Author's note: I do not own the characters, the plot, the concept, or the story.
By the way, "Horaios" is the Greek word for "beauty". Though it's not really a central/strong theme around the anime/the story, I like how the word sounds.
To the people who have watched Kuroshitsuji II:
Please note that I WILL omit a lot of parts. This novelization will strongly center only among the parts that involve Alois Trancy...so the mini-episodes of Ciel's case solving and his date with Lizzy is going to be out. The triplets, Grell, and the parts with Shinigami will be out. I want it to be focused around the Trancy Tragedy. Though only bits of the Trancy Costume Ball will be narrated, yes, yes, I will make sure that readers know that Ciel has amnesia. Because I will not be narrating Kuroshitsuji's 1st season, there will be a lot of flashbacks to explain why is Ciel amnesiac and all stuff about the contract.
EDIT 1/7/13: I have changed my mind and decided to include Lizzy. Still, no plans for yaoi.
Since, stating from personal experience - I had to watch the whole season II about 7 or 8 or 9 times all over again to understand everything - I will do a great deal of explaining on that part, which will come much later.
Please review, tell me what you think.
Please note that I've written everything, assuming that you all fully understand what happened in Season 1.
Chapter 1: Introductions
Another one of those seemingly endless days, nothing but a continuous shower of boredom and dullness to make life even more boring – that was today for a certain blonde boy.
That blonde boy was no ordinary boy, however. He was an earl, if that was what people in those days called someone of his rank and simply awe-striking wealth. His mansion was gilded inside-out, and it was rumored that the rooms and the passages, even the scullery – was shimmering and ornate with shining rubies and custom-imported carpets.
But it was not his immense wealth or his favorable standing as the Queen's Guard Spider that kicked him out of the mediocre population. It wasn't his unusual, silky blonde hair and his piercing cerulean eyes that shone like sapphires that made him so special.
It was his butler.
The blonde boy was only in his early teenage years. He kept jabbing and jabbing a gloved finger against the surface of the newly-polished table his face was pressed upon, spoiling its polish with the uttermost shamelessness – just to save him from boredom. Though the boy knew that there were a million more things besides a newly-polished table to entertain him in such lavish a mansion, all those things were either not to his interest, or he had already lost his interest in. He looked out his glass window, and noticed that the sun was already setting, the final golden rays disappearing, melting against the green, green forest that encircled his mansion.
A knock from the door knocked him out of his oblivion. Without really bothering to wait for a "come in," his butler entered anyway.
"Young master," a very deep and composed voice called out diplomatically, "the preparations for dinner are complete. We await you downstairs."
"Ah, Claude," the young blonde replied his usual sing-song voice, "what's for tonight?" The voice was as pleasant as the chirping of birds, innocent as a child's, yet hiding behind it was the sharpness that rivaled even a blade's. His sapphire eyes closed and his lips formed into an ever bittersweet smile.
"A Salmon Fillet, yogurt and mashed potatoes with mushroom sauce included as you have requested, Master Alois. I have been careful to include the buttered vegetables and the eggs."
Alois Trancy's sapphire eyes opened, and scanned over his towering butler's lean body that was as straight and sturdy as a metal pole. His eyes ran through every part of his butler's physique with an unbearably judging stare. When the blonde boy crossed his butler's burning, hazel eyes, his own sapphire ones softened, all judgment and coldness melted away in an instant. As a drizzle greeted them, the sound hollow against the windows, Alois started walking to the dining hall. He covered his ears in order not to hear the thunder.
"Hannah," he called to the young silver-haired maid waiting on him, "Don't you think it's so pitiful to be an egg?" he asked her in an apathetic and bored voice as he poked and poked the yolk until the yellow spurted out in an ugly, shameless mess at his dinner plate. "Yesterday, they were feathers, today, they were my meal. Before those long days, they could have been a plume….and tomorrow they may become someone else's organs."
The maid, Hannah, too frightened and intimidated by such an unpredictable master, was speechless. The blonde boy, disguised his annoyance with her lack of reaction using a far-off look, purposely dropping a glass of wine that hid his inconspicuous true intent, with such skill that only one in a hundred could possess. He let out a fake scream as the liquid hit his leggings, waking Hannah from her blankness. As the maid went on to work, slipping off the stained table cloth, Alois let out a fake yelp again, making the maid look at her master's face and see what is wrong.
To this gesture, Alois yanked a handful of her hair and pulled her face upwards. With a brutal smile and an insane spark in his cerulean eyes, he gouged out her eyeball, the blood spilling from the maid's poor, disfigured visage. An empty black whole was left of her face, and the blood soiled Alois' gloved finger. Hannah let out a painful scream, shocked and hurt. "Hannah…don't you remember that maids shouldn't be looking at their master's eye?" He paused to laugh sadistically, poking at the damaged hole in Hannah's face, drawing more and more blood, earning him more gasps and cries from the unfortunate maid. "It's not like I want to do this. You should be thanking me for sparing you from Claude's punishment."
With Alois jerking his head away gracefully, Claude stepped forward to wipe his master's stained fingers with a clean cloth. Then after the task was done, the blonde boy stormed out of the dining room, the pleasurable sounds the maid produced still ringing in his ears as he drowned himself to enjoy them.
Alois, accompanied by Claude, was on his way to his bedroom when a deep ring of the master bell alarmed him out of his reverie. Claude excused himself, then stepped towards the entrance to open the door and greet such a late visitor in the middle of the mad storm.
The visitor was all black. Black top-hat, black raincoat, black suitcase. His face was partially concealed by the long hat atop his head, but it was enough to reveal strands of rich, raven-black hair. His coat and his suitcase were drenched with the rainwater, and he was barely audible when he said, "If it will not be that much trouble for your master, I wish to spend the night here, that is, until the storm subsides."
Alois stepped forward, his heeled stilettoes making thundering thuds against the spotless floor. When he was closer to the drenched stranger than his own butler was, he groped the wet raincoat and began sniffing the unknown man, then when he was bored of that, he looked at the stranger's half-concealed pale-as-a-ghost face. Still keeping only a few inches from the stranger, he let out an innocent, yet oh-so-twisted laugh. "Claude! Look! He's as filthy as a rat with all the rainwater on him!" The stranger was stoic, not seeming to be alarmed by the way a boy of Alois' standing talk like that. He was still as silent as a grave the youngster continued on. "But he smells….good. He shall stay with us."
When the stranger was kindly led to their gilded dining hall, the table laid out with a single dish (which was in an ornate China plate of the utmost quality), Alois sat beside him, Claude standing to wait on them. The stranger was as rude as not taking off his drenched coat and his top hat, but the young boy cared not of it. He was still amused with the man's phantom-like bearing and his undeniable magnetic attraction. Claude found this fishy, as his master isn't interested in conventional, thoughtless things like these – and when he does, he loses interest in things fairly quickly. But the butler himself was also sensing something different from the stranger…
The stranger suddenly spoke in an intense voice, surprising both Alois and his butler. "This is indeed a fine, fine meal prepared with the highest quality ingredients and presented in a superb China plate…but it seems that you may have forgotten something." A wet, gloved finger pointed to the side of the ornate plate, indicating a sauce splash, barely visible to the human eye.
Claude took the plate away solemnly after apologizing to the stranger. "What a fine eye you have. I did not expect someone who does not even go through the trouble of taking off his coat and his hat to notice something as small as that. I do apologize for my incompetence. I shall bring you something else right away."
When the stranger was finished dining, he was taken to a guest room in Alois' mansion, the floor carpeted with a very thick and fine oriental one, the nightstands gilded with gold and silver threads, the furniture shining and newly-polished, the bed king-size with an exquisite set of beddings, and the walls a very high-class shade of deep, deep, deep red. The chandelier was crystal, and was shining, and the room was laid out with a few small paintings and sculptures. It was a superb room indeed, considering that this is only for the guests.
Alois sat beside the stranger on the edge of the bed (the stranger still had his coat and hat on), poking curiously at his drenched leather suitcase. He looked at it with such an innocent curiosity, alarming the stranger a bit when he saw Alois' persistent need to know.
His gloved fingers slid mischievously down, up, left, and right of the suitcase, with an unsatisfied look on his flawless, youthful face. "How fun is it to travel, stranger? It must be, very, very much. This mansion has already bored me. I wish I could travel like you do. See new things, interesting people…"
The stranger still maintained his sturdy-as-a-pole posture, keeping a not-so-obvious watching eye at his suitcase. "In a mansion this extravagant, how could you get bored?"
The blonde boy didn't answer the question. A discreet knock from the door alarmed them both, and entered Hannah, with a fresh bandage on her injured eye. She had a vase of water in her hands, and bowed when Alois turned to look at her. "I've come to change the water," she said in a meek voice. Yet Alois could sense something else from her. Something mysterious…that he couldn't figure out.
And because of this, he burst into another eruption, slapping the vase away from his maid's shaking hands, spilling the immaculate water on the carpet. The vase fell to the carpeted floor in an ugly crash, sending shards of broken glass down their feet. Alois, in the same insane flare in his eyes as when he gouged out her eye earlier, began kicking the innocent maid. Hannah made no protest, and willingly took his blows.
With a bitter smile, he began in a soft voice, "You came here to take a look at our visitor," he raised his voice, the anger showing. "CORRECT?!"
"I-"
"GET OUT OF MY SIGHT!"
The maid, after cleaning up the mess her master made on the carpet, quickly stepped out of the room. The stranger was shocked, but did not show it. "Is she all right?"
The stranger continued asking away when Alois was silent.
"Why do you treat an innocent maid that way?"
Alois was not a boy to be questioned. But since the stranger was new to him, he decided that he would treat him kindly. The blonde boy let out a sigh. "I really can't understand what she's really trying to do or say."
"And it scares you, hmm?"
Alois was stoic, but after a few seconds, he gave a small nod that could barely be seen.
"And you abuse your servants because it helps you feel more dominant…and in control of things."
No reply. The stranger continued on. "If you show me something interesting in this mansion…I'll show you what's inside my suitcase."