The Good Brother

by ArgentNoelle

"There once was a boy and his brother who lived in happiness on the edges of a great forest." Black Butler as Hansel and Gretel.

The Good Brother

(Black Butler as Hansel and Gretel)

There once was a boy and his brother who lived in happiness on the edges of a great forest. They were not rich, but they made enough to get by, and for the first ten years of the childrens' lives—for they were twins—they wanted for nothing, and were doted on by their parents. But the winter of their tenth year was a hard one. The winds blew down from the north and froze the streams and the ground, and the storms were early and harsh. One day, the mother, whose health had always been weak, began to cough.

"My dearest Rachel," said the father, "I will go and get the doctor."

"No," the mother replied. "Save the money for food for the family. I will get better." So the father stayed inside, while the winds raged around them. By the third day, the mother was weaker than ever; her face was pale and red, and her breathing rattled in the room.

"Stay with your mother," the father said to his sons. "I am going to get the doctor."

So he set out into the terrible storm.

The children waited. The younger one watched his older brother go to the window each day and look for their father's return, while he brought steaming rags to his mother's bedside.

"Sing me a song, sweet one," his mother whispered to him, so the boy did. "I must try to keep hope," he thought.

Finally the doctor came. The father rushed in, and cried with relief to find that the mother was still alive. The doctor mixed herbs and syrups, cloths and poultices, and day by day, the mother regained her strength. "Now I must have my payment," she said, and the father gave her all the money she asked for.

The winter went on, and again, the mother fell ill.

"Save the money for food for the family," she said to the father, as they looked over the coins locked in their small wooden box. It was lower than it should be, and they both knew it. "Even if I don't survive, the children will have a chance."

The father counted the coins. He counted them again, and again, and then he shook his head. "We'll make it work," he said. "But if you die, I fear my heart would break."

So he went out into the cold snow, to trek the miles into town.

Again, the boys waited.

"Big brother," said the little brother, "do you think father will be home soon?"

"Of course he will," said the big brother, with a smile. "God will not forsake us."

"You're right, Ciel," said the little brother. "I believe you."

And the father came home with the doctor in tow. The doctor stayed for days, trying to save the mother's life, and at last, her cough abated. "Now I must have my payment," she said, and the father gave her almost everything that was left of the coins in their little locked box.

But the winter was cold, and now the family had no food for bread. The father worked for hours each day to earn a coin, and the mother as well; but each day she came back from work in the freezing weather, walking the miles into town, she looked a little worse. At last, her cough returned, more terrible than it had ever been.

"Please, let me get the doctor," the father begged.

"How can you?" the mother said. "We have no money to pay her, and hardly money for food. At least when I am gone you will have one less mouth to feed, and the children will get more."

But that evening, the father left to take the long walk into town. "I'm going to get the doctor," he said.

"But what are you going to pay her?" the little brother asked. "We have only a few coins left."

"We'll think of something," the father said. "Don't lose hope."

With the doctor's help, again, the mother got better, but after paying her once more, the family was left with nothing. Even with everything they could make, they could not get enough for food. The children tossed and turned in their sleep, and dreamed of summer berries and fresh meat, gravy and thick brown bread.

One cold bright morning, a man came through town on a fine white horse. He was dressed in silks and velvets, and he had a fur cloak the color of fog. When he saw the two boys, he brought the father aside and spoke quietly to him, but the father turned him away in anger.

"Don't forget my offer," the man replied. "If you change your mind soon, I might still be interested." And he gave the father a coin.

The father swore that he never would, but when once again the mother fell ill, he took the long walk into town, and took the two boys with him.

"Where are we going?" asked the eldest, shrewdly.

"I'm taking you to the man in the fur coat," the father said. "If you work for him, he will pay for all the doctor's fees."

"What work?" the younger asked.

"He's a painter," the father replied.

"That doesn't sound too bad," the younger son said. "Maybe I'll learn a fine skill that I can use. Perhaps I can become a rich painter someday."

The elder son scowled, and dragged his feet. "Why do you want to be a rich painter?" he asked. "Can't you just live with me by the forest, and be a woodcutter like father?"

The younger son did not point out that though he could muddle through cutting a few small logs, he had taken after their mother in constitution, and he was too weak to lead the life of a woodcutter.

"Didn't you know that?" he thought. "I was always going to have to find some other path." But because his father was frowning down at them, he didn't say this, but only hurried to keep pace with the others.

The man with the fur coat had a house in town finer than any the brothers had ever seen. It had high windows with glass in every pane, and steep gabled roofs covered with slate. Inside, it was wood-floored and carpeted, and filled with paintings from roof to floor, and sculptures made of marble and bronze.

"This is amazing!" said the younger brother.

"I suppose," said the elder, who was still angry.

The father hugged them and left, making them promise to be good, and the two boys were introduced to the man with the fur coat and his beautiful companions. Aleistor was his name, and he said his interest was in beauty of all kinds. He painted his friends—young women with sparkling eyes and pale, flawless skin, and he showed the boys how to mix paints, make brushes, and fill in the backgrounds of the sketches he drew. The younger brother took to these lessons with concentration, and soon, he was painting the details on dresses and fans, fruit and eyeglasses and skulls. The elder brother was less interested. He did enough work to get by, but spent most of his time talking to Aleistor's beautiful young friends. They were charmed by him—women and men alike, calling him darling and angel. He took to their ways of speech and their manners, and the money that did not get sent home he spent on fine clothes.

"What about being a woodcutter like father?" the younger son said.

Ciel scowled. "Why would I want to be a woodcutter when I could be a prince?" he asked. "You've seen the way the rich live. I want to be like that."

"But how will you pay for it all? Aleistor won't keep us with him forever," the younger son cautioned. "When spring comes, we'll probably go home."

The elder son frowned. "I don't want to go home," he said.

"But what about mother and father?"

The elder shook his head. "As long as I have you, I don't care," he said.

The younger brother noticed his twin begin to look in the mirror, critically; to turn this way and that in his fine clothes. "I could be painted, don't you think?" he said. "I'm certainly pretty enough."

"I suppose," said the younger. He carefully measured out the pigments and stirred them into egg yolks, until the paint was the right consistency, and the color of a robin's egg.

.

So the elder brother began to ask to be painted. Aleistor obliged, as did many of his young friends, and they would all pay him in coins that he would keep tucked in a pouch under the mattress in the room that he and his brother shared. But the more money he made, the more he spent—not just on clothes now, but on fine jewelry. He asked to be taken to parties, and came back walking regally and with a cold look on his face that his younger brother did not recognize.

"You should stop this," his younger brother begged.

"Why should I?" Ciel said. "I'm everyone's darling. They love me."

He went out more and more; not only with Aleistor's young friends, but with Aleistor's old friends, the ones that made the younger brother feel uncomfortable and shy; and then with people the younger brother did not know at all. Sometimes he wouldn't come back until near dawn, swaying, and with drink on his breath. He would walk up the stairs, giggling with his 'friends'.

"They're not your friends, Ciel," his younger brother said. "I don't think they really like you at all."

But this drew his brother into a rage. "You're just jealous!" he said. "But just you wait—I will be a prince, and then you won't have to worry about anything, anymore… I'll take care of you…"

"I know," said the younger brother, quietly. But he had been finishing his brother's work on their paintings for months now. He had slept terribly because of it, and he feared the times his hands would shake and ruin the carefully-wrought work of hours. Ciel didn't seem to notice any of this, no matter what he said.

Still—the younger brother had always admired his elder. He'd always believed in him, so he put aside his worries, and was quiet.

But one day, when Ciel returned, he walked straight to his bed and curled up on it. His younger brother, who was painting the details of lace on a fine lady's collar, didn't look up at first—he thought only that his brother was tired and probably drunk, and about to fall asleep. After a few moments, he realized that Ciel was crying. "I want to go home," he said.

"What's wrong?" asked the younger brother, putting down his paintbrush and walking over to his brother's side. His brother shook his head.

"I… I don't know. Someone wanted me to model for a sculpture, so I did. And then… they kept turning me this way and that, and I didn't like it, but I didn't know how to tell them to stop. They just kept touching me and… I don't know what happened."

The younger brother sat by his older brother's side and held his hand. He didn't know what to say, and the sound of his brother's voice, choked with tears, frightened him. "I'll walk back home," he said. "I'll tell father we want to come home now. We have enough money to live, as woodcutters. If we sell your fine clothes too, we'll have more than enough to spare. We won't have to worry about money for the whole year—maybe longer."

"You'll come too?" his brother asked.

"Of course."

"And leave your career as a painter?"

"...Of course. I'd do anything for you, brother, you know that."

"Thank you," his brother said. The younger brother curled up on the bed next to his older brother, still holding his hand. Their hands, like everything else about them, was identical, but while his brother's nails were smooth, his own were dinged, his fingers covered in smudges of paint. His brother, in his fine clothes, smelled like perfume and new lace, and he smelled like brush cleaners and pigment. But underneath it all, they were still the same.

Early the next morning, the younger brother put on his thickest boots and his winter coat and set off in the long walk to the forest. "At least I will get to see mother and father again," he thought. He quickened his pace as he rounded the last bend to their little house at the edge of the forest.

But when he got there, he stopped short. The little house was still and quiet, and there was no smoke coming from the chimney. The door was hanging open on its hinges, and snow had blown into a drift half as high as the door.

"Mother?" the boy yelled. "Father?" He scrambled through the snow, desperate to get inside. But when he had finally dug his way over the snow and through the door, he gagged at what he found inside. The cold had cut the smell of decay somewhat, but the odor of old blood was still clear. Mother and father were lying on the bed, frozen, holding onto each other. The little coin box was overturned and emptied, the dishes were gone, and the spare boots. "They've been robbed," the boy thought. "And we weren't here." He walked over to the bed, crying. "Father, mother, please wake up," he said. But he knew he was far too late for that.

He curled up on the floor and cried until he had become still and cold, and the shadows had grown close around him. He walked the long path into town in the darkness, stumbling and bloodying his hands, crying all the while.

His brother met him at the door. "What's wrong?" he said.

"Mother and father are dead," the boy said. "The house was robbed—everything was taken."

"...Dead?" his brother asked.

The boy nodded.

His brother started to cry. "I don't believe you," he said.

"It's true."

"What shall we do now?"

"I don't know," his brother said.

Because neither of them could think what else to do, the next day, the younger brother went back to his painting again, though his fingers were stiff and clumsy from the cold and scratched from falling; and his brother left. He said he was going to find work, but the younger brother thought that he might just be going to another party. He felt guilty at that uncharitable thought.

When Aleistor saw the mess he'd made of the paintings that day, he demanded to know what was wrong. So the boy explained, telling the whole story as coherently as he could. The fair-haired man tutted, turning his scratched, numb hands this way and that, and bandaging them. "How terrible for you, my dear robin," he said. "I can have a funeral arranged for, and headstones—if you plan to continue working for me, of course."

"Of course," the younger brother said. "What choice do I have?" he thought.

Aleistor smiled.

.

In the next two years, the boy became known through the town as having a fair talent for painting, and his brother became a model for paintings and sculptures that sold for more money than either brother could have ever dreamed of.

"This all happened because of my patronage," Aleistor boasted. "No one but me noticed the unpolished jewels sitting hidden at the edge of the great forest."

The boy began to dream of places other than the town in which he lived, and the great forest where he had once lived with his family. He dreamed of great cities, in which he might become known for his talent.

"Doesn't that sound wonderful?" the boy said, to his brother.

His brother laughed. "It sounds like a flight of fancy, to me," he said cuttingly. "Oh, little brother, you've always had too much of a woman's imagination."

The younger brother looked down, and folded his paint-smudged hands on his lap. "You're right, of course," he said quietly. "I don't know what I was thinking."

"Don't worry," Ciel said. "You don't need to fend for yourself, don't you know I'll take care of you?"

The younger brother nodded. He looked at the colors under his nails—vermillion and emerald and sky blue. "How could I think that I could become somebody?" he thought. "Ciel is the one who has worked hard all this time, meeting people, becoming known… if he doesn't think I could make it, how could I ever do so?"

So, while the elder brother rose to fame, the younger brother continued to paint, making work as he went, keeping the money he made and using it to buy all the necessities his older brother forgot.

They had gotten a house in town, with a slate-roof of their own, and window-boxes with climbing roses under every window. His brother's friends swept in and out of the front rooms, while he worked in the large, open back rooms, with their wide windows that let in the sun.

"Don't you ever want to get out more?" one of his brother's friends asked, giggling, as she leaned over his shoulder to look at the picture he was drawing. He breath smelled of drink, and her eyes were shining and green. She was beautiful, and if he hadn't known how jealous his brother got, he would have asked to paint her.

"I don't really mind it," the younger brother replied.

"Too bad," the girl replied, with her sweet smile and pink lips. "You're very interesting, you know… you seem like you have so many ideas, locked up in your head, but you're afraid to let them out."

The younger brother smiled tightly. "No, not really," he said.

The girl pouted. "You're supposed to agree with me, you know," she said. "I'm trying to flirt with you."

The younger brother laughed and shook his head. "My brother would never let me hear the end of it if I reciprocated."

"Why should he care?" the girl asked. "We're not engaged. We went out a few times, that's all, but really we're mostly friends. And I like you better."

The younger brother turned aside, and picked up his brush, though he did not know what to do next, standing in front of a half-finished easel. "You should leave," he said.

The girl leaned away. "Fine," she said, and when he looked back, he saw that she looked genuinely hurt. For a moment, he considered calling her back. Saying, "wait! I've reconsidered." But that was foolishness. She didn't know what she was saying, anyway. Everyone liked Ciel better.

He watched her leave the room, the way her hair shone half in light, half in shadow, as she opened the door into the rest of the house. And he put aside the easel he was working on and took up another, on which he sketched the memory of her face, for no one to see but him.

.

The girl's name was Elizabeth, he found out later. He watched her and his brother walk down the aisle and remembered the day she had come into his studio and propositioned him; remembered her saying "I like you better." "Of course it wasn't true," the younger brother thought. "But, I wonder if I had accepted. Would that be me there, now? And would I have been happier that way?"

His brother didn't look happy. He looked proud, and distracted; more interested in the clothes the girl wore than her blushing face and the almost confused look in her green eyes. She looked away from her husband-to-be, met his eyes and smiled at him, and he smiled back, and wondered why she was marrying Ciel at all. He'd seen her happy. He'd seen her carefree, on nights of wild parties held in the front of the house, when she would sneak off to his studio where he was working late, cleaning off his brushes, packing up his paints, and she would giggle as she told jokes and cajoled him into speaking with her. He knew what she looked like happy, and she did not look happy now.

"It's because of a baby," the doctor said. The doctor was not the one he remembered from his childhood, the sad-eyed woman with the bright red hair. This girl was younger than himself; with a loud laugh and a wide grin. Her legs were shriveled, and her feet couldn't hold her, so she pulled herself around on crutches and carts, or leaned on the arm of her tall and quiet assistant. He liked her immediately. "That's what I would say—I've seen it a million times. A young woman goes too far with a man, and we all know what happens then."

"Ah," the younger brother coughed, blushing. He wasn't sure he felt right speaking so about his brother and his wife. But the doctor carried on, without seeming to notice his discomfort. "Not that I blame 'em! A girl has her needs too, don't you think? Myself, I couldn't wait long enough, but thankfully I've been lucky. Not that I'd mind a child, you know? As long as I could support her. I don't know—do you think I'd have a boy instead? What do you think, Wolf?"

Her silent assistant met his eyes with a look of, "what can you do?"

"—but of course that would be up to the father," she finished. "By the way, if you ever want to sleep with me, just show up at my door, I wouldn't mind at all. You're so gorgeous."

"Uh," he said.

"Oh, you're shy! Oh you're so cute! I'm serious though. I wouldn't mind it at all. I'm sure I could teach you a thing or two," she added, with a wink.

He turned around to hide his blush and muttered something unintelligible.

Still, despite the doctor's over-enthusiasm on some matters, he liked her. Not only for her brash personality and her ever-inquisitive nature, but for the fact that she never seemed to treat him as though he was the quiet one (although he was), the one who would never get anywhere in life, the spare. She hardly paid any attention to Ciel at all, in fact; and it wasn't because he was married. She simply found him uninteresting, and he found her disinterest in his brother refreshing.

"It's terrible of me to think this way, when Ciel has done nothing but support me," he thought, and he put aside Sieglinde's offers of sex until even she stopped offering. She'd had a fiery, short-lived fling with a sailor named Grey, who could match her with cursing up a storm and never blushed at getting into a brawl, but the doctor's interest in the occult had finally driven him away. "It's the one thing that scares me, I'll admit," he told the younger brother, the night after he'd broken off the relationship, as he downed bottle after bottle and bemoaned his ill luck.

"I don't know why it scares him so much," Sigelinde said, the next day, when she came with her own stash of bottles and her assistant. "If he could only get over it, it's such a silly thing…" she cried. "Oh, it's terrible. I think I really loved him. But I can't put aside knowledge, not for anyone."

.

At first, Elizabeth spent her time wandering the house, talking of redecorating, bringing in craftsmen from everywhere in town to re-do this and that, until the younger brother found himself retreating to the back rooms to escape from her whirlwind presence. But when the redecorating was finally over, and the season for parties was slow, he found her curled up on the couch in his back room, asleep.

He shook her awake. "Elizabeth, what are you doing here?"

She blinked up at him, sleepily. "Ciel?"

Then she realized where she was. "Oh!—Oh, I'm so sorry," she said, sitting up. "I just… I felt like I needed space to think, and this was the only place that came to mind…"

"You're always welcome here," he said. "I just don't want Ciel to get the wrong impression."

Elizabeth giggled. "Yes, he is the type for that. Oh, who am I to speak? I'm the same way." Then she sighed. "What have I done?" she looked up at him, quickly. "It's not that I'm not happy," she said. "It's just… I had plans, you know? I meant to travel, I wanted to leave the country… I know, that sounds silly, but I wanted to take a sea voyage. To go somewhere I knew nothing about, and just… make my way. My friend and I were going to go together. Paula. She's getting married this spring, you know? I suppose it'll never happen now."

"I understand," he said. "Sometimes I've thought the same thing. What it would be like to just leave. To go somewhere new."

Elizabeth frowned in concentration. "Maybe it can't happen now," she said, "but that doesn't mean we can't imagine, does it?"

"What do you mean?" the younger brother asked.

Elizabeth jumped to her feet, giggling. "Come with me!" she said, with a secretive smile. "We're going to have an adventure." And she towed him out the door of his studio.

"Elizabeth, wait—!"

But Elizabeth could not be slowed by anyone, him included. She pulled him down the narrow cobbled streets, winding their way through tall buildings that became tilted and closely packed as they reached the docks. Finally, they were there: amid the overpowering smell of fish and the salt-spray, the creaking of the ropes in the wind, and the ships waiting in harbor. Sailors bustled here and there, dock-workers unloaded boxes. They turned and whistled as the two went by, laughing at their rich finery. The younger brother felt uncomfortable.

"Elizabeth, why do you want to be here?" he said. "You'll be stared at, and maybe worse—"

"Don't you think I can protect myself?" Elizabeth said, looking at him oddly.

The younger brother opened his mouth, and closed it again. He couldn't think of anything to say.

Elizabeth's cheeks flushed, and she looked away, seeming almost hurt.

"What have I done now?" the younger brother thought.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"That doesn't matter," Elizabeth said, regaining her brightness. "After all, I have you to protect me if I'm really in trouble."

"I'm a painter, not a knight," the younger brother reminded her.

"Oh hush," Elizabeth said. "Just enjoy yourself. That's what we're here for. So. If you were going on an ocean voyage, which ship would you take?"

The younger brother sighed, but fell in with her game eventually. So for weeks, that's what they did: run down to the docks, Elizabeth giggling and him with a grin, to play pretend. He brought his smaller sketchbooks with him, and while his brother modeled, and in between his own commissions, he started to explore other subjects—not the carefully crafted portraits and still lifes he'd been taught, but moments captured with a pencil on the docks, filled with movement.

"I love the sketches you do here," Elizabeth said. "It feels like you put your soul into it."

"I'm just passing the time," the brother replied.

.

A ship came in, carrying sailors and cabin boys, and a brown-haired, freckled boy with one blue eye who laughed and spoke broadly came over to look at the sketches that the younger brother drew. By now, everyone on the docks knew about them. A few had even paid a coin or two for one. "Wow," he said. "You're really good, you know that?"

"He's a painter!" Elizabeth said. Even in one of her plainer dresses, she looked like a fine lady, almost untouchable, though she sat on a crate and swung her legs, carefree and laughing.

"You must be real proud'a your husband, ma'am," the boy replied, tipping his hat. "I would be."

"Uh," the younger brother said, glancing at Elizabeth. "Oh, she's not—"

"I'm his cousin. More like his sister, really—we grew up together," Elizabeth said, brightly.

"Oh," the boy blushed. "Sorry. I didn't mean to assume."

"It's fine," the brother said, with a smile.

"You said you sell these?" the boy asked.

"Yes, some of them."

"Oh! If I wanted you to sketch my family, would you do that? My brothers and sisters? I'd like to give them a gift before I leave again, an' I have enough coin, I think—s'long as they were just sketches."

The boy looked so hopeful that the brother couldn't refuse, so the next day, he came down to the docks alone, and followed the freckled boy to a ramshackle apartment, up the tilting stairs and into the one room at the top.

"Here's the man I was talking about!" the boy said. "Ee's just as good as anyone. Go on, show 'em your sketches!"

So the brother did.

"Ye really are talented," said a ginger-haired man with one arm and a wide smile. "But are ye sure ye aren't a girl?"

"Don't be daft, Joker," said freckles. He turned to the brother apologetically. "We call 'im Joker because e can never stop jokin' around for one minute."

Joker laughed unapologetically.

The brother looked around the room. He was interested to notice that all the people—and he became sure they weren't all related by blood—had some deformity or another, but apart from that, none were hideously ugly; in fact, they were nicer-looking than some of the rich men and their wives who commissioned him; and after Joker's jest as his expense, they seemed easy enough in his presence. "This won't be hard at all," he thought. As he sketched, he listened to the those who weren't sitting for him chatting, and found himself relaxing. He hadn't realized how much he felt constrained by the rich people he'd lived among for so long now; always feeling on his guard, trying to live up to his brother's way of life.

A few hours had passed, and some of the family had already left for work of one kind or another. "I didn't know there would be this many of you," the brother said. "Do you mind if I come back tomorrow?"

"I dunno," Freckles said. "I don't think I can pay anythin' more."

"Don't worry about that," the brother said. "You've paid me enough for these sketches, I'd just like to refine them a bit, if you'd let me. I have the time."

"Oh… well, in that case, sure!"

.

"Show me your sketches," Elizabeth said, when he returned and told her what he'd decided to do. "I won't get to see them when they're finished." She looked over them, quietly. "This is your best work yet, I think," she said.

The younger brother looked at them with a smile, shaking his head. "I just did the best I could," he said.

.

The next day, he finished his sketches. He even brought sticks of color along with him, so he could shade in the bright of Joker's hair, Beast's lovely eyes, Wendy's colorful dress. When he finished, and showed it to them, they were all silent for a moment.

"...is that… really what we look like?" Freckles said.

"Yer amazing," Joker said.

"I only drew what I saw," the younger brother replied. He watched their faces as they stood around the picture—probably the first real view of themselves they had ever seen—and watched them seem to stand taller, to take second looks at their family, to smile, secretly.

.

"I'm gonna have to go soon," Freckles said. "It's a shame. I really liked you, Smile." That was the nickname the family had somehow thrust upon him, and he hadn't managed to be rid of it.

"Where?" he asked.

Freckles laughed. "Who knows?" he said. "The world's open, when you're a sailor, you know? S'long as I get my money at the end of the day, I can do as I please; sleep under the stars. I miss the feel of a ship under my feet and the wide ocean."

"I don't think I'd enjoy that life," the brother admitted, "but the way you describe it almost makes me miss it too."

"You were made for big things, I can tell. It's there in your sketches. I 'aven't seen your paintings, but I bet it's there, too. I dunno what's keepin' you tied down, but don't let it. Think of me! I take care of my family, don't I? But I don't let it stop me."

The younger brother smiled, slightly, and then sighed. "Maybe you're right. But, I just don't know how."

They were sitting in a bar, filled with smoke and oil-lamps, stale alcohol and the raucous song of the sailors.

"Hey, before I go…" Freckles said, shy, for once in his life. "We have the rest of the night before us. An' I never seen a man I liked more'n you."

"What?" the brother asked, blushing.

Freckles took his hand. "Don't need ta if you don't want," he said. "It was just a thought."

He didn't know how he'd allowed Freckles to lead him up the steps into a room, and he didn't know how they'd begun kissing, only that he didn't want to stop. Freckles fumbled with his clothes, and he returned the favor, and then, at some point, got enough of his head back to mutter, "didn't think you were a girl, you know?"

They were lying curled up side by side on the hard pallet mattress, staring at the low ceiling above him, and Freckles' breath was warm in his ear as she laughed. "I know," she said. "Didn't wanna tell you first, though. It was prob'ly bad of me, but I just wanted to see if you would… wiv'out thinkin' any different of me. It's hard to be a sailor if you're a girl, you know? An' I don't mind dressin' up. Feels more real, somehow. People look at you wiv'out assumin' things."

They next day, Freckles left, out to sea on a ship that the brother sketched from the docks. He tried to imagine where it would go, and if it would ever come back. His last view of Freckles was her bright smile on the gangplank as she turned back to look at him. Somehow, he knew he would never see her again.

.

"What were you thinking?" Ciel hissed at him, coldly angry. "Taking my wife down to the docks, with the riffraff—do you want to make me a laughingstock?"

Elizabeth sat on the parlor sofa behind him, silent, with downcast eyes. They were reddened, but dry now. Her gloved hands twisted tightly around each other, over the swell of her belly. She'd tried to intercede on his behalf, but Ciel's furious voice had cut her off at every turn, until she had subsided. He refused to believe it was all her fault, as she'd pleaded him to. He'd stormed into his brother's studio, found the sketches, the small, quiet moments, Elizabeth with her laughing eyes in front of the sea, and one by one, he threw them into the grate, the fire flaring up and burning all the evidence behind it. The younger brother watched each piece burn. "I remember that moment," he thought. "And that," "And that." It didn't hurt him the way he'd expected it might, seeing those moments disappear. It hurt him more to see Elizabeth so silent and still.

"You've always been jealous of me, haven't you?" Ciel continued. "You wanted to steal my wife for yourself… is that it?"

"No—I never—"

"It's fine," Ciel said, pacing, his hands clenched tightly behind his back. "It's fine. I forgive you, brother. I should have realized someone like you would find it hard to help yourself. You didn't mean anything by it. It was… an indiscretion. A simple mistake. Yes. I forgive you, brother. But we can't let this go on. It would ruin my reputation—it would ruin Elizabeth's reputation if this got out."

"I never meant to… I'll leave, if that will make things easier for you," the younger brother said, desperately.

Ciel stopped short with a sudden, harsh breath. The younger brother couldn't tell what he was thinking with his face turned away. "No, brother," Ciel said, suddenly sweet and gentle, and he turned back with a soft look in his eye; he pulled the younger brother close against him and brushed a hand along one cheek. "How could you ever think such a thing? No matter what you've done, you're my brother, and I could not bear to be parted from you. You wouldn't add to my sadness by leaving now, would you?"

"No…" the younger brother whispered. "No, of course not."

"There now. I'll think of something. Don't worry brother," Ciel said, pressing his lips to his brother's forehead. "I promised I would take care of you, and I will."

.

The winds were blowing colder from the north. That winter was the hardest in some time, and somehow, despite the fact that they had fireplaces in every room and thick furs and enough food, the younger brother caught a chill that didn't abate. He wanted to call for Sieglinde, but his brother insisted he must only be treated by the best, and brought in a kind-faced man with small round spectacles, warm brown eyes and a head of dark curls.

"I don't like this at all," the brother heard him saying.

"Come now," Ciel replied. "You know you can't refuse me anything I ask. It would make life very… hard for you, if you did. What with your… other activities."

So the man treated him. Some days, the brother felt better, but many days, he felt worse. His cough seemed to rattle in his chest constantly, and the air seemed impossible to draw in. He would toss and turn in a fever, waking only rarely to his brother's concerned face above him, pressing a cooling cloth to his forehead, or the doctor, with worried eyes behind his thin-framed glasses. Elizabeth, to his knowledge, never visited him. "It's for the best," he thought. "But I wish I could see her, just once, so I don't worry… so I know she's all right." He slipped into a fitful sleep again.

"We thought it was just an ordinary sickness," Ciel said, his voice trembling with unshed tears. "I never thought… but after what he's done, I don't feel safe keeping him here. My wife is going to have a child soon, and to have someone like that around…"

"I understand," the gold-eyed man said.

The younger brother stared at the floor. He could see the man's polished shoes. He didn't remember what he had done, and so he could not even defend himself. He felt sure he must have done it, though. But why… why would he have poked out his own eye? The space where it had been felt itchy under all the bandages.

"It's not that you wanted to," Ciel had explained to him, quietly. "You were in a fit… you weren't thinking rationally." He'd sighed, with a heavy look on his face. "I should have known, though. There have always been… moments, like this. Where I don't feel like you're aware of anything at all."

"I've never done anything like—" he'd tried to protest.

"No," Ciel said. "You'd never done anything, before. So I wasn't as careful as I ought to have been. But I should have known."

If he'd been able to think more clearly, he was sure he'd have been able to explain that something about Ciel's words didn't make sense. But everything felt so fuzzy and far off. It scared him. "Perhaps Ciel is right about me," he thought. "He would know, wouldn't he? He knows me better than anyone else."

He could hear his brother talking, and the gold-eyed man responding, but their words' meanings seemed to float out of reach. Ciel's tone sounded like candy, he thought. That was nice, wasn't it? He'd always liked candy. But something about this, he didn't like. The gold-eyed man's voice was worse. It sounded like spiders, creeping their way up the legs of the furniture, covering his arms and legs. His voice seemed to wrap itself around him, cocooning and suffocating him with strands of fine, thin thread. He wrapped his arms around his legs hid his face in his arms, trying to make it all go away.

Finally, they stopped talking, and the gold-eyed man walked up to him. "It's time to go," he said, quietly, reaching for his arm.

"No!" he screamed. He lashed out, trying to attack the gold-eyed man. That was the only thought in his head. "I can't let him get me. I can't let him get me, or he'll kill me. I have to kill him first."

He heard Ciel calling out in the background, and then everything went dark.

.

The asylum that Ciel had sent him to was an old house that creaked at night, surrounded by fields and rose gardens. There was a constant, bitter draft that made him shiver, but the fevers that he'd been afraid would return did not. He still had warm clothes and enough blankets and food, but there was nothing with which to draw, and nowhere to go.

"I think I might be feeling better," he said. "Can I see my brother?" he asked.

So Ciel came, and talked with him, and told him about what had been happening. Elizabeth had given birth to a beautiful baby girl— "it's not a boy, but what can you do? Maybe I'll get an heir with the next one," and all the friends whose names he could never remember had gotten this, lost that, had another scandalous affair.

"Do you think I might get out soon?" he asked.

Ciel stopped talking, and looked at him sadly. "It might be a little early for that, I think," he said. "I want to make sure you're all right."

He nodded. "Okay," he said. He smiled, weakly. "I believe you." But something about his words echoed strangely off the dank, dark walls, and they came back sounding hollow and afraid.

.

"This is the place they send people to forget about them," Alois said, with a cruel smile. "If your brother sent you here, he must really hate you."

"He doesn't," the younger brother replied.

The asylum was a private practice, run by the gold-eyed man an his ancestral estate, and it had very few people in it, altogether. There was himself, and Alois, and a man who only called himself Snake—he believed he could communicate with them. Whether he could or not, he could handle them well enough to get one of them to kill and had committed murder, and because he had a rich relative who felt badly for him, he'd ended up here instead of in prison or hanged. Of the staff, besides the gold-eyed man, there was only a lavender-dressed nurse and the the triplets who attended her. She felt sorry for everyone, and would let Alois strike her without saying anything about it to the others. She would smuggle them gifts from the outside. But he'd also seen her, one night when he'd been wandering, tying up the gold-eyed man and making him do her bidding with a cruel smile. The sexual roles they played didn't change the gold-eyed man's disdain for her, nor did it change her complete lack of care as to that effect. "It's all a game to her," he thought. "I can't trust her at all. I wish I could."

"We're here because we've killed someone," Alois said. "You only poked out your eye. Not that that's not terrible, but really, you don't belong here." He grinned. "I don't mind, though… you're another toy for me to play with. Claude knows how I love those."

The younger brother grimaced. "I'm not a toy," he said.

"Aren't you? You're your brother's toy. He just winds you up and watches you go. I had a brother once, you know?" For a moment, Alois looked far off, smiling almost kindly. "But he died. I would have done anything to stop that happening. What happened to you?"

"Nothing happened."

Alois laughed. "Something happened. Didn't you have any parents?"

"They're dead."

"Ooh, murdered?"

"It was a robbery. They took everything and just… left their bodies behind."

"Who did it?"

"I don't know."

"Surely you have some ideas? Some guesses?"

"It was a random act. That's all," he insisted. "My family wasn't important. A woodcutter and his wife. My mother washed laundry for a few coins. There was no motive in killing them."

Alois sighed. "Oh well," he said. "It was an idea. But you're rich now, aren't you? Or your brother is, at least."

"Yes."

"Could have been worse."

"...Yes."

He painted the sea, and ships, and fantastical lands beyond that, places that had even Snake coming from out of the shadows and watching, quietly, with an expression of longing. Snake, despite the snakes he always seemed to find and hide in the folds in his clothes, was a fine enough man. He kept to himself, and he let the brother keep to himself.

.

It was two years before Ciel decided he was cured. He had nothing to pack: he gave his paintings to Snake, his other items to Alois, and left with nothing but the clothes on his back. The ride back to the slate-roofed house passed in silence. Elizabeth, it seemed, had died, having her third child. A boy. Only now was the younger brother cured.

"Alois was right about something," he thought, watching his brother with new sight. It had gotten easier to think about Ciel in that long time apart from him, and now he found to his surprise that all of Ciel's sweet words and protestations of care felt like ashes on his tongue.

"Do you really think you could continue to control me?" he thought coldly. But why shouldn't he? He'd always been able to, before.

.

He went back into his studio, and picked up his paints. But while he took a commission here and there, that Ciel fawned over, he spent most of his time without his brushes at all: walking down to the police station, doing odd jobs for a man called Abberline, who seemed to understand the wish to start afresh. He'd never pressed the brother for his story, and of that, he was glad—though there must be many people who knew of the scandal; Ciel was too high-profile for it to have been completely hidden away. Abberline would talk seriously with his coworkers, but with his fiancé, he would laugh and smile. "I don't mind introducing you to my family," Abberline had said. He had a twin who worked in another part of the town, and when he came over, they would converse and joke together. He watched it with a twinge of sadness. "Did Ciel and I ever act like this?" he thought. "Or was it always him, trying to tell me how to be?"

Abberline was impressed by his memory for detail. "Not many people in the force can remember the way you can," he said.

"It's what a painter needs to pay attention to," he said. "I suppose it comes in handy in other ways, as well." He'd gotten involved in high-profile cases: a woman's butler going out in the night and killing prostitutes all over the city; rumors of a werewolf on the edge of the great forest that he had been able to prove was nothing more than a group of rich young men trying to terrorize the town. Ciel didn't know about this other work that he did. He never let his name get out to anybody who didn't already know, and he dressed in plain clothes and kept his head down. As long as he did a commission every so often and showed up at his studio when Ciel came home, with the money to show for it, his brother was too self-interested—and self-confident—to suspect. "It's not like I need to hide from him," he thought, but he'd learned how to ignore his better feelings, and he was careful instead.

Children had started to go missing into the great forest: young children from poor families, who had hardly enough to sustain themselves. When pressed, he'd gotten admissions from many of the families that they'd abandoned their children in the forest themselves. But other families seemed truthfully baffled and grieved.

"There's something to this case," he told Abberline.

"Maybe," Abberline replied. "But with so much else to focus on, no one's going to start an investigation when there's such a ready answer to hand."

"And because all the victims are poor children," the brother added.

Abberline sighed. "That, too."

"If you got promoted, you might have more sway in these things, you know?" he said. "But if you won't accept bribes from anyone, how do you ever think you'll get into a position of power?"

"I don't need a position of power," Abberline said. "I don't know what you're life has been that you think the only way to gain power is to compromise your morals, but there has to be another way."

"Not one I've ever seen," he answered.

He followed the investigation on his own time; putting together witness testimony, trying to pinpoint where in the forest the children had gone missing. At last, he set out alone, leaving a note on Abberline's desk to tell him of what he'd found and where he was going.

The forest was still and quiet. The trees grew tall and thick about him, and the animals dashed away from him, frightened, before peering out as he passed. The soft leaf-mould under his feet crackled as he stepped. He wasn't an official part of the force, so he had no gun; he'd taken a woodcutter's axe instead. It was heavy and unwieldy, but he still remembered how to use it, from those times as a child when he'd tried to pick up his father's axe, the man's warm hands over his own as he helped him to lift it, showed him the movements of the swing. The weight of it felt comforting in his hand.

He wandered farther into the forest than he had ever been, dropping pale, shining white stones behind him to find his way back. And at last, he did find something: a cottage, standing amidst the trees, with smoke rising merrily from its chimney. A sweet smell wafted his way, and he stood still for a moment in confusion. The whole entire cottage, from the delicate, shimmering window-panes to the rich brown walls to the intricate decals over the door, bright and bold, seemed to be made of candy. He walked closer, and trailed his fingers against the walls, which were dense and dark and smelled of fresh gingerbread. "This must be the place. Something like this reeks of magic," he thought. "I ought to bring Sullivan here, she would know what to do." But before he left, he paused. "If it's magic, can I really be certain that it will be here when I return?" He looked back down the path of stones and shook his head, taking a better grip on his axe. "No, I can't risk it."

Still, he was tempted enough to take a few of the candy-glass flowers from the box in the windowsill. He broke a bit off with his teeth as he stepped toward the door and knocked, politely.

"Nibble, nibble, little mouse," a voice said, from inside. "Who is nibbling at my house?"

"A woodcutter," the man replied. "I was passing through when I smelled gingerbread and candy, and I felt that was enough of an invitation. If you don't want anyone eating your house, maybe you shouldn't make it out of edible materials."

The voice laughed. "I never said I disapproved, little mouse. It was only a question. But no… you're not a woodcutter at all, are you, liar?" The door creaked open, and he caught a glimpse of a tall man with glowing red eyes and a fanged grin. "I can smell your deceit," he said.

The man clenched his hand around his axe, and brought it swinging forward in a perfect arc toward the creatures head. But the creature tutted, and caught the axe mid-swing, stopping it in its tracks with inhuman strength. "Now, is that any way to treat someone in their own home? How would you feel if I showed up uninvited to your house and tried to kill you?"

He hesitated. For a moment, he remembered coming to the house of his mother and father, finding it ransacked and overturned, and their still, cold bodies.

While he hesitated, the creature waved him inside and shut the door behind him, taking the axe from his unresisting hands and hanging it from a hook beside the door.

"There now," said the creature. "I knew you weren't such a barbarian as that, though you are a liar."

"I'm not a liar," the man protested.

"You're not a woodcutter," the creature replied, with a grin. He waved a hand. "It doesn't matter to me, but we must be honest about our deceit, don't you think?"

He lead the man over to a table and poured fresh tea, steaming hot, and brought a plate of cookies that had been sitting on top of the oven. "I always like to be prepared for guests," the creature said, sitting across from him. "It's only hospitable, after all."

"Your guests, I assume, are usually much younger than I," said the man. "You're what's been luring children away, aren't you?"

The creature laughed, showing its white fangs. "Wonderful guess. And what if I was, hmm?"

"That would be a crime."

The creature shook his head in mock-disapproval. "Now, surely you can do better than that."

"That would be murder. It would be immoral."

"And what if I said I only took poor little children who would have starved to death, anyway? Usually, they are the only ones who can hear my lure. The little mice come creeping, creeping, right into my trap. And then I gobble them up." The creature's eyes flashed. He didn't seem to care that he'd sounded like a beast; in fact, he was still merry and truly carefree: and powerful. Something he would not easily be able to kill. The man realized once again that what he was dealing with was not only not human, but really inhuman. It would not be persuaded by human morals. And why should it be? It was just a wicked, hungry thing.

"We humans care about each other," he said, slowly. "We don't approve of that kind of thing."

"Now now, Liar. You don't even believe that yourself."

The man thought to himself, quietly, for a moment. The beast was right, of course. He didn't believe in the goodness of man; not to that extent. He believed that goodness was there, but so was greed and desperation, and worse. "Then answer me this: will you make a deal with me?"

"What sort of deal?" the creature said, leaning forward, its glowing red eyes wide and curious.

"I know you're hungry, so eat me. In return, you will never come back to this town or the great forest, nor lure anyone in with your traps."

"You'll let me eat you?" the creature laughed. "How do you know I won't just break my end of the deal the moment you're in my belly?"

"You couldn't," the man replied, calmly. "I know about your kind. A deal is binding. So: tell me. Will you agree to what I have said?"

The creature shrugged. "All right," it said. "It's not much to me, anyhow. I can pack up anytime and go somewhere nicer."

The man smiled. "So?" he asked.

"What? You want me to eat you already?" the creature said.

"Aren't you hungry?"

"Yes," the creature replied. "But you're too interesting to cast aside so soon. —Anyway, you're as skinny as a reed. You might be grown, but you'd hardly make a mouthful yet. Have a cookie."

The man picked up a cookie, and ate it. "It's very good."

"Really? You think so?" the creature said. "That's nice to hear. Usually my prey isn't half as polite as you, once they realize what I've got planned. They just… scream a lot." He sighed. "It does tend to get tiring."

The creature stood up, and clapped his hands briskly together. "Now," he said. "I can't stay here any longer, so where would you like to go? I'm open to suggestions."

The man smiled. "Somewhere across the sea, I should think," he said. "I've always wanted to see the world."

"I wonder when the creature will realize," he thought, "the trap I've laid for it. 'you will never come back to this town or the great forest, nor lure anyone in with your traps.' The one is not dependent on the other. Without being able to hunt, I will be its last meal." He took another cookie, than stood up and brushed off his clothes, joining the creature at the window and watching the gingerbread house fold itself up and spin into the air, surrounded by the smell of cotton candy and freshly brewed tea. Below them, he could see the whole of the great forest, looking dark green and small from above; and the town where he had spent so much of his life. It filled him with gladness to see it again, but he wasn't afraid to watch it go.

"I don't mind," he thought. "I rather like the thought of being someone's last." He looked over at the creature, who was grinning wildly, staring into the sky, his ink-black hair twisting in the wind, and remembered Elizabeth's bright green eyes and Freckles' smile, and the yearning for the far places that they had all shared. They were not there with him, but he felt their presence beside him still. The creature looked over at him, and he found himself smiling in return; not at all frightened by the creature's fangs or the wicked glint in his eyes; he rather felt his expression mirrored its own. "What an adventure this will be."

.

.

.