “I made the deal knowing that. I knew what I signed, I know that. I made my bed and usually it’s fine—” like his voice wasn’t breaking on every word, “—usually, I’m fine with it.

“But, God, Alois,” he leaned back in Alois’ arms, face tear-slick and glinting in the light. “I don’t want to die.”

Alois swore, he could feel the words like wood-splinters lodged into the meat of his heart.

It had been a long time, since he’d feared for anyone but himself. Since Luka, maybe. Long since there was a charge in him, unbidden, to make someone else’s life better, for no personal gain but the relief of keeping them from sorrow. Since he had some saccharine, silly thought, I would do anything to save you.

“Ciel—” Because what could he say? That he wouldn't? It was something Alois had known well as Ciel, this whole time. He’d pushed it down, turned it to some ignorable pang-in-chest. But he’d known, that Ciel’s days were numbered, hideously tallied by the very demon that Alois had to pass in hallways every day. As long as that creature was alive, there wasn’t a hope for Ciel.

As long as Sebastian was alive.

“It’s stupid, I know.” Ciel sniffled again, straightening up and backing up from Alois’ deathgrip. “I don’t know why it got to me today, but I’ll return to normal.”

Alois, still shaky and unsure and playing over in his mind the realization he had come to, tried some levity: “Darling, there’s never once been a normal with you.” Then, sobering himself, “But really, you don’t- I don't want you normal. Don’t act like nothing’s wrong.”

Ciel shrugged. He did seem disturbingly back to normal, like a five minute bout of sobbing could be left behind like nothing. “Nothing is wrong. Or, I suppose, nothing is different, so that would mean everything is wrong, otherwise.”

“What can I do, Ciel?” He tried to keep his voice from cracking, on the words. It was a useless, sentimental plea. There was nothing he could do (there was one thing he could do). There was no reason for asking. No reason, except trying to let the boy know how desperate Alois was to save him.

Ciel frowned. “Don’t ask that. We both know there’s nothing for it, don’t get up in arms.”

“It is, you may imagine, difficult not to,” Alois forced out through the grit of his teeth. “How much, do you know, can he see where you are, what you’re doing, what you’re— thinking, even. Is he allowed all of it?”

Ciel hummed, looking half taken-aback by the shift of topic. He sat back on the bed, his knees still brushing Alois’s. “Not sure. He’s never told me, and I haven’t thought to ask. He should know not to pry, and I know he’s not paying attention every second, but to be safe I assume he’s always listening.”

“Horrifying.”

“Careful. He might hear.”

Alois snorted. “Well, let’s hope he’s not paying attention, for now at least.” With that, Alois leaned in, and pressed a gentle kiss to Ciel’s forehead. Leaning back, he finished, “Wouldn’t want to scandalize the poor demon.”

There was a soft flush to Ciel’s face, and clear signs of forced-down smile. Better forced-down smile than sob.

“Come dear,” Alois continued, leading Ciel so he was laid down in bed. “Watch over this novel for me. I’ll be right back.”

Ciel frowned. “Where are you going?”

“Don’t whine. I promise I’m just off to see Baldroy, and then I’ll return, and until then, just pine for me, alright?”

“Bitch.”

“Fop.”

Ciel still had a proper pout, so Alois brought his own fingers to his mouth, kissed them, and then pressed them to Ciel’s lips. The pout softened, a bit. “Take your time. I wanted you to leave anyway.”

Alois snorted. “Sure you did.”

He walked to the doorway, sparing one glance back at the boy on the bed, curling into the novel Alois had left for him. Saving someone, Alois thought, would make the savior so needed by the saved, that what could follow but love?

And yet. Alois knew wholeheartedly, looking at him, that if he managed the saving, and he could get away with it, he would never tell.

Not a word.

“When’d the young master even been here?” Baldroy asked, peering at the window at a countryside an hour and change off from home. “Can’t imagine sheep are making milk any different out here than home.”

“Are we almost there?” Finny said, ignoring Baldroy in favor of pressing his face to the window. Mey-rin reached over to draw little pictures where Fin’s breath had fogged up the glass. It was the sort of thing Alois usually would have laughed at or joined in on but. But he was just a bit out of sorts.

His shoulders were set tight and back, hands clasped in his lap. He could do this, obviously, it was easy. It was just talking to people he trusted. It was fine.

(Just talking, and hoping they believed him, and trusting them not to tell Ciel, or, god forbid, Sebastian, and making sure they weren’t suspicious, and didn’t leave out weapons — any more than usual — and, fuck, there were so many factors, but. But. Trust. Trust.)

“This should be fine, actually,” Alois said.

Baldroy snorted. “Kid, we haven’t even gotten to the dairy farm.”

“We’re not—” Alois sighed. “We’re not getting sheep cheese. That was a ruse.” Pause. “We probably should get some. Cover up and all. But I just wanted to talk to you. Alone. Away from the house.”

Mey and Baldroy immediately exchanged one of the tensest glances Alois had ever seen. Great. They completely misunderstood. “Did something happen?” Mey asked, perching her glasses up on her head. “Is there someone we need to—”

“No, no, it’s not about me.” They looked skeptical. “Really. I’ve been doing. Good. I promise.” Shaking his head, “It’s about Ciel.”

Finny perked up at this, looking back, eyebrows furrowed. “Is the young master okay?”

“For now,” Alois assured. “But. But he won’t be forever.” Alois lifted his chin high like a man with far greater confidence in the words he was about to say. “So, I’ve decided.” Then, deep breath, and firmer tone than he’d thought he would be able to manage,

“I want to kill Sebastian.”

Chapter Text

— which was, apparently, one of the worst things to say to a group of high-powered adults already hell-bent on protecting whatever Alois had left of a virtue.

Baldroy had to grab Mey’s arm to keep her from reaching under her skirts to hold assuredly onto some weapon, but his expression hinted he wasn’t too far from doing the same. Finny had grown a bit beyond taking all his cues from his de-facto da and sister, and as such, he immediately leaned forward to gently place his hands on Alois’ knees without a glance to the two elders.

“Did he—” Baldroy started, before Alois threw his hands up between them.

“He didn’t do anything!” No one looked particularly convinced. “No molestation has taken place, of myself nor Ciel, I swear to you, you can all exhale. He’s an absolute prick, and we are going to kill him, but I assure you, nothing sexually untoward has occurred.” They relaxed a bit — Baldroy no longer had to restrain Mey-rin from drawing, and Finny’s hands had slightly less of a death-grip. But there was still an edge on which everyone was desperately balancing. “Will you all let me explain?”

Mey and Baldroy shared a look, before looping Finny in on said look. Since Fin turned twenty — the birth date, like Alois’, was a mere guess, and Alois will admit enjoying their connection in that — the two elders had seemingly been trying to catch him up to their quick, inner connection. About this, Alois felt ambivalent. He figured Finny deserved to be a true member of their team, but the Baldroy-Mey near-telepathy was already hard to work around, and if they managed to loop Finny into it…

Maybe he could ask to be a part of it, too.

“It’s a hell of a statement,” Baldroy said, finally moving his eyes from Fin. “Like I said, I’d lift the mansion onto my back and carry it if it’d keep you safe, kid, but yeah, I will be needing more than that.”

He most certainly had never said that, but Alois was too warmed by the words to contest them, in case they were taken back.

“I think I’d be better at carrying,” Finny said, something like musing in his tone. But just as heart-wrenchingly sincere. “So I can do that, and Baldo can direct me where to carry it.”

Baldroy grinned and looked at Finny with that familiar softness. “Yeah, I sure can.”

“It would be a lot of hedges to walk around,” Mey added. “Might be tricky, finding your way with a mansion on your back.”

“You can look from behind, Baldo from front!”

Alois cleared his throat. He loved these people — slow and cloying as that love had found him, not in any way expected — but they were a bit hard to corral. “Would you like me to explain?”

Mey-rin snapped to attention, instantly, like he was the whistle of a training regiment. The clear, sniper-eye glint cutting through her glazed-over stare. “Yes, yes, go ahead.”

He realized, then, with all eyes on him, that he didn’t have a clue how to start.

“Well— this might be, surprising, a lot, but I need you to believe me,” he began. They nodded — fast and rushed from Fin, slow and measured from Mey, and just one confirming down-tilt of the head from Baldroy — and he trusted, implicitly, that he would be believed. “Alright. So.

“Sebastian is a demon.”

This was met with markedly less surprise than he’d hoped.

Mey narrowed her eyes. “Of the literal, religious sense, you mean?”

“Not just that he’s a piece of shit,” Baldroy finished for her.

Finny hummed. “He could be both.”

“Right you are, Finnian.” He had been planning for a bit of rebuttal, he was all ready to show off his faded contract seal, tell the whole grisly Claude story he’d kept tight to his chest for three years now. He wasn’t expecting this. “Demon. Literally. All— powers and summoned and the like.” Nods all around. “I’m sorry, are you not surprised?”

Mey laughed, the harsh, grit noise so much more grounding than her put-upon high-pitched one. “Alois, we’ve been working here for five years.”

“We noticed something was up.” Baldroy shrugged. “Wouldn’t’ve said ‘demon’ for sure, but yeah. The guy was never normal. Wasn’t any of our business.”

“But it is our business, now!” Finny said, sharp nod of the head. “If he’s hurting Ciel.”

“Well, not at the moment. It’s that, he has a contract with Ciel.” This was the easy part. This, at least, Alois could get through. “Sebastian is to find who killed Ciel’s parents, and in return, Sebastian gets his soul.” And this was where it got hard. “When he takes Ciel’s soul, Ciel dies.”

An inhale of breath through teeth. Furrowed brows. Something like heartbreak, in all the different ways it could manifest on three different faces.

In lieu of a response, Alois shook his head. “I won’t fucking let that happen.”

“Language,” Baldroy muttered, instinctually, through the worried furrow of his brow. “Okay. Yeah. And you’re sure?”

Alois nodded, frantic. “I had one too. Claude, my butler — he was a demon. We had a contract. He was going to kill me, but Sebastian killed him first. That’s how I got here — They burned down my house, when they killed Claude. So Ciel took me in.” Everyone was gazing out, worried, into space. “I still have the mark.” He stuck out his tongue — he didn’t show it often. Ever. But these people were — maybe — his family too. “It faded when he died. Ciel’s is on his eye.”

Finny looked up. “That’s why his eye is purple? The covered one?”

“I thought he was just embarrassed about the heterochromia,” Mey said.

“I thought it was a freaky eye condition.”

So, they had all seen it. Alois knew there was no way that could have passed unnoticed, even by a group as occasionally distractible as the three sat around him. “Indeed.” And, because he could never quite help that all-consuming need to be right — “I told him you’d all noticed. He didn’t believe me. But I was right.”

“Course you were, kid.” Baldroy gave him a nod. “So they can be killed, demons, yeah? If Seb killed yours, we can kill him.”

Alois wracked his brain for more of the specifics. “Yes, yeah, there was — My maid, she was a demon, too, and she had one — a specific sword for killing demons. Sebastian used it to kill Claude. I don’t know if he would have kept it, though, or where it would have gone, but also there’s probably other ways. I just don’t know who to ask.” Then, wanting an assurance: “Does that mean — you’ll help? Actually?”

Another look. Baldo-Mey-Fin, then back, a nod and a chin lift and an agreement reached without a word spoken. Baldroy took the lead. “Yeah, of course. It’s a different sorta way, but hell, Ciel’s our kid, too. Our first job was protecting him, and if that’s gotta be protecting him from the prick who’s our boss — that’s still our job.”

Mey-rin leaned forward, resting her mouth and chin against the curl of her fist. “Hm.”

Alois had assumed, as one must, when faced with the three of them, that the decision one made was to be taken as universal. But— “A differ of opinion, Mey?”

“Hm?” again, then: “Oh! No, no Alois. Of course we’re with you.” Finny nodded emphatically, which would nicely decrease the necessity of a third ask. “It occurred to me, though, that I may have someone to ask. About help.”

Baldo raised his brow and looked inquisitively at Mey. She tilted her head right, then a quick tilt back, and this seemed to get across whatever it needed to, as Baldroy shifted to an appreciative expression and a nod.

How the fuck did they do that.

“Sounds like we’re starting to get a plan.” Baldroy grinned, and took Alois by the shoulder. “Kid. Thanks for coming to us with this. Seriously. It’s a fucking risk, to say a word, but we’d’ve never forgiven ourselves if something happened to Ciel, or you, when we would’ve had a shot at stopping it. So thank you. For giving us the chance.”

Alois, face-flushed and still with the instinct to dismiss and deflect and grin his way out of feelings, was tempted to write it off as really not that big of a deal, Baldroy. But it was a big deal. It was a life in hand. An important life.

It was a life of someone they all loved.

“Of course,” Alois chose, instead, and hoped they could hear his own myriad gratitude within it.

As they shared another fast and flicking look, he thought they could.

All things considered, Alois was favorable to having Ciel’s tongue in his mouth.

Alois was currently perched over the boy, arms bracketed on either side of his head, knee between Ciel’s legs. Ciel, for his part, was being quite enthusiastic about the situation, near-entire torso pushed up off the bed in order to chase Alois’ mouth whenever he deigned to shift a centimeter back. It was charming. Embarrassing, too, for Ciel, but Alois would never complain for an upper hand. (Although, to take a more literal stance, the hands that happened to be up belonged to Ciel, who was holding tightly onto Alois’ hair and the fabric around his waist. His possessiveness had become a very tangible thing.)

Alois moved his right hand to rest against Ciel’s jaw, in part for the soft feeling of contact and in part for something to hold him back from chasing when Alois pulled away. It was only a moment, anyway, given he immediately returned to press short, light kisses against the skin of Ciel’s neck, nothing so firm or biting that it could leave marks (he was respectful of that rule, thank-you-very-much). But he liked the small, sharp inhales from Ciel when he pressed his mouth to a pulse point, so he counted it as worth it, even if there was no trace of him left behind on his friend.

Ciel was still fucking tiny, even if had managed to put on a bit of weight after Alois had bitched him out for not eating enough, and this had the sole benefit of allowing him to raise his leg and hook it over Alois’ hips, which provided a marvelous amount of contact. Following a keening sound and the hand in his hair tugging him sharply up, Alois met Ciel’s mouth and kissed him firm. It was good. It was really fucking good, and close as they were, there was no way to hide that either of them was sure fucking enjoying the situation.

If only it could actually be a situation.

The thing about Alois was. Well. He didn’t know a thing about sex, not really. For what was likely the best, he didn’t remember much of the sex he’d had before. It was a blur of anxiety and pain and posturing, intercut with the occasional sharp, specific recollection, but honestly, he doubted the conduct of those events would actually be that informative for what he wanted with Ciel. Ideally, he would be fully mentally present if he ever got to fuck Ciel (and ‘fuck’ felt too harsh a word, but ‘sex’ was oddly clinical, and it was horrifically embarrassing to even think the phrase ‘make love’, so he refused to), and that, at least, was a complete diversion from what little he remembered. And, of course, it wasn’t as if Ciel had any better idea of what they should do, which was less of a comfort than it might’ve been. It would have at least been nice to have one of them with the sense to be a guide.

(For not the first time, he regretted not letting Elliot take him home that night. At least he’d have something to offer, if Elliot had taught him.)

In any case, they were currently in the unfortunate situation of the traumatized leading the virginal, and unfortunate it fucking was. Because Alois had thought about it, and he did want this. He did! Even if the case was as it appeared, that Ciel wanted him for snogging and sharing literature, rather than anything akin to need or love, that was a good realm of difference than only wanting him for a quick fuck. Ciel had been reticent, about the sex, for fuck’s sake, so it was no longer a situation of Alois wanting to sleep with Ciel in a desperate bid for companionship and love, it was just a situation of Alois wanting to sleep with Ciel, because he— cared for him, or something of that embarrassing like, and because there is only so much one can take of snogging relentlessly and grinding fully clothed and acting like he didn’t want to unbutton the virtually hundreds of layers Ciel found it fit to put in every still boring outfit.

But every time he offered—

“Ciel, darling, do you—”

And there it was.

The moment words broke through the haze of the kiss, Ciel seemed to realize the extent of the situation, and quickly shuffled back, separating them so fully that there were no longer any places of contact. He cleared his throat, face pink as anything, and straightened his eyepatch. That was it, then. Closed off, end of discussion.

“Apologies,” he said.

The fucking prick.

“What the fuck are you apologizing for?” Alois asked, knowing full well the answer. To look a little less either pissed off or put out by the sharp change in the situation (really, he should be neither, unless he could get Ciel to admit that this was a pity situation. A stupid, martyric ‘I simply can’t fuck you, Alois, your life is too tragic and I cannot foist this discomfort on you’. Ugh.), he picked back up the book he’d abandoned in favor of snogging Ciel senseless. Not that he could read through the haze of annoyance. “If you haven’t noticed, I don’t actually mind at all. Any of it.”

Ciel, moving slowly as if trying to avoid alerting Alois of what he was doing, grabbed a pillow and, honest-to-god, used it to cover his lap. Christ. Who the fuck was he hiding from? “I didn’t want to—” He cut himself off. Head tilt and eye widen. Like that was supposed to communicate anything. Alois returned the nonverbal with one sharp raised brow. Ciel huffed. “I don’t want to pressure you.”

“You aren’t!” Alois snapped. If the sudden change in tone startled Ciel, he didn’t show it. He hated this. He hated that Ciel acted like Alois wasn’t upset when he clearly was. He pushed off the bed to stand. “Christ, Ciel. I’m not a child. You aren’t my fucking keeper.”

Ciel, in Alois’ periphery — he was doing well on his attempt not to look at him — flushed, brow furrowed. “I—” Then, calming his tone: “I know that.”

He never fucking met Alois’ energy. That was the thing about him that was so goddamn infuriating. Closed off and quiet and unemoting, and Alois would always rather he just tell him off than do this. Because it just pissed him off more. “Then what’s your goddamn problem?”

“I don’t think you’re…”

And the trail-off. Pursed lips. He was such a cunt.

Alois raised his chin. “No. No, finish your sentence. Tell me what I’m not, Ciel.”

Ciel didn’t meet Alois’ eyes. Drummed his fingers slow over the pillow. Tsked. “I just… I was thinking about what we talked about. About checking with you.”

“It isn’t checking in for you to just decide how I feel without asking me. That’s not what we fucking talked about.”

“I feel like it’s better this way than the other!” Finally, finally, a raised voice. Alois could work with this. “I can’t check if we’re— In the middle of it!”

“Maybe you could fucking trust me that if we’re ‘in the middle of it’ I’m okay with it!” Ciel made a tsk sort of sound, not a full eyeroll but near to it. Alois felt the emotional shift, like he often did, the anger falling out of him as quickly as it had come. He sat down and re-opened the book in his lap. “It’s— whatever. Forget it.”

“Alois—”

“Do you know what this word means?” Alois interrupted, pointing aimlessly at a page in the book. He didn’t want to do this anymore. Perhaps, maybe, Ciel simply didn’t want Alois. Perhaps his utility began and concluded at the snogging, and it was idiotic of Alois to believe there was anywhere to go from there. It wasn’t like if Ciel fucked Alois, it would mean he also loved him. He knew that. But if at least Ciel wanted him— “‘Cordially’ — what’s that?” He knew what the word cordial meant. Fucking obviously. Doyle had already used it a half dozen times in the stories and it wasn’t hard to determine context. But it was something to ask.

“About the opposite of how you’re acting,” Ciel grumbled, low enough that Alois suspected he was not meant to hear. In a clearer tone: “Friendly. Affable.” Alois actually didn’t know that word, but again. Context. “He’s happy to see Watson.”

“That felt obvious,” Alois snarked, realizing a moment late he may still have included more bite than was due for. He clicked his tongue. “Thank you.” Ciel nodded. He was looking up at the corner of the room, awkward as all hell, and shit, it was on Alois to fix this, wasn’t it? It was probably fair, but. Still irritating. “I just started this one. If you want to read with me.”

A moment of heavy, worrying silence. Then: “Of course.” Nevermind Alois was fairly certain Ciel was well ahead of him on the Doyle collection. He moved close enough that their sides were lightly flush, without pressure. It was nice. It was still awkward, sure. But just having him here.

After a minute or so of silent reading, Ciel asked, in barely a whisper, “Do you think Holmes is a queer?”

It was a cautious question, another attempt to bring them back to a softer bend of their conversation. Ciel knew Alois liked to talk theories about characters in their books and where their inclinations laid, and this was a kindness related to that. Alois took it. “Obviously. I am quite certain he and Watson have snogged. At least once.”

“Hm.” Ciel laughed a bit. “Likely. Helps the working bond, I would suppose.”

“Ha!” Alois full grinned, despite himself. God, it was so much better like this, being entertained by Ciel’s genuine wit, than fighting. This was enough. And it would be. “I have to imagine that’s the only reason.”

“Indeed.” Ciel leaned his head to the side, like musing over something. If it happened to place his chin to rest on Alois’ shoulder, well. Reasons. “It’s a shame I didn’t get a chance to ask.”

“Huh?”

Ciel hummed. The specific, shit-eating hum of a man incredibly proud of the information he was about to drop. “Oh. I’ve had Doyle over for dinner. He helped us solve a murder. Did I never tell you?”

The fucking bastard. He couldn’t even hide the grin, could he?

Shit.

Shit, Alois loved him.

He huffed out a laugh and shook his head, and resolved to deal with that particular realization later. Because really, this information— far more pressing.

“No. Fucking. Way.”

“Baldroy.”

The chef in question immediately looked up from a less-questionable-than-it-once-might’ve-been pot of soup to grin at Alois with all the immediate, inexorable attention of a man on the front lines. “Hey, kid! Everything alright?”

Alois shifted, slightly uncomfortable. “Fine, on my end.”

“Yeah? I thought you’d be off with the entourage visiting the Midfords.”

Alois waved off the assumption. He perched himself up on the prep table, curling nervous fingers around the ledge. “Lizzie’s brother hates me. He thinks I’m trying to ruin his sister’s virtue.”

Baldroy laughed. It was the kind of loud, free sound that could bounce around a room as small as the kitchen. “Jeez, did Liz get all the brains of the family? Pretty boneheaded idea, and I’m one to talk.”

“Don’t you dare compare yourself to Edward. You’re the most studied man in the world, next to him.” He watched the smile grow on the chef’s face, as he brought a hand up to scratch behind his neck. “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something. Make use of your sage wisdom, perhaps.”

“Got plenty of that.” He turned fully from the soup (it remained in Alois’ line of sight so he, at least, could watch and ensure no over-boil) and threw a towel over his shoulder. “Lay it on me.”

This was the hard part. He should’ve considered himself fit for sharing any sort of information with the man, now knowing he’d kill for him, but this was an airing-out in explicit terms of something that still felt unstable, flimsy, and easy-broken beneath his feet, and to offer its existence in words out into the universe felt so foolish that Alois himself nearly abandoned ship rather than risk that barely-solid surface splintering. But maybe it was for that reason, that lack of solidity, that there was no option but asking.

“Ciel and I are —” Come on, Alois. Clear, precise method of delivery, something fit for your da to hear. There must be, he was sure, some set of words to clearly articulate, and he could find them, if only — oh fuck he was already talking: “—snogging. We’re snogging. And have been, for a bit.”

The chef blinked once. Twice. Alois found himself, in a way he hadn’t expected, caught off-guard by Baldroy’s surprise, from a man who tended to notice. But then — “Oh. You are?” Leaned back on his heels. Not meeting Alois’ eyes. “Huh. Well, I’m glad for the two of you.”

Oh.

He already knew.

“You knew.”

“What? I—” His flush hid nothing, and as he met Alois’s pointed gaze, he gave a shaky grin and stood a bit straighter. “Yeah, yeah, no, I knew. But! In my defense, y’all were kissing in the club in the direct sight line of all three of us, and none of us keep a word from the others, so. Careful next time, if you want stealth.” Ah, wonderful. They all knew. “We figured y’all wanted privacy, and didn’t want us poking into your business. But, for what it’s worth, we were all really happy for you both. Can’t say it was all too much of a surprise, but you and him — you deserve some happiness, yeah?”

Shit, and now Alois was all red-in-the-face. He knew going in that he’d have to suffer some embarrassment, but he’d truly hoped Baldroy would be able to take the far share. Happiness. Ugh. “I— that is— Thank you, I suppose. Not that it’s always a delight, given what a bitch he is.” With the slight chuckle and far-too-fond look he was met with, just then, he couldn’t imagine his annoyance was all too convincing. “That’s not— He’s not even a queer, really. He’s just— trying things out.” Baldroy let out a surprised little laugh. Alois didn’t feel like arguing this point, so he moved on. “Not that it matters. I merely wanted advice.”

“Sage wisdom, yeah, I remember.” He did a lift of the chin, up-nod.

“I’m asking you because I don’t know any other adults, really, and before I say anything, know I am completely mortified by it, thank you, and we can never discuss this again, but it’s bothered me enough that it felt relevant to at least bring up—” He caught his breath. “We haven’t had sex.”

Baldroy clicks his tongue, and nods. “That makes sense. Nothing to worry about, either. That kind of thing can take a lot of time to work up to — It’s been, what, four months? Five?”

“Around that.” God, that really was a while, wasn’t it? They could be halfway to married, if one of them was a girl. Well, if one of them was a girl, and Alois was the type of person anyone would actually want around long enough to marry. “The issue is, I— I think I want to. Actually. And it’s— He, it isn’t that he doesn’t want to. I think he does, though I guess I don’t— We haven’t talked about it much.” Since that first night, and the mortification of it. If it must be re-discussed, Alois hopes to have some stronger preparation beforehand. “He worries about me. With it.

“Which is my fault, I suppose, because I got all in arms about it the first time we kissed.” Not technically, his recollection reminds, but they don’t need to go into details on the birthday kiss. “I… I had wanted—” How had Ciel worded it? “I had wanted him to want to have sex with me, but I didn’t— I was freaked out about it, for— you know. You know why.” Baldroy nodded. His brow was furrowed, that same sad, angry expression whenever he was reminded of what had befallen Alois before they had met, as if he still had some hope that he could have prevented it, in some way of fate. “So he stopped it. He noticed I was out of sorts and refused to go any farther and so we haven’t gone any farther, which has been fine, but I’m not some— scared thing. I can have sex with him. I even want to! But there is no way in hell that he’ll believe me, now, so we just snog until we’re both mutually worked up, as it were, and then! Nothing! Ever!”

His hands were thrown in the air by the end of it, pitch and volume raised enough he likely should carry some worry for others hearing, if everyone hadn’t been gone. “Sorry,” he apologized, nonetheless. “And, besides, neither of us would even know what we’d be doing. Not a clue. So the whole thing is just constantly mortifying and annoying and also. I want to.” Beat. “If that makes sense.”

Baldroy clicked his tongue. Sighed. Nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, kid, it makes a fucking lot of sense.” He moved closer to Alois, so they were stood side by side rather than across, and Baldroy could lean back against the table. “Well, I’ll address the first one in a second, but the latter is a bit easier. Here’s the thing: even if I wanted to explain to you how sex worked, I’m just frankly not practiced enough in sodomy to let you know. And as much as I’m feeling like it ain’t the move to be giving my kid pornography, I mean. It’s probably the closest to educational you’re gonna get. I can ask Mey where to find the queer kind, cause she’d know better than I would. So. If you think that would help?”

“I…” Now what the fuck did he say to that? It was kind of fucking ridiculous, the very notion, but fuck. Fuck, it was funny, too. (And genuinely, really, sweet.) “I mean, yeah. That would be. Much appreciated, Baldroy.”

“Oh, oh! And I met a couple guys at the bar, too. Seemed like good fellas, married to each other, or as close to it as they can, and have been for thirty years, they were telling me. I got their address so we could keep in touch, maybe I could ask them to like, write it out? Good practices for it? Safety and all that. Fuck, that’s probably a much better idea than the smut books. Sorry.”

“No, no, you’re fine. That would be fantastic, actually. If you could.” And then, as an add-on (because frankly, he was a seventeen-year-old boy who had just realized that not only did queer smut exist, but that he could have access to it!): “Both, maybe. To cover our bases.”

Baldroy narrowed his eyes, like he was about to give some all-too-fatherly admonition of Alois’ ploy for pornography. But he just shook his head. “You know what, kid? I’ll do my best.” Then, with a bit of that fatherly expression back: “Just promise me you’ll reference the actual advice more than the porn, yeah? I just want to make sure you and Ciel are being safe.”

God, he was flushed in the face. “Yes, da, we will, I promise,” he shuffled off the worry. Embarrassment aside, though, this was exciting. The smut was exciting for smut reasons, but this solved one of the problems quite handily. The other, more looming one remained (no amount of sexual knowledge matters if the man you want to sleep with simply doesn’t want you) but even that seemed slightly smaller. Maybe if Alois could show him the advice, the safety tips, he would understand that Alois actually did want this. Maybe he would find the preparation sexy. That notion was a bit silly, but then again, his files were fucking meticulous. Alois liked a clean room, sure, but could not fathom why anyone would put that much preparation into tax files if they didn’t get off on it, at least a bit.

“Now, as for the other thing,” Baldroy continued, likely for the best. It was serving no one well for Alois to continue his train of thought. “Have you tried just talking to him about it? I’m sure you have, but for what it’s worth — I do believe you. That you’re ready for that. It seems like you’ve given it a whole lot of thought, and maybe if you could explain that to him like you did to me?”

“I’ve tried talking about it, obviously,” he said, somewhat derisive. Because he had, hadn’t he? Well, there was often a bit more in the sphere of yelling than talking, to be fair, but it was still — expressing the opinion… “It’s difficult. He never wants to talk about it, which pisses me off, and then I’m angry and he gets more closed off, and it’s this idiotic fucking cycle and we never actually get anywhere.”

“Hm.” Baldroy crossed his arms. “Well, I’m going to tell you honestly, kid, that is something y’all will need to work on if you’re going to continue your relationship. Because you will have more issues than just sex, and if you’re yelling and he’s not responding it’s gonna build a lot of resentment that will just fuck you both over in the long run. You need to learn how to have difficult conversations with him, and hard as that is, that’s probably just something you have to work on in your own time, okay?”

Alois groaned. “Must we?”

“Yeah.”

“Ugh.”

“It’s tough shit, being a grown up, and dealing with feelings like that.” He nudged Alois with his shoulder. Alois nudged him back. “But I’m thinking that’s gonna be a bit more of a long-term fix, and this is something you might want to get dealt with a bit quicker. Have you thought about writing it out?”

“What?”

“Giving him a letter. Writing out all the feelings about sex and being listened to, and signing off on it as something true at the time you wrote it. Say it’s fine, of course, if he himself is genuinely just not okay with sex yet, but that you are. And that you’re, I dunno, in your right mind when you wrote it.”

“Well that’s the problem,” Alois said, leaning his head back far enough he could see the top of the oven, upside-down as it was. “I don’t think he’ll ever believe I’m in my right mind about this.”

“Now that’s a problem. Because he does gotta believe you.” Alois threw a hand in the air, like I fucking know that. “But — and I stand by he’s got to listen to you — maybe it’s less that he doesn’t believe you, but he’s scared that any given time you say ‘yes’ might be a time you’re not sure, if that makes sense? Like he’d rather not risk it.”

“So what, then? I need a fucking outside source? I have to get my desire to sleep with him notarized?”

Baldroy laughed. Not a quick thing, but a full, long laugh, like Alois had told a really good joke. Which he wouldn’t deny feeling some pride for. “I mean, there have gotta be some queer notaries, right? Or, like, a first hand witness promising you’re being honest. Sign off here, we promise Alois isn’t full of shit, he actually wants this.”

It was ridiculous enough to make Alois laugh, too. Shit. That’s what it would take, wouldn’t it? Kid Capitalism needs to see a contract in order to get it through his head? “What, like you? I could get you to sign it?”

He tilted his head to the side. “Yeah. I mean, honestly. I would. If you think it would help.”

Alois was still laughing, but. Huh.

Huh, maybe.

“You know what, Baldroy? I might just take you up on that.”

“Ciel Phantomhive,” Alois addressed, in his most business-appropriate tone. He had made deals, he sort of remembered how it went. Not that he had the focus of the other party.

Ciel hummed and didn’t spare a glance away from the book in his lap. “Yes, Alois?”

“No, Phantomhive. Book away.” He was tempted to do what he usually would, and grab the book from his hands and sit close enough that Ciel simply had to look at him, no option besides. But this simply wasn’t the energy he was intending to embrace in this situation. “This is a business meeting, I expect your full attention.”

Ciel did look up at this, and closed the book, and even moved away from his bed in order to sit himself across from Alois at the table. He was doing that fucking adorable expression with his face, clearly trying to raise one eyebrow but wholly unable to. “Is it?”

“Quite. I have files for you, for your consideration.”

There was a slight quirk to the corner of Ciel’s mouth. It was something lovely, to be able to amuse him. “I look forward to reviewing them. What do you have for me, Trancy?”

“Well, first, an offering. Please peruse at your leisure.”

Ciel took the pamphlet handed to him and flipped a few pages in, scanning a few sentences of each before moving onto the next. Alois could hardly stifle his slight grin as he watched the gradual furrow of Ciel’s brow, until he eventually clicked his tongue and spoke: “Now, Trancy, correct me if I’m wrong, but you have just handed me pornography, yes?”

“Astute, Earl Phantomhive.” He leaned forward, and flipped to the back half of the pamphlet. “Technically, the first half is more what I would consider smut. If you want visuals, I would direct your attention to the latter half.”

“Hm.” Ciel took a moment to look over the fantastically lewd drawing of one man kneeling before another, both quite naked. He traced the line of the standing man’s spine, tapped the place of intersection, and then closed the pamphlet. “A risky opening gambit. It certainly draws the attention.” He looked up at Alois, then, and hell if he’d ever seen something more gorgeous than that sharp gleam-in-the-eye. Perhaps he hadn’t been too off, in his joking prediction that what would take to rile up Ciel Phantomhive was honest-to-god business roleplay. “What else do you have for me?”

“This is more the meat of it, if you’re prepared to move into more relevant matters,” Alois warned. The thing was, the pornography book was, genuinely, a bit of a gambit. It could have been laughed off if Ciel was horribly scandalized at Alois handing it to him, but the rest was. Well, the rest was about them. Or more relevant to them. The whole goddamn thing was a gambit, maybe. And Alois could only pray Ciel took favorably to it.

Ciel nodded. “I second the motion.”

There was a sex joke to be made in that, Alois was sure, but he wasn’t quite finding it. Wouldn’t be appropriate for a meeting, anyway. “Alright. I have reached out to a colleague of a colleague, and acquired some… educational resources. That I consider relevant to our current proceedings.”

Ciel tilted his head to the side, furrowed eyebrows conveying a bit of genuine curiosity — twinge of concern — in contrast to the levity of his earlier comments. But Alois was calmed, slightly, by his in-character: “Alright. You may present the files.”

“Of course.” He opened the folder Baldroy had delivered to him. He withdrew the first of the pages, a hand-written cursive list of advice. “This is a thorough documentation of safety measures from experts in the field. Notes on consent assurance and physical limitations and lubrication methods and other such things.” He pushed over the file and refused to meet Ciel’s eye. The porn bit was funny. This was. This was so much more laid-bare than Alois was expecting to feel, and he was fully-fucking-clothed.

Silence for a minute, except for the slight rustle of paper and the slowing of breath. “I… Hm.” Because he knew the boy far-too-fucking-well at this point, Alois could practically feel the gaze boring into his head, and, as such, he looked up. “This is. Quite thorough. I appreciate the dedication to it. But I must ask how you acquired such… documentation.”

This was the sticking point. (Or, one of several sticking points. The whole thing was rather adhesive.) Alois was, for what it was worth, preferable they did this part now rather than later, when even more was on the line. Because he also knew Ciel well enough to suppose this may not be received favorably. “A friend of Baldroy’s. Two friends, really. A set of rather practiced queers.”

“‘Experts in the field,’” Ciel quoted back to him, seemingly on instinct. Then, with a rather inconclusive tone: “And how did you get in contact with Baldroy’s friends?”

Business front aside, Alois figured it would be far easier just to answer the underlying question without making Ciel pry. “It was offered, by Baldroy.” Beat. “He knows about our business conduct.”

“He… does.” Incomprehensible, how flat he could get that tone.

“He has for some time. Apparently, our dealings in the bar were markedly over the table. All three of them know.”

Tone flat as it may be, Ciel couldn’t hide the slight widening of his eye, part of lips, an expression as close to horror as he was known to get. “But they haven’t said anything.”

“I don’t think they care. I mean, Mey-rin is in this ‘line of business’, and I’ve not quite sussed out Finny’s deal, but I suspect in walks in similar circles, and Bard— well, not to drop the business jargon, but Bard is my da, so. They don’t mind. Rather, from what I gathered from Baldroy, they’re all quite happy for us.”

“‘Mentor’ would work, for the metaphor,” Ciel offered, half under his breath. “Alright. Alright. This is fine.”

“Is it? If we need to adjourn the business meeting and reconvene in a more casual manner—”

“No, no, it’s fine.” A long exhale through grit teeth. “I… was merely unaccustomed to the idea of people knowing. About me.”

This, Alois understood. It didn’t hold the same innate fear for him it seemed to for Ciel — perhaps because there was never really any other option for him besides people knowing, but… “I understand. It is terrifying, to have people know. But these people, they… love us, or something embarrassing like that. We don’t have to worry about them.” He, tentatively, set his hand over Ciel’s. His skin was cold. But, when he looked up at Alois through the dark of his lashes, his eye was wide, his gaze soft and something reassured. Sweet. It was so goddamn kind that for a moment, Alois didn’t even consider how Ciel likely did not want to be grouped in with him in this matter, but once he did, that was all he could consider. “And, besides,” he said, removing his hand from Ciel’s. “I know you’re not actually—“ probably smart to soften it, return to metaphor. “Part of the company, as it were, and I told Baldroy that. So you don’t have to worry about him thinking—“

“Alois.” The return to his first name, from the pomp and posturing and last-names of the business metaphor, was enough to actually halt Alois’ speech. “I…”

He wasn’t looking at Alois. Rather, he was quite pointedly looking down at his hand, tracing the lines where Alois’ fingers had laid over his own. “Yeah?”

“I am.” It was quiet, barely audible, but Alois caught it. Before he could ask for clarification, Ciel continued. “I am a— part of the company. Obviously. I thought — Jim, I’ve been kissing you for months. I — Of course I’m a queer.” Oh. “I thought you knew. Well, I thought you just didn’t believe me when I said otherwise.”

“I believed you.” It was all Alois could think to say, besides some variation on ‘Oh’ ‘Uh’ or ‘Huh’. Because this. This did complicate things, didn’t it? It was no longer Ciel the tragically-uninterested-in-men, it was now Ciel the could-feel-that-way-for-him. Ciel the could-love-him.

Ciel the still-didn’t.

“Is that a problem?” Ciel asked, close to a snap as his voice got.

“It would be marvelously hypocritical if it was, huh?” This did not appear to be comforting. “Of course it isn’t. I’m glad to have you in the company, of course. I’m merely surprised.”

“Hm. Well.” Ciel still didn’t look entirely at ease with this exchange of information, but Alois simply did not know how to help that. “It is better to have all cards on the table, I suppose, during such a meeting.”

“I find that quite difficult to believe, for general business practices.”

Ciel shot him a look. “Might I see the other files?”

“Of course, Phantomhive. Though I warn it’s much of the same.” He removed the second and third paper and laid them out before Ciel. “These are a list of common practices, most comfortable and safe ways to go about performing them, with some general pointers. And this page,” he added, pulling out the final, smaller card, “is a bonus, because they knew I was also receiving the pornography, and it is advice of what to solidly ignore in the porn. It’s all quite informative.”

Ciel seemed not to take his word for this, and spent the next five or so minutes reading through every detail on the pages, occasionally nodding or tapping on a paragraph. When he finished, he looked up, met Alois’ gaze. He didn’t speak for a moment.

“Thoughts, Phantomhive?”

Still and silent, for a moment. Then, a nod. “This… is for us,” he said, having apparently just made the connection.

“No, Ciel, I wanted you to have a full understanding of sodomy so you could go fuck someone else,” he deadpanned. Ciel did not look amused. “Of course it’s for us.”

“You want us to have sex.”

“Yes. I have for quite a bit. And not just, ‘us to have sex’, I want to have sex with you. I want it.”

“Hm.” Ciel looked back down at the papers, and then at the earlier one on safety. Which is not quite the response Alois had been looking for, if he was honest. Mostly because it wasn’t a response. “You want to have sex with me, so you acquired educational material and advice and all the information we could possibly want on safety.”

“Yeah,” Alois concurred. “I’m serious about this, Ciel. I thought — You don't have to sleep with me. Obviously. If it doesn’t— if I don't interest you, like that, I'll drop the whole thing. But you always seem like the issue is the grand worry that I don't actually want to or I'm only doing it for your sake or it's some trauma response, and honestly, there is another issue here is working on you fucking believing what I tell you, but. But I want to prove to you. That I mean it. That you don't have to push away and apologize whenever things start to get good.”

“Alois—”

Alois could feel it, could tell he was full red-in-the-face, but he had to keep going. He had to just say that. “And, and this is fucking stupid, obviously, but I. Here. The closing file of this meeting, a testimony, signed and fucking notarized. For you.”

With that, he handed over the very last file, which read:

The undersigned, Alois James Trancy, swears under threat of perjury that he is being honest and forthright with his desire to sleep with the constituent, here named Earl Ciel Phantomhive, and is not misled by former trauma, altered mental state, or perceived external pressure when making this statement. The notary, here named Baldroy Sinclair, swears to bearing witness to these statements and, to the best of his ability, verifying their candor.

This was followed by the signature of both himself and Baldroy.

Ciel took the page, and read it over. And over. And, unless he had massively decreased his reading speed since yesterday, read it at least four more times before meeting Alois’ expectant gaze. And, honest-to-god, smiling. Not a grin or a smirk or something forced down, but a full, beautiful smile.

And said, “That’s not what a constituent is.”

“Oh, fuck you.”

For a moment, Alois was worried he’d horrifically offended the boy, and the sound he was making was one of reproach, before he realized — it was laughter. “You made Baldroy sign this.”

“I needed a—”

“No, no, Alois, I cannot believe you made Baldroy sign this. I can't believe you talked to him about us having sex!” He was laughing. He was laughing between every word, holding the paper tight enough that spiderweb-crinkles were appearing at the sides. It was odd. It was an expression of emotion Alois had never seen on the boy before, so it took him a moment to place. But then he did. And it was pure fucking glee. “You— you got resources! And documents! And notaries!”

Alois still laid unsure where they were going with this, but there was only so much one could take of watching the person they loved so filled with joy without cracking a smile themself. “I thought they'd be appreciated, to you, Earl of Makes Rules for Kissing.”

“They are.” He was standing then, mouth still parted in smile, traces of laughter in every syllable. Alois followed suit. “You… You did this for me. You did this in the form of a business meeting, for me.”

“I thought it would be well-received.”

Ciel shook his head, but not in negation. In disbelief.

And he pulled Alois into a hug.

For all the snogging and the reading pressed side-by-side and general proximity, Alois was fairly certain they hadn't hugged since the night of the bar, Alois falling apart and Ciel holding tight to keep the pieces in place. He wrapped his arms around Ciel in return. He was shorter than Alois by a good few inches, but they seemed to slot together perfectly, every point of contact warm and right.

When Ciel pulled back, it was only a few inches, and only so he could look Alois in the eyes, and place his hands on either side of Alois’ face. Alois could feel the catch of his breath, so tight in his chest he could barely get oxygen, but somehow it felt worth it. “Jim— Alois— you—“

“Any and all are accepted,” Alois said, in what would have been a drawl if he were not so breathless.

“I…” He trailed off, shook his head, and looking Alois full in the eye, confessed: “God, I fucking adore you.”

Oh.

Forget breath, Alois wasn’t even sure his heart was beating.

Not waiting for a response (likely figuring that Alois was unable to give one, caught in surprise as he was), Ciel tilted his head to the side and kissed Alois, the pressure great enough that Alois could feel the shape of Ciel’s smile beneath his mouth.

And Alois would still be cautious, would still be careful with the heart in his chest, but what if, what if? Ciel was queer and Ciel (presumably) wanted to sleep with him and Ciel, Ciel adored him. And maybe that wasn’t need, and no, there was no assurance that love must follow adoration. There was nothing unique in what Alois gave to him, nothing so strange and glimmering as to call love into the room with them, but what if?

What if, not now, not yet, but what if Ciel could, someday, love him?

Perhaps it was idiotic. Perhaps he was no smarter than he had been as a silly, desperate fourteen-year-old looking for love in people who never even spared a moment of care for him. Perhaps he would regret letting any hope reside in that hollow cavity in his chest.

But he cupped Ciel’s face gentle in his hands, and returned the kiss, and let himself hold the thought:

What if, what if?

Chapter Text

“Alright, want to tell me what we’re doing out here?” Alois asked, narrowly avoiding tripping over a skull — dog, he’d guess, not human — left on the grimy floor of this scary fucking house. “Because if getting information from your ‘contact’ is contingent on my murder, I want to pursue other avenues.”

Mey-rin scoffed out a laugh, and didn’t look back at Alois. “This is her house, for now at least.”

“Recent inheritance, I’d suppose,” Alois muttered. It was on the outskirts of London, with all the requisite cracked photo frames, dour lighting, and dried-out remnants of splattered blood to suggest that the residents had been evicted from life rather than just the premises. They looked like they'd been rich arseholes, in what remained of the washed-out photos, which was a consolation only until Alois remembered how much of a rich arsehole he himself appeared to be. “And she couldn’t let us in at the door herself?”

Mey turned at a large, rustic doorframe, leaving her in full visibility when she grinned, small and sweet. “Er, she’s a bit dramatic, she is. I’d guess a tableau of some sort is waiting for us behind here.” She rapped against the wood twice, with two knuckles. More an acknowledgement than a knock. Not, Alois supposed, that it would be answered.

“As long as it’s a corpse-free tableau.” He scrunched his nose, remembering what they were asking said woman to do — “Well, free of our corpses, anyway.”

Mey-rin tilted her hand from side to side. “Probably.”

And she opened the door.

In the center of the room, blurred by a light haze of smoke, was an immediate and evident red. He could just make out the details: under a single lamp — like a spotlight in a stageplay — a woman was sitting in an armchair in perhaps the least intuitive seating position. Back curving over the arm of one side of the chair and legs crossed over the other. Her hair was long and crimson and nearly hitting the floor, and her fingers glittered with rings. Sharp glasses were perched on an equally sharp nose, just one of myriad sharpnesses about her features. She was gorgeous, undoubtedly. 

Undoubtedly familiar, too.

“You’re the woman who was with Mey at the bar,” Alois said, the realization catching him fast enough it superseded his desire to properly introduce himself.

She grinned, kicked her legs off the edge of the chair, and swiveled to face forward. “And you were the one snogging the Phantomhive kid’s face off. Congrats on that.”

“Oh, so literally everyone knows,” Alois sniped, not quite as annoyed as he might’ve been.

Meeting someone so immediately and evidently queer — it provided some sense of safety. Some instant trust.

“Don’t say that like it’s a bad thing. Subtlety is for those who don’t have the panache to stand out.” She pushed off the chair with all the drama of a Shakespearean actress, and held out a hand to shake. She had to bend down to speak to him — she was magnificently tall, with heels that added a third of a foot to that. “Grelle Sutcliffe. Pleasure to meet you, Alois — I’ve heard plenty.”

“So have I,” Alois said, another realization slotting into place. “Ciel talked about you. A couple times. You aren’t what I imagined.” The description had, notably, involved a gendering of language quite counter to both how Mey had described the woman they would be meeting and everything clearly involved in Grelle’s self-presentation. Which Alois would be having a talk with Ciel about. He could tend to be a cock like that, but well. He used to be about the queer thing, too, and he learned. 

The description had also included a murdered aunt, for which Alois is less inclined to favor this woman.

“Language can’t do me justice,” Grelle stated, shrugging so the line of the coat around her shoulders dipped into the light. “And I doubt little Ciel is that good with the spoken word, anyway.”

“That he isn’t.” Then, less playful, “You killed his aunt.”

Alois — in the days where his hobbies lied much more in the life-ruining — had often reveled in the moment where you first saw a mask slip. All the better, when the wearer was clearly so used to living with it sewn on that they had nothing to default to, when it was gone. It was less comforting, to see it happen to Grelle. “Ah. Yes, one of my more unfortunate casualties.” She shrugged, the movement choppy, forced, unlike her languid performance of self moments prior. “Poor dear. Ciel’s never quite forgiven me for that, but perhaps this could win me back some points.”

“He’s not the most forgiving,” Alois countered. He wanted to press it, but the Madame Red situation was one he knew little of — photo frames, a ruby vest in the back of Ciel’s closet, a story half-told, the last dregs of one side of a family — and he needed this woman's help. Ciel’s family was gone. Ciel could be saved. “But we can try. How much has Mey told you about the plan?”

A small, edged laugh. Something closer to a stitched-together mask. “As far as I can tell, dear, you don’t have half a plan between the lot of you.” She grinned, razor-sharp. “That is what I’m for.”

“I was hoping you’d make this terrible road trip worth it,” Alois offered back. “There’s a sword that can kill demons. How would we get it?”

Grelle leaned backwards in a gentle arc that sat her perfectly back on the arm of the chair, swaying slightly so her shoulder made contact with Mey’s arm.  “Well, first off, there isn’t a sword. It’s a type of blade — all old as hell, and I do mean that literally. Seb used the Lævateinn, I believe?”

Alois shrugged. If he’d ever heard the name, that was a three-year-gone memory. “Maybe? He pulled it out of Hannah's body, that's all I remember. Is that the way we'll have to get one? Another demon? Do they all have swords in them?”

“What? No.” Grelle wrinkled her nose. “It’s a defense mechanism. A demon will store that sort of blade within him, to keep it from being used on himself — I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what Seb did with the Lævateinn, which is a waste, that sword is gorgeous. But that isn’t where they come from.” She waved a hand. “The reapers have a supply. Demons have a death date, too, and we are required to facilitate that.”

“So you give us one,” Alois said. “Easy as that?”

“Darling, I don’t have access to the supply. I’ll have to steal it.” She pouted, and leaned her head on Mey’s shoulder. “Will — that's my boss — he'll be horribly cross with me.”

“You’ll find a way to convince him to forgive you.” Mey wrapped a long, red curl around her finger, and yanked lightly. “I’m sure.”

Alois made the wise choice to not attempt to figure out the nature of any of these relationships.

“I can get you one.” She tilted her head to one side, then the other. “Maybe two, if my William is particularly charmed by me that day. But you, Trancy boy, will owe me a favor.”

The amount of menace in her voice was tangible. The annoyed flick Mey gave her ear made it slightly less so. “He isn’t owing you anything,” Mey said, the fondness in her gaze warring with the clear protectiveness in her tone. “I can owe you a favor, that's your price.”

Grelle pouted. “But I get favors from you for free~”

Oh, god.

Not figuring out the nature of these relationships failed.

His desperation to change the subject away from whom Mey happened to be fucking cracked his voice as he said, “About the plan—” This got the attention back on him. Thank god. “I want to get Ciel away before any fighting occurs. If we knock him out, would that keep Sebastian from knowing the plan? I don’t think we can risk Sebastian learning about it through him.”

Grelle sent one more wanting glance towards Mey before turning fully back to Alois. “Well, don’t let him know the plan, obviously. Good call on that.” Alois couldn’t quite force down the self-satisfied grin. “Now, I am not an expert on demon psychic links, but I am fairly certain Seb can still track him down when he’s unconscious, so getting him away might not be the best use of time.”

Alois considered. “More like, we draw Sebastian away from Ciel, before the fight. It would make him more desperate, right, not having his prey in close quarters? Oh, maybe we could even — could we use the bond against him? Have Ciel scream, or something, block the signal, throw Sebastian off his game?”

“Huh.” She looked him over, appraising, and then nodded. “I see why Mey likes you.” Yeah, no hoping blocking out that grin. “By the time you’ll need to throw him off, the cat will be out of the bag, so no need to hide it. But you think you can get him to do it? Do you think you can get him that far from Seb, at all?”

“Well, I am going to be with him, during whatever the fight is.” Alois crossed his arms over his chest, and tried to look more confident in his words than he felt. “And maybe that makes me a coward, but quite frankly, I’d be dreadful in a fight. I quite nearly lost to Ciel the one time I tried it — I’m not good for it. And — I don’t think we should tell him why we’re getting Sebastian away from him. I don’t think — I think he’d fight it, if he knew.” It is to save his life. Not all lies are horrid, Alois promised himself. “But I can get him to do it. Without saying why. Which no one else can.” 

“I trust your powers of persuasion,” Grelle said. “I mean, the boy does seem gone on you. But it does leave who is going to kill off Seb.”

“You’re not?”

“God no. Look, I’ll weep no tears for that man — for that body, maybe, God he's gorgeous... no, no, but the man really is vile.” She clicked her tongue. “Like I said. Weapons for killing demons are on a strict by-need basis, very bogged down in bureaucracy, and lending one out is one thing, but killing a demon without permission? Couldn't. Oh, and Will would be so jealous to see me drive a sword into Seb, I really can’t do that to him.”

“Is it even something humans can wield?” Alois asked, instead of, dear god why would that make your boss jealous.

Grelle shrugged. “Surely the young master has adopted some supernatural friends besides myself? Well, I say friends, but— Oh, what about that gorgeous one, the cook? Not the American, thank you. No, the servant to the Indian prince?”

Alois blinked twice, before it clicked into place. “Soma’s man?” He’d only had the pleasure of meeting Prince Soma twice — and pleasure was a mixed word for it. It was odd, seeing Ciel in the company of a friend who wasn't employed by him, related to him, or Alois, and he could admit he didn’t love sharing attention. But then again, Soma was sweet and had incredible stories and was, to put it lightly, ridiculously fucking hot. 

“Agni,” Mey offered, while Alois was busy reminiscing about long line of Soma's neck.

Grelle raised her shoulders, grinning delightedly. “God yes. Beautiful man. I bet you could get him in on it.”

“I am worried about calling in more people.” But, Ciel did trust Soma. Agni by extension. Soma adored Ciel, and Agni seemed to echo the sentiment, and — “Mey, you and Baldroy, you can get a read on the situation?”

“Of course.”

“And what about his lordship’s ‘fiance’?” The fingers making what Alois had to imagine were the shape of quotation marks, in the air, were clawed with elaborate red and black nails. He wondered how Grelle got them so long, and if she might have tips for him. “She’s a swordswoman and, as far as I’ve seen, delights in getting to protect Ciel.”

“I don’t want Lizzie involved.” Alois said, firmly. He’d considered it, in honesty, but — “This whole thing is risky as it is, I won’t have her getting tangled in it.”

Grelle raised her hands to either side. “Your call, Trancy.” She stood, then, red coat billowing around her. “Alright, I’m a few weeks late to burning this house to the ground, so I should get on  that. Meet me here — or, the ashes of here — in… Three weeks, let’s say, should give me enough time to get your weapon, and you enough time to arrange a trip to your Prince. Sound good?”

“Thank you, Grelle,” Mey said, leaning over and kissing her on the cheek.

 “Of course, love.” She waved two hands in a shooing motion. “Off you both go. I don’t need to see your souls on my list any time soon.” Then, as they turned to go — “Wait. Alois.”

“Yes?”

She looked him over, long enough Alois thought she might give up on saying anything. “You knew Hannah, you knew about the sword... I didn't place it, hearing about you, but, you were Claude’s, weren’t you?”

Ah.

A few years ago, Alois thought, he would’ve smiled, canines bared, promised loudly to her and the world that no, no, he owned Claude, not the other way around, that there was never a moment he hadn’t controlled. But now, he just shook his head. 

“I was,” he said. He placed a hand over his chest. “And now I’m mine.” 

“I think we should put a date on it,” Ciel said, apropos of nothing, while catching up on his Byron. Ciel was — as Alois had found after quite a deal of study in the subject — not one for beating around the bush, or for speaking sans-apropos. Unless, he was nervous.

Alois had been trying to train him to speak forthright, so he didn’t speak immediately. But he felt the slight tremor of Ciel’s shoulder pressed to his, saw the way his hand gripped around a page he didn’t need to turn, before offering an, “On what, darling?” Sure as he’d predicted, the pet name settled on Ciel enough to calm the shake of his shoulders. Ciel was surprisingly receptive to the endearments — relaxing posture, speaking louder, even smiling, on rare occasion — and Alois figured for someone who grew up adored, then facing tragedy and a marked stint in care, it was probably nice for him, to be verbally reminded that he so affected someone. 

Ciel did turn the page in earnest then, using the motion of his arm as probable cause for why he was suddenly pressed tighter to Alois’ side. “On the sex,” he said, managing to only go red in the cheeks rather than the entire face, and Alois would admit a surge of pride at that.

“Amenable.” Alois closed his own book and leaned an arm on Ciel’s shoulder. “Now, you know I think the talking takes too much damn time away from the more interesting bits, but it may be worth a discussion of what the sex is that we're gonna have?” He felt his own smile falter, but if they were already talking about it there was no point in beating around the bush. “I don’t think we should... I don’t want you to fuck me. Not yet.”

“Ah.” Ciel well and properly flushed with that, so at least Alois wasn’t red-faced alone. “I didn’t assume we’d go that far, honestly, this time. Unless…” He looked askance, at the unshaded window and the light streaming in, as if someone was spying. Technically not impossible, Alois supposed, and resolved to be less dismissive. “Unless you were wanting, ah, to fuck me?”

“Oh darling, you do tempt me.” Alois would say he’d never considered this option, because it was so impossible seeming, but privately, he had considered it. Considered it several times, in intimate and considerable detail, when Ciel was not there to keep him company and his hand had to do. This said, he had never considered it might be an option, that he would hear Ciel offer it, and this was already getting to be a bit heavier than he’d expected conversation to go. “No, I think we should on any of that sort of penetration. For now.” He clicked his tongue, and aimed for nonchalance — “It isn’t, isn’t an awful idea, though. If you ever did want that.”

“I’m not against it,” Ciel’s fingers were all folded up in his lap, and Alois wondered — on one hand — if they were hiding anything, and wondered — on his other — if it was too early in the day for him to draw those gorgeous fingers into his mouth, and wondered — on an additional hand, maybe one of Ciel's — if it would be too revealing to lace their fingers together, that moment. “Either way, really.”

“Probably we’ll figure out preferences when we've actually tried.”

“Surely.” Ciel raised his thumb to his lower lip, running along the line of the part, gaze flicking to Alois just long enough for him to know this was done for his benefit. (Sue him, he loved looking at Ciel’s mouth). “Thoughts on fellatio?”

Alois cackled, a bit, at the tone. “Hell, Phantomhive, we can't keep conducting these conversations like business meetings.” Then, leaning forward to settle his hand on Ciel’s thigh. “Thoughts are favorable.” And, because this one didn’t freak him out — “And I have been told I am quite proficient.”

Ciel blanched a bit, there, going from cherry-tomato to sickly in a moment. “It won’t bother you? Memory-wise.”

Alois shrugged. “Don’t think so. As long as you let me lead, and don’t just fuck into my mouth, I’m not worried.” This didn’t look like it did all that much to assuage said, sallow worry. Alois rolled his eyes and swatted at Ciel’s knee. “What did we say about believing me? Because it is a requirement, here. I’m not getting Baldroy to cosign my desire to put my mouth on your cock.”

“Alois.” Flush re-achieved. Better than the pallor, by far. “Fine. But you can back out if you want. At any point.”

“I know.” Alois tsked, and brushed the hair out of Ciel’s face with a gentleness countered by how he said, “You know, it’s fucking annoying, that you don’t trust me, to tell you what I want.” Before Ciel could argue, “But it’s also sweet. And for the contradiction in that, fuck you.”

Ciel cocked his head to the side.“I thought we agreed, not yet.”

Alois grimaced and tilted his hand one side to the other. “Weak joke, Phantomhive.” The admonishment worked poorly, as it only meant Ciel smiled and leaned forward so his elbows were resting on Alois’ shoulders. “But I mean it. You’re trying to take care of me. And I don’t need it. But the gesture —  I like it.” Ciel’s small smile and scrunched-eyed gaze were unbearably fond. Alois adored him, bitch as he was, overly controlling and overly coddling, cold and cruel, and through all of it — “I like you,” he said, not fully intending to. Unable to regret it, seeing the wrinkles at the corner of Ciel’s eye, hearing the caught-breath of a laugh stifled.

Sure in it, when Ciel mirrored, “I like you.”

The kiss he pressed to Alois’ mouth was gentle, the give of his lips nothing compared to what he let Alois take. Alois’ hand around the curve of Ciel’s jaw, breath in his mouth, and Alois liked this. He liked Ciel. He loved Ciel too — obviously, inevitably, unrequitedly — but the liking was of a less ostentatious material. The liking was something he could offer without overwhelming. Something they could share, before the inevitability of Alois’ plan — his love, in turn — was poured out and picked over and rejected.

But Ciel would be safe.

By the time Ciel pulled away with a hum and a kiss to Alois’ forehead, they were lying sprawled on the bed. Alois’ head laid pillowed on Ciel’s bony elbow, the fingers of that hand running through Alois’ hair. “We didn’t pick out a date,” Alois pointed out, after letting out an embarrassingly long yawn.

“Oh,” Ciel’s tone was meandering, kiss-tipsy, as was his light laugh. “I mean, do we need to?”

“Lest you forget, putting sex in the calendar was your idea, your Lordship.”

“We don’t need it.” Another kiss. “We’ll know.”

“A lot of trust in our collective foresight. And in your ability to believe I’ll want to blow you when I say I do.” 

Ciel hooked their pinkies together. “I’ll believe you.” His gaze was steady. He was offering belief, and who was Alois to refuse its reciprocation?

“Then I believe you.”

The Midford manor was gorgeous, in Spring.

Light poured through the wide, open windows, onto the pale pink walls of the sitting room that had once been Lizzie’s nursery. It was her place for receiving guests, and she received Alois happily, let him lounge on her champagne-shade embroidered chaise, lit up and lovely and so much warmer than the dour, death-drenched halls of the Phantomhive estate.

The one downside was, of course, the other Midfords.

Alois paused his line of speaking as Edward passed the open door — open only at his insistence, and passed by every ten goddamn minutes, each time with an increasingly angry look, that Alois returned with an increasingly sweet one. He raised his glass this time, just to see Edward’s grimace. 

When he was past — finally — Alois continued, “You were telling me about the stables, Miss Midford?”

Lizzie, also returning her gaze from the open door, hummed and leaned back with her wineglass in hand. “Lovely, this time of year.” They were drinking a magnificent imported wine Lizzie had gotten for her eighteenth, dry with a slight bite to it, smooth and pleasant on his tongue in a way that beer with Ciel and whiskey with Baldroy never had been. As potent as her sharp edge of a grin, as she said, “I’ve been able to take Marigold out more often.” 

Ah. It was that sort of conversation.

“She would be remiss without you, wouldn’t she? I've heard mares get skittish when they lack attention.” Marigold was the codename they’d adopted for Meriel, and incidentally, was the name one of the real horses Lizzie rode on occasion. The palomino Rhubarb’s name had been co-opted into a codename for Isabelle — a fling of Lizzie’s when she and Meriel had been on the outs — and the infinitely stubborn stallion Jack (short for Jackass, Lizzie’d said) had become the code for Meriel’s properly dickish suitor who kept bothering her at the stables. 

Alois lived for drama, and the eavesdropping Edward wouldn’t take that from him.

“She has gotten quite affectionate."

“Yeah?" He grinned. "Smooth ride?”

Lizzie giggled. Like Ciel, her tipsy-flush was oddly centered around her nose, the tip near full-red.  “She’s been tiring me out.”

“Good girl, better give her a treat.”

“Oh, I assure you I have.”

Alois swirled his wine in glass before downing the dregs. Lizzie was quick to refill. “You are lucky, Eliza, to have such a strong bond with your beautiful mare.”

“Oh, don’t sound jealous. I’ve heard you have been bonding with your stallion quite well. Heaven, right?” 

Alois snorted, and rolled his eyes. It was only fair, he supposed. “He’s a lot more fickle than your horse. Haven’t even gotten to riding yet.”

“You’ve only had him for, what, eight months? That sort of thing takes time.” She leaned over and tapped twice on the back of his man. “I heard he’d practically eating out of your hand, how much he adores you.”

That was, unfortunately, an inordinately sexy thing for him to be imagining in the boy's cousin's home. Urgent to write it off, “You’re the horse whisperer, Liz, but you’re also an optimist.”

“I stand by it. It’s worth the work you put into it.” 

“Weren’t we talking about your horseplay?”

“You’ve got to be more selfish, Lou.” She grinned. “What was that french phrase? Aide-toi, le ciel t'aidera?”

“Budge off,” he said, not wanting to risk a realer curse in this part of the manor. “That barely applies.”

“Fine,” she leaned back, her drink swirling in the glass. “I didn’t actually get you drunk for stable talk.”

He didn’t like the serious turn her tone was taken. He tried a light, “Edward will be beside himself. You, with the foul intentions?”

The slight lift to her eyebrow implied the tone wasn't quite reading. “What’s going on, Alois?” Her voice was so low, so close to a whisper, that the set-down of her glass nearly blocked it out. “Ciel’s worried about you. You’re going out with the staff and not letting him come, you’re not paying attentions in Sebastian's lessons—” 

“— I mean, the man is a dreadfully poor lecturer, who could pay attention to him?—”

“— and you’ve seemed more jumpy lately, and reticent, and Finny just showed me his new big sword.”

Well. That would do it. “Ah.”

“Seriously, Lou,” she reached out to cover his hand with her own. He darted his gaze to the door, less worried about being overheard discussing murder plots than being overseen sharing skin to skin contact with the Lady Elizabeth. He knew which would get him slaughtered by Edward. “What is going on? I’m worried.”

Alois let his eyes flutter closed, did a bit of calculation behind the lids, and answered: “I don’t particularly want you involved,” because of all things on this earth, one of the most dreadful was the idea of lying to Elizabeth. And then, with a sudden rise of worry, “Ciel doesn’t know about the sword, right?”

“Finny told me to keep it secret, so likely not.” She tilted her head to the side. “Why don’t you want Ciel to know?”

“If I tell you, you’ll want to get involved. And if you get involved, you could get hurt.”

“Is the alternative you or Ciel getting hurt in my place? That isn’t a compromise to me. That is inexcusable.” 

“Lizzie—”

“I’m a better fighter than either of you. Than both of you, combined.” He had seen her and Ciel spar, once, and this was true. It was hard to notice, most days, hidden with makeup and gloves, but there was a silver nick on her chin, and a long, pale scar running the line of her pinky, visible now in the casual setting of the room. It seemed even more prevalent, with her eyebrows drawn like this, concern turning her fighter. “I know his life is more complicated than I’m allowed to know, with more danger than I’m allowed to keep him safe from. But I thought…”

“What?”

“There’s been so much less since you’ve come into his life.” At Alois’ confused shake of the head, she sighed. Tapped bitten-down nails on her wineglass. Continued: “Less, I don’t know. Danger, complications. He doesn’t run headfirst into things anymore.”

Alois offered a shaky grin. He didn't know if this was true, but — he hoped. He hoped it was. “Great, I’ve always wanted to be a stagnating influence on someone’s life.”

“You’re joking, but it’s true.” Her eyes were shadowed over, and in that lack of light, they were an ocean in a storm, all that power owned in her. “I don’t think it’s just you, but before— He only wanted to be alive to solve and avenge his parents’ death. And I spent years praying that he’d never find out. That it was random fire, cruel chance. A looter covering his tracks who has long since disappeared. Because as long as he didn’t know, he’d have a reason to keep looking, and as long as he had to keep looking, he’d stay alive. I was sure, the moment he got closure, he’d…” She opened her palm, a mimed explosion, a signal of unfair inevitability.

Ciel had made a deal with a demon. He’d been ready for it, ready to die for this. “I think you’re right.”

“But he’s not like that, anymore.” She was smiling now, eyes shimmering with something unshed. “You make him want to be alive.”

“Lizzie—”

“You’ve given him something else to live for. He’s friends with the staff now, he’s been writing music again, he— he talks to me. Laughs at my jokes. Like when we were kids.” She smiled at him. So fond, so loving, and Alois felt sick. “If he solved it now, avenged all of it, I think he’d still be here. You’ve made him want to stay.”

She didn’t know. She didn’t know the truth of it, and god, failing Ciel would be failing her. She thought too much of him. “Lizzie, don’t .” 

“I mean it.” He shook his head. She stopped the motion with a hand on his cheek, and it was all he could do to keep from crying — if he did, she would catch the tear. She would see. “I mean it, Lou. You are my dear friend, and I love you for everything you are, but even without that — I will love you forever, just for this. You saved my Ciel.”

“Don’t say that, Liz.”

“Why not?”

“Because I haven’t .” His voice broke on the last word. He pulled away from her. “Not yet.” He swallowed, and said what he had not yet managed to. “And I don’t know if I'll be able to.”

She looked at him for a long moment, her tear-foggy eyes settling from ocean to pond, the same she and Ciel had always known, that they had let Alois into. She took hold of his hand, again. “Then let me help. You brought him back to me. Let me safeguard him.”

“Okay.” He turned his hand over. Wrapped her fingers in his. “Okay.”

And he let her in.

Chapter Text

“Ah!! Ciel! Alois! Welcome!!”

Soma was an immediate and unmissable presence, something that would be true even without the incredible amount of chest visible through the dip of his casual, summer-approved tunic. As it was, there was all the more reason to be overjoyed, pulled into his embrace and pressed against that warm skin. “It’s so good to see you both!”

“You as well, Your Highness,” Alois turned around in Soma’s grasp, facing outward, but still in the Prince's vice-grip — for which Alois was not complaining. This way, he could see Ciel, and be held by the hottest man in line for any throne, and bask in the way that this, specifically, had his Earl all flushed and pretty. “I keep telling Ciel to make this summer house an all-year house, but, well—”

“Oh, I wish,” Soma did let him go — tragedy — in order to make the two-space trek over to Ciel and hold his face in hands, still looking at Alois. Ciel’s flush was unrelenting, and Alois raised brows, and Ciel mouthed ‘fuck off’. “You’ve made my life so hard, Alois, I used to be Ciel’s only friend, and now he has you as a live-in, he barely wants me any more.”

Ciel’s mouth parted in an obvious — but mercifully silent — whine, and his line of sight showed clear that he was looking at Soma’s beautiful pout as much as Alois was. “I doubt that,” Alois offered up, and then Ciel really did let out an embarrassing peep. “He was dying to come out to see you.”

“It’s the season for it,” Ciel countered, like he wasn’t still leaning into the rich, giving touch of a Prince. “We’ll be here until the beginning of August, at the earliest, so I hope that will be sufficient time for you to… hover about.”

“‘Hover about’? Is that the new London term for ‘being best friends’?” Soma mused.

“He has a habit of misnomers, that one,” Alois said, coming to lean on Ciel’s opposite shoulder. Causing another flare-up blush. “He keeps saying ‘fiancé’ when he means ‘cousin’, have you noticed?”

Soma’s laugh was full-bodied and bright as the light-glint on his wide, dark eyes. “I have! Oh, how is Lady Midford?”

“She will be joining us here, in a week or so,” Ciel reported. It had been Ciel’s idea, actually. Alois was going to pitch it — for more practical reasons than the Earl realized — if not, but there was something lovely, that he had wanted her there, of his own volition. Conveniently less suspicious, as well. “But she is faring well. She keeps threatening to elope with Alois, so if you hear of that, know it’s just them being dreadful to me.”

Soma wrinkled his nose. “I should hope so. Two blondes married? The children’s hair would have an unearthly glow.”

“Have you considered stealing her away?” Alois asked. “As long as she’s free from Ciel’s wretched grasp, I’m happy. Besides, a prince? The elder Midfords would be delighted.”

Soma crossed his arms, somewhere between a disparaging and pouting expression. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think they might care a bit about where this Prince hails from.”

Alois waved this away, and in turn, waved in Baldroy and Finny, who were holding two suitcases and twelve, respectively. “Oh, posh. I am positive they’ve worked out I’m born poor as dirt and I can’t imagine they’re more racist than classist.”

“If you say,” Soma said, unconvinced.

Ciel let out an annoyed huff. With Soma and Alois no longer flanking him in their gorgeous embraces, he was less easily mollified. “How about we resolve this as a moot matter since she is my fiance.”

Alois pouted. “The rich, white, British Earl. He always wins. You know, the first time my real accent slipped he looked like I’d led an Irish uprising myself.”

“I did not!” Blinking. “You have an Irish accent?”

“Yes, love, it’s the thing my voice does when it sounds Irish.”

“Will you do it for me?” Soma asked. His dark eyes could launch a hundred ships, but…

Alois tilted his head. “Maybe in private. Since you've shown me yours.”

“We should settle into our rooms,” said Ciel, decidedly. The look he shot Alois was imploring and he wasn’t sure in exactly which direction. “I’ll show Alois to his.”

“See you for dinner!” Soma waved to them, and spotted Mey-rin walking past, and called her name. She barely had time to drop the packages she was holding before he was full in her arms, hugging her.

Alois had full view of that touching display until he was spirited away around the corner with Ciel’s hands in his. “You’ll be sleeping in my room most nights—”

“Presumptuous.”

“Aren't you?”

“Sure, until my beloved Elizabeth arrives. Then I’ll leave you with an empty bed and a broken engagement, and hope you’ll forgive me.”

Ciel scoffed. Took his hand and pulled him back towards the room, inside which he could already see his suitcases piled up. “You’re dreadful. And this is your room, where you can keep your belongings.”

“Except for whatever special things I’ll need when I’m alone with you?” At Ciel’s very, very tired look, Alois swatted him on the shoulder. “Books, I mean. For reading. Not whatever your lurid mind conjured.”

“One of us will need a lurid mind, at some point in this trip.” Ciel, very evenly, closed the door behind them and backed Alois up to the nearby wall. “Ideally us both.”

He kissed Alois, warm and open-mouthed. Alois indulged Ciel — and himself — for a moment, before pulling back. “While I am not against Christening that bed, perhaps we should wait until there aren’t so many nosy people milling about?”

“You know I didn’t mean now.” Ciel’s fingers had tangled themselves up in Alois hair, pulling gently to work through knots. “I don’t trust the Prince not to barge in, so we'll have to give him fair warning.”

“I don’t know…” Alois trailed his hand slow up Ciel’s side, till it could rest at the hip. “He is terminally gorgeous, isn’t he? Perhaps we’d do well to have him barge in.”

“Dear God.” Ciel was a delightful pink shade then. “No, no. I mean…” He looked wistful, for a moment. “No. But, God, you wouldn’t believe how horribly I fancied him when I was twelve.”

This actually took Alois aback. “You did what?” Shaking his head, “I thought you didn’t know you were a queer until…”

“Until you?”

“If the drag dress fits…”

Ciel flicked the side of his face. “Narcissist. I didn’t know it was fancying, then, I just thought he was…” Ciel sighed, more head in the clouds than Alois had ever seen him. Sure, he’d admit he was jealous. “So gorgeous. It got on my nerves. He was just, beautiful, and older, and then this time he wore his shirt open. Oh, and he'd hug me, and smile and talk on and on… I couldn’t handle it.”

Alois bristled a bit. It was silly to be jealous about an old crush that was (in all likelihood) fully unattainable, when there were plans in place for him to ‘attain’ Ciel in the most physical way there was. And as for non-physical ways of attainment, well, he’d never had Ciel in that way and wasn’t about to start complaining now. “Well, he certainly sounds very deserving of your admiration.”

Ciel looked at him, curiously, for a moment, before huffing and shaking his head. “Do not tell me you, Alois Trancy, are jealous.”

“Why should I be? Clearly there’s no competition.”

“Alois—”

“Because he’s just so unimaginably gorgeous.”

Ciel rolled his one eye with the annoyance of two. “I saw you all over him, is he not?”

“Of course he’s bloody hot! He’s a prince!” Alois pouted and tried to infuse humor into it. Couldn’t add ‘jealous’ to the list of traits he and Ciel share. With the recently-added queerness, the list was too long already. “Honestly, darling, are you going to leave me for him?”

“Only after you leave me for Lizzie.” Alois deepened his pout into the truly heartbreaking kind, and Ciel sighed. “Do you know who else is beautiful, and older, and wears his shirt open, and hugs me and smiles and never shuts up?”

“I don’t— Oh.” Alois smiled, then, despite himself, and slapped Ciel on the arm when his expression got near to smug. “Shut up. You have a type, Phantomhive.”

Ciel shrugged, and leaned back up into Alois’ space. “Perhaps.” He pressed the pad of his thumb to Alois’ mouth. “Accents, too. Add that to the criteria. Wouldn’t suppose you’d let me hear it?”

Alois bit his thumb, just hard enough for Ciel to make a little squawking sound. “No. Earn it.” He grabbed Ciel’s chin and pulled him up for a brief kiss. “Horribly rude thing to ask, too. Next you’ll ask me to dress in Soma’s formal wear for you.”

Ciel pulled away to look him in the eye. “Would you?”

Alois — sue him — considered it. He probably shouldn’t. Morally. Besides, it would be weird. “No.” Ciel’s eye was too damn wide. “He’s a prince! Surely I’d be disrespecting something. Plus we’d have to steal it, and make sure Soma didn’t see, and…”

Ciel was looking at him, half-smile-fond, and Alois kissed him, just for the hell of it. Alois continued kissing him, because he’d had damn near enough of hell and was ready to be focusing solely on him and his Earl — for the time being, before Hell would be a much more present topic of conversation.

“Lois, Ciel!”

Speaking of barging in.

Ciel shuffled back so quickly he fell ass to the floor, and Alois was too caught up laughing to be embarrassed. Finny — standing in the now-open doorway — already knew about them; who gave a damn if he got a more visual confirmation of that?

“Oh, sorry!” Finny said, covering his mouth.

“It’s— I’m— You—” Ciel was spluttering over the sounds, not even attempting to stand. Alois offered him a hand up, at which he scowled, before taking. Alois pulled him in so they were side-by-side flush, Ciel trading his splutter for a mutter, confused for vaguely annoyed. But not pulling away.

Finny clapped his hands together. “Oh you two are so cute!! I’m really really sorry for barging in, but I just wanted to say goodbye, because we’re leaving soon, and, and oh—” He was a flipped switch, then, all that delight replaced with despair. “Oh, I’m gonna miss you both so much.” He grabbed Ciel and Alois into a hug, in which they properly smushed together in the strong grip. “I know we need to protect the manor, but, but I wish it wasn’t so far away.” He was tearing up now. Dear god.

“Oh, Fin,” Alois extricated himself and Ciel from the grasp, and gave Finny a kind pat on the cheek. “It’s just three weeks, then we’ll be home and you and yours can bother me with made-up card rules to your hearts’ content.”

Finny sniffed, and looked at Ciel, and back at Alois. “But what if everything is different, then?” His whispered question meant more, of course, to Alois than Ciel could know. It froze him up, but he trusted Finny with his life. He had to trust him to exercise discretion.

“If you haven’t annoyed me to the point of murder in the past three years, I doubt it will happen in the three weeks we’re apart.” He looked over at Ciel, and said with a confidence he didn’t feel — “Everything will be alright.”

Finny wiped at this nose, leaving a wet streak along the back of his knuckles. “If you say so.” He grabbed Ciel and Alois into another hug. Alois was happy to report the snot-covered hand was on Ciel’s side. “Have so much fun with the Prince! I love you!”

“Love you, Fin,” Alois returned. Elbowing Ciel, the other offered: “Yes, you as well, Finnian.”

They waved him off, and once he was out of earshot, Alois took back up with laughing. “God, darling, you’d think you’d never been caught with another man before.”

Ciel shoved away from him and stalked to where Finny had exited. “Just because he knows doesn’t mean I want him seeing—” He shut the door, and took his hand from the handle, and, “Oh.”

“Hm?”

“This door has a lock.”

He looked at Alois. Alois grinned. Ciel flicked the lock closed, and returned the smile. “Well, then,” Alois purred, grabbing Ciel by the belt loops and pulling him in — “Back to it?”

“We don’t actually need to make this an event, you know.”

“But I put it in my appointment book and everything,” Ciel deadpanned, not looking up from the spare sheet he was setting over the duvet.

Alois tilted the flame from his chamberstick to the little bedside lamp, as was his task. “You didn’t. Did you? You’re such a horrible parody of yourself I can’t even tell when you’re making a joke.”

“You will just have to look in it yourself, I suppose.”

“And decipher your shorthand? I’m clever, darling, not a genius.” The wick of his candle spluttered out into a depressing whine of a flame, while attempting to share with the light on the opposite bedstand. He sighed, and resigned himself to a trip to the nearest sconce. “Did you talk to your constituents?”

“Soma and Agni are accounted for. You?”

“Lizzie and hers will stay out of our way, barring an actual life-or-death situation that could only be remedied by a business-savvy fatalist or a literary-minded rake.” He trailed over to where Ciel was refixing an already-even line of cloth. “I notice your bitch didn’t warrant a mention?”

“I told him to stay out of my way tonight.” The end of the sentence was a tight-clipped thing that offered no invitation for prying. Unless, of course, you were the Earl’s live-in prier.

“Hm.” Alois wheedled his way closer in, leaning his chin on Ciel’s shoulder. “Do you think he knows what you’re up to?”

“I should hope not. If we prefer this little death to a larger one.”

Alois grinned. “That was a good one, darling.”

“You don’t have to sound surprised. I am clever.” Then, that cleverness conniving to give the poor thing a realization, “Oh, god, do you think the others know?”

“Ah, well…” Alois sucked in air through his teeth. “Do I ‘think’ they know, or do I ‘know’ they know…”

Ciel whirled on him. “Did you tell them?”

“In so many words? Only Lizzie.”

“Lizzie!”

“But I’m sure the others are bright enough to have put it together,” Alois finished, turning his raised-in-surrender hands to something more of a wave-off.

Ciel griped, “Ah, yes, because everyone needs be aware of our situation.”

Alois pouted dramatically and looked over with his most kicked-dog expression. “You don’t want to halloo my name to the reverberate hills, darling?” And when he received naught but a blank look, “It’s Shakespeare. God, Ciel, we need to get you literate. I was merely expressing shock that you may not want the entire world to know of our tryst.” He hoped it didn’t come out needy. This was one insecurity that did not, actually, sit so heavy beneath the bone of his breast. Being the proprietary-kept secret of someone he loved was a far cry from being the dirty underaged shame of a man Alois hated, and there was something nice, about the privacy of what he shared with Ciel.

“The entire world is one thing. My fiance is another.” Oh. Alois had, perhaps, forgotten, that Elizabeth’s position in the loop was not known to his Ciel. The long-sufferer in question sighed. “I have to imagine you told her about us a while ago, and not that you dropped it on her when I am about to do the most engagement-breaking act of my life.”

“Assumptions, dear boy. I wasn’t the one who told her; she’s a clever thing, picked up on some of your more subtle hints.”

“Such as?”

“When you kissed me underwater a meter from her, for one.”

Ciel pursed his lips. “Ah.”

“Ah indeed. She is alright with it, swear.” Ciel's shake-of-the-head was unbelieving. Alois rested his hands on Ciel’s shoulders, giving a calming touch. “Lizzie is a wife many would kill for, I among them. Don't question that good nature of hers, or I will poison your tea and take her for myself.”

Ciel side-eyed him, scoffed, and leaned in to press a tauntingly-brief kiss to his mouth. “She hasn’t treated me different, at all. She’s known since that time at the pond?”

“Earlier, maybe. When you were fourteen, she told me she was damn sure that you fancied me.” Ciel’s eye was startled-rabbit wide, and, god, that was likely horribly presumptuous — “I had told her she was hysterical, obviously.” Ciel hummed, which wasn’t indicative either way. “I updated her on the state of things when she saw the kiss."

"And she wasn't upset?"

"God no. Of the three of us, she was by far the most excited about our affair.”

“She has the highest base excitement factor of anyone I know. It’s an unfair competition.”

“I dunno about that, love.” He wound a lock of Ciel’s hair around his finger. “She wants you to be happy, more than anything else in the world. You’re lucky, to have family that loves you so much.”

He had meant it more as sweet than funny, and took it as surprise when Ciel lightly tapped the side of his face. “You will never drop that cousin thing, will you?”

“Not until you two drop the genetic tie.”

“Probably better this way,” Ciel drew up the arm that was around Alois’ waist, till his fingers pressed to the small of his back. “I have been vaguely worried about breaking her heart.”

“What are you, some casanova?” But with the way Ciel was chin-tilted-up at him, he couldn’t quite complain. “Her heart will be quite alright.”

“But I think it does matter,” said Ciel, Earl of Non-Sequiturs — and, it seemed, Earl of the slow, gentle trail of a hand up the spine. “That it was you. Like you said, she worries, about my happiness. More than I’ve earned, in all honest opinion.” Alois was already shaking his head as Ciel held up a hand between them. “She wouldn’t be so excited if she didn’t like you. If she didn’t think… that you were good for me.”

Do you? he wanted to ask. Do you think I’m good for you? It was a desperate, childishness need for reassurance owned by a part of him that had far less sway over his whole self than it might’ve, years back. It was a quiet voice, now, because there wasn't the need; the words themselves were the assurance.

Ciel thought he was good for him.

“She’s never once threatened to kill me if I hurt you, so,” he said, feeble in the way jokes were when backed with too much emotion. More emotion piled ‘top it, when he realized how much it meant, that she hadn’t. “Either she likes me best, or she doesn’t care for you, or she just underestimates my ability to break your heart.”

“Or, she thinks you’re good for me,” Ciel reiterated. His poorly-hid smile was mirroring Alois’ own.

“Well,” Alois said, with the little breath his lungs mustered up for him. “She’s a smart woman.” He looked down, at that poorly-hid grin. “Probably shouldn’t question her judgement.”

“Probably not, no.”

“Nope,” Alois tagged on a meaningless filler in the space between them, that Ciel — mercifully — decided to close.

It was silly, how much of an event they’d chosen to make of this.

Out in the country, there were no streetlamps through the window, only moon and stars, and Alois had snuffed out the candles on the sconces, leaving only the light from the bedside candelabras to cast over himself and Ciel. The bed had been laid with an extra sheet — silk and soft — dyed that light-blue shade of which they both found themselves fond. There was no one who would be inquiring after them. Ciel’s was the master suite — despite it being Soma’s home the majority of the year — and it was at the end of a wing no one else inhabited. Ciel had dressed up — slightly, perhaps he thought Alois didn’t even notice — his purple ribbon tie the very one Alois had co-given to him, the first of his birthdays they’d known each other.

It was all very much.

It was lovely.

“Can I…” Alois trailed, trying to find a way to say ‘get you naked,’ in a way that would make Ciel want to reply ‘yes’. And hell, how had he thought he was any good with flirting? Should he lead by example? In all honesty, he’d rather let Ciel strip him than do it himself, but he would manage, if it would mean a following suit…

Ciel had seemed to get fed up with the trail off, opting instead to tug Alois in by the shoulders for a long, deep kiss — more tongue than he was usually wont to, and Alois needed them both naked instantaneously, and always, forever, he was pretty sure, and decided to take action. He brought his hands to the buttons of Ciel’s vest, unfastening until it was loose enough to shrug over Ciel’s gorgeous slope of a shoulder — minding, of course, to keep his fingers firmly away from that space on his back he was disallowed from contact.

The ribbon of a tie followed, and the collar and cuffs, the suspenders fallen to either side. Alois had just unfastened the button around his neck when he felt Ciel stiffen. He resumed the kiss a half-moment later, just long enough for Alois to mark the stilt, to start leaning away.

“What?” Alois asked. Ciel’s face was shadowed over by Alois’, but the closeness shedded to light the gentle furrow of a brow.

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit.” Alois leaned in to kiss him on the cheek. Still soft, still teasing, but — “You’re the one who makes rules for kissing, live up to your own standard. What is it?”

Ciel scoffed, and with Alois’ mouth against his cheek, he could feel the puff of air on his skin. “It isn’t much. It just reminds — Sebastian undresses me. Or did, usually. I didn’t think it would bother me, to have someone—” He was biting at the inside of his lip. Unfair; that was Alois' job, now. He flicked Ciel’s cheek. “Would you mind. If I did it myself?”

Alois nodded, his fingertips leafing gently through the wisps of hair on the back of Ciel’s neck. “Darling, I hate to break it to you, but I don’t give a damn who takes your clothes off as long as they get off.” He kissed an exposed bit of wrist. “You can step into the other room, if you’d like.”

“I could.” He wet his lip with his tongue, just enough for the candlelight to glint on the saliva-slick mouth. “Would you rather — watch?”

“Oh, God, yes.”

Let the record state, Alois had in fact performed strip teases. He was, reportedly, very good at them. It was an art of timing, of knowing every inch of your body so thoroughly, knowing how the watchers would think of each revealed sliver, knowing what to put on in order to garner the most reaction when it came off. Alois had been masterful at this.

Ciel, in contrast, was terrible.

It was too fast-paced, the clothes a poor choice with their number of buttons Ciel wasn’t deft enough with to remove quickly. He did pants, then shirt, then underthings, which was likely the least erotic choice, he was nervous and turned his back several times (well, Alois wasn’t complaining about all of it), and it was just…

So honest.

So laid-bare, in a way Alois never had been, in his moments of performance.

Just his Ciel, in front of him.

By the time the last article dropped from his grasp, Alois was on him. Hands cupping his face, kissing him between each word. “You," kiss, "are fucking," kiss, "gorgeous,” He drew his hands down from Ciel's face, over his neck. To his shoulders, to the soft curve of his arm, ‘round to his waist, then hips, then trailing down so just his fingertips ran over the bare and goosebumped flesh of his outer thigh. “You’re too pretty, I understand why every demon wants you, I could eat you, just like this.”

Ciel laughed, and Alois could see, now, where his flush matched the pink of his ears, his elbows, and the lovely plane of his chest, below the scattering of dark, curling hair. “I am sort of hoping you will.”

Alois moved his hands back, fingertips trailing over the outside of Ciel’s arse before he pressed his palms flat to the small of his back, and pulled them flush. “You thought I was euphemizing. I’m not. I want to bite your thigh and come away with a chunk of flesh.”

“Alois—”

He pulled Ciel in for a kiss rough and biting and nearly drawing blood from his mouth. “I’m your insane houseguest you’ve invited into your bed daily for months, now. Don’t think for a moment I’ll be any less crazy now that we’ve gotten to the less literal part of ‘in bed’.”

“I hope you won’t.” Ciel shoved Alois back until he was sat on the mattress, Ciel all flushed and pretty, straddling his lap. “I want you as you are. I want you crazy and threatening to cannibalize me. I want you with my blood in your mouth and my heart in your hand, don’t think it would ever be any other way.”

Oh, god.

Alois kissed him, in order to not confess his love right there and then. “Christ, which gothic novel did you steal that one from?”

“None. I didn’t need to.” His breath was so warm. “We could write our own.”

Alois smiled. “We might just do. How allowed is men fucking in gothics, again?”

“Didn’t go very well for Wilde,” Ciel tugged on the collar of Alois’ shirt. “Do you want to get your clothes off, too, or do you just like me vulnerable?”

“Oh, sweetheart, yes to both.” Alois pushed Ciel down on the bed, so he was hovering above, in perfect position to reach down and steal a kiss. “I know you don’t care for being undressed, but how do you feel about doing the undressing?”

“You’ll have to forgive my lack of expertise,” Ciel said, like he hadn’t already undone half the buttons on Alois’ shirt in the time since Alois flipped them over. “But I’d be quite interested to try.”

“So helpful, darling.” Alois said, in the moment reprieve he got while Ciel, from below, got Alois’ undershirt off his head. After that, it was an imminent return to kiss, while Ciel fumbled with the clasp of a belt hovering barely above his own naked dick. It was admirable, the effort, even as pawing and clumsy as it came off as. Everything about Ciel, these days, was endearing.

What had become of him?

No idea, truly, (love, some contrary part of him pointed out, was obviously what had become of him) but he was aware that what had become of his clothes was a pile on the floor and a sock Ciel was valiantly attempting to take off with his own toes, before Alois reached down and got it for him.

“How did I do?” Ciel asked, fingertips digging into the soft flesh around Alois’ waist.

“Showstopping. Bonus points for managing it while beneath me.”

Ciel smiled that clever thing of his. “I figure I should get accustomed to it, and the reverse. It’ll be good for us, to switch stations every so often.”

Alois raised a brow. “You’re expecting a repeat performance? You haven’t even seen the show yet.”

“Hm.” Ciel curled Alois’ hair in his hands and tugged him closer. “I like the lead actor. I think whatever it is will be to my tastes.” Then, letting go and leaning back enough to merit a more serious sort of conversation— “On the topic… Who would you like to do the leading?”

It took all Alois had to push against his outer instincts to roll his eyes and cluck his tongue and demean, to give in to his more core desire to press his mouth to the corner of Ciel’s jaw. To pull back, and speak honestly: “May I?” To lean back in for a long, slow press of lips, when Ciel answered.

Sex — he realized — was much like any other taken action. Fuck was just a verb, and meant little without its neighbor nouns and adjectives to give it context. One could fall in love with one book and read another that made them so angry they couldn’t think. Eating can make one satisfied or nauseous. Sex could be every horrid prior experience —

Or it could be this.

It could be the gentle cradle of Ciel’s hand around his skull, Alois’ head pillowed on the soft plane of his stomach. It could be the scent of his skin and the familiarity of the room. The assurance that nothing ungiven would be taken.

(The actors involved, he found, were a very important part of any taken action.)

He pressed his mouth to the valley beneath Ciel’s pectoral, long and lingering but soft. No physical impression left, just the memory of kindness. He kissed down the skin, the line of dark, curled hair providing clear direction, till he could lie with his head rested on Ciel’s inner thigh. He leaned over and bit — not hard enough to break skin, as tempting as it was; just enough to serve reminder and get that grin on him.

He looked up to find it. There, backed by light and haloed as demanded by his usually-ironic name, Ciel was smiling. Alois, through the sudden breathlessness, managed to ask, “Can I?” and watched the shift of light as his Ciel nodded yes.

Alois had been taught how to do this, and do it well, mostly through a series of grunted instructions, hands pushing him to show him where to put his lips and tongue and how to use them. Ciel beneath him offered no instructions; no words, even, beyond a few swears and Alois’ names and various abridged syllables — so Alois was left to explore for himself. He learned, now, by doing, experimenting. What made Ciel throw his head back, what made him uncomfortable, what made him stop to laugh (a particularly ticklish spot on his lower thigh, apparently).

He was succeeding, in not letting himself get lost in memory, but really, there was no connection to be made. What did every rushed, thoughtless, loveless violence enacted on him have in common with the attentive, curious way he and his best friend were learning each other anew?

It didn’t take long before Ciel fell apart beneath him, with just-sufficient warning (Alois made note to thank him for that), and Alois swallowed. In his periphery, he could see the rise and fall of a chest, the sweat-sheen catching the candlelight, lingering in the curled hair on his chest. Ciel was beautiful, just then — but, this was not uncommon, as far as Alois was concerned. Tilting his chin up, he could see the flutter-shut of Ciel’s eyes, an expression like calm, and Alois registered a pang of missing this moment already, even as he delighted in this show of comfort he and he alone brought to his friend.

And Ciel looked up.

Alois hadn’t, he realized, been expecting Ciel to look at him. He was expecting a face turned perpendicular, flush and evident shame. But instead — his wide eyes, looking down at Alois, mouth-part starting to smile. Still half-blissed, but so aware. Intent. Knowing what they had done — what Alois had done for him, to him — and being glad.

“Can I kiss you?” Were the first words to fall from Ciel, in the wake, and Alois nodded. “Thank you,” Ciel said — Ciel, wanting him, even now — and pulled Alois near enough for Ciel to — kiss him. Like that. “I don't know what to do with you.”

“I have a few ideas,” Alois said, his bravado lost to breathlessness, as he returned the kiss — once, twice, again — to the gentle give of Ciel’s mouth. “I was expecting you to be more put off by the fact I just had your cock in my mouth.”

Ciel snorts. “I understood what the concept of fellatio was, actually.”

“Still. You kissed me.”

“Obviously.” Ciel looked at him, eyebrows in a gentle furrow. Alois moved to smooth out the line of that frown, but Ciel took his hand and held it, gentle as anything. “You did something nice for me. And I like you.”

“I like you,” Alois mimicked, feeling just a bit flushed and silly about it. “You are gorgeous, when you let yourself get out of your head a bit.”

“Speaking of 'head,'” Ciel mused, conversational even as his hand crept down between Alois's thighs. “I believe it's my turn?”

Alois grinned. "If you're in such a rush."

It went mostly well, at first, in the way that things tended to go mostly well when you were trying not to think of them at all. The room was brighter, sharper, without him in control, it had him on edge, and if he drifted off, he could do it. It could work that way — thoughtless, absent — but,

But he wanted to be present. He wanted it: the blue-and-purple eye contact as Ciel looked up at him. He wanted the amusement at Ciel's unpracticed, faltering technique, the sensation of a grounding hand on his thigh. He wanted every second of it, even the awkward, the way Ciel seemed to find some bit of it confusing, eyebrows furrowed, letting out an annoyed sort of sound Alois recognized from when they were at odds with some literary opinion, and fuck, Alois loved him more than anything, and—

The overwhelm of that thought combined with the overwhelm sensation of his body—

“Stop,” Alois asked, “please.”

“Alois?” Immediate Watchdog-persona adopted. “Did I—”

“Come here,” because he could not balance Ciel’s panic against his own, so in a reassurance — Alois pulled him up to press their foreheads together. “Just — too much, it’s okay.”

“Are you sure, do you need to—”

“Shh. Kiss me.” When Ciel still appeared hesitant. “Darling, I promised you I’d tell you when things were wrong. I did. We’re not doing that now. Kiss me.”

And he did.

It was long and languid, and Ciel was still hot against him, every bare inch of skin touching — barring the pelvis, which Alois had tilted helpfully away. Ciel took Alois’s face in hands like he was something soft and precious and worth the gentle marvel of his kiss. He pulled back, breath warm in Alois’ face. “Was I that terrible at it?”

Alois scoffed. “No. Really! You were fine, a little unpracticed, sure—”

“And after you gave me that educational demonstration,” Ciel deadpanned, which shuffled off only some of his prior nerves.

“I don’t fault you — you seemed quite distracted.” He allowed himself the feeling of running his fingertips up Ciel’s inner thigh, and considered the keening sigh a fair recompense for the questions he’d been besieged by. “It was a perfectly permissible first attempt, don’t work yourself up over it.” When this didn’t seem convincing: “I was overwhelmed. Too much at once.”

“Weren't remembering anything unpleasant?”

“No, I was too busy focusing on how the mouth on my cock happened to belong to a guy I find so attractive that I want to eat him.” The small smile this brought to Ciel’s face, along with the gentle, amaranth-flush was altogether too much for Alois, who pushed Ciel onto his back and clambered on top of him and said, “I’m going to kiss you senseless, now, alright?”

“Alright,” said Ciel, looking just as starstruck as Alois felt.

And so he did.

For the past two months, it had been like living in countdown — every good moment heavy with the countdown of seconds between it and the fallout of Alois’ plan. In the manor and the country house, every press of Ciel’s mouth, every game with him and the staff, every book page.

This was the first time in a while he felt a moment as a moment, rather than an advancing towards something dreadful.

He and Ciel kissed until Alois got a bit tired of it — possible, really, even with the person you were in love with — and he rolled over to invade Ciel’s space. Ciel was prattling on, obviously a bit put-out over Alois not cumming, which Alois would have absolutely fucking none of. “I got what I wanted from this,” he insisted. “Well, almost everything. Haven’t figured out a safe way to eat you yet.”

“But—” Ciel protested.

“Shh. Or I will come up with something.” Alois kept his finger pressed to Ciel’s mouth as he mused, “The kitchen here’s pretty big. I could get a big soup pot, cook you there. Made flour from your bones. Soup and toast. You’d make a classic.”

Ciel pursed his mouth in that pinched, not-quite-attractive way he did when he was deciding if it was worth picking a fight. He relented, and said simply, “Empty threat.” Alois raised a brow. “You can’t cook. You’d just waste the meat.”

“You don’t know that. Maybe Baldroy’s been giving me lessons.”

“Baldroy can’t cook.” Alois tilted his head back and forth. The chef had gotten better, in the past few years, but, well… He couldn’t, in all logical standing, argue. “And I doubt you’ve asked Sebastian.”

“I could do. When he eats your soul, you think the meat is left? Maybe he’d let me have it.” Ciel looked unimpressed, but also unoffended. Small victories.

“Dunno,” Ciel mused. “I haven’t had my soul eaten before.”

“If only Claude had stuck it through. I’d have advice.”

“If only.” Then, murmured low: “Thank you." The syllables half-lost in the tangle of Alois’ hair.

“For which part, darling?” Alois yawned. “I’ve done quite a bit for you.”

“You have.” His fingers were gentle, working through knots in Alois’ hair. “For this. For your patience in getting us here. For kissing me, and reading with me, and making friends with Lizzie. For inviting me to play with you and the staff. For going in my place with the cult, then.”

“Christ.” Alois, flushed, cut him off. It seemed he might go on forever, if uninterrupted. “That was three years ago, you know? One blowjob and you’re this in love with me?” Ciel snorted a laugh, but Alois could feel, where his hand went tense and still, in Alois’ hair. Alois turned far enough to press a kiss to his shoulder. “Thank you. For — I’m not giving you a list. That’s not in my nature.”

“I know.” He resumed the hair-petting, and Alois would not complain for that. “You know, when I started fancying you, I thought you were gone on Finny.”

Alois sat up. “Our Finnian?”

“I don’t know many others.”

He barked out a laugh. “God, no, he’s my brother.” Alois blinked. “Huh.”

“‘Huh’?”

“I’ve never thought of him in such terms prior. Huh.” He thought of Luka, he felt guilty of replacement — But, no. It wasn’t. Finny was not what Luka was; Finny was an elder brother. Not someone he had to protect, but someone he had the honor of helping when he could, who wanted him safe and let him be near. He was a friend, and he was Alois’ brother. “But he is. My brother.”

“Huh.” Ciel ran his thumb over Alois’ jaw. Letting him revel in it, for a minute. “I wish I’d known. Would have saved me being horrifically jealous of my own gardener.”

“Like that would have helped. You'd get jealous of a willow that waved my direction.” Ciel leaned forward and nipped at Alois’ shoulder. “Weak jaw. That won’t even bruise. Try again.” Ciel bit harder. Alois laughed, and flipped them over, and pinned Ciel’s wrists over his head with a single hand. “Never thought I'd say it, but I think I understand royal old bint. I’d want you as a watchdog, too — you’re so good with orders.”

Ciel flushed with that. So pretty. Alois indulged himself in licking a long stripe up the side of his face. “You are disgusting,” Ciel deadpanned, shutting the eye nearest to Alois' tongue.

“Say more.” Alois pinched the skin of Ciel’s neck between his front teeth. “Disgusting as I may be, you’ve been gone on me, for, how long were you saying? Where in that three-year epic, exactly, did you fall for me?” Alois teased. He knew the answer, but wanted the reminder of how damn good he had looked, in that dress.

Ciel managed a shrug. It was impressive, with his hands pinned above his head. Alois loosened his grip, and Ciel immediately looped his arms around Alois’ shoulders. “I don’t know, a bit ago.”

Alois pouted. “The drag didn’t have you falling for me on the spot? I thought I did a good job with it.”

Ciel rolled his eyes. “It worked on Elliot, you don’t need my flattery.”

“You jealous bitch,” Alois said, delighted. “You remember his name!”

“Of course.” Alois was excited for further ragging on the subject, but — “It was important to me, all of that day. You kissed him, and I realized, that. That maybe I could too.”

It was nice, Alois thought, to know something so important to him was treasured to both of them. But that, he wouldn't say aloud. “And to think, I've spent all this time sure you were jealous of him, not me.”

“You know what I meant.”

The all-fours hovering was getting a bit heavy on the arms. He needed to start helping Baldroy haul about flour. He leaned his weight down till he was laying on Ciel’s left. “So it was the drag, then, that did it for you?”

“No. I didn’t see you in a dress and suddenly want to kiss you.” He turned his head sharply to the left. “Is that what you thought?”

Alois shrugged. “Yeah, honestly.”

“Hm.” He’d turned back to look at the ceiling — or, well, the bed canopy that separated them from it. Alois took a peek up, in solidarity. Nothing interesting. Looking back down, he found an indent in Ciel’s cheek where he was surely biting it from the inside.

The Earl was in his head, then.

“What?” Ciel swallowed, and Alois watched the bob of his throat. No answer. “C’mon, Ciel. I answered your last question, it’s your turn.”

“We’re not playing that right now.”

“Hate to break it to you, sweetheart, we never stopped. I’ve been keeping tally. I’m owed four questions.”

“You certainly ask me more questions than I ask you.”

“No, sorry, I’ve kept track. I’m owed this one. Drag? Elliot? Something? What’s rattling through your brain.”

“Further back, actually.” Ciel ran a hand over his face, and sighed. “I'm thinking about the first time I kissed you. My birthday.”

They’d never actually spoken of it. Alois wasn’t surprised Ciel remembered, but was, to hear him bring it up. “What of it?”

“I kissed you.” Ciel reiterates. “And after I kissed you, you ran off and hurt yourself trying to fuck some grown man in some horrible corner of London, and you could’ve gotten yourself killed. Because I kissed you.”

Alois winced. “That wasn’t… that wasn’t because you kissed me. Mostly.” Then, because Ciel wasn’t actually an all-knowing god — “You never told me how you found out where I was.”

“You disappeared. I thought you’d been kidnapped, again.” Alois had left in the middle of the night. He’d been gone barely three hours, even with the travel. He’d chalked Mey-rin finding him up to pure chance — he hadn’t thought anyone would notice his disappearance. “I had Baldroy and everyone look for you. Not, not Sebastian. But I would have. If you’d waited another few hours to turn up.”

“You’re so fucking obsessed with me,” Alois forced out, like his throat wasn’t tight. “Doesn’t explain how you knew.”

He shrugged. “I might have listened in at the door, when you and Mey spoke.” When Alois raised brows at him. “I wanted to know, and you didn’t come to me with it. And if it had to do with me—”

“It didn’t. Not actually.”

“So I didn’t try again,” Ciel barrelled on, rushing through words the way he only did when they were important. Alois shook his head, not getting it. “I didn’t kiss you. For two years, I didn’t kiss you. Because I thought you didn’t want that from anyone.”

Oh.

Oh god.

Two years. Two years, before they even, before he—

“But Elliot kissed you. You kissed him back. You seemed to enjoy it.” Just the hint of a jealous bite to that word. “You weren’t scared. And I thought — maybe if I tried…”

“Oh.” Every moment of that night seemed to refit, changing its shimmering shape like the turn of a butterfly wing. Every moment before, and after, too. Oh. “I honestly, I hadn’t expected you to give it that much thought.” Ciel had taken his hand. Held it, like an offering. Alois smiled something still-shaky. “I should’ve, though. Chess bitch, you’ve been doing steps far in advance.”

“Really, it was rather spur of the moment.” He turned Alois’ palm over in his hand, leaving the scar just visible in the candlelight. “And you wanted to come home with me, and I let you, and you — you freaked out, and I thought I fucked it up, that I hurt you, again, that I had taken something you weren’t willing to refuse me.” He swallowed tightly. “I know I can be selfish. But I never want to be an obligation.”

“Darling, you are always selfish. I like it about you.” He pressed his hand to the side of Ciel’s face. It was still barely tacky with his saliva, which was, in fact, disgusting. Ciel made some good points. “But I’ve never done a thing with you out of obligation.” Ciel raised an eyebrow. “After the first time. You scolded me well for that, I learned my lesson.” He held Ciel’s face in the curl of his hand, thumb pressed to chin. “So that’s why you refused to fuck me for so long? Because you thought I’d run off and get myself molested if you did?”

Sharp glance. “That’s a simplification.”

“It all comes back to your jealousy.” Then, with a lump in his throat, like whatever he’d be admitting here wasn’t less than half than what Ciel had so gently laid over him, “You don’t have to worry, your lordship. I’m yours.”

Ciel smiled, but shook his head, too. But, before Alois could drown himself in that negation: “I don’t want to have you. I just want you to want to be here with me.”

“I always do.” He kissed Ciel then, gentle as anything. His mouth parted with breath, and felt it breathed back into him, every ounce of kindness weighed in and parceled back in even measure. “Except when you’re playing that fucking violin.”

Ciel laughed, full and bright and the loudest thing the room had heard all night. “You are such a bitch, Jim Macken.”

“Yes, in the way—” Whatever the rest of Alois’ genius reply would have been, it was sharply cut off as Ciel rolled him onto his back, and resumed that kissing senseless thing.

“On the topic,” Ciel asked, once Alois was half-asleep tucked against him. Alois had, honestly, not a clue what topic they could be on about. His brain was tired and blissed out and calmer than he could remember it being in ages. “How long have you fancied me?”

Alois hummed. “Oh, maybe a week. You finally wore me down, now I find all of this passable.”

Ciel laughed. “Arsehole.”

“Darling, we said that was off the table for now.” Ciel flicked him on the cheek, and Alois snapped his teeth, just catching Ciel’s middle finger in his mouth. He bit it, hard, for good measure. “Not as long as you’ve been thinking about me. A year, if that? Around when you made me paint that portrait of you.”

“I looked awful in that, for which I’m blaming the artist.”

Alois reached up to slap him on the face, not opening his eyes. As such, he missed the mark, and got mostly hair. “Models. They never introspect.” He yawned. “See what sort of gift I get you this year.” He tucked his head in the reassuring cool of Ciel’s neck. “Coal for you, Lord Phantomhive.”

Ciel snorted and nuzzled his face in Alois’ hair. “You are cruel to me.”

“Hm.” They were past the point in the evening where either of them could come up with banter, it seemed. He was quite ready to sleep, all things considered. If anyone found out Ciel had tired him out, he’d be ruined.

A few minutes later, Ciel offered a quiet. “Jim?” He hummed. He wasn’t quite up to conversation, but he’d let Ciel say whatever peace he had. “I know it’s a moot point. So forgive me the illogic of saying it.” He ran his fingers over Alois’ arm. “But if I had a forever, I would want it to be you.”

They’d blown out the candles, and there was no light left, to catch on Alois’ smile.

Ciel, when not forced into labor early in the morning, was a far more indulgent sleeper than Alois.

No one was to bother them, butlers or princes or housestaff, and Alois chose to count himself on that list, and let the Earl sleep. He put on his clothes quiet as he could, and scrawled a note on some hopefully-unimportant work papers — ‘Dreadfully hungry. Going for breakfast. If you drag your pretty arse out of bed before noon, I’ll try to see that some food is left for you.” And, indulgent and looking at a very naked Ciel, he added a little heart to the bottom of the page.

What Ciel had said — he’d said a lot, and most of it Alois was believing despite his better judgement, but the last part — was likely a post-sex, pre-sleep bit of unfettered sappiness. Forever is a very long time, and it is a much easier promise to make for someone whose forever didn’t stretch beyond age eighteen, if that.

But Alois was giving him forever.

He wouldn’t hold Ciel to it. Wouldn’t expect a living boy to keep a dying one's promise. But he would offer it, nonetheless. Offer out this long, spanning life, for Ciel to do with what he pleased, and hope that that forever had a place in it, for Alois.

Because, before forever, there had to be this.

Chapter Text

The plan was as follows:

First, Ciel and Alois migrate to the country house for the summer.

A few weeks in, Elizabeth comes out for a visit, with her entourage of several swords in tow.

A week or so after she's settled, Baldroy sends word to Sebastian that there is a hapless nobleperson asking to stay at the manor — packing the letter with plenty of suspicious activity from the stranger, which of course the witless staff couldn’t figure out was dangerous on their own.

Sebastian then returns to the Phantomhive manor, where Agni and the staff are stationed — per layout of strategy-master Baldroy — ready to kick him back to the Hell he’s been out of too long.

Alois and Lizzie and Soma stay with Ciel, and if all goes well, serve as his comfort in the aftermath. If all goes less well — they serve as his protection.

All will go fine.

They decided on an innocuous Thursday, to call Sebastian home. True to prediction, the bitch stopped in to tell Ciel he was to return to the manor briefly, on monitoring work. Ciel asked to accompany, and Soma wheedled and whined until Ciel relented to stay. It was an admirable acting role, on Soma’s part, but that was likely because it was hardly acting at all.

Alois couldn’t blame him. He liked it when Ciel stuck around, too.

They had a quiet few hours. Lizzie was working on a painting of Soma and Ciel — Soma lounging gorgeously, and Ciel sprawled over his lap. Alois was given an ancillary job: reading aloud from Woman in White to keep the models from dying of boredom. Ciel had chosen to look like he was sleeping for most of it, but Alois had noticed a pattern in his eye-openings; he was quite taken with Fosco’s parts of the novel.

It was in the midst of one of one of those less-than-charming Fosco speeches that Ciel sat up with a start.

The motion was so sudden that Soma screeched and pitched backwards into the pile of pillows behind him. Lizzie hadn’t moved a muscle, which was impressive; even as anticipatory and on-edge as Alois considered himself, he had dropped the book upon hearing. “Ciel?” he inquired. The boy had fallen forward onto his knees, cradling his head in hands. No panic in his shoulders — more like a reaction to the sharp shock of a headache. “Faring alright over there?”

“I…” He lifted his head, something dazed in the single visible eye. “Sorry, I don’t know what — fuck!” He doubled over again, making a mewling noise like a streetcat in a fight.

Alois looked over to Lizzie. Her paintbrush had been set down, hand hovering over a knife at her hip, ready to trade instruments if needed. She nodded sharply, chin jut down, to tell him to tend to their Earl. “Ciel? Love, what is it?”

“It’s— oh god.” His hands had curled in, both surrounding his covered eye, and in the tangle of fingers, Alois worried for him tearing into the delicate skin around the organ. “Something, Alois, Alois something’s wrong.”

“I got you, Phantomhive. It’s alright.” He was kneeled in front of Ciel, then, pushing his hands from his eye. Pushing the eyepatch off, too. He hissed, as Alois pulled it away, and Alois responded in kind. The eye was glowing a bright, sustained purple, unlike the brief neon flashes he’d come to expect. It was pulsing, too. Like something fighting to crawl out of him. “What are you hearing? What’s happening?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know I, fuck, Alois.” His eyes were glassy, darting about as if he couldn’t see the room surrounding him. “I think — Sebastian. Sebastian? Where is he?”

Alois kept his hands pressed firm to the sides of Ciel’s face, fighting against the boy's attempts to turn his neck, to look about in a desperate search. Alois hoped he couldn’t see, as Lizzie stood and dashed to the corner where she’d stored her weapons. As Soma had righted himself, gone to the window in lookout-pose. “He went home, remember? Dealing with something Baldroy was worried over? You have me here, and Soma, and Lizzie, and Agni.” True, barring the last. “What can I do?”

“I…” He pushed away from Alois, a motion so sudden that Alois couldn’t stop him from towering over Alois’ fallen-back form. “He’s, he’s shouting, he, it’s so, so fucking loud,” he gripped his skull in his hands, fingers drawn back through his hair. Pinkening the scalp where pulled too harshly. “It’s never been like, like— we need to go.”

Alois scrambled to his feet, determined to keep a hand on his Ciel. “Go where?”

“The manor. Sebastian. I need to, I need to go there.” He looked up, caught Soma in his line of sight. It was the first time he’d seemed semi-lucid in minutes. “Soma! Call your servants, get us a carriage—”

“So you can, what, help Sebastian? With what?” Alois asked, pressing his arm. “Ciel.”

“It’s— fuck, Alois, you can’t — hear it, it’s — louder, and—” He gasped, and straightened. Face pale as cooked egg. “Here,” he said.

And the window crashed in.

It was Sebastian, wild-eyed and bloody, inches away from the lost-fight — looking right at Alois. In an instant, Ciel moved between them, acting under some ingrained instinct to protect over Alois. Before Alois could feel anything but a dull, traitor’s ache, Agni was through the window. Tackling the demon down.

“Sebastian?” A whisper, then, mounting to a yell, “Sebastian!” His arm was still cast out, still covering Alois in some cheap defense. He wasn’t who needed the protection. He was supposed to be the protection, if it got to here. It wasn’t meant to get here — but it had, and it was okay, that okay, they had a plan for this—

“Ciel, let’s go,” Alois grabbed his arms, pulled him back on one side as Soma flanked from the other, Lizzie with her blades sharp as her narrowed eyes, moving out in front. “We need to go.”

“What are you doing?” Ciel asked Soma. He tried to throw off the hand Soma grasped onto him, but the Prince just shook his head, holding firm. “What is Agni doing?” Alois could see it, corner of vision — as Agni bore down on the demon, fist unwrapped to dig into Sebastian’s shoulder. “Soma! Call him off, call him off, now, what are—”

“It’s okay, Ciel,” Soma’s voice was so low Alois could barely catch it over the clanging of metal — Lizzie raised up on a leg, jumping up and hurtling down one dagger, then another, to pin Sebastian’s sleeve to the ground. “It’s—”

“Lizzie! Lizzie, get off, what’s, what are you—” and then he was pushing forward, and Alois was holding him tighter, the pressure mirrored on the other side as Ciel rebelled against his restraint. Alois could hold Ciel back, physically, but Ciel was looking at him, all wide eyes, and — “Alois? Alois, what’s happening?”

Alois shut his eyes, heavy exhale, as the background heard a snarl and a scream from two different mouths. “Ciel…”

“Alois? Jim, please, let me go.” His hands were warm and familiar and insistent, pushing against Alois’ arm. “Let me go, please, please!”

He could feel the tears sharp in his eyes. “I can’t.”

“What—” Sharp inhale, narrowed eyes, realization and terror and— “You’re going to kill him. You’re going to kill him, you, traitor, fucking, let me—” He writhed against Alois’ unrelenting grip, in parallel to the demon pinned and thrashing just in corner of view. “Soma, Soma please, fuck, Lizzie—” Lizzie had gotten a sword fully through Sebastian’s palm, and he was kicking, tearing at Agni with fingers turned to claws, but Mey-rin was through the door behind, and then Baldroy, and Baldroy threw Agni the demon blade, and—

“Stop, now! Stop it!” Ciel howled, each word tight like ripped from the muscle of his throat. Alois turned to him, and he was struggling less, and Alois put his free hand to press against his cheek. To look at him. To see his Ciel, and remember that this was so very worth it.

He didn’t take his eyes off him, when the final blow came. He knew it, from the animalistic snarling yell behind him, from the thump of metal reaching through a body to lodge into wood, from the way Ciel’s marked eye lit up, glowing a bright, burning lilac, before fading away and taking with it every tint of purple from the eye.

Leaving only the faint demonic outline ‘round the iris.

The world was very still, for a moment.

When Ciel pushed away from him, his and Soma’s grasps were shock-slacked, easy to tear free from. He ran across the parlor, over the broken glass shatter on the ground, pushing Lizzie and Agni away as he fell to his knees. He took Sebastian’s curled, clawed hand in his own. Sebastian’s eyes — Alois could just tell from this distance — were still open, and his mouth parted in what could be a last word, or a final breath he never needed, before he slumped back, and Alois was made intimately aware, that it was over.

Alois padded slowly over, minding the glass beneath his feet and the crowding of Lizzie, Agni, Baldroy, Mey-rin, as they moved towards the shaking boy and his unmoving demon.

He wasn’t crying.

“Young master?” Baldroy was the first to speak. He had four long, bloody lines across his cheek and over the chin, an imprinted memory of a clawed hand. He was limping a bit to one side. Finny, behind him, was holding an arm curled to his chest. Alois would feel that guilt, later. He would be feeling a lot of guilt, he was realizing.

That guilt’s favorite star rose to his feet. “Whose plan was this?” Ciel asked, voice unshaking. His head was downturned. He would not look.

Alois stepped forward, and the space was small enough his words might as well be for Ciel alone. “It was mine.”

Only knowing him so long allowed Alois to notice the space where his eyebrows raised and creased together, and only an intimate history of Ciel-centric guesswork let him read that as anger. He nodded, unspeaking.

Alois hadn’t expected gratefulness. He hadn’t wanted it, hadn’t wanted to coerce something from Ciel that his own nature hadn’t won. But this wasn’t Ciel ungrateful, this was Ciel angry. Ciel looking at him like he was another mourning in his tragedy of a life.

Alois reached out to touch. “I wanted—”

“I should be off.” Ciel said, stepping back so swiftly that Alois’ hand met air a full moment before he realized he didn’t have Ciel’s body under his skin. “There will be much to attend to at home.” The voice was cold. The gaze, too, left on him just long enough for it to settle, frostbitten, on Alois’ skin. He looked to Lizzie. “Lady Midford, if you would have someone call us a carriage.”

Lizzie looked at Alois. She was bloody, but the crimson splatter on her skin and dress was — Alois was fairly certain — not of her own. He nodded. No reason to fight it, certainly not for him; they couldn’t have Ciel write off her comfort too. He needed someone. “Of course.”

“Baldroy, Mey-rin, Finnian, follow us. I am sure there is a lot to fix of whatever mess you’ve made of my home.” They nodded. Of them, Baldroy was the only one emoting enough to look guilty. “Agni, clean up here, and see to the Prince.”

And he turned to leave.

“What about me?” Alois asked. His voice was breaking on it, and it was all he had to not collapse into the desperate tears, to not fall to another emotional fit that would coerce, unearned, Ciel back to him.

It wouldn’t be fair.

Ciel’s gaze stayed just off of him, oil to the wet of Alois’ eyes. “You are welcome to stay with the Prince.” Then, after a breath so heavy Alois heard it across the room, “Until you can procure more permanent residence.”

Alois laughed.

What else was there to do?

By the time the rough sound had scratched itself fully from his throat, Ciel was out the door, and Lizzie was watching him like she could feel his heart breaking in her chest. He shook his head, and waved her on. She turned, and went, and then he was left with the people who had all risked lives for an outcome the savee didn’t even seem to want. All these people, with their lives and limbs risked, and not an ounce of gratitude to them.

Which hardly seemed fair.

“Thank you,” Alois said. He looked first to his family, only now noticing the way Mey had sunk to a knee, one leg out and clearly bloody. Baldroy had his hands on her shoulders. “Oh, god. Are you alright? All of you? Do we need a doctor?”

“Oh, prolly.” Baldroy huffed out a pained chuckle. “The young master might be finding his clean-up crew running a bit late.” Then, nodding to Finny, “You manage unscathed, Fin?”

The kid nodded. “Pretty much, but I saw it when he got Mey. We need…” he sniffed a little, brought to the edge of tears as he always was when one of them got hurt. “We need to get her some help.”

“I’ll be alright,” she said. Her voice was quiet, breathy in a way that matched neither her hurried, enthused tones or her calm, gentle calculation. “But yessir. A doctor would, ah, be quite nice.”

“Agni,” Alois turned to him. “Thank you. I, I know I said it earlier, but thank you. You didn’t need to do this, but you risked your life, for us, and I’m so grateful.” He bowed his head, part to show the respect Agni deserved, and part to hide his own wet, blinking eyes. “I will owe you forever.”

Agni put a hand over his chest and nodded. “You have no debt to me. If Sebastian’s death makes life safer for children like Ciel, there is no option but to rid the world of him.”

These words, too, were for Alois’ comfort, he could tell. A reminder that his gift to Ciel, even unwanted, was still something worth the cost of its purchase.

Alois’ raised his head just enough for a grateful nod. “Still. Thank you. Thank you so much.” The gratitude was a bubble in his chest, warring with everything else coming to play. He could feel the rise of it, like that — the elation of success knocking against the bogged-down misery of guilt. It would take him soon. The dread would flow, cascading over the edge of his brain, separating out into river-runs, laden with suds of desperation, till it spilled all over the floors, and he knew, he knew he needed to leave. Needed to get out before this drowned everyone who had been so very kind to him. “I, I should go.”

It was kind, too, that no one questioned him.

Instinct took him halfway to Ciel’s room before he faltered. It was like a physical wall before him, blocking off the remaining steps. This had been his room, too, in every functional sense; it held all his favorite books and clothes and items of comfort — (his memories of Ciel and him the closest they had ever been) — and yet, he could not go in. It wasn’t his space, not anymore.

He turned, and ran, and, unable to get his tear-laden eyes to see, crashed directly into the Prince.

“Alois.” Soma was low-spoken, hand rising up, as if on instinct, to curl around the back of Alois’ neck. Alois took advantage, gave himself a moment’s reprieve sheltered against Soma’s shoulder. “Are you alright?”

Alois nodded, and sniffled some crying sound, and figured the two contradicted each other enough that there was no real point in the lie. “Not quite.”

“Let’s sit down,” Soma said. His lithe hand had moved down between Alois’ shoulderblades, guiding him along.

“I should, yeah.” Alois wiped his eyes, just enough to see ahead to his room, where he could go and be alone and cry and shatter the stupid decor in Ciel’s stupid summer home and scream loud enough the once-damned Earl could hear him, however far the carriage had gotten. “But on my own.” He grinned. It was a specific grin, uncharacteristically ugly; the sort of sharp-toothed smile that made men worry his bite wouldn’t be worth whatever else they got from that mouth. “I’m about to be quite unpleasant to be around.”

But Soma remained fully nonplussed. No running at the glimpse of the ugliness in Alois he tried so hard to keep under wraps. “I don’t mind.”

“Really, it’s not—”

“I’m friends with Ciel,” Soma interrupted, eyebrows raised. “Unpleasantness is fun, when everyone feels like they need to be pleasant around you.” He gestured at his whole, regal self. “Come on. Let me sit down with you.”

It didn’t sound up for discussion. Still, Alois figured he should fight it — it wasn’t quite there yet, the horror of his unfettered emotions still dripping in through cracks rather than flooding the place — and he felt like he ought to remove himself. When people saw him this way it was because it came on too fast before he’d had an option to let them — Ciel, Mey, even Baldroy and Finny a time or two — escape.

Soma didn’t look like he wanted an escape.

“That an order, your Highness?”

Soma smiled. “I don’t think I can order you about, you’re not part of my court.”

“You could bring me into the fold,” Alois said. He didn’t say, I have nowhere else to go, now.

“I could,” Soma said. “Let’s go sit down.”

Alois was proud to say he made it all the way to his room before he started crying.

But by then? It was torrential.

“The stupid — fucking — thankless bellend!” He knocked a row of second-rate books off their shelf — the ones that hadn’t been important enough for them to read together. “I risked my bloody life—” He kicked over a table with a vase, and delighted in the shatter. “All these people risked their bloody lives, for you, you ponce fucking ingrate!” Ciel wasn’t there to hear, and wasn’t that piss; he should at least go to Ciel’s room, wreck all his shit instead of Alois’ own. “High and mighty and un-fucking-feeling, coward wretch!”

He spied Woman in White on the bed, by Soma’s hand — Soma was there, he’d nearly forgotten — and nabbed it, the bedside-candelabra providing just enough fire to turn the thing to torch. Before it could catch on him — he could, he thought, let it catch on him, catch the whole bloody summer house aflame, and what would stoic-Phantomhive think of that? — he threw it out the window, right on the dewy path still-marked with the carriage tracks. “Do you fucking hear me?” He didn’t. “Insipid cunt! Go marry your cousin and bugger your servants and neglect your incest babies and die at the end of a boring fucking life, see if I give a damn!”

He slammed the window shut behind him and collapsed on the floor, amidst the ruin.

It did, honestly, make him feel a little better.

“Can I ask you something?” Soma inquired, once Alois’ fever temperament had cooled down to something more like a muggy August afternoon. His chest was still heaving, but he could at least feel the breath, now. Feel other things — the sting in his toes from kicking the armoire, the sharp pain of shattered porcelain dug into skin. The burn on his thumb where it had made too-close contact with the book fire.

“If it’s ‘will you be able to clean this up?’ the answer is I’ll find a way.” He hadn’t quite come out of anger enough to feel guilt about the mess, but had some instinctive knowing that he couldn’t just leave this to Agni.

“No, not that.” Soma pushed up on the bed to a better sitting position. “Are you in love with Ciel?”

Alois’ flush of anger hadn’t faded, so there was nothing so obvious written on his face, at the very least. “Not at the moment.” Then, relenting to sit on the bed, rather than the debris-scattered floor, “But usually, yeah.”

“I didn’t think it was a thing that stopped for anger.”

Alois shrugged. “Maybe it doesn’t. But there’s a lot of anger. Hard to see damn near anything underneath.”

“Hm.” Soma reached his leg out to kick his shoed foot at the shattered ceramic. “And it’s mutual? You two are lovers?”

“Not anymore, I think he made that clear,” Alois groused. And, shaking his head, “We were — some sort of together. But the in love thing, I don’t… it wasn’t mutual. I don’t think. He, he cares for me, or did, but it wasn’t… if he loved me, he never said. And, if he loved me, he certainly doesn’t now.” Then, stepping in through the door anger had left open, came the quietly malicious houseguest of grief. She redid the hall into greys that seemed somehow deep in their lack of saturation; made it a fitting home for herself, and then that was all that he could feel. “Oh, my god. He is never going to forgive me.”

Soma was very nice, to not point out how this moody fit contradicted his previous. “He will.” When Alois shook his head, crying, Soma cupped the back of his neck and gently touched his hair. “He forgave me, and I commanded a near-deadly fight against him when we met.”

“He has that effect on people,” Alois sniffed out some sound that could look like a laugh, in particularly bad light. “I tried to kill him, too.”

“And he forgave that!” Alois didn’t quite share that hopeful enthusiasm, looking over the wreckage of another space belonging to Ciel. All those lovely things, that Ciel had allowed Alois to hold, and have, and spread his ruin all over. He was going to be sick. “And this — Alois, you were saving his life.”

“But he doesn’t want it!” He grasped his strands of hair till it was painful, the scalp-tug. “I’m — I did it without asking, and he hates me for it. He hates me! The stupid bitch would rather get eaten by a demon at seventeen than live a life with me!” Alois sobbed.

“Oh, no, I don’t think that’s true.” Alois shook his head until his neck ached, and right then, Soma took his face in hands to look at him. “I think he’s mad about it now, and upset about being lied to. I think he’ll come around.” This shake of head was stopped immediately by the gentle hold Soma had him in. “And from what I’d seen, I think he’d rather like a life with you.”

Unable to move enough to negate this in gesture, Alois just sniffled, and leaned into the crook of Soma’s shoulder, face buried in smooth skin. “I love him.” He’d never said it aloud before. It was a comfort, to have it soft and muffled and held in the space between himself and Soma. “Oh, I really, really love him.”

“I’m glad,” Soma said. “He’s in need of people to love him. Me and Lizzie had the bulk of it, for so long; it’s easier when we share it.”

“But he doesn’t want it from me, anymore. If he ever did.” He pulled away, heart suddenly heavy with a new worry. “And what if I ruined it for you too? What if he doesn’t want you or Liz to take care of him anymore? What will he have?”

Soma shrugged. “Still, us. He tried to get rid of me nearly every time we met, for years. And I’ve still loved him, and stuck around. He’s rejected us plenty, before, it won’t start working now.” Soma nodded deeply so he was looking up at Alois, full sincerity. “He’ll be okay.”

“Sure fucking hope.” Alois tried the joke, a sniff disguised as a laugh as he wiped at his wet face. “Else why’d we do all this?”

“Cause you’re a good person.”

Alois burst out laughing. Thank god, to have a new emotion to jump ship to. “What? God, no I’m not.”

“I think you are, for what it’s worth.” For all Alois was still giggling over it, Soma was perfectly straight-faced. “I talk about this with Agni sometimes. He thinks he was born bad and is only good through me. But he is good, himself, as a person, and I try to tell him that; try to tell him that I have been just as sinful — sloth and gluttony and so on — and should be as bad as him; worse, even. That we are both good, and just sometimes fall to bad actions.”

“I think you both have bias, in that.”

“Maybe. But I think I’m right — there aren’t actually bad people.” Alois was immediately shaking his head, able to think of a good several, and every thing they had done him wrong. “There are people, and the actions they take. There are people that take enough bad actions that it feels fair to label them as bad, but I don’t think there’s anything stopping them from taking more good actions, and turning that around.”

“Like how Ciel was a right prick till I got to him?” Then, slightly rueful: “Like me, before Baldroy and them?”

“Sounds right.” Soma reached out to run his hand over Alois’ hair. It was soft, and sweet, and Alois leaned into it. “If you don’t want me to say ‘good person’, I can at least say that you are a person who is willing to risk much for those he loves. Someone who tries to make the people around him happy. That counts for something.”

“I still think this whole good/bad thing lacks moral nuance.” Not that Alois had much of a better idea of moral nuance. He should get around to reading that Kant guy, even if he had a very unfortunate name. “But it’s a good thing to think about.”

Soma grinned then, full and bright with the whitest teeth in England. “I try to be a good role model.”

“Ciel certainly thinks so.” And then, getting some unfair joy out of embarrassing Ciel, “You know he had a horrible crush on you, when he was younger?”

Soma — let it be known — looked lovely full-flushed. “Oh, did he?” He smiled fondly. “Aw, that makes sense. He was always a bit shy. And blushy.”

“I know the look,” Alois parried. He was happy to spill Ciel’s secrets, but didn’t want to look like he had less of a hold of Ciel’s heart than Soma — or, well, that he had had. “He still gets it, around you. I think he wanted to bring you into our fold.”

Soma raised a single, perfectly-arched brow, and tilted his head. “Did you also have a crush on me?”

Alois shrugged. “You’re a prince. Everyone knows how damn lovely you are.” He laid back on the bed, looking up at Soma with wide eyes. “You know, if the Earl really is done with me, I’d be happy to, metaphorically, climb ranks to an upper echelon of nobility?”

Soma’s laugh was full and bright, and his hand gentle, even as it pushed Alois away. “Oh, no, god, that is what Ciel would never forgive me for.”

“He is a jealous bastard.” But maybe he’d find that hot. Alois chose to keep that thought to himself, especially as a more dour one followed. “But he did seem rather over me.”

“No. He’ll come around.” Soma held Alois’ hand in his own. “And until then, you have me. You have this house, as long as you need it. Alright?”

Alois sniffed, and nodded. “Alright.”

On the dewy-pavement outside, the last tongues of flame licked at the back cover of the novel. Then, surely, went out.

Chapter Text

Alois found himself rather taken with Soma's little country house. The trees, the warmth, the smell of sun on grass; much like if the manor garden was magnified to its own little world. Quiet, and starlit. He liked the long walks. He liked the company. It could, really, be worse.

Soma's presence was a massive boon. The man was a delight beyond all earthly delights, sweet and funny and unflinching in his gorgeousness. So charming, he could even occasionally persuade Agni to play cards with them. (Agni won every game handily, resulting in Soma screeching incomprehensibly, and Alois plotting a way to re-fix the betting pool.)

He wasn't bored. He had visits from Lizzie, shopping trips with Soma, letters from the staff. Not lonely, either: Lizzie taught him about snakes, Soma told him of fairytales and fashion, Finny wrote updates on the Poplar trees and Mey’s poetry and Baldroy's stews and, dear lord, if this was the making of homesickness, he was well glad to have never before had a home to miss.

But it was fine.

This home was a nice one. No screeching violin to avoid, no stuck-up interrupters of his hard-won reading time, no intrusions into his space and his bed.

No Ciel, in any form.

For all Lizzie’s visits, for all Fin’s letters, everyone was horribly reticent when it came to the Earl. All reports stated he was alive, running his business. He had not had any Watchdog missions, since, nor anything else Alois would have reason to worry over.

And he had not asked after Alois.

Which was fine.

On the eve of his third week in his country exile, having abandoned nearly all hope of Earl Phantomhive finding it in his cold, shriveled heart to reach out to Alois — whom, let all remember, saved the prat’s life — Alois decided to pen a letter himself.

It read as follows:

Ciel Phantomhive,

I am beginning to get the sense that you are upset with me. For whatever it may be worth, I don’t begrudge that anger. Be mad. Steam from your (tiny, round) ears, curse my name, write horrid things about me and print them to the public. I’ll have no complaint. My work is done — you are alive, and will remain so as long as that God we don’t believe in wants you to be. And, sure, that is perhaps a grander stretch of time than you had planned on, but is that so dreadful? Maybe, for you, o Prince of the Dark.

It is possible I am also angry with you.

All to say, I am sorry if you are hurt. I am sorry if you feel aimless, or like some purpose of your life will now go unfulfilled because of me. I am sorry for your pains.

I am not, and never will be, sorry that your life will stretch beyond the meager years you had otherwise allotted yourself. If the price of you being alive is that you hate me forever, I will gladly pay that debt, a hundred times over. Your life is worth more than any trouble saving it may cause me.

Yours, now and till you do away with me,

James Macken.

P.S. If you never intend to see me again, at least post me my clothes. Your hand-me-downs are boring and I still find wearing Soma’s garments inappropriate.

He read it over once — a little drunk off of some warm, spiced beverage Agni served with dinner — and sent it to post. He forgot about it entirely, until the next morning, when it is all far too remembered, but by then, what was there to do?

From correspondences with Mey and Finny, he knew Ciel wouldn’t get the mail for a day or more, and even if he had the unlikely desire to write back immediately, it would total several more for any response to find its way to him. As such, he only checked the mail once daily, and only felt a mild sense of crushingly put-out disappointment each time nothing sat waiting for him.

When Ciel showed up in his room on the evening of the third day, Alois was not dressed for the occasion.

As letter-mentioned, he was deeply lacking in clothes aligned with his personal style. As such, he was currently in some of the former summer staff's cast-offs: a bleached-white shirt still boasting stains, heavy steel-toed boots, and work pants. Ciel, in contrast, was perfectly adorned in Earl-splendor, drinking a tea he surely didn’t make himself — damn Agni for the lack of warning — and looking to all the world like a businessman on a particularly unpleasant venture.

“Afternoon, Phantomhive,” Alois offered, swallowing down any shock that had knotted up his throat. “Good riding on your way in?” Droll and casual, he dropped down his easel. He had been planning on a bath to wash off the errant paint and combat the chill of the outside, before Ciel’s appearance made it obvious he wouldn’t have that any time soon. On the off chance this conversation ended anywhere in the realm of well, he could chew Ciel out over that later.

Make matters worse, the frost in the space between them was worse than any cold outside. “You had no right to do that.” Ciel set his teacup against saucer with a resonating clink. His tone more level than the tea-surface, lacking any of its small, ripple-wavers. “Least of all behind my back. Least of all making me complicit.”

“If it is any point in my favor—” Alois wasn’t looking him in the eye. He was still struggling out of his left boot; he normally would sit on the chaise to unlace it, but that place had been taken fully up by the Earl. With a final yank, it was wrenched off his foot and out of his hands, to drop directly, but accidentally, on Ciel’s toes. “If we told you, he would have known as well, and that would rather defeat the purpose. As for any trauma you endured from being present, I actually didn't intend on you seeing it.”

Ciel toed at the errant shoe, testing its weight before kicking it over onto its side. Half-dried mud rose up in a cloud of dust, over the clean, white floor. “I don't think you want me tallying your ‘points’ on this matter.” His hands were folded beneath his face, dark gloves keeping those pretty fingers out of Alois’ sight. “What was the plan, exactly? If you didn’t intend for me to see you kill him, how long were you planning on keeping it from me?”

“I suppose 'forever' wouldn't be an appreciated answer.” Alois, modeling behavior, took off his own gloves and sat on the edge of the bed. Ciel had to turn to him to see. “Honestly, Phantomhive, I don’t know. We thought we could make it seem as if he was killed in an attack on the house. Wait until it seemed the right time.”

Ciel blinked, heavy. His ‘bad eye’ was still covered — Alois supposed, it would need to be, in public, to not have to explain a regenerating socket. But he didn’t need the patch, around Alois. He hadn’t, in ages. “You were going to continue to lie to me.”

“Yes, Phantomhive, when I thought you might be grateful.” He slammed his right boot down on the ground. Not on Ciel, this time, but even in the corner of his vision he could see how it made the boy start. “I didn’t — want undue credit.”

“Undue credit,” Ciel held the words in his mouth for a moment, like chewing on a euphemism. “Credit, for what? The esteem of ending a demon?”

Alois glared at him something incredulous. “Undue credit for saving your sorry life, how about?” Alois looked to the side, at the layer of dust over the tile. Saving himself the disgrace of having to look Ciel in the eye as he mentioned something he was sure held no more relevance. “This plan has been in the works for a good several months, you know. It wasn't — you’d said, what you said about ‘forever’, and me—” Even turned away, Ciel was unmissable in his field of vision. Nervous, wrapped-up hands held in trembling position. “It wasn’t about that. I wasn’t attempting to solicit that from you. So you know. If that was a worry."

“It was a worry. At first.” His gloved thumb passed under the line of his eyepatch. Alois had seen the iris glow and fade, turning blue and barely-marked. Alois wondered what it looked like, now. What was kept from him, obscured by gloves and eyepatch and distance? “But I wasn’t even sure you’d heard. And, if you had, it would’ve been an obviously bad plan, and I figured you were more clever than that.” He shifted his body, slow in a way meant to look uncalculated, but still quite noticeably put his face in Alois' line of sight. His back was slightly hunched, curling him into the couch. “I considered killing myself.”

Alois did look up at him, in earnest, and, in earnest, answered, “I’m glad you didn't.”

“I don’t think I was very likely to. It was just — a consideration.” Carefully, like this — of all things — would scare Alois away, Ciel moved to sit on the bed next to him. “It made sense. My purpose was gone. I’d been lied to on a mass scale, and made an accomplice in the murder of the only constant presence I’ve had since the death of my parents. Everyone I trusted had either betrayed me, or been killed by those who had. I was fucking angry, and I thought that it would serve the lot of you right, that you put in all this work to save me only for me to die anyway,” the bitter end to the sentence exhaled all in once. He tsked, and collected himself, and shook his head. “It was a tad dramatic.”

“Was it, now?”

“But I was thinking about it,” he continued, undeterred. He was turned to the side; Alois could only see the covered eye. “Because I had, in a sense, died with him. I had known what my life was, before: revenge, and the answer to my loss, and my soul taken from me. I had made an unbreakable deal sealing what the entirety of my years would look like, better or worse, and then you… You robbed that from me. You took the planned life and the planned death, and left me all this copious time. You gave me a future I was so sure I would never have.” Ciel’s outgone breath of air was soft, staggering and gentle and just audible in the scant space left between them. “What am I meant to do with it?”

The look in Ciel’s eye was familiar. Like waiting for an invitation for a game, or an answer to a proposed kiss. The hopeful stand at a middlepoint, yearning only to be met there.

Alois, of course, had been there from the start.

“You could practice that torture weapon of a violin?” Alois tilted his head back, all the appearance of thinking it through. “Run your company into the ground? Oh, you could tell the Queen you’re done being her bitch?”

Ciel snorted, a canary to the mine-collapse of his laughter. “I don’t think there’s enough time before the death of the earth, for me to get that brave.”

“Ah, well. We’ll start smaller,” Alois relented. “You could read the entire library, write an erotic novel, swim in the lake with Lizzie, and play cards with the staff.” Alois swallowed, feeling the pulse of it down to his chest — “You could, maybe, find it in your heart to forgive me?”

“It is a lot of options.” Ciel replied, noncommittal. His hand had inched close to Alois’, so they were pressed pinky-to-pinky. “And I get to consider them. I get to try any of it. All of it. Because you gave me forever.” He said this as a statement, like something needless of inflection. Like he couldn't recall the anger that had kept him from Alois for weeks, now. Like every wretched part of both of them could be forgiven, easy as that. “I am mad at you. I think you should be sorry. And, I am also... Immeasurably grateful. I am alive, because of you.”

Alois shook his head. “No, no, because of all of us. It wasn't just—”

“But it was your plan.”

“Yes, but—”

“You were willing to take the fall,” Ciel commented evenly. “Why not the reward?"

Alois scoffed. “As I have mentioned, even before today, I don't want you owing me. I would have rather you were happy for being free and thanked it all on chance. As it is, you can hate me for the inconvenience, and the lying. But for the saving, I don’t want you fawning over me.”

“Alois.” Ciel shifted away. “You’re not— hm.” He stood, and made a single pace, and,

He took off his gloves.

He undid the eyepatch, too, and set it on the fabric pile. He kneeled down, in front of Alois. Undid his left shoe, then his right, and set them aside, but didn’t rise from his knees. He looked up, like a man at prayer, hoping for communion, and Alois answered Ciel’s outstretched hand with the gentle setting of his wrist in that upward curve of fingers. He turned them to hold, Alois’ scarred hand in his, smooth and small and familiar in its warmth.

And he said, most even he's ever done: “Jim, I love you.”

Skip of his heart. Catch of his breath. Hope like a book set ablaze, snuffed out by dew in tall grass.

The world doesn’t slow down and stop for such petty things.

Alois exhaled all that had passed through him, and smiled — small and tight-lipped and forgiving. “Oh, what did I just say about owing?”

Ciel furrowed brow, like he didn’t know. “What?”

“Darling,” He’d past the grief-point of a cracking voice, but the blase tone still had Ciel flinching back. “You are spouting your — undeserved — gratefulness, talking about what I gave you, and suddenly you come out with a love confession? You are very sweet, but I don’t need it. Your death was never an option. I don't want a reward for ensuring your safety.”

When Alois braved a look up at Ciel, the boy was scrubbing his spare hand over his face. When he had let out the proper amount of exasperation in that action, he left his fingers to rest over his mouth. And said, measured, “You. Are an idiot.”

“Excuse me?”

“Which is it, then?” Ciel cocked his head to the side. Whatever anger had lit him up, had him casting Alois from his presence, had simmered down into a hazy, curious annoyance. “Are you telling me you don't know, or have you conveniently forgotten?”

“Forgot what?” Alois snapped. He didn’t like this. He didn’t like Ciel’s three words, echoing in his head like nightmare. He didn’t like the false promise in them that Alois was smart enough — had to be smart enough — not to accept. He didn’t like that Ciel wanted to dredge out their respective affections and weigh them; that he wanted to see how greatly Alois’ towered over his. “That you heap devotion on whomever gives you an upper hand, whether or not it’s earned?”

“No. That I love you,” said even as the first. Easy. Simple. Unfairly so. “That I've loved you since I was fourteen. All of which I do believe I told you.”

“You didn't.” Alois returned. Because he hadn't told Alois that. And — Alois was fairly sure — he didn't love him, either. The idea was absurd. “You never said.”

Ciel rolled his eyes. The uncovered one was lighter than the other, the demon-mark doubly faded over by the milky sheen over the iris. It was lovely, to see his annoyance in tandem. “Maybe not in those words, exactly. But I told you I adored you. I told you I wanted you forever. Before that, even, I slowed down my reading pace exponentially just to have a reason to sit close to you, and patience is not on my list of virtues. What did you think?”

“I, I don’t— That you were — we — that I…”

Well, damn good question, Ciel.

What had he thought?

He had hovered there, in Ciel's world and life and bed, been offered Ciel’s adoration and eternity, been loved and brought in by what Ciel had of a family. What had he thought this was? What was the easier solution? What reason was there for it not to be love, except that the fact he wanted it made it seem impossible?

“You have never had any need of me,” he tried. “You only brought me into your home to assuage your guilt. And then I just, lingered. Pointless. And when I tried to offer myself to you, make some use of myself, you didn’t want me. Or, or you only did when you wanted me to want to…” Ciel was raising an eyebrow, looking over the unappealing scraps of argument strewn out over the air. Alois had a point, he was sure, and he pushed on to it. “I don’t offer you anything. I don’t, and I can’t. I’m some parasite in your home, a jealous and crude whore who has and will drag you from your better reputation. I am sadistic and vindictive and low, not worth half the price of my keep. What could you love, of this?"

Ciel’s hands found his face for the first time in weeks, tilting his chin down. Two blue eyes looking in two. “If we ignore the fact that I do in fact need you — if for no other reason than I don’t really like it when you’re not around — I don’t actually need anything from you to love you. I just do.” Alois shook his head, the motion half-stopped in Ciel’s gentle hold. “Saying so in such words isn’t in my nature. I dislike having even said it twice, now. But I will, as many times as you need, because I thought you knew. Clearly I haven’t done enough.” He raised from his kneeling position, to sit back on the bed, hands never leaving Alois’ face. “I love you, in all your sadism and vindication and lowliness. I love you, in every version of yourself I have seen. Do you believe me?”

In true answer? No. He didn't.

But didn't he owe Ciel, to try?

He felt the soft weight of the hands on his face. The warm tufts of breath. He replayed the sound of a confession, offered even while angry, while upset with him and giving him a proper chewing-out. He thought over the feel of Ciel's mouth. the give of his body, offering only where he knew he would be joyously received.

What was so impossible, about the name ‘love’ appended to such a thing?

Alois smiled, and leaned in to press a kiss to that open and waiting-mouth. “I suppose I can try.” He kissed him again, warm and lingering, and pulled away only to nestle himself in the crook of Ciel’s neck. “If you keep giving me reason to.”

“You are so much work.” Ciel pressed a kiss to his temple. “I like that, too.”

“Your top qualities you look for in a man: a high-maintenance, vengeful sadist.”

Ciel grinned and took him by the chin. “Well, lover, I happen to find several of those things wildly attractive.”

“Oh, three weeks is not long enough for me to have forgotten that,” Alois lunged forward, then, to bite lightly at the skin of Ciel’s throat. Still nothing marking, although he figured they may eventually rediscuss that boundary, with its reason for existing gone. “Though I do think we’ve run back into worry about Soma barging in territory.”

Ciel hummed against the kiss. “Oh, I dealt with that, don’t worry for it.”

“Oh god,” Alois covered mouth with hand, mock-horror. “You murdered Soma?”

Ciel rolled his eyes and kissed his palm. “But to your point… If you’d have me, and if you’d want it, I’d very much like for you to come home.”

“Maybe I like the country house. Maybe I want to stay here.”

“And to think, Soma gets you, after years of you threatening to run away to Elizabeth’s manor.” He bumped their foreheads together. “Do you want to go home?”

“Not yet.” It wasn’t quite so joking, in tone, and Ciel looked genuinely put-out at the deferral. “Oh, worry not, I will soon. You were the one who showed up to interrogate me while I was dirt- and paint-covered and fucking cold, the least you could do is run me a bath before you stick me in a carriage.” While Ciel considered, Alois put his elbows to rest on the Earl’s shoulders, pleading eyes looking up at him. “Did you bring me my clothes?”

Ciel was firmly unsmiling for a moment, before glancing askance. “Yes.”

Alois grinned, wide and face-splitting and nothing put-on about it. He looped his arms ‘round Ciel’s neck and pressed a loud, messy kiss to his pink-flushed cheek. “Oh, what did I do to deserve you?”

From within the tight embrace, he could just feel Ciel’s shrug. “Well, I can think of a few things.”

“Try as you might to hide it, you really are an incorrigible sweetheart. Let the world know.” Alois hopped up to stand, pulling a startled Ciel along with him so he was more steadied by Alois’ arms than his loosely-planted feet. “Come. You’ll keep me company while I bathe?” At Ciel’s half-raised eyebrow. “Incorrigible slut, too. No, Agni’s still here, I assume; you had to get that tea somewhere and I know for a damn fact you’re no good at making it on your own. You’ll sit on a stool and read to me.”

“Demanding,” Ciel admonished, twirling up a strand of blonde hair around his finger. “Fine. We never did finish Woman in White.”

Alois looked up to the ceiling as he started to drag Ciel to the washroom. “Oh, er, well. Let’s maybe wait on that one.”

“Why? I want to see what happened to Fosco.”

“And so you shall, darling, just not yet.” Ciel came to a stop and looked at Alois with all the petulance of a child told he’d ‘understand when he’s older.’ “I may have set our copy aflame.”

An impressive furrow of brow. “You—”

“I was mad at you!” He jerked his thumb towards the wide, hallway window. “Its burned-and-sopping remains might be more than pulp, if you want to look out in the grass.”

“Alois.”

“Hm?”

Ciel looked at him, any annoyance dissolving quickly into an unmistakable fondness. “I will never get sick of you.”

Alois grinned. “Sop.” He took his hand, and held it tight. “C’mon, Phantomhive. Get me clean, and get me dressed, and get me home.”

Chapter Text

Alois opened the manor doors to a grand reception.

There were banners in Alois’ signature purple, strewn uneven over the balconies by undeniably human hands. On a central table, a cake was piled high with chocolate ganache and dark, pitted plums quartered and lining the rim; only one of the fruits had toppled off onto the floor. The air was rich with flute and fiddle and the acquired taste that was Fin’s singing voice, all muddling over some old country song. And standing about, smiling and calling their welcomes, were Baldroy, Mey-rin, Finny, and Elizabeth and Soma and Agni, and Ciel, by his side.

Oh.

It was for him.

While his brain was doing the required catch-up to give him whatever glib-but-still-affectionate response that would save him from bursting into embarrassing tears in front of all these unnervingly wonderful people, Ciel offered up, “You’re always whining about me having the good parties, which I don’t even want. I figured you should have a turn.”

Alois looked over, and Ciel was looking back at him, smiling something small and soft that made his face look as much like home as anything in these walls. “Darling, when you allow me to throw a party, it will be a far grander thing than this.”

“Be nice,” Ciel tapped him, insistent, on the small of his back. “It’s the first event they’re putting together themselves, and they were very serious about the project.”

“Lois!!!” Finny had paused his singing for long enough to call out the name and wrap Alois up in his arms, but went back to it immediately — for he’s a jolly good fellow-ing off the unmatched melody of Lizzie’s flute — as he hauled Alois into a bridal carry and spun him around.

“Hell, Finnian, I’m happy to see you too,” he said, and there was no measure of sarcasm to overwhelm the grin and the unnecessarily tight hold he had ‘round the young man’s neck. “Have you been practicing your singing since I’ve seen you last?”

“Oh, yes!! I mean, there’s not been much else to do, really, but still, so much I want to tell you about — the gardens have been really overgrown, try as I might, there’s this new beetle I really want to show you—”

“New to the world, or you?”

“And then there’s this girl in town who’s been teaching me about what all these bugs do — Oh, I’m hogging you, here’s Baldo!!” With that, he deposited Alois nigh-on top of Baldroy, who caught Alois best he could. Which did mean he fell on his ass.

“Fuck! Sorry, kid.” Alois got to his feet, and laughed, and threw his arms around the chef. Baldroy latched on just as tight, squeezing him close — a small and safe feeling, despite the fact that Alois had, at some point that year, gotten taller than him. “But really, Fin, you can’t be dropping people in my arms. I’m pushing forty, I don’t got the strength for it.”

“We have to train you back up, we do,” said Mey. She took Alois’ face in her hands and pushed onto her toes to kiss his forehead. “I’ve missed you, Alois. We’re very glad you’re home.”

Alois nodded, and pressed his forehead to hers. “Me too. I’ve missed you.” Mey put her arms around him, and then Baldroy did, and then Fin, wrapped around them and squeezing them all together. Alois let himself cry a few tears into the soft of Mey’s hair, caught up in the embrace of his family. He hadn’t realized, how awful it had been, three weeks without them. “It’s been dreadful. Agni’s actually good at cards, I have no one to shark.”

Baldroy laughed, a rich, deep sound from his chest, as he pulled away to ruffle Alois’ hair. “Yeah, yeah, you know how much I let you win when you first got here? You looked so damn sad on a losing streak, I gave you a misplay every so often just to get you a little happier.”

Alois tilted his head and pouted. “And what’s your excuse now?”

“That I raised a damn cheat,” the man groused. “It’s good to have you home, kid, even with all your sass.”

“I want his sass!” was all the warning he got before Lizzie had flung herself on his back; the shell to his turtle. “Welcome home, Lou!” She pressed a messy kiss to the side of his face, before whirling him around in her arms to hug. “I’m so glad you worked it out,” she whispered, still pressed close.

“Me damn too,” Alois responded.

After a good thirty seconds wrapped up in the vicegrip of his Lizzie, Soma said, “Why don’t I get a turn with our Alois?” He was posed with one elbow rested on Ciel’s shoulder. His pout that could move mountains.

Well, as long as those mountains were attracted to men.

Lizzie, with her unflinching sapphic powers of resistance, just stuck her tongue out at him. “You’ve gotten him every day for weeks. I’ve only seen him twice!”

Alois allowed the flush, it should make him look healthy. “I am the most sought-after commodity.”

“The most sought-after friend,” Lizzie corrected, patting him gently on the top of the head. It was a silly little correction, but a sweet one, too. “Why don’t you ever get to spend three weeks at my house?”

“Because then I would never leave, and it would break our Earl’s heart.”

Ciel rolled his eyes from his position next to Soma. “These have been the quietest three weeks I’ve had in years. Take him whenever you’d like.”

“Don’t you dare offer that, Ciel,” she smushed her face up next to Alois’, till their cheek fat was squished. “Because I will do it. You’ll never get him back.”

Alois expected more of the same, the old blatant facade of Ciel trying to hand him off, so he didn’t pay attention to Ciel walking forward and pulling him away from Lizzie until he was sides-flushed and hands-held with his earl. “I suppose, then, that I’ll have to keep him around.” He pushed up on his toes and, in full sight of everyone, pressed a heart-wrenchingly chaste kiss to Alois’ cheekbone. “As long as he’ll have me.”

“For a good while, at least,” Alois promised, his hand warm in Ciel’s.

“Yes, but for right now,” Lizzie grabbed his spare hand, wrenched him from Ciel, and pulled him into the middle of the room. “I was promised dancing. Lou, you’ll share this set with me, won’t you?” 

Alois laughed and let himself be lead. “You won’t be horribly jealous, will you, Ciel?” 

“No, he’ll have me to dance with,” Soma said, hauling the Earl onto the floor. There was a wonderful flush across his face, and Alois looked forward to the opportunity to lick that bright pink.

“Oh!” Finny clapped his hands — only slightly booming in the small space — and ran back to the little stage area. “Oh, Baldo, get the fiddle!! Agni, can you play the flute?”

“Ah, no, but I have my sarod?”

Finny nodded with all the blind encouragement of someone who had no idea what instrument that was. “Mey can take the flute, she’ll figure it out!” Mey, from her spot seated, with bandaged leg outstretched, looked ready to counter this. She wasn’t given a chance. “Lois, what do you want us to play?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Something shit classical to soothe our earl. Mozart?” Facing away, Alois could only hear the offended, reproachful scoff Ciel offered. “Really, whatever you like! Me and Lizzie could polka to clattering pots and pans and still be the envy of the dance hall.”

Lizzie twirled him around and pulled him back in. “I am so, so sure you don’t know how to polka.”

“Yes, well, I can try.”

And so they did.

It was rather like dancing to clattering cookware, for a minute, as Baldroy regained his musical balance on the fiddle, and eventually began playing out something like Mozart. Mey offered some nonharmonic toots on the flute, while Agni improvised entire accompanying melodic lines on the sarod, and Finny, encouraged by this, joined in with lyrics Alois was damn sure had never been heard in Don Giovani.

They switched around partners, Lizzie grabbing onto Ciel, while Soma took Alois — the former pair, to his great dismay, actually could dance, Ciel coming out with the proper steps once Lizzie was there to guide him. Soma let him go, halfway through what certainly couldn’t be considered an aria, to grab on to Mey-rin. She dropped the flute on her chair, saying some warning about her splinted-shin, but Soma had already scooped her up and to dance her around on her good leg. Alois, solo, joined Finny in the improvised tune. Fin’s lyric choices were inscrutable, and he was making a cuckold of the melody, but it wasn’t as if Alois knew it well enough to be faithful. It created quite a lovely clamor.

So much so that Ciel abandoned his fiancecousin to stomp over. “Oh, Lord, stop.”

“You don’t like my singing, love?” Alois spoke/sung, hearing that his ending note was at least a fifth below Finny’s.

“Not on top of this racket.” He put a hand out. “You’re more needed on the floor.”

Alois raised a brow, and refused the hand, but did relent from singing his next sentences. “Oh, absolutely not. After the fuss you put up the first two times I tried to get you to dance with me? Do better than that.”

Ciel rolled his eyes — both of them! in such lovely tandem, too — and offered, “Will you give me this dance?”

Alois crossed hands over chest. “Better.”

“Alois James Trancy,” He took the offered-out hand and turned it inward, so it crossed over his still-beating heart. Bowed at the waist, giving Alois view of the frizz-halo of his hair in the light. “Will you grant me the honor of dancing this set with you?”

Alois tipped Ciel’s chin up with a single finger. “Your request is kind, my Lord.” He was tempted to continue the bit, a my dance card is full response, before stealing away with Finny onto the floor, but those two, just-barely heterochromatic eyes looked up at him, expecting antics in their slight-narrow, but with obvious excitement in their brows upturn, and poor-concealed amusement in the quirk of his mouth.

This. This was how love looked on Ciel Phantomhive.

 “I have no choice but to oblige,” Alois acceded, knowing he was known too well to hope Ciel couldn’t hear the crack in the middle. 

Ciel nodded. He took Alois’ hand, kissed the knuckles, and led him to the floor.

Whatever style of dancing Alois had was somewhere in the realm of either comedy or improvised fumble around beautiful people, and Ciel’s was so tied up in unflinching, pre-coordinated dance moves that they were fully incompatible for the first few rounds. They settled into something-like-tempo, Alois catching onto some of the rhythms of Ciel’s memorized steps, and Ciel loosening those pretty shoulders into more of a forgiving slope. They passed Lizzie and Finny at one point —

“The Earl Phantomhive has taken every spot on my dancecard!” Alois whispered, waving his hand in front of his face like a fan, while Lizzie giggled. “Is it too much to hope, he might offer me his hand?”, before Ciel was twirling him away.

“Whose hand do you want?” Ciel asked, only tripping mildly over Alois’ feet. “Because I was sure I heard rumor of you eloping with Lizzie.”

“You, or her, doesn’t matter much to me. As long as I get into the family.” He clucked, and patted Ciel’s cheek. “You know, you’re not doing a very good job at being angry with me.”

“I don’t actually mind, the cousin joke.” At Alois’ raised-brow, “Not anymore.”

“Please do note my disbelief.” Having been taken into the dance by Soma, Fin’s unique crooning had been misplaced, leaving only the hum of fiddle and the lull of flute and sarod. He lowered his voice, in respect of the diminished-clamor. “You know, that isn’t what I meant.”

Ciel huffed out a puff of air. Nearly louder than Alois’ words. “Oh, that. Believe me, I really am quite cross.”

“So 'quite' isn't cross enough to keep you from debasing yourself, dancing with a man at a servant's party?” Then, with stark realization.  “Oh god, it's a party. Is this morbid? We’re, celebrating — this isn’t… uncouth, right? Or upsetting you?”

“Darling,” Ciel said, and it was a rarer moniker to fall from his mouth than Alois’, which was all the more reason for its instant soothe to the scratch-cut of Alois’ worry. “I planned the damn event. Or, the base idea, anyway.”

“Darling,” Alois echoed, so overjoyed with the thought that it didn’t even occur to him he was being a nickname copycat. “You threw a party? Asked for a party to be held? For me?”

Ciel shrugged, but leaned-in as Alois was, there was no hiding that gorgeous, amaranth flush. “You organized a business meeting for me.”

“Well, yes, but that was to get me laid.”

Ciel cocked his head to the side. “This isn’t going to get me laid?”

“In front of all these people?” He chanced a dip, then, Ciel’s body following easy to his whims, at this point. Alois kissed his nose, to see the way his face wrinkled. “Some of us care about our good reputation, Phantomhive.”

“I’ve already let you wreck my reputation in better society. Who gives a damn about it, here?” He’d hooked an arm around Alois’ neck, the other lifting his hand to be able to cup Alois’ cheek. He nosed up, to Alois’ space, and asked, “Can I?”

Alois nodded, and let Ciel kiss him. Chaste as it was gentle, and it was heaps of both, testing waters of being so open, so publicly. He pulled back, and smoothed his hand over Alois’ hair, as Alois righted him to full standing.

“About the anger—” His hand didn’t leave Alois’ face, nor did the serious set of his brow chase away the affection in the slide of thumb over cheek. “I am mad. I’m pissed at you, and I’m… grieving, I suppose, and I will need time to trust you fully. Time to think this all over. But I have done a great deal of thinking it over on my own. I’d like to do the rest of it with you, here with me.” 

Alois thought about what Soma had said, about love’s reluctance to stop for anger. His own rage had masked the softness, sure, and maybe Ciel’s had as well. But nothing could keep them from its gentle glow, there in the shallow space between their chests. “Oh.”

“You gave me a lot of time, Alois. A whole life of it. That’s time to be angry, to get settled, and do it all a hundred times.” Then, looking just to Alois’ side, like he couldn’t bear to have his eyes as the final anchor of contact, here. “You were joking, with Lizzie, but I would. I’d offer you my hand.”

“Ha.” Alois had to bite the inside of his lip to keep from grinning like an idiot, or worse, crying. He still had half a mind to fight Ciel on it — to argue his own lack of worth, or to mock Ciel for the statement’s impossibility, or write it off as something that could only be claimed because it was impossible — but he left it there, in the front of his brain, hoping for it to slow-steep into his mind. “Oh, you really are the proper gentleman.”

“I think the ‘proper gentleman’ might’ve asked that before getting you in bed with him.” They had, some point post-kiss, stopped dancing. Ciel was twisting his ring on his thumb in the nervous pace of Lizzie’s flute. “Apologies. If that was too forward.”

Alois snorted. “Not at all. You’re so curled in, any inch I can get you forward is a huge success, in my books.”

“I meant,” he was proper-red now, ring-twisting so rapid he’d lost the rhythm. “That it may be considered so, seeing as you have never actually made your feelings for me clear.”

“What are you—” Alois, as he spoke, flipped through his mental record of the words exchanged between himself and Ciel, since the latter had spilled out his love for Alois. And, ah.

No wonder he was so nervous.

“Oh, Ciel,” Alois wheedled. “There are easier methods than proposing, to find out if I love you.”

“It wasn’t for that.” It, undoubtedly, was. But petulance was pretty on him; Alois wouldn’t complain. “And I didn’t propose . And, even if I had, I don’t need you to tell me a thing. It’s your business.” He was clipped, on the word-ends, just a bit. His hand, when Alois took it, was tense.

“All business is your business, you miser. And you’ve certainly made mine yours.” With his free hand — the occupied one coaxing Ciel’s fingers apart just to lace together with his — he titled the boy’s head up. “If I didn’t say anything, it was only because I thought you’d have the sense to look and see for yourself. Or listen when I talk. Or feel when I touch you.” There was still a guard to those shadowed-over blues, let down slightly as Alois pressed a kiss to the back of their joined hands. “Or, you could use your words. Ask me.”

Ciel shook his head. “Alois.”

“No, come on. Ask me.” He dipped his head. “Do it. I promise, you’ll like the answer.”

Ciel swallowed, the tight bob of his Adam’s apple revealing a tenseness his question didn’t convey. “Do you love me?”

Alois gratified his more sadist nature but letting the question linger, just for a second or two. Then, “I love you. Quite disastrously so.” He watched the tug-pull on either end of Ciel’s mouth, and poked the one that was more obvious. “See? No need to fret over it.”

“I wasn’t fretting,” Ciel said, with an absolute tone of fret.

“Of course not.” Alois kissed him, a brief peck mainly for acquiring Ciel’s star-struck gaze. “Thank you. For letting me home.”

“I don’t want you anywhere else.” Ciel cast aside his heavy affection-gaze just long enough to wave to the back, at the rest of the party. All of whom were very obviously trying to find something to look at other than him and Alois. “Besides, they all hated me for sending you away. Hell, the party is half to get me back in their good graces.”

“Hm,” Alois shifted pose, to be more side-by-side with his Earl. He looked out over their crowd of people, some guilty-eyes darting off. Their people. Their silly, messy, blemished, often-stupid, overloud, loving and giving and undoubtedly-human people. “I have it on good authority that they don’t hate you. I seem to remember they all risked life and limb to save you.”

“Well, then.” Ciel squeezed his hand. “I suppose we’ll both just have to accept that we’re very loved.”

Alois smiled back. “I suppose so.”