Rating: M, NC17, R—take your pick.
Warnings: Explicit sexual encounters involving males, Non-Con.
Pairing: Alois/Ciel, Claude/Ciel.
Summary: Alois finds an interesting new way to torment his favourite plaything.
A/N: Written as a Christmas request for my friend Ciara, who absolutely adores this pairing. I can't say the same—the Kuroshit anime was a bit too over-the-top for me to handle, particularly Alois, but nevertheless, I shall deliver.
For your benefit Ciara, I have grudgingly decided to refer to Charles as Claude. I hope the rest of you won't be confused by this.
Enjoy and Merry Christmas!
Porcelain Doll
"Claude…"
The man looked up from his crocheting suspiciously. He knew that tone. And it did not bode well with him.
That was Alois' bored tone.
Claude stopped his work, giving his young master the full attention that said master demanded, his glasses glinting as he pushed them up on his nose.
"Yes, your Highness?"
"I'm bored." Came the drawled reply as Alois stretched out on one of the massively expensive Victorian couches in his newly acquired Trancy Manner. Claude's eyebrow flicked up, just the slightest, before he inclined his head in acquiescence.
"And how would you like me to remedy this, Highness?" Claude truly didn't want to know the answer; the boy would probably demand they go to the circus, or fly kites, or torment small animals. Claude had no interest in such things. He just wanted to finish this particularly complex doily…
"I want a doll." This time both of Claude's eyebrows shot up. His golden eyes narrowed in thought as he tried to grasp this new information.
"A doll, your Highness?" He inquired, his question filled with uncertainty.
"Yes, Claude! A Doll!" Alois sounded exasperated. Claude frowned. "Surely you can get such a thing for me!"
Claude mulled the obviously mundane request over in his mind before answering the boy. "Certainly, Highness, if you wish it, I will go fetch you one now."
As he stood to leave though, he was halted as Alois huffed up at him from his slouch on the couch.
"But I haven't even told you what kind I want yet, Claude!" The boy chided, getting a dangerously little glimmer in his eye that Claude had quickly recognized was a bad thing.
Hesitantly again, he asked; "And what type of doll would his Highness want, then?"
"Ohh you know, nothing special." Alois answered with a disparagingly poor attempt at and innocent voice. Claude became instantly dubious. "Just a voodoo doll."
The expression on Alois face was sickly sweet, as though he'd just asked for a kitten instead of a Siberian tiger. Claude's expression was quite the opposite; that is to say, frowning deeply.
"A voodoo doll?" He repeated, his eyebrows synched together as he watched Alois sit up properly, coming over to stand before him, poking a bothersome finger into his chest with an air of superiority that made Claude want to instantly kill the boy.
Unfortunate that with their contract the boy was superior. Claude sighed internally.
"Yes, Claude, a voodoo doll. Are you having trouble hearing today?" Alois was the pinnacle of impatience. "You can make one, can't you? I mean, you are a demon after all. And you have to do as I say! Besides, I've heard they've become quite popular in the Americas. I want one."
Claude looked affronted. "Of course I can make one."
"Then do it."
Claude was about to leave, his outward expression of simple obedience, but internally he wanted to crush the child.
"Oh, and by the way, I want a Ciel doll, specifically." Alois added, his blue eyes mischievous as Claude's back stiffened. The butler had expected as much.
"Yes, your Highness."
The doll wasn't simple, by any means. But he was Claude Faustus. He'd made it out of a delicate porcelain; an exact replica down to the colour of Ciel's eyes, hair, and skin. He'd even spent taken the time to detail the intrinsic demon seal of that Michaelis bastard as well, and of course he'd taken time to make well tailored miniature clothes. And he'd just happened to have a few of the delicious boy's hair lying around.
Et Voilà. C'est complète.
For a moment, he almost regretted making the doll. Because he would have to relinquish it to that brat. And who knew what the boy would do with it.
Claude gently brushed the hair out of the boy's lifeless eyes, admiring the still, austere beauty that Alois was so afflicted in not possessing. It was a small model; truly a doll, perhaps one eighth of Ciel's actually size… so delicate, so lifelike yet cold, lacking the soul that Claude wanted so badly to taste… His finger began a dangerous decent down the doll's front, before Claude caught himself. Coughing lightly, he finished buttoning the smallest of golden buttons on the smallest coat front, each emblazed with the tiniest Phantomhive crest.
Now it was time to present it to his master.
The boy was in the drawing room still, lying ever listlessly on the couch, a sheen of boredom making his normally bright blue eyes glazed and dull. When Claude approached however, the manic glisten returned, and the boy was immediately up, grabbing the delicate doll from Claude viciously, clutching the thing to his chest in a way that made the butler cringe inside.
"Ah finally, Claude! I thought you'd never finish!" Claude had taken only about an hour to craft this masterpiece. "Now I can play!"
The boy's tittering laugh accompanied him as he fell back onto the couch, positioning the doll so that it was sitting on his lap, nestled against the deep green and black of Alois' vest.
It was through a very complex working of spells that Claude had been able to make such a delicate thing so easily maneuverable, something that Claude had taken great pride in; the porcelain was almost life-like in its pliability, the skin almost warm to the touch. Almost, but not quite.
"So how does it work?" The boy demanded, his head tossing back, blonde hair flicking out of his eyes as he turned his attention from the doll he had a tight hold on to its creator.
"There is an incantation, your Highness, that you must say to activate the voodoo's effect. Otherwise it remains just a doll. And likewise there is a incantation to deactivate—"
"What's the spell?" The boy demanded, not interested in the logistics. He just wanted to begin!
"Caro incarnata, transsubstantiationem corporis tui corporis servitio in manibus mei1." Claude supplied calmly, realizing his master impatience could not be underminded.
"But that's Latin." Alois complained, but was quickly cutoff by Claude.
"If you thought the Psudo-American, Haitian born voodoo was a feesable form of spellworking, you're mistaken, Highness. Latin is the proper language with which to invoke this sort of spell. Not Cajun. The only reason their half-fledged spells have any potency at all—which is very little—is because French, as a Romantic language, possesses some vestieges of the power of Latin's command."
Alois frowned, obviously having already fixed in his mind the romanticized image of a mysterious black woman in the alleyways of New Orléans dangling chains full of shrunken skulls and surrounded by bottles filled with love potions.
Claude just loved ruining his dreams.
"Fine. So I just repeat the spell and I can do what ever I want to the doll, and the real Ciel will feel it?"
"Yes, you recite the incantation and Ciel will experience whatever the doll experiences." Claude confirmed, correcting the boy's definition as subtly as he could.
Alois looked like he was going to explode with excitement.
"What to do, what to do!" He exclaimed happily, bouncy joyously on the couch in the childish manner he had.
He pressed a finger to his lips, a look of more subdued contemplation now marring his features. "Well, it can't be anything too Avant-Garde, or else that stupid butler of his will notice. So I'll have to start subtly."
With the apparent brilliance of his conclusion settled in his own mind, Alois' pensive expression morphed once again to barely constrained, sadistic glee.
"And would you look at that! It's nearly time for tea!" Indeed, the clock on the mantle piece showed it was almost three in the afternoon. Claude could hardly fathom what tea had to do with anything, he hardly thought the boy would like to halt this experiment for tea.
"Ciel is about to be a very inappropriate boy." The look on the boy's face was enough to make even the demon worried.
Ciel had just sat down, tucking his light overcoat beneath him as he settled before the small table that he was to take tea at with the Duke of Devonshire. The man was a less than important business partner, being far more interested in playing petty politics in the House of Lords to bother dirtying his hands in the affairs of the small button making trade his household ran. Ciel didn't even care about his buttons, or the various members of the Upper House the man was currently discussing with him as they sat down.
Sebastian began serving the two, noting Ciel's utter boredom, and smiled a bit to himself as he prepared the small scones the two were to have with their Darjeeling tea.
"And so you see it was imperative to me that I form an alliance with Lord Wycliffe, because as you know, he has recently been one of the primary importers of Indian luxury goods to Great Britain, and let us not forget America, through Boston, of course. You see he has a cousin in Boston whom runs a shipyard—a lesser noble, a forth son you see, so he moved to America—the land of opportunities! They say. A quaint and novel suggestion. Anyway, this contact in Boston has generated quite a bit of revenue in the past few—"
Ciel had been holding a wavering concentration on the conversation. Truly. This man was under watch by the Queen for apparently attempting a coup d'etat in the Upper House to try to limit the power of the Lower, essentially with the intent of returning Great Britain to a pre-Cromwellian system. As much as the Queen would favour in light of a transference of power to the House of Lords and the Crown itself, the amount of unrest it might stir amoung the lower class might be enough to stir up the beginnings of a Civil War. It was Ciel's job, then, to make sure this bumbling idiot didn't get that far.
His concentration had slipped however, when he felt a light ghosting of a touch ripple down his chest, which stopped to press against a rather inappropriate place. The young lord almost dropped his tea cup.
Luckily, the Duke hadn't noticed Ciel's lapse in attention, and kept rambling quite to himself. Sebastian, however, had noticed.
Curious dark eyes watched as tiny, delicate fingers clenched desperately at the darkwood arms of his chair. His keen hearing heard the slight hitch in the boy's breathing. The boy was shaking slightly, his face resolutely straight, his attention fixed on the Duke's face in seeming attention, but his shimmering blue eye betrayed just how shaken he was.
Ciel almost breathed a sigh of relief as the butler came to his rescue, suddenly pressing a gloved hand to his forehead, drawing the Duke's attention at last away from his ongoing commentary.
"My lord, you're shivering. Have you taken ill?" Sebastian was performing this kindness for a purely selfish reason. He wanted to know what was setting the boy in this state, and he was sure it wasn't sickness. Not with that delirious blush that had come over the boy's whitening cheeks that was entirely different from the flush of a fever.
"I-I fear I might be…" Ciel managed quite easily to sound pathetic, though he tried to convince himself it was an act to cause the Duke to be concerned enough to leave. "I don't know, it just came on so suddenly…"
The Duke, slowly, came to realize that Ciel's subtle swooning in his seat was probable cause to leave, so that the boy would be able to rest.
"Most unfortunate!" The man exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air excitedly. "Please, don't tarry on my account, get you to rest! I can make my own way out assuredly, so that your butler may accompany you!"
Ciel hadn't liked the man more than in that one moment.
"I'm so sorry, Devonshire, truly, I don't know what's come over me…" Ciel would really like to get down to that as soon as possible. This was surely not natural. His whole body was shaking by now as he felt a teasing press between his legs.
"Oh don't worry at all, Phantomhive! I'll call on you again soon to assure myself of your health. Until then, rest well."
Ciel groaned, and wasn't sure if it was at the thought of having to see that man again, or if it was the sudden feeling of licking.
As the Duke disappeared out of the sun-room's door, Ciel collapsed back against the chair.
"Take me to my room, and figure out what is happening to me." The boy demanded, not daring to make eye-contact with the demon.
"Yes, my lord."
Alois, surprisingly, took his time unwrapping his new treat, peeling off the layers of clothes like the wrappers on a fine, imported Belgian chocolate. His patient perusal made the creamy skin inside all the more delightful when he finally reached it.
Claude had really outdone himself; after Alois had wrapped his tongue around the complex Latin spell, he'd felt the life almost breath into the delicate doll, and he'd been rewarded with feeling the porcelain almost shiver as he pressed his fingers against it.
At first he was content with just exploring the newly exposed representation of Ciel's unclothed body, his fingers tickling across what he imagined would be sensitive skin, and took special delight in being able to touch Ciel's most intimate places so easily. But soon enough, touching with fingertips alone wasn't enough. Alois was impatient by nature after all, and yearned for something more.
"Can't you make it any bigger?" Alois whined, turning his crystalline eyes toward the demon who stood not a meter away, watching the proceedings with something akin to jealousy in his eyes.
Claude nodded, moving forward to press his ungloved hand against the frosty warmth of Ciel's porcelain skin. Alois' expression was pleased as he ended up with quite a lapful as the small doll suddenly grew to Ciel's normal size.
"Now it's time for the real fun to begin!" Alois dug in greedily, pressing his lips against the pliant yet unmoving mouth before him, his marked tongue playing against Ciel's listless lips, delving inside to explore and tease. Oh how confused Ciel must be at that feeling!
His hands trailed over the unmarred skin, wondering if the real thing was equally smooth. He pushed the doll to lay back against the couch, his form slipping easily between the slender legs to rest against Ciel's body more fully as he pressed his lips over and over against the lightly shivering skin.
Warm hands trailed down cool skin as Alois sought a special area to play with, his long fingers wrapping around Ciel's cock, with twitched in his hand. Alois jumped at the reaction, looking to Claude in surprise.
"I didn't think he could react!" Alois gasped, clearly pleased.
Claude simply pushed his glasses up his nose, looking silently smug.
Deeply delighted, Alois eagerly jumped to exploit this newfound complexity of his toy, scooting down the couch to press his lips against the frigid length.
"Ooooh, Ciel! Who ever would have thought…" A scribed tongue flicked out to dance across the swelling cock, twirling against the tip to the crown and back as he drew it from its sleep. "If this is how your cock reacts, I can't wait to see how another part of you will!"
Alois was giggling, giddy with excitement as he trailed his fingers down to press against Ciel's entrance, the tips running in teasing circles around it.
"Claude, fetch me some lubricant!" Alois demanded. He looked slightly taken aback when a vial appeared next to him almost immediately. Claude was certainly on the ball today.
Wasting no time, Alois opened the vial and dribbled the viscous liquid over Ciel's entrance, watching mesmerized as it slid along the boy's premium and down along his cleft, wetting the Earl deliciously. Alois pushed the boy's slender legs up over his shoulder to get a better view.
"How adorable!" Alois keened, using his fingers once again to tease the quivering extrance. "I bet the little slut wants more by now…" He pressed his fingers in roughly, loving the way the tight walls convulsed against him, uselessly.
"You're so cute like this, yet it's not the same as it would be to really watch you in pain… I want to see you truly mortified!" Alois pressed forward, his fingers rocking in and out of the doll, wishing with each rough curl and thrust Ciel would feel the burn and stretch. He wanted to see the pain and defeat on the boy's face. The fingers on his other hand slipped unconsciously to circle Ciel's defenseless throat. "I want to see you weak, Ciel. Weak against me in every way."
The nails on his fingers had just begun to break through the porcelain skin when Alois heard glass shatter, and had only a moment to react as a dark flash came darting across the room. In an instant the blond had drawn a blade from his coat to press against Ciel's lifeless neck even as Claude engaged the interloper.
Alois grinned as he saw Sebastian freeze, his black eyes flashing red as he took in the sight of his master with a knife pressed against his throat. The demon had no choice but to back off, and he quickly moved away from Claude, watching the Trancy and his minion carefully. He had not expected the blond boy to have a knife. He could have easily gotten around Claude to get at the doll, but with Alois wielding the blade at such a close range…
"I've been expecting you." Alois' words were haughty as he addressed the newcome demon, his fingers now moving lazily inside of his pray, curling up against the spot Alois knew would have Ciel moaning; if only he could hear it.
"And so I've factored you into my plan…" Contemptuous did not even begin to describe Alois at that moment. His blade pressed closer to Ciel's neck. He, of course, knew that a demon would be bound to keep his master alive by all means, and that meant that by threatening this doll of Ciel, Alois' wielded ultimate control over Sebastian.
"I want you to bring Ciel here to me, in less than an hour, or else I'll kill him." He stated simply, leaning forward to press against the boy's cheek. "I've had fun playing with this, but I imagine the real thing would be even better. So go and fetch him now, like a good dog."
Alois didn't think he'd ever seen Sebastian look truly mad in all the times the two had met, yet now the look in the demon's eye made him shiver the slightest bit. Luckily for him however, he held the trump.
The demon was gone in an instant, leaving Alois to continue to torment his unwitting captive for a while longer…
Ciel's whole body shook in Sebastian's arms, his hands digging viciously into the demon's vest as he struggled to hold the wracking shivers at bay, but they were only getting worse. Sebastian had told him plainly why Ciel was being taken to the Trancy Manor, and as much as Ciel had screamed in rage between the groans of pain and ecstasy, he could see no feasible way out. So he let himself be carried.
He'd already climaxed once, just from the feelings of phantom fingers pressing deep inside of him, and despite himself, he'd hardened again not long after the feeling of fingers had disappeared to be replaced with something larger. He could not have hated himself more than in that instant.
He thought of asking Sebastian to kill him, but quickly rejected it. He'd lived through worse. Alois could do nothing to him that hadn't already been done before.
A single blue eye was set determinately as he finally arrived at the Trancy Manor, his legs quivering dangerously as he forced Sebastian to set him on his feet, and he's taken a few shakey steps toward the smirking blond who was fucking a phantom of himself into the couch in front of him.
"Trancy." His voice held the smallest hint of a quaver as he stared the boy down.
Alois seemed to be immensely pleased, and Ciel could guess why, as the blond withdrew himself from the doll laying beneath him to focus his attention on the real Ciel. What he really wanted.
"How nice of you to come!" Alois beamed, handing his dagger off to Claude, who took the doll into his arms.
"And of course I mean that in more than one way…" Alois' wink sent sparks of untold rage through Ciel's body, his whole being filled with hate and a lust for blood as never before.
"This is a rather quaint preoccupation you've developed, Trancy." Ciel's voice was full of mockery as he waved at the lifesized replica of himself. "Playing with dolls is something I would consider child's play, but I suppose you're not far off."
Alois' blue eyes darkened at the jab, but was not one to rise to a challenge when he knew the jibe had been made out of fear.
"I suggest you start to strip, now." He commanded, taking a seat on one of the chairs. He motioned Claude to do the same, and the both of them watched Ciel eagerly as the boy began to take colour in his cheeks.
"If you think that I'll submit to your petty demands—" Ciel was cut off by a feeling of dangerous pressure on his neck.
"I can easily force you to submit, Ciel Phantomhive." Alois lazily draped a leg over the arm of his chair, pressing his hand teasingly against himself as he watched Ciel predatorily. His eyes shifted targets however, and it was then that Ciel began to worry.
"So take off you clothes now, or I'll have your demon do it for you." Ciel was furious, but began trying to work the buttons of his vest off, his shaky fingers fumbling slowly—too slowly for Alois.
"Enough! Are you too incompetent to undress yourself?" The room erupted with snide laughter as Alois through his head back. "Let us have Sebastian do it then. Now play the good butler and undress your lord." Alois commanded, the regal air the boy adopted striking a nerve in Ciel just as everything the blond did had.
Ciel felt himself jump slightly as Sebastian came up behind him, well practiced fingers completely divesting the young earl of his clothes within moments. Ciel could do nothing but glare as Alois raked his eyes over his exposed frame.
"Now then. Sebastian, I want you to sit on that couch, yes, facing me, and have Ciel sit in your lap."
Ciel's spine went ridged as he was pulled to sit on the demon. He didn't like where this was going.
"Now I want you to spread Ciel's legs…yes, perfect… and now I want you to prepare him for me." Alois was looking ridiculously pleased with himself at his point, his hand moving to rub faster against his crotch as he watched the demon pull his glove off and reach for the bottle of oil on the side table.
Ciel's body seized as fingers pressed against his entrance, real fingers this time, really running tauntingly against his opening. He turned his head to the side, refusing to look at the Trancy bastard, feeling the other boy's eyes on his body, watching as black fingernails scraped teasingly against the sensitive flesh, watching as they disappeared into the tight warmth only to reappear as Sebastian began the teasing again.
Ciel was under the impression, by this point, that the demon behind him was not going about this as a man under duress. He hated Sebastian in that instant.
"Hurry up." He demanded, his face heating up as the bastard's laughter assaulted him after the comment.
"Such an eager slut! Come now Sebastian, let's not keep him waiting; I'm sure he's dying to let me fuck him!"
Ciel was shaking again, and it wasn't sure if it was with rage or because of the feeling of Sebastian's fingertip pressing against that spot Alois had exploited so brutally earlier.
By the time Sebastian had pressed a third finger in, Alois was on his feet, eager to get things underway. He shed his coat and vest before lightly pulling himself from his shorts, moving forward to press himself against Ciel's blushing face. "Tell me where you want it Ciel…"
The Earl remained tight lipped, even as Alois grabbed his chin and forced his lips to press against the straining length before him. "If you play with it in your mouth for a bit I might go easy on you, you know."
Ciel supposed this was Alois being generous.
"Just fuck me and get it over with." Ciel spat, not giving in to the bastard.
"That's what I wanted to hear!" Alois wasn't put off by Ciel's sour mood, in fact, Alois rather preferred it. "Now then, I suggest we try a different position. Sebastian, go stand over by the window. Good boy, now Ciel…" The earl stared dispassionately up at the blonde from his seat on the couch. "I want you to ride me."
Saying nothing, Ciel waited for Alois to take a seat beside him, then began climbing onto his lap, hair covering his eye as he reached behind himself to grab hold of the bastard's dick as he pressed down against the bobbing head.
Alois had a look of greedy joy on his face as Ciel sank down onto his cock, his hips jerking up swiftly as he caught Ciel's slim hips in his hand. "Now look at me like a good slut. I wanna see how much you hate this."
Ciel's legs began to burn with the strain, matching the burn of his insides as Alois slammed up into him again and again, forcing his hips down with each upward thrust.
Alois suddenly gave a squeal of joy and thrust particularly fervently into him, earning a questioning look from the earl.
"It seems that you have developed a taste for this, Ciel…" Alois murmured, relinquishing his hold on Ciel's hip to wrap a hand around Ciel's semi-hard cock. "You've done this before, haven't you! And without me!" Alois pouted, and all Ciel wanted to do was strangle the boy.
"So you've fucked other men then hmm?" Alois' eyes sparkled dangerously. "Not denying it? Or maybe it was that other men have fucked you?"
Ciel's tense silence only spurred Alois on, the sadistic teen grinning happily as he slammed into Ciel harder.
"You certainly move like a slut, angling yourself so that I hit your special spot! What a talented boy!" Alois' cock hilted itself in Ciel's tight heat. "I suppose you must secretly love the feeling of a dick slamming into you, based on this response." He squeeze Ciel's length hard, drawing a moan of mixed pain and pleasure from the reluctant boy.
"Maybe just one cock isn't enough for a slut like you though…" Alois muttered, a dangerous sparkle in his eyes. Ciel's heart fluttered with panic, his mind rebelling against the thought as memories flooded him. "My my, it certainly looks like you do want another cock."
Ciel's body froze as he felt something pressing against his entrance; even through he was already full of Alois' cock. This was bigger through, the head thicker, forcing his entrance open much wider than Alois' had. But Alois was still inside of him…
Suddenly Ciel snapped his head back, looking desperately over his should, his being overcome with fear as he anticipated what he would see.
Claude's cock was pressing into the doll, the phantom's entrance stretching wide around the thick head. Ciel couldn't look away as he saw inch after inch slip disappear. He could feel every bit of it.
"So you like watching yourself getting skewered do you?" Alois teased. "Such a narcissist." Suddenly Alois pulled out of Ciel's body, leaving only the phantom fullness of Claude's cock as he felt Alois turning him forcefully around so that he was sitting with his back to Alois' chest, facing Claude and himself.
"I'll let you watch yourself then, since I'm feeling rather kind at the moment."
Ciel's mind was almost too blank to understand Alois. Claude had begun to move. He was watching himself being fucked.
He felt the stretch of Alois' cock re-entering him, despite the fact that it was slimmer than Claude's—an unnerving feeling to say the least.
And then his two rapists began a tempo.
Alois would thrust in as Claude drew out, so that Ciel was never anywhere near feeling empty. Although Claude's cock was longer, Alois' cock hit Ciel's prostate just as well as the demon's, resulting in an effect that left Ciel's mind spinning and his body arching and shaking with need. His prostate was constantly barraged, ripping moans too readily from his reticent lips. He came within moments, his whole body spasming with the force of it. He could do nothing but fall back listlessly, his posture mimicking that of the doll he faced as Alois and his butler continued to fuck him ruthlessly. There was no light left in either of their eyes.
Ciel felt nothing as seed filled him, his mind having locked itself up in an impenetrable hold.
"Sebastian…"
He watched as the demon appeared back into his line of sight, rescuing him from Claude's grasp as the demon reached his climax, phantom seed filling him again even as his doll was pulled away. Soon enough he was in Sebastian's arms, just like he had been back then, come dripping down his legs as Sebastian carried him away from his horrors.
"What took you so long…?" He muttered, clinging to the butler's vest, his gaze fixated on the doll being carried in Sebastian's arms along side him.
"I'm sorry, my lord. This will never happen again."
"That's what you said last time…" Ciel felt listless, like a doll. He had no faith. He had no soul. He passed out before he could hear the demon's response.
Alois watched almost wistfully as Ciel was whisked away from him, his mood only slightly somber as Claude began cleaning his master up.
"Why did you not send me to bring him back? It would have been pathetically easy to best Sebastian when he had two defenseless boys to protect."
"It's for the best, I think." Alois muttered, looking away from the window.
"I would have broken him eventually."