A/N: I realize in the manga Ciel likes to read the paper but, I chose to disregard that for my own devices.

Death stands above me, whispering low

I know not what into my ear:

Of his strange language all I know

Is, there is not a word of fear.

-Walter Savage Landor

Respondeat superior

Were his butler anyone but Sebastian, Ciel would have taken the inclusion of a popular London newspaper with breakfast as an act of thoughtfulness. The dark-haired man merely dodged the questioning looks with smiles and a polite excuse before slipping from the study. The boy unfurled the sheets of paper with great suspicion as he sipped his morning tea. The Earl never bothered himself with the papers, preferring to let his servant sift through the muck and gossip for the useful information. To him, the airheaded nattering only served to remind him that adults were very silly and not at all fit for ruling the country, let alone the world.

His eye lazily drew across the first page, looking for what could have inspired this unexpected delivery. The headline was an update regarding a boiler explosion that had occurred a week back, claiming 17 lives. His butler, cum tutor, had summed up the incident as a "rather nasty bit of business," and left it at that. Beneath the sensational headline there was an arrest report that made the young lord frown behind his Wedgwood cup. Before long, the tea and biscuits had been abandoned in favor of his heavily worn latin dictionary.

By the time of his evening lessons, he was still mulling the meaning of his impromptu morning assignment. It may have just been the glasses, or his imagination, but Sebastian's smile seemed to have a sharper edge of cruelty; much like a sadist anticipating a session of torture.

"Did young master enjoy the paper this morning?" He purred as the petite Phantomhive seated himself for his least favorite part of the day. He couldn't hide the scowl that crossed his face.

"It is my intention that the young master receive a well-rounded education, and we cannot do that without dabbling into ethics," he crooned. Those long legs unfurled themselves as he stood, crossing the drawing room with eerie swiftness. His slender fingers toyed with a piece of chalk before scrawling on the board in wide looping letters reminiscent of some other language.

Respondeat superior.

"Let the master speak," Ciel murmured as he read the complex scrawl.

"Ah, excellent translation," Sebastian crooned with pride.

"I still think it's rubbish. Why should owner of the factory be arrested? He's not the one maintaining the equipment, he didn't kill them."

"Mm, yes, but if one pays an assassin. Are they not still responsible for the death? What if this man bought cheap equipment as is the most recent theory. Should he not compensate those families? The law was introduced to protect the innocent working man from the corrupt Lord."

Ciel's scowl only deepened. Sebastian remained placid, plunging onwards into a list of philosophers who had been dead so long that Ciel couldn't begin to understand why he should care what they thought. His mind began to wander down darker alleys, where Sebastian stood, white gloves dark red. He recalled those nights, early in their contract where he shouted out the window at the demon. It was such anger he felt when the screams of the dying had roused him from a deep sleep. Did all of Sebastian's trespasses weigh as heavily on his soul?

The demon's eyes darkened as the boy's eyes unfocused and the end of his gilded pen slipped between his soft lips in thought. It was with no small amount of joy that he slammed a heavy book down on the boy's desk, eliciting the most delightful yelp.

"If the young master finds my lectures lacking, perhaps a lengthy read will interest him more," he purred into his ear. To the demon's delight, Ciel shivered and sneered simultaneously, cracking the tome open.

From his bed, the thin sliver of moonlight taunted him, twisting the shadows strangely like he thought only Sebastian could do. His mind found sleep to be an unwelcome visitor, shoved aside by the memories of those earlier nights. There had been so many bodies littering the lawn like a fallen harvest, Sebastian standing the middle, a prim and perfunctory reaper. When the dark-haired man had woken him with a mediocre cup of tea the next morning, the lawn was as pristine as ever. No sign at all of last night's massacre. The earl's lily pale fingers laced and unlaced themselves across his stomach with anxiety. Where had all the body's gone? Pearly teeth worried at his lower lip, and his wide eyes stared hard at the ceiling, as if it my suddenly yield answers.

The first explanation that came was that Sebastian had eaten them. It seemed the most practical of the possibilities, with all the evidence devoured by morning. An unwelcome image of Sebastian slurping down a man's intestines entered his mind, causing his own guts to boil and turn. It didn't seem possible though, that an entire battlefield could be held in the butler's flat stomach. Inspired by a flash of cruel humor, he entertained the though t of an engorged Sebastian, rolling and bloated like a tick. He snickered briefly before a shift of shadows silenced him. Long tendrils of darkness reminded him that the servant's true form had no such limit as a waistline.

There were always the woods: they were vast and dark, and as long as he could remember, no wandering hunters had stumbled from them. The demon could easily scatter the bodies through them, the tall and ancient trees serving as nutrient hungry grave markers. But, something about it didn't seem like Sebastian's style, and the hot summer wind would floor the surrounding acres with rot.

Restless, he swung his legs out of the bed, bare feet bypassing his slippers and jolting briefly at the cold of the floor. He swallows heavily to settle his stomach before padding silently to the window. There, he tore back the heavy curtains and flooded the room with moonlight. The shadows and the bloodied, murdered men of Ciel's imagination retreated. He took in the dark horizon lit with the softest silver. From here he could make out the dim edges of where field and forest joined. Mass graves also seemed too mess. Sebastian might wear blood with an air of casualty, but Ciel could not see him toiling in soil if he could avoid it.

The bodies could be burned like they had in the plague years, but a plume from such a fire would be visible for miles at sun up, and the smell of burning meat would definitely carry to the neighboring properties. Ciel searched the night for any hint of the man at work, but found nothing. With a despondent sigh, he rested his cheeks in his small hands. There were no signs of movement except for the slow drift of fog forming on the lake. The mirrored water caught his attention. Of course.

His body prickled with gooseflesh at the moist, chill air and his thin arms offered no warmth as they tightly hugged his body. He shifted from foot to foot, absently trying to ease the soreness of his bare feet and cursing his thoughtlessness. The lakeshore was eerily silent. There was no familiar hum of insects or the high choked whine of the frogs. Such a pervasive silence could only mean his solitude was about to be broken.

"Though I've become used to young master's peculiarities, a nocturnal walk in one's skivvies is highly irregular," came the silken voice in his ear. Ciel felt his stomach roil again at the soft rush of air that smelt faintly of blood. "If young master had told me he desired an evening stroll, I could have arrang-"

"Is this where you put them, Sebastian?" The words left his lips like bullets.

"Pardon?" Sebastian's lips curled with cruel delight.

"The men who come for me at night, this is where you put their bodies?" He could remember a number of hot summers on this lake. Tanaka would row and his mother would be perched on a cushion, lacey parasol in hand to ward off the hot sun. They were the very model of high society. Once, he had been adamant to try his hand at the oars, but with his skinny arms and frail constitution he'd barely been able to pry the oar from the water. Sullen, he amused himself by trailing his fingers in the cool waters. Now, in his mind he could the bodies, their hair swaying like weeds on the lakebed; their blue fingers floating, pulling their arms upwards with the lightness of their flesh. The butler's tongue clucked loudly in his mouth, not missing a beat.

"Such trivial things should be of no concern to an Earl. Disposing of refuse is a butler's duty," he advised with that same obsequious smile that was somehow warm and distant at once. Ciel felt a tearing inside him, between the weight of knowing and not and the guilt that rode beside it. There was no hell waiting for him after all. The demon would be sure of that. His eyes narrowed once more on the lake, scrutinizing the still waters that hid his skeletons in its deepest, darkest, muddiest closets. They would become yet another nightmare that would need to be soothed by Sebastian's dark, obedient shadow.

"You are right, Sebastian," he'd barely uttered before the weight of his butler's wool tailcoat settled on his narrow shoulders. A gloved hand came to press urgently between his shoulder blades. As Ciel allowed himself to be steered from the shore, he wondered who was really master here.

"Perhaps I shall prepare some hot milk as well," the tall man proposed, Ciel's fingers pulling the coat closer against the night air.