The tall case clock was striking half nine, the evening meal was over and the dining room had been cleared. In any other grand household the men would be moving off to the library, smoking or billiards rooms to speak manly words about equally manly subjects to one another over port or something stronger and perhaps indulge in a good cigar or two while the women socialised over needlework and other such distaff arts in the parlour. Below stairs would be finally eating their suppers, then washing up and squaring away the kitchen for the evening, adhering to the normal order of things
However this was the Phantomhive manor where nobody, from the maid in the scullery with the pistols under her skirt to the footman in the foyer, having a private word with the six or seven snakes secreted about his person, ever gave a rotten fig for the 'normal order of things,' so the staff was already done for the day and retiring like their little lord, who, behaving like the child he was for once, was already heading off to bed.
It had been a remarkably slow day: no call for the Queen's Guard dog, no paperwork, reading or even decision making called for by Funtom—even the Queen had planned for him to still be on his holiday with the Middlefords aboard the ill-fated HMS Campania. Returning early had given Ciel time for some much-needed rest and a little introspection.
Interestingly, in the wake (as it were) of the sinking of the Campania, the thing that had remained in Ciel's mind most vividly was the way Sebastian had behaved in the lifeboat that night and the following morning.
When the sun had come up over the rim of the world, enough to turn the sky a delicate rose, Ciel had roused himself from the miserable, sodden doze he'd fallen into in the midst of desperately hanging onto the seats of the lifeboat while Sebastian rocked the boat battering the animated dead who were swarming through the ocean waves and up the sides of the boat. No one could fault the demon's dedication, Ciel thought. How easy it would've been for him to simply sink to the ocean floor, use his senses to choose the appropriate direction and walk his way out of it all, leaving Ciel to his fate. Instead he faithfully kept playing his part as knight and sword, standing between his little master and seemingly unavoidable mortal peril.
The last thing Ciel remembered from the night before, he had been looking up into the frigid, star-scattered darkness, at the darker-than-night silhouette of Sebastian towering over him like a living colossus, laying about him right, left and centre with his bloodied oar. He was smashing undead heads like so many rotted pumpkins as soon as they rose from the water and tried to clamber onto the little boat. Blood, brains and bits of bone kept flying all over Hell's half-acre. It seemed as though he'd been doing it since the beginning of time itself; long enough Ciel was getting quite blaze' about picking bits of battered zombie out of his hair. Long enough for him to fall asleep despite the peril all around him despite him fighting to remain awake. Judging from the demon's expressions as he'd battled the inexplicably still-moving dead, even he found the rotting creatures unsettling. The last time Ciel had seen such a grimace on the demon butler's face he'd been caught between Pluto's naked slobbering on one side and one of Suttcliff's amorous assaults on the other.
Now, waking and looking up at the quickly lightening sky, Ciel realised Sebastian hadn't moved an inch. He was still at his self-appointed post, still standing guard over his little master, alert and on guard, oar gripped sternly in his hands like a singlestick, only now he was stock still.
Ciel cautiously peered out over the rim of the lifeboat. What met his eyes was a horror to exceed his worst nightmares and, given this was Ciel Phantomhive, that was really saying something: a becalmed, mirror-like sea stretched out before his eyes, frigid mist curling off the surface in graceful, ghostly tendrils, the water chock-a-block with bodies, broken, rotted, body parts and bloodied lumps of ice. There was not a single head amongst the hundreds and hundreds of floating bodies beneath his eyes which had not been bashed or torn loose or cracked open by something distinctly
oar-shaped.
Every broken head and severed body part I'm looking at represents a blow Sebastian dealt in the night on my behalf, he thought, completely overwhelmed. Sebastian had done all that, battled all night long in addition to the pitched battles he'd fought earlier aboard the Campania with zombies, shinigami and worst of all, the terrifyingly unstoppable Undertaker who hadn't just wounded the demon, he'd come close to splitting him in half like a grilled lobster. He impaled him on his monstrous death scythe, back to front right through the torso—a perfectly ghastly wound, the worst the demon had suffered in his service to date, and, Ciel suspected, the worst the demon had ever suffered, full-stop.
It was an overwhelming thought. At any moment in the last 24 hours or so Sebastian could've decided it was all too much, game not worth the candle, and just let one of those things latch onto Ciel and drag him away. He could've still snatched the boy's soul and been sated and then well out of it. He could've even renounced the contract and just walked away, turning his back on the entire mess. Even more upsetting, Ciel had only just raised his eyes gratefully to the demon who had stood guard over him all night long, who'd seemed to have shaken off even that terrible impalement and gone right on to battle undead 'dolls' all night long without letup 'til the sun rose, and just as Ciel was about to praise him for it, the demon suddenly cried out in pain and buckled, crashing to his knees, shuddering, clutching at that horrific still-weeping wound and groaning like a dying animal.
Ciel hadn't thought he could feel any colder than he already was, until he'd seen Sebastian driven to his knees and writhing in pain. It struck a bitter chill deep into him in a way the ice-strewn ocean never could, to think his indomitable demon had finally suffered something he couldn't simply shake off in a few short hours. It somehow felt like losing his parents and the fire and waking up in that gruesome cage all over again. Sebastian the impervious, Sebastian the bullet-proof, Sebastian the immortal, beautiful as the dawn and tough as an old tree root, formidable, indomitable, his saviour who rescued him from the bloody altar and wiped out the entire cult in a heartbeat was now somehow reduced to feebly writhing in the bottom of their boat and coughing up blood a full half day after the Undertaker's blow had been struck.
If that could happen, Sebastian was fallible; if that could happen, Sebastian could die.
A death scythe blow is quite tough even on someone like me, the demon had told him, forcing his words through gritted teeth, clutching his chest and abdomen together trying to grin through the pain and prove it would not defeat him. But given his gift for understatement—he was after all a very English sort of demon— it could only mean the demon had come quite close to dying of that death scythe blow. Of course he had. The undertaker had taken quite a detailed look at the most recent parts of his cinematic record, those parts concerning Ciel and their contract.
How had Sebastian stayed on his feet and continued fighting after sustaining that hideous wound—and why had he even wanted to? Ciel could never seem to sound the true
depths of Sebastian's reserves of strength and ability to soldier on, bull his way through anything despite pain and injury. It was difficult to get one's head 'round, even after having witnessed it.
The first private moment Ciel got with him he asked the demon about it. He was actually still resting up—Ciel had insisted he do no work and that he be put into his own bed until there was a marked improvement. It wasn't just to honour the demon's sacrifices, though that was part of it, but also for Ciel's peace of mind. He'd become terrified the demon would somehow die in his sleep, though how Ciel's being nearby could make a difference should such an unlikely thing occur, the boy had no answer. It did give him the chance to ask his question though, and he was quick to take advantage of that.
"But I don't understand how you were able to go on like that, in such a horrendous condition. Isn't...isn't it possible for you to die, Sebastian?"
"Well," the demon sighed, "Certainly it's possible for me to be sent back to Hell empty and defeated.
That's as near death as I'm ever likely to get, having attained this age and level of power."
"So then, why didn't that blow from Undertaker's death scythe kill you? Or send you back to Hell the way you described?"
"My Young Master ordered me to eradicate the 'bizarre dolls', not die in the attempt. Since I wasn't given leave to die, I survived, of course," was his only offered explanation. It did not satisfy the earl. He really wasn't certain just how literally to take that answer. He was doubtful his command could have that much power over the demon's life. Perhaps it was something to do with the fact this wasn't the demon's real form, that it didn't matter as much if it was damaged lethally, his real life force resided elsewhere...mostly though the boy was simply very, very relieved his demon had not died. But would Sebastian really bother to lie about such a thing? And if so, why?
It was true Sebastian never lied, could not lie to Ciel, thanks to the words of contract. You would never hear him speak a flat out lie such as 'I am not a demon.' or 'in my opinion, dogs are the loveliest creatures on God's green earth and 'I wubb dem to deff'." But he would at times fall silent if he preferred not to answer something and hope you'd get tired of waiting, fail to tell you a thing for his own reasons, answer questions with other questions, draw Ciel's attention to something that embarrassed or angered him so he'd forget what they'd been talking about, change the subject, try talking you out of wanting to know, distract you (Look, my Lord! Up in the sky: It's the Winged Victory of Samothrace! Oh, shame you missed it! You'll not soon see that again.) or wiggle round things if 'wiggle room' were permitted. Any time you asked Sebastian something and he answered you, you had to stop and ask yourself: now was that a proper, straightforward answer or something that entirely avoided addressing the main point? Sebastian Michaelis would not lie, no. But he certainly would and did prevaricate. Prevaricate like the devil. If there were ever an Internationalcompetition for prevarication skills, Sebastian could Prevaricate for England and win himself a chest fullof gold medals.
I should have compelled him to tell me the unvarnished truth at all times as well as never lie to me, Ciel realised in retrospect.
"I can't have the Phantomhive family butler continuing to work in this condition, Sebastian. Consider this an order: you will take a good, long rest when we get back to the mansion, and Sebastian," Unable to put his grateful feelings into better words, the boy reached out and wrapped both his arms about the butler's nearest leg and laid his head against the rock-hard calf hiding beneath the black wool as he said earnestly:"You did well today, Sebastian. Really well."
It was an odd moment, made even odder by the demon's reaction to those hard-earned words. He'd only just managed to get his legs back underneath himself when he came crashing back down onto his knees again in an ungainly heap, his normally bold eyes downcast. Hidden behind the curtain of his quirky, long fringes Ciel was certain he could see just the faintest of blushes kissing those pale cheeks and maybe, just maybe a pair of tearing eyes.
"Young master, please. You must stop. For you to say such things..."
From the moment the butler said those words they'd started eating away at the young earl. For him to say such things...what? Meant what? Did what and to whom? What did he really mean? What wasn't he saying? Was the earl such a grim, thankless taskmaster he never thought to tell his servants when they'd done a good job? To the point that doing it now actually unmanned the demon? Was it that rare for the demon to be thanked for his efforts-even efforts as stupendous as those he'd accomplished on the Campania? Ciel really hoped that wasn't it. That would just be far too sad. But if not that, then what did it mean?
He decided to ask his servant point blank.
A few weeks after he'd resumed his normal schedule of work, as Sebastian was dressing him for bed was Ciel's carefully chosen moment. It was always a quiet, intimate time, free from interruptions. It was a good time for conversations intended to be private.
The demon didn't answer immediately. Ciel recognised the signs of impending truth-twisting and was on his guard. Sebastian spent a few extra moments smoothing out non-existent wrinkles in the boy's nightshirt, straightening the microscopic lace trim along the collar, clearly avoiding both the question and the eyes of the questioner. Ciel couldn't take the silence. He blurted out:"Is it because I am too hard a master Sebastian? Do I not give credit where credit it's due often enough?" Ciel watched the butler's reaction carefully.
The demon laughed—it almost seemed as though he laughed in relief—as he turned back the sheets and blankets, then he said,"My young lord's compliments and praises are indeed rather scarce, I'm afraid." But there was something about those dark red eyes as they slithered away from contact with his own that made the boy carefully examine that answer.
In fact, Ciel realised, Sebastian hadn't said 'yes, my lord, that is the reason.' He'd only agreed that what the boy said had an element of truth to it. The boy waited to see if the demon would say more.
He didn't. Of course he didn't say any more. He merely gathered the comforter and blankets into his two hands with a deep sigh and a thoughtful expression and drew them up to the young boy's chin. But as his one hand reached out for the candelabrum to leave, the boy captured the other, the one still resting on the boy's chest, caught it by its narrow wrist and sinewy forearm and used them to draw the demon down onto the bed with him.
When their faces were quite close Ciel asked softly "That's not the real reason at all, is it, Sebastian." The boy raised his pointer finger at the demon before he could formulate a response. "A yes or no answer, demon, nothing else."
After a pause the demon answered "No my lord, it isn't."
"The real reason, Sebastian, is you fear too strong an attachment forming," the boy guessed. "You fear the tender emotions like gratitude and other, even softer ones, and not just in me but in yourself as well, because they will make our final ...business more difficult, maybe even impossible. That is the real reason, isn't it, Sebastian?"
A dusting of pale blush and a crooked smile broke across the demon's face and his eyes immediately stopped being so evasive.
"My young lord understands his servant far better than I have given you credit for, my lord. Please forgive this foolish servant of yours for underestimating you."
"Eh, never mind Sebastian, everybody does it eventually." He let the demon's hand go. "I will respect whatever distance you feel is appropriate."
"Thank you for understanding, Young Master."
"Undertaker said you brought nothing but misery to my life. I say what that proves is just because you have someone's cinematic record in your hands doesn't mean you understand what it is you're looking at. I judge you to be about as far from a source of misery as it's possible to get, oddly enough. And my opinion, in this case, is the only one that counts." Immediately the demon looked simultaneously gratified and very worried. "Don't worry, Sebastian, I'm not going to go on and on, only it needed to be said. I don't want to make taking my soul difficult when the time comes. You have more than earned both it and my gratitude. Many times over, so I reckon this is the least I can do to show it."
The butler straightened up with a warm smile. "You were always unique, Young Master. You have known from the start what I was, yet never once did you treat me as though I were beneath you."Ciel wasn't certain this was so, but he kept silent. He could tell this was something the demon had wanted to say to him for quite some time.
"You always did and still do show me the same respect, if not more, you show your fellow humans."
"More. Far more, because you've earned it."
"I understand your sentiment. If one only looks at behaviour, it is often difficult to tell the humans from the demons. To a man, my previous masters all treated me brutally, beating and torturing me, ordering me to harm myself if I failed to amuse them or please them, even when it wasn't my fault. They deliberately put me in harm's way for their own entertainment, forcing me into pointless battles as one might a fighting dog, for bets and entertainment, or treating me as though I were an animal in other ways: not permitting me a place within their homes as if my damnation might infect them, often refusing to even permit me to enter their home as if I were no more to be trusted indoors than a barnyard animal. I will do no more than refer to the carnal humiliations forced on me because you deserve to hold onto whatever innocence you still possess."
"I know what men are capable of, Sebastian."
"Yes, I know you do. You, Ciel Phantomhive, have never done any of those degrading things to me. "
"I have threatened to make you hang yourself a few times..."
"But never done it," the demon said, smiling. "My young master is easily the most honourable, admirable human I have ever contracted with and I am proud to serve him, to fight for him, and to belong to him." The demon bowed deeply before extinguishing the candles and leaving the room, calling out a wish for a good night's sleep for the boy as he pulled the door closed.
"And I to you, Sebastian," said the boy, thinking back to that figure standing over him in the lifeboat. "And I to you." And turning over, the boy closed his eyes, slept, and felt no fear.