A/N: Please be warned that this story is based around a certain theory that has yet to be confirmed in the series, but is hinted heavily in latter chapters. If you have no idea what it is and do not want to be spoiled until the reveal in any way, do turn back now.
Darkness. Cold. The perpetuant metal taste of blood. A piercing scream from somewhere far away.
"Spectacular! This is so much more worth than two of them!"
They talk about them as items for sale, not living humans, but he has grown too used to that by now. There was a more constant fear clawing at his mind, yawning always like the mouth of a cave he dares not venture into. He tries not to think about what would happen should if his nightmares come true. If he was bought alone. If he was separated from the one person he had left. If he was taken from him and lost forever, like the other children they had seen...
He burrows his head into grubby knees. The back of his eyelids, screwed tightly shut, doesn't help much to ward away the darkness outside the bars and inside him, on the verge of swallowing him up and eating away at his sanity, bit by bit...
But the warmth by his side does.
/-*-/
He remembers his parents faces, burning together in the raging fire. Sebastian lies in a pool of blood, fur drenched and indistinguishable from the black mass in the shadows. Laughter above him. Tanaka telling him to run, the usually comforting, serene face contorted in despair and fear. Tanaka falling -
"I've got the other one!"
He wakes with a start, the scream sticking in his throat. Darkness wherever he goes these days, and he had thought he had grown used to it, but now nothing terrifies him more. The fears he had kept at bay come surging back; he cannot see, there is nobody there, he is alone (always alone) why, why is it always him, whywhywhy -
A shifting sound to his right, and suddenly thin but strong arms are around him. He tenses at first, ready to fight them off, but the familiar feel of the embrace and memory catches up then and he sucks in his first breath of what feels like hours.
Silence for a while. Then, gently, "Did you have a bad dream?"
His breath hitches, and he nods.
"Hush. It will be alright. Everything will be alright."
He manages a croaky whisper. "Will it?"
"Of course. I'll protect you."
/-*-/
There was light, now, flickering in the candles and the large chandelier above, but it didn't comfort him in any way. He watches uneasily, tiredly, as men with a pot of gruel and a funnel went around the cages, clanging on the bars and laughing as the children behind them cowered. When his turn came, they shoved the end of the funnel in so deep it hit the back of his throat, and as he gagged and dribbled the cold gruel down his chin they guffawed and moved on to the next child.
He had quickly learnt to throw away his pride and tremble before his captors, but even then he couldn't help crying out when they beat the more resilient children. Now, though, he doesn't even have the strength to do so. He feels empty, and it's horrible, but he almost prefers it to the terror that is always threatening to grip him in waves.
As his vision clears and his coughing calms down, he spots from the corner of his watering eyes a pair of men dragging something from another cage. It takes him a moment to see past the grime, the rags, and realise those sticks they are dragging the object by are arms, the eyes staring from the lolling head with no light in them -
Am I to end up like that?
His hands start to shake, gripping the iron bars so hard he could feel his chewed fingernails biting into the skin of his palm. Everything seems to close in, darkness once again engulfing his senses, even blotting out the dancing fires around the chamber. The tasteless mixture in his mouth grows heavy, clotting, and his breath comes in quick, heaving beats, he needs air...
A hand covers his around the bars, dirty and stick thin like his own, yet somehow still so warm, so full of life.
"Don't worry. I'll protect you."
Ah, that's right.
He looks up in glad relief to a soft smile and eyes as clear as the sky.
I still had you.
Their fingers tangles, and clasps; for a moment it feels like they are home in his bed again, and instead of blood it is the scent of honey and milk wafting around them.
It's warm.
Then suddenly, he is gone.
The cold is back. Blue eyes stare back at him, smile disappeared into desperation. Masked men and women, white teeth glinting in their mad grins, drag him away even as he struggles to reach out. He, left back in the cage, can do nothing but scream his throat raw as they tear away the one thing he lived for, the one thing he had left...
"NO!"
He throws himself against the bars, a wild, caged animal, and he barely feels what rationality he had left slip away as he claws the air against all reason, wails and cries as though they would listen.
"NO!"
He is screaming, too, his eyes wide and scared like the little boy he really is. His lips are mouthing frantic, empty pleas, drowned by the crazed cheers as they haul him onto the centre table. The metal bars separating them have never been more hateful; he beats against them, he screams and sobs, even as the swarming crowd of bodies finally block him from his view and the next thing he sees is a gleam of the blade as it strikes down andnono -
/-*-/
Darkness.
/-*-/
Darkness has always been there, for all he knows. But it has never been this dense, this stifling, until it is pure black, uncomparable to the shadows he had become familiar with till them.
Because even shadows need light, and there are none now.
/-*-/
"Oh my - "
"It really showed up!"
"Demon! Grant me my wish - "
He cannot understand what he is seeing. He cannot bring himself to care.
"Grant me eternal life and wealth!"
His wide eyes land on the thick ribbons of red, still dribbling down in rivulets from the stone table, and follow them desperately to the small, limp hand hanging lifelessly off the edge. Move, he wills it silently, please. Move. You can't leave me. You promised.
But after all the deaths he had witnessed, after learning that nothing could shield even the most perfect, strongest people from cruelty, that not all promises can be kept, he knew. He can hear a small, cold voice speaking to him from the back of his mind, to wake up, to let go, but he refuses to acknowledge it.
Something moves in his peripheral vision, then, and he cannot tell what draws his terrified, blank gaze to rest upon the Darkness. But once caught, his eyes drink in everything of the sight before him; long, curved fingernails gesture towards him languidly; a sharp, wicked smirk fixed on him of all people; and above them, blood-red eyes pierce him, removing all the confusing clamour and excitement around them, till he could almost hear the Darkness' words reverberating in his mind.
You have made a great sacrifice.
Sacrifice, he thinks dimly. Yes. He is gone, now. They took him from me.
Now, it is your choice. Sign this contract with the devil, or not.
You'll give me what I want? Whatever I want?
The fare to cross the river has already been paid.
His dry, cracked lips tremble as they open. "I...I..."
A panicked yell comes from outside the cage. "Hey! Stop him...!"
They took him from me.
The thought rips out his voice at last, tearing the terrible words from his throat.
"I... WANT POWER!"
"Somebody shut him up!"
"THE POWER...TO TAKE REVENGE ON THE ONES WHO DID THIS...TO US!"
And as he watches, all is swept up into the darkness, and the only things visible are the red, laughing eyes.
/-*-/
After all is said and done, he stands with the demon's hand in his - out of the cage, on his own two feet, the stone floor as cold as the mutilated bodies around them. His right eye throbs, and he can feel the thick blood running down one side of his face, of his chin and onto his collarbones. A dark pentagram adorned the skin of the hand he was holding - when it had flared bright, so had his eye, and somehow he knew that there was now the same mark where his pupil had been.
The voice settles over him once again, hollow and menacing, but he could still hear the smirk in it.
What is your name?
He replies immediately, the decision made, his mind made up.
"My name is..."
Just for a second, he spares a thought - to a life he was leaving behind, a life now destroyed, with all the people he cared for in it.
He looks up, straight into those empty, red eyes, a new, bitter flame rising within him.
"Ciel Phantomhive. The one who will inherit the House of Earl Phantomhive."
And the demon smirked.
/-*-/
It was still dark when Ciel opened his eyes, gasping sharply, and it took him more than a few moments to realise that he was back, awake, and no longer in his dream. He could feel his nightshirt sticking to his chest and back, and the sheets underneath him were also drenched with cooling sweat. The squeezing sensation on his chest was not lifting, however, and it sent alarm bells ringing in his mind.
"Seb - Sebastian," he manages to croak.
Instantly there was a gentle hand slipping under his neck, lifting his head, as another gloved one peeled back the blankets and exposed his torso to the cool night air. Where there had only been dim moonlight outlining the furniture there was now a soft orange candlelight, illuminating the portraits on the wall and the smiling features of his butler. "Bad dreams, young master?"
Did you have bad dreams?
He mentally shakes the memory off, only slightly suppressing the shiver that ran through him. His breathing coming to him easier, he curses himself for his reaction.
It takes some more seconds for him to regain a little of his usual composure, and even then he still felt clammy and cold. Sebastian produces a steaming cup of honeyed milk out of nowhere, and he takes it without a word, lifting it to his lips with unsteady hands. It is warm, the familiar sweet taste filling him, and slowly he relaxes into his feather pillows.
Sebastian waits in silence, watching his master with an unreadable expression. Ciel scowls up at him.
"I suppose this is all very funny to you, seeing your abusive master in such a state."
"Not at all," Sebastian replies smoothly, reaching for the finished cup. "On the contrary, I have grown used to your night terrors, no matter how infrequent they are coming to be. Responding to them appropriately is merely part of my duties."
He scoffs, and prepares to settle back down. But the dream still has a grip on him; he couldn't bring himself to close his eyes.
There was a shuffling sound, and his butler leans over to pull up the thick comforter up to his shoulders. He pauses for a moment with his fingers still resting slightly on his chest.
"If it may be of any comfort," said the demon. "The past is the past; just that. It cannot touch or hurt you anymore."
Ciel blinks, and his frown deepens itself. "Remember who you are talking to, Sebastian. As if I have need of any such 'comfort'."
Sebastian sighs. "Of course. My apologies." He drew back, and Ciel tried not to think of a different someone who had done so similarly, long ago.
He could not, for some reason however, stop himself from opening his accursed mouth.
"Sebastian, I have... a question, to ask you."
The butler raises his eyebrows in surprise, even as he took the blanket into his hands and straightened them. "Oh?"
"How..." He hesitates. "What happens to those..."
He stops. He knew he couldn't go on. The thought of an answer filled him with dread that he did not need after his ordeal.
He lets out a frustrated huff, and squirms onto his side, pressing a cheek to a pillow. He is tired, and his mind is sluggishly slow - it would not do for him to let something slip to a demon.
"Never mind." The past is the past, after all. I must prepare for the future.
Sebastian shakes his head, bangs casting shadows on his pale cheeks in the candlelight. "My master is as fickle as always."
Ciel yawns, the hot milk catching up to him at last, blissful sleep starting to cloak his mind and eyes. "I said, never mind. And Sebastian - "
The demon smiles, the same smile from his memories, only different because he knew who it belonged to. "I know. Sleep well, young master."
No dreams plagues him for the rest of the night.
A/N: What is the fate awaiting the sacrificed soul? Is it forever dissolved, or consumed by the demon who answered its call? Why, out of all the people in the room, did Sebastian choose Ciel? Was it because he was the one who lost the most with the death of his pair, or because in his dying wish, the other boy called on Sebastian to protect him in his stead?
Just some food for thought.