Disclaimer: I do not own Kuroshitsuji or any characters from Kuroshitsuji. I do own Ivy and Ivy's family.
Author's Note: Hurray, I finally got my computer to let me post a long chapter. So this chapter is kind of sad and a lot happens but as it has been so far it is mostly background. In fact every thing in this chapter that is in italics is back story. If you want to skip that then unfortunately there will only be two short paragraphs for you to read. On the bright side starting in the next chapter she will start her life at the Phantomhive Manor so I guess you can look forward to that tomorrow. Please comment and rate and tell me what you think of it so far. I still don't think anyone reads this part but as I said before I'm going to continue doing them anyway.
"No! Get out! I just want my daughters! I don't need anyone else so just go and let me die happy!" The words echoed through the dark halls and reached every corner of every room in the mansion. The same effect was created by the sounds of footsteps moving away from the room and then of the front door opening and closing violently. Then there was nothing but an eerie silence filling the house. It stayed that way for a long time before the bedridden brunette once again began to speak. Her voice was much calmer this time. "Rose, where is your sister? I wish to see both of my daughters in my final moments. She was speaking to the young girl who was sitting in a small chair at the end of the bed. In the days prior that had become her permanent spot. Her curly black hair shifted on her shoulders as she turned to face her mother. Her brown eyes now widened in shock momentarily before fading back into the sad, empty ones they had been for the past few days.
"You mean Ivy? She has disappeared back into her own world. She believes she is not allowed to exist in the same world that you and I do and she has no desire for the two worlds to mix. I doubt you'll be seeing her."
"Ivy. That name suits her quite well. I suppose it makes sense that she would refuse to go by Jane. I was the one who picked it out for her after all. If she won't come to our world maybe I should go to hers. Do you know where it is exactly?" Rose raised her hands and gestured all around them.
"It is here mother. She hides in the hollow walls and in the shadows. Her world is the one that is always just out of sight. If you call to you she will hear you, but I cannot guarantee that she will come out."
The woman smiled and with a weak voice began calling to the unseen girl. "Ivy, please come out from your world; even if only for a second. I have much I need to tell you, and I will not be able to move on if I don't get to." They sat in silence for a few seconds while waiting for something to happen. Then from the darkness of the hallway a pale girl with tired red eyes emerged. Her pure white hair fell in strands in front of her face and was so long that it reached all the way to the ground and dragged behind her. It more closely resembled a long veil than it did hair. She wore a grey dress that looked as if it had been repaired and refitted multiple times. She looked back and forth between the two of them.
"Happy?" Her voice was quiet and raspy as if she was in the process of losing it. They all knew that it was in fact the other way around though. She was not losing her voice. She was gaining it. Having not needed it for the majority of her life she only bothered learning a few words that she thought she may need later. The sickly woman in the bed once again smiled tiredly.
"Almost. There is still much I need to tell you before I can say I'm truly happy." She paused to see the girl's response. After getting a nod in conformation she continued, "I wanted to apologize to you. For everything. You were forced to create your own world and you even allowed yourself to be forgotten without complaint. I know it was all for my sake. I had never truly forgotten that you existed, but I can't say that I didn't try to. It was always still somewhere in my mind, but I refused to accept it. Then one night I saw you in the garden and could no longer refuse it. You existed. I hadn't even thought of how it would effect you until I saw you that night. You looked so lonely and seemed that you really did love the plants though considering you spent every night in that garden. Maybe it was because they seemed so much kinder to you then humans did. It was all my fault. Now I know that there is no way that I can ever make it up to you bu-" She was stopped by a pale hand rising into the air.
"Forgiven." Ivy only said one word but it had her mother in tears.
"That's not possible. Everything was taken from you because of me. No one can forg-"
"Forgiven."
"But -"
"Forgiven." It was as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders with every tear the woman cried. She realized it shouldn't have been that simple but the way that her daughter said that one word, as if it was a unarguable fact, made her feel like it was true. Even through her tears she could see a white blob moving across the room to the wall on her left. She leaned over and picked something up. As she put the item on her shoulder music began to play. The item was a violin and she was the one creating the music. The song was slow but not sad. It was peaceful and calming. She closed her eyes and began to listen. The sound was getting quieter and quieter and she had begun to hear yelling right next to her ear.
"Mother! Mother! Whats wrong? Please open your eyes!" She realized that it was Rose calling to her but she was unable to respond. She was fading quickly. She was happy though. She had been able to apologize and had been forgiven in return. She had no regrets.
"Dead." She had stopped playing the violin and was now staring at the crying form hanging over what was once their mother. Her eyes were still just as cold and empty as they always seemed to be and when the other girl noticed this her sadness morphed into anger.
"Why? Why were her last words only for you? Why did you say that you forgave her? Why did you come out of your world? If you had just stayed there like you were supposed to she wouldn't be dead right now. Just go back there. Back into the darkness where you belong!" With her last words Rose pushed Ivy out of the room with so much force that she slammed into the wall and then fell to the floor. Before she had time to turn and look back into the room she heard the door slam behind her. She could taste the blood filling her mouth from where her teeth had stabbed the inside of her cheek when she hit the wall. She was so used to much worse pains by now that she just ignored it and began walking down the hallway to her right.
She soon reached a large room that was mostly empty. There was nothing but a couch and a fire place. Sitting down on the couch she looked at the ceiling above her. It wasn't really the ceiling that she was looking toward though. There was a trap door that was barely visible unless you already knew it was there. It was the door to her world. The one very few people knew about.
The sound of the front door opening and closing echoed through the house again and she began to get up as if planning to leave, but seemed to decide against it and sat back down. The sound of crying filled the house as the door to the room she had been thrown out of was opened. The sounds of a man and a girl yelling could be heard, but it was all so jumbled by the echos that it was impossible to understand. It seemed obvious to Ivy though that the man was trying to understand what happened and the girl was blaming her. The sound of stomping footsteps filled the air and within seconds there was a grown man standing in the room with her.
The anger on his face was evident as he began to draw closer. It was a sight that Ivy was used to and she simply braced for the impact of his fist. As he got closer she could smell the alcohol on his breath. It was a scent that was all to familiar to her and she knew that this time it was going to be one of the worst ones. The jolt of pain she was expecting never came. Instead there was a strong pressure on her neck. "This is your fault. I told you to make sure she never saw you and you just flat out disobeyed me. She's dead because of you."
She felt the pressure get worse and realized this wasn't one of the usual beatings; he actually planned to kill her. Only a few years before she wouldn't have minded, but now she had a promise to keep. She had made a promise to the only person to have ever spoken to her kindly. The only one who had ever done anything with her benefit in mind. He was the one who had given her the name Ivy and asked her to give him one in return. She had never liked names though so she called him by the first thing she noticed about him. Her name for him had simply been Demon. She had made a promise to Demon and had no intention of breaking it.
Knowing she wasn't strong enough to break free of his grip she decided on another method to get free. She sucked in as much blood from the injury in her cheek she opened her mouth and spit it into his eye. He instinctively let go of her and brought his hands up to wipe the blood from his eye. She used those few seconds to put as much distance between them as she could and ran through one of the doors leading out of the room. Hearing him behind her she began running faster and turning down random halls. Instinct had taken over and she was no longer thinking rationally. Instead of turning left through a hall that would have led her to the back door she turned right down a hall that led her through the only door connecting the kitchen to the rest of the house.
When she realized where she was she reached out and grabbed a knife that had been left out on the counter and took a stance in preparation to charge at him when he came through the door. It didn't turn out the way she had hoped though because he had the same idea. As he walked into the kitchen he was already holding the hunting knife he always carried with him. He hid it behind his back until she ran at him. Then he held it out in front of him causing it to go straight through her stomach as she push against it.
While she was still stunned by what had happened he turned it to the side and she could feel the blood pouring out. The Jolt of pain brought her back to her senses and she pushed past him and once again began running through the halls. This time she somehow ended up going up the flight of stairs in the entrance hall. Her injury had slowed her down and the incline of the stairs caused her hair to flow out behind her just high enough for him to grab onto. He pulled back sharply and she had to grab onto the railing to keep from falling. She looked back and saw him getting ready to do it again. Just as he was beginning to pull she pulled the knife from her stomach and cut grabbed her hair in a giant clump before slicing through it. The sudden lack of resistance caused him to fall back and tumble down the rest of the stairs.
She watched as he slammed down on the ground at the bottom of the stairs. As she began to run back down the stairs she heard crying. Thinking of the girl who had just lost her mother minutes before she knew she couldn't let her lose her father too. It was a pain she had felt a long time before. She ran over to a coat rack by the door and pulled a long black one down. After putting it on and making sure none of the her blood was visible she ran to the room the other girl was in. She grabbed her arm and dragged her to the front door. "What are you doing? Haven't you already caused enough damage for one day?"
"Father. Fell. Stairs. Get. Help." She was unable to form the rest of the words but was glad to see her point got across when the other girl frantically looked toward the stairs and then ran out the door. She looked at the man laying on the floor for a few seconds before slowly walking over and prying the hair he was still gripping onto from his hand. Gathering it all up she began walking in the direction of the kitchen. Along the way she threw the clump of hair into the fireplace in the large empty room and lit it.
She made it to the kitchen and grabbed a large pot. While it was filling with water she grabbed a rag from under the sink and proceeded to wipe up most of the puddle of her blood that was still on the floor. When the bucket finished filling she pulled it out from under the sink and washed out the rag. She finished cleaning her blood from the kitchen and then went along the path she had taken cleaning up any blood that was left along it. When she reached the entrance she walked up the stairs and grabbed the knife before cleaning up the blood that had begun running down them. She cleaned the knife and slipped it into his pocket before picking up the bucket and walking back to the kitchen. She also threw the rag in the fire along the way. In the kitchen she cleaned out the bucket and the sink.
She began walking back to the large empty room for the last time. Her vision had begun blurring when she was still in the kitchen and by now she could barely see anything. The only thing she saw clearly was the trap door that would allow her to return to her own world. She grabbed a metal pole from the corner of the room and used it to push the door open. As the door slid out of the way a rope ladder fell from the opening. After replacing the pole she climbed the ladder. As she pulled it back up she took one last look at the world that she had never belonged in. Then she slide the door closed and allowed herself to be forced into the darkness she had become accustomed to. She pushed a set of shelves over the door so that it would have to be pushed up in order for the door to open. Then,so that she could be sure that the door wouldn't even shift slightly with the amount of force a human could put on it, she filled the shelves with the heaviest boxes she could find and still lift.
By now she was crawling across the floor because she could no longer stand on her feet. She made it over to a small blanket that was laid out on the floor. Reaching out and grabbing a small music box she began turning the dial. When she let go it began playing a tune that was obviously for the son London Bridge. She closed her eyes and laid her head down. The smile that spread across her face contrasted the tears streaming from her eyes. She had stopped moving and suddenly there was movement in the other side of the attic. A handsome man in a black suit wearing glasses walked out. He adjusted his glasses with what looked a large amount like a pair of hedge clippers attached to a metal pole.
"Jane Bell." He read it out of a notebook he pulled out of nowhere. Just as he finished saying it a light started coming from her and suddenly a cinematic real began flashing through the air. He watched it closely before looking back down at the book in his hands. "There are very few people who are actually deserving of heaven. It would seem you are one of them."
Suddenly he heard a voice coming from the record. "No. I don't. I have caused at least one death tonight and I was unable to keep my promise. If my option is between here and heaven then I would rather stay here. I believe hell would be the most fitting right now though."
"You are incorrect,but if you truly refuse heaven then I suppose you will be staying here until you will accept it."
"Thank you. I apologize for causing you trouble." Then her cinematic record started running wild in different directions and eventually hit a small potted plant in the corner of the room. It went into it instead of her body and it suddenly began to grow. When it reached her height it was obvious that it was a red spider lily. It began to morph into a humanoid shape. the stem split into two legs and its roots into feet. The stamens morphed into a torso, arms, and a head. The petals remained as they were and made the skirt of a dress while the upper half came from the stamens as well. Other than that her appearance was exactly the same.
"This will cause a large amount of extra paper work."
"If you would like I can help you with it. It's the least I can do."
Ciel and Sebastian looked at each other and then back at the girl in front of them. She had expended most of her energy on showing them the flash back and was now leaning on a wall to keep from falling. "Did that answer your questions?" The two just nodded to her. A small smile crossed her face before she fainted from exhaustion. Sebastian caught her before she hit the ground and proceeded to lift her in his arms bridal style. He turned to face Ciel in an attempt to see what he wished to do about her.
"Bring her. She will be staying with us from now on. When we get back make sure that they know not to disturb her until she wakes up." He turned and began walking out just in time to miss seeing Sebastian smile happily while looking down at the girl he has clutching in his arms.